Hanging Out

A lot of time on the island is spent in hanging out. Just being. Watching the world from a roadside, from a corner "colmado" or "bodega," from a front door. High, very high, rates of unemployment and underemployment.
We had lunch at a restaurant in Samana. Two large fish on a platter...straight from the wharf...choose one to be cleaned and cooked.
Across the way we watched a group of three men, one of whom was doing some welding repair work on a lookout that stretches along the waterfront.




After a while, a small car pulled out. The men walked over to the car, had some words, and each received a styrofoam box...apparently it was lunch time.




The welder went back to work. During that time, Charlotte's fish arrived, perfectly cooked.
The welder stopped and picked up his gear. He got on the back of the motorcycle and rode away. He left behind the generator he had been using. And one of his mates.




Who by this time had climbed into the tree and was resting in the breeze that was blowing off the bay. My guess is that he was working as guarding the generator which was left on the sidewalk. For more welding work next week?
So here was a slice of these men's lives, played out on the bayfront...and ours, in the cocoon of a restaurant high above the street...and these lives never really touched...but they did in the way that images from the world can be drawn into the lens of a camera that bring us connections far beyond the small town of Samana.
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Location:Samana, Dominican Republic

On the water

The first fishing boat came by while I was on the beach. Doing my exercise routine. Seven men rowed the boat. On a small raised deck, a man sat and appeared to direct.




Then another boat. And another. A flotilla of vessels.





and then they began to fish. The man in the rear stood and began to cast out nets...a long net...the men rowed a wide circle as the gave out line.





The men work for shares of the catch...the boat owner and the caster of nets getting larger shares.

But some prefer their own skiffs. Cloth sails stretched between poles cut from the forest. Catching the wind. Seeming so fragile.








Am reminded of the America cup race maybe going on in San Francisco Bay...the billionaires throwing their money (or is it, in some way, our money?) onto sailing ships that will carry their names to glory. No glory here...just a day's work done, a trip through the waves.

There are, of course, other boats that don't get off the beach for the day.
And those that stand ready to take tourists to even more perfect beaches...but, then, how perfect do they need to be...










We went to Samana, the town, for lunch. A new marina has been built for boats with middle and upper class pretensions...at least for this island country. The look good against the blue waters of the bay.





Yet I am not sure these yachts get us any closer to the experience of being on water than those "barcos" that are rowed and sailed to extract a daily livelihood.

Viste Mare

We have moved from the north coast, Las Terrenas, to Viste Mare (hmmmm...why does that sound Italian?)...around the tip of Samana Bay almost to the Caribbean east coast. (You may need to check the map).

We drove yesterday down along the bay...passing small towns...to the new marina in Samana (the town)...then up to this resort. The area has been popular with Europeans for a long time...not too many Americans...and now especially with the Italians who I suspect are getting rid of their lira and investing in Caribbean properties.




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In some sense this beauty and privilege appear undeserved to me...my life has been too easy to be taking a vacation like this. Yet...it is so amazing. The resort has two seeming (to me) pretty pristine beaches...crowds of fishing boats yesterday were throwing nets just off shore.









Now that we are here...we enjoy the quiet...just about the only people here except for some younger couples who do not give the impression of newly weds.

Nor, for that matter, do we.

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Location:Los Naranjos

Transport

Los Terrenos' streets are a cacophony of people, motorcycles, scooters, cars, SUVs, ATVs...coming and going...hard to figure out where everyone is going. I kept on wondering what it would look like if everyone just had a bike...and what the quiet would sound like.



But, then, it is all part of the scene...the combinations of people on their vehicles...a woman on her phone and ATV, possibly just getting back with baguettes from the boulangerie....




A laughing couple...I do hope he keeps his eyes open though...











Transport is clearly just part of the fun...not having rides like Ocean City...we make our own rides.

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Green

On land, it is all green. Every plant wants to bust out of its primal shell. Reach for that sun. Drink in all that rain. Luxuriate in the heat. Drench in the humidity.



Use it to break out in forms never seen in the dry lands where I live...

















In Colorado, I am used to admiring the wide shades of brown and gold that cover our hills. In Las Terrenas, my eyes drink in a thousand forms of green.

Location:Las Terrenas, Republica Dominicana

Isabela

La Isabela was the first European settlement (well outside of the Norsk settlement in Newfoundland) in the New World. Columbus. 1494 on his second expedition. Some 1500 settlers came to find cold, silver, enslave the Taino population, and then move onto other lands in this "India." The settlement lasted only two years and resulted in Columbus's fall from grace. And his imprisonment. The original site is miles west of here...it was excavated by a friend who studied with us at the University of Florida.

The irony was not lost when I passed the sign for Playa Isabela while exploring around this same north coast of Hispanola.




Another ruin but much more recent. The tropical climate has a way of aging construction, but the ruin...multiple condos on the beachfront, buildings stretching into the fields in back...had been picked apart. The way thieves come in the night to rip out copper pipes in Detriot. Or the Bronx.











Termites settling in on wooden window frames....




So it is not all paradise...or rather paradise can be fleeting. Yet hope springs eternal. Further down the road, another sign.





Jacques and Christine have their place on the market. "Simply your dream" says the small print, followed by telephone numbers. Feel free to call.

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Location:Las Terrenas, Dominican Republic

Samana

Samana is a peninsula on the north coast of the Dominican Republic. The United States was going to buy it for its deep bay the 19th century. Congress thought the price was too high. Instead they bought Guantanamo.

A new highway makes it accessible from the capital, Santo Domingo. We stay at an apartment hotel along one of the beaches: a large pool with the beach just across a narrow roadway.





Vibrant color...so green, so unlike our dry Colorado mountains.











And long quiet beaches...





Put a towel down to do morning exercises...most people sleep late...





French, German, Italian, some Russians come...mostly in the winter. In these months, Dominicans down from New York, New Jersey, getting together with their families still on the island...like us, hanging out at the pool, eating and drinking at the small shack that services the hotel on the beach....








Last night, an astonishing sunset...as if holes had been punched into the sky to show through to the other side of the universe.








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Familia - otra vez

So here we are in Nagua at last. On the sofa, Charlotte, Alejandro, Nelcy, me, Henry (a cousin), and Nelson (Nelcy's Dad) holding Dylan. Robin took the picture.

We had crossed the continent to Miami, then crossed the Caribbean to Santo Domingo, then crossed the island to the north coast...for lunch and to begin hanging out. A long day...mucha familia. Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Nagua, Dominican Republic

Color

At a national
Quaker conference several weeks back, I took a workshop in Contemplative Photography. It was taught by Peter Nutting from Maine. The course was about seeing. How to see the world in terms of its images. How to let those images present themselves. How to meet them half-way using the camera. Not to "capture" or "take" pictures. Rather how to let them open themselves on their own terms. How to have the patience to let that happen.

Each day we did an "assignment"...a task that formed a framework within which we could do our own exploring. One day it was color. I smiled broadly when I heard the assignment because the day before I had been struck, rooted to a spot, when I saw the climbing wall in the gym...the holds were of such vibrant colors.

I spent a long while at the gym enjoying them again. And other colors that I had noted before, but I had never really seen them.








The color of the zipper on my mail bag carrier...





The top of a picnic table....





I am not sure that seeing is believing...especially in these days of media-generated images...but seeing does provide a window on understanding the world in some of its own terms.

Location:Dominican Republic