Update on Life

School has been....well, there, to say the least. We got three new teachers in January, and then one of the second grade teachers announced she was leaving so the girl who was supposed to do ESL is now teaching grade 2. Other than that, nothing too dramatic has happened. But it is coming time for us to say whether >we are staying or not next year, so I imagine things will get a little more interesting.

The economy here is going crazy, and the president, Hipolito, is practically taking over the country and becoming a dictator. There is a two day strike scheduled for this week on Wednesday and Thursday. I think it will be worse than the one in November (not many paople got shot, and there were not too many burned tires) because things have gotten so much worse here. The peso has gone from 35 to 1 US dollar to 51 to 1. And peoples salaries aren't increasing
.....but the prices are, so you can just imagine.

Taking Flight

*edit* This post is really from when I was still living in the Dominican Republic in January, 2004 but it is WAY to funny not to be shared in the present. I will archive it a bit later after everyone's had a good laugh*edit*

So on Sunday, George, Stacy (*not the same Stacy I went to Poland with here in Italy*), Yolande (my roomie), Matt (the new technology teacher--*not the same Matt whose house I went to for Christmas last year*), and I went to a restaurant called El Chef that is near my apartment. Stacy, Yolande, and I usually go there every other weekend for lunch. It is a nice place with good Dominican food (rice and beans, chicken, platanos fritos y maduros *yum yum*)

Anyways, this weekend we all went together for lunch. As we approached the restaurant, we saw a homeless bum with one arm sitting outside. Yo, Stacy, George, and I had seen him at that same spot a few weeks ago. On that occasion he was asking for money from a guy in a car, but he was being really rude and hostile about it, almost like he was going to attack the guy in the car. Well, remember that whole Dominican machismo 'I must carry a gun' thing? Guess what happened next? Right. The guy in the car pulled a gun on the bum. We were totally freaked out, but the bum kept fighting and being violent. The guy in the car, deciding he didn't actually want to shot the bum after all, drove away and that was that. But we were like, 'OK! Stay away from the crazy bum!!!'

So this Sunday, that bum was there sitting outside about 30 feet from where we were eating. About halfway through our lunch he started calling to all of us rudely, so we ignored him. Well, when we got up to leave, he got up too (remember there are 5 of us!) and started shouting rude things at us. So we crossed the street and sped up bit. Well, he crossed the street and started walking faster too and got even more rude with what he was saying. None of us could properly understand him, but he sounded angry, and George (who could actually understand him) was looking a little panicked.

At some point, George looked back and saw that his eyes were popping out of his head and he was looking ready to attack us! I was the last one in the group, and he was getting pretty close to me so George yells "RUN!" So we all start running down the street...me in my flip flops... towards the gas station on the counter. As we were running, I heard Stacy say "I wish he only had one leg!"

Well, everyone turned into the gas station but me because I was so bloody scared that I didn't even turn my head sideways to see where I was! By the time I realized that everyone else went into the gas station, I couldn't turn to go in myself because of the decorative wall that was blocking my way (seriously it was just for decoration. It was about two feet tall, and had large trees and flowers growing out the top of it). At the exact moment that I realized I could not seek refuge at the gas station from the crazy, one armed bum who was probably still chasing me, I heard the STOMP, STOMP, STOMP of running footsteps behind me. I swear I almost s#!t my pants!

I finally ran far enough past the decorative wall to be able to find shelter at the gas station with the others. At that point I turned around and looked back to see who was running behind me. And there, running at full speed, following my every footstep was....Matt! *phew* Talk about relieved.

By this time, the others were on the other side of the gas station. As they were running in, the worker guys called out for them to be careful of the hole in the ground. So there everyone was: running in, swerving around the hole, and ducking under the automatic arm thing that lifts up for cars to go out. If I had actually seen this happen (had I not been running for my life at the time), I would have found the whole thing quite funny. Then the gas attendent guys yelled at George "What are you running from?!?!" just in case we knew something they didn't and maybe they should start running too!

It was quite the experience! WOW! I am never going back there for lunch again! But what was even funnier is that after the whole thing we were like, ok...there was 5 of us....and we had a 10:1 arm ratio on the guy! And to top it all off, Yo and Stacy were taking Tae Kwon Do lessons. During lunch one of the topics of conversation was what we would do if we were attatcked. Talk about irony! I guess it's pretty obvious that all fall into the "flight" category, eh?