Hi Everyone!
I'm back again with another globe-trotting adventure. For the next two weeks I'll be in the Dominican Republic doing my Jr/Sr Honors Thesis Project. I'll be interviewing women who are microcredit recipients from Esperanza International (www.esperanzainternational.org). They are a wonderful organization and have been extremely hospitable in arranging my sleeping arrangements, my interviewees and finding me a research assistant/translator.
I'll be Santo Domingo, San Pedro de Macoris, as well as the more rural areas of Hato Mayor and El Seibo. I am SO EXCITED! I'm looking to find out what the women actually buy with their micro-loans, whether it be a sewing machine, a refrigorator, etc and how they apply those "technologies" to their small businesses.
Keep checking back for pictures/updates!
Adios amigos!
Dobs
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Friday, August 8, 2008
6 weeks later...
Hi all!
I know it's been almost a month since my last post, turns out I'm not the best blogger in the world but I gave it a shot. If you're curious, our presentation, the following week of classes went really, really well. Our group then went on some pretty amazing trips together--a safari, we explored the cape of good hope, biked, hiked and enjoyed each others company for the program's last days in cape town.
After, myself, 5 other girls and the bravest man in the world Tim, embarked on a two week whirlwind across South Africa, Zambia and Tanzania. In each place we visited, we were so lucky to meet people who wanted to help us and keep us safe. We volunteered at an orphanage, went to Victoria Falls, white water rafted the Zambezi river (terrifying) and relaxed on the white sand beaches of Zanzibar. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity, I saw and experienced so many amazing things.
So, rather than write a 40 page post on each of the adventures, crises, shady activities and "T.I.A" moments, I'll post some photo highlights.
(ps. T.I.A.= this is africa. often said after something extremely shady, dangerous or odd happened.)
the airport in zambia. in africa, they have these great candybars that are called ps bars and they say PS in really big letters and then they have a message like P.S. i miss you or P.S. we make a great team etc, etc.
katie got off the plane and said: "ps. we're in the bush"
stone town on the island of zanzibar
vic falls, in the flesh
more stone town
stone town, once again
I know it's been almost a month since my last post, turns out I'm not the best blogger in the world but I gave it a shot. If you're curious, our presentation, the following week of classes went really, really well. Our group then went on some pretty amazing trips together--a safari, we explored the cape of good hope, biked, hiked and enjoyed each others company for the program's last days in cape town.
After, myself, 5 other girls and the bravest man in the world Tim, embarked on a two week whirlwind across South Africa, Zambia and Tanzania. In each place we visited, we were so lucky to meet people who wanted to help us and keep us safe. We volunteered at an orphanage, went to Victoria Falls, white water rafted the Zambezi river (terrifying) and relaxed on the white sand beaches of Zanzibar. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity, I saw and experienced so many amazing things.
So, rather than write a 40 page post on each of the adventures, crises, shady activities and "T.I.A" moments, I'll post some photo highlights.
(ps. T.I.A.= this is africa. often said after something extremely shady, dangerous or odd happened.)
the airport in zambia. in africa, they have these great candybars that are called ps bars and they say PS in really big letters and then they have a message like P.S. i miss you or P.S. we make a great team etc, etc.
katie got off the plane and said: "ps. we're in the bush"
stone town on the island of zanzibar
vic falls, in the flesh
more stone town
stone town, once again
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Almost two weeks
Hi there,
So, tomorrow our big final presentation is due and let me tell you, the caffeine is coursing through the veins of almost every student on this trip. It's been a very intense past two weeks--it happened to fast that it's almost hard to believe that it's over. Katie and I are editing a little sneak peak movie to show during our presentation because we don't exactly have financial models or anything to go over tomorrow.
It gives me the butterflies, I'll try and post the opening scene on the blog, because it's our favorite part, and the best we've got so far. I don't know when we'll finally get it uploaded, because our internet connection is like molasses at best... but I'll set the scene for you. It's a shot I took as I was taking the train with my boys to Khayelitsha, where Cebisa (the c is a click noise, by the way) was going to show us where he grew up and his friends. Anyways, so its the scene through subway doors, and we have text explaining our field study trip and the train's noise fades into "waiting on the world to change" by john mayer. everyone we've force fed it to says they get the chills. I'm excited.
Our lunch time (and dinnner time) meals have become very easy to predict. We think we are SO funny, we'll be walking to the canteen and we'll say, okay, so i bet today, for lunch, we'll have hmmmm bread.... and meat. And voila. I must say, the South Africans are quite creative with combining just two simple ingredients. Samoosas with meat, egg rolls with meat, pies filled with meat, braided rolls filled with meat, tortilla wraps filled with meat, sandwiches filled with meat, muffin things filled with meat, pita pockets filled with meat, the list goes on and on.
they must have run out of ideas today because it was just a chicken wing and a roll. But don't get too excited, generally the meat filling is steak or beef or...something else that is brown and chewy.
Our palettes are definitely overwhelmed meat-wise, that's for sure. At breakfast in the hotel, half of what they offer is a schmorgasbourg (sp? do i care?) of cold cuts and cheese. Lunch is carbs and meat, usually snack is meat and dinner gets topped off with more meat. I will never experience an iron deficiency in my life because of all the meat I am being fed on this trip.
The funniest part of all about lunchtime to me is the meals they invent for the vegetarians in the group. Today, instead of a slab of chicken meat, the vegetarians got chocolate mousse cake. Clearly the nutritional equivalent of a chicken breast. I love when the vegs try and explain to TSiBA students, people we meet or the township people that they're vegetarian. They just look and say, "what?!" and "are you allergic?'' and if we're out to eat, chicken is usually the non-meat offering. It's been interesting to see that specialty diets (for lack of a better term) seem to be a "developed world" concepts. (cept for you buddhists living in countries with emerging markets out there) Here, if you have something to eat, you eat it.
The food item that comes to mind smiley. Smiley is a seared sheep's head, minus the brain of course. (There's a picture of a woman preparing it in an earlier post). People in the townships began eating smiley during apartheid because butcher trucks would drive by and leave the sheep heads in piles in the townships. The rest of the animal was reserved for the whites. It's amazing to think that a small group had such stringent control over an entire nation--down to what they ate.
So, this is me, just musing on food. More to come...no doubt.
dobtown
So, tomorrow our big final presentation is due and let me tell you, the caffeine is coursing through the veins of almost every student on this trip. It's been a very intense past two weeks--it happened to fast that it's almost hard to believe that it's over. Katie and I are editing a little sneak peak movie to show during our presentation because we don't exactly have financial models or anything to go over tomorrow.
It gives me the butterflies, I'll try and post the opening scene on the blog, because it's our favorite part, and the best we've got so far. I don't know when we'll finally get it uploaded, because our internet connection is like molasses at best... but I'll set the scene for you. It's a shot I took as I was taking the train with my boys to Khayelitsha, where Cebisa (the c is a click noise, by the way) was going to show us where he grew up and his friends. Anyways, so its the scene through subway doors, and we have text explaining our field study trip and the train's noise fades into "waiting on the world to change" by john mayer. everyone we've force fed it to says they get the chills. I'm excited.
Our lunch time (and dinnner time) meals have become very easy to predict. We think we are SO funny, we'll be walking to the canteen and we'll say, okay, so i bet today, for lunch, we'll have hmmmm bread.... and meat. And voila. I must say, the South Africans are quite creative with combining just two simple ingredients. Samoosas with meat, egg rolls with meat, pies filled with meat, braided rolls filled with meat, tortilla wraps filled with meat, sandwiches filled with meat, muffin things filled with meat, pita pockets filled with meat, the list goes on and on.
they must have run out of ideas today because it was just a chicken wing and a roll. But don't get too excited, generally the meat filling is steak or beef or...something else that is brown and chewy.
Our palettes are definitely overwhelmed meat-wise, that's for sure. At breakfast in the hotel, half of what they offer is a schmorgasbourg (sp? do i care?) of cold cuts and cheese. Lunch is carbs and meat, usually snack is meat and dinner gets topped off with more meat. I will never experience an iron deficiency in my life because of all the meat I am being fed on this trip.
The funniest part of all about lunchtime to me is the meals they invent for the vegetarians in the group. Today, instead of a slab of chicken meat, the vegetarians got chocolate mousse cake. Clearly the nutritional equivalent of a chicken breast. I love when the vegs try and explain to TSiBA students, people we meet or the township people that they're vegetarian. They just look and say, "what?!" and "are you allergic?'' and if we're out to eat, chicken is usually the non-meat offering. It's been interesting to see that specialty diets (for lack of a better term) seem to be a "developed world" concepts. (cept for you buddhists living in countries with emerging markets out there) Here, if you have something to eat, you eat it.
The food item that comes to mind smiley. Smiley is a seared sheep's head, minus the brain of course. (There's a picture of a woman preparing it in an earlier post). People in the townships began eating smiley during apartheid because butcher trucks would drive by and leave the sheep heads in piles in the townships. The rest of the animal was reserved for the whites. It's amazing to think that a small group had such stringent control over an entire nation--down to what they ate.
So, this is me, just musing on food. More to come...no doubt.
dobtown
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
rainy days
Herro herro!
I finally posted some more pictures, and I'm planning on getting a picasa website, so ill put the link up in case that happens so you can see EVERY SINGLE picture I take.
hello cape town
view from a xhosa hut window
mormons in south africa! hizah!
nights out in cape town on long st
Next post: video of our raw footage for our documentary
AND
cebisa's message to darwin dobson: cows are coming to america in exchange for my hand in marriage
I finally posted some more pictures, and I'm planning on getting a picasa website, so ill put the link up in case that happens so you can see EVERY SINGLE picture I take.
hello cape town
view from a xhosa hut window
mormons in south africa! hizah!
nights out in cape town on long st
Next post: video of our raw footage for our documentary
AND
cebisa's message to darwin dobson: cows are coming to america in exchange for my hand in marriage
Monday, July 7, 2008
Almost a week later...
Malo!
(Xhosa for Hello!)
I know I haven't written in quite awhile, so I'll try and give the best update that I can.
This week was pretty darn crazy. We had some problems with our project. First, the dance school we were supposed to work with fell through. Our entrepreneur, who is now something of a mini celebrity in Cape Town didn't show up to present his idea to us. Our coordinator got really upset, because apparently TSiBA has done alot to get his dance theater (which has already done quite well) off of the ground and he didn't return the favor for his students. So, some ego got in our way. Honestly, we were pretty disappointed because we were so excited to work on the project. We had visions of tiny African babies dancing in our heads. But I suppose we wouldn't want to work with someone who didn't have time for us or who believed they were above us anyway.
Then, we got assigned a law office project which was one of our group member's uncles. We were kind of excited, but none of us are really law people, and I mean, it's not cute dancing children so we weren't really into it. We went and interviewed with the entrepreneur, and he had no idea who we are, his nephew hadn't informed him of anything that was going on. What's more is he didn't really need our help, we could have produced something for him in a day or two and the extent of it would have been: have both walk-in hours and set appts; get a better secretary. By the time it came to this, it was already Thursday and we have until this coming Friday to come up with, prepare and present our proposal, so if we were going to do another project, we needed to do it fast.
So, nothing really appeared, and the options of finding another enterprise would have had us getting in touch with them last minute, so Prof Shaugnessy suggested we make the project I was working on, a documentary of sorts, into something larger that the group could do. The videos produced will be fundraisers of sorts for the Social Enterprise Initiative and a means for TSiBA students to obtain funds to study in the US, like we have studied here.
I was disappointed at first. Ever since my Cameroon project fell through with Tita, I've really been itching to prove myself in an international project situation. I kind of felt like, I've finally gotten onto the continent, and now I'm doing this? But, I'm sure there's some lesson I need to learn out of this, to have faith and to still give my best.
I was thinking about it on the bus ride home today, and the thought occured to me that my co-op position for city year will be fund raising and attempting to work with corporate sponsors, so I guess these are concepts I need to start grasping now. There's a reason for everything, and I'm confident this situation is no exception. It'll be fun too. Our group gets to know every entrepreneur, each township community and the problems and sucesses each will face.
School and working days have been long, about 7 hours, and the people on our trip are definitely starting to feel that, piled on top of the jet lag. Last week each night was woooo let's go out to the clubs, go to Long St, go to the cafes! Today, we discovered what we will believe the savior to our gastronomic sanity in Cape Town: Mr.Delivery.com. Now, instead of having to get into a cab and go to the other side of town and eat, food will be brought to us. We just can't take the heavy cream and butter of the room service and hotel restaurants any more. It's been especially frustrating because our hotel is located in District 6, which until the 70's, was the black part of Cape Town before the government literally shoved, cleared and moved its 60,000 residents to the Cape Flats area townships and informal settlements. And, it's stayed pretty much dead since then, there are a few lazy shops, grocers and cafes that are open during the day, but they close by the time we get home from school and close on 1pm on saturdays, and completely closed on sunday. Anyways, we are pleased to be connected to the rest of the city/different food again.
This weekend was a nice and relaxing. It started out right on friday with a braai (try saying that in your classiest afrikaans accent) (aka a BBQ) which was SO much fun. Adeeb dj'ed for us and we played really fun games. I was the musical chairs champ, hard as it was for josh to swallow that bitter pill. I have the bruises on my knees from being shoved onto the ground to prove it. That night was crazy! Esther and I slept/layed around until 11, and then we met up with all the other crazy kids at Ricks Cafe Americain (restaurant featured in "Casablanca"anyone?) where they were having an American Fourth of July party. We danced to the Village People, Barry White, Rihanna, Britney Spears and all other fine products of American record labels. It was pretty darn fun/crazy. We got home around 3. Esther and I turned off the alarm and slept until 1:30 pm, which we were quite proud of, because as research assistants, we have gotten very little sleep during the week. Then we kind of putted around because it's been quite rainy and dreary here. Sunday we went to Kirstenbosch gardens which was GORGEOUS despite the gloomy weather. We kept saying that we felt like we were in Jurassic Park. It was quite beautiful and table mountain had its famous "table cloth" of fog rolling over the top of it.
So, that's the long and the short of it for this week. There's been plenty of ups and downs but now I think I've established a rythym of how to live and work here, so I'm excited for the coming weeks!
Much love,
dobbay
(Xhosa for Hello!)
I know I haven't written in quite awhile, so I'll try and give the best update that I can.
This week was pretty darn crazy. We had some problems with our project. First, the dance school we were supposed to work with fell through. Our entrepreneur, who is now something of a mini celebrity in Cape Town didn't show up to present his idea to us. Our coordinator got really upset, because apparently TSiBA has done alot to get his dance theater (which has already done quite well) off of the ground and he didn't return the favor for his students. So, some ego got in our way. Honestly, we were pretty disappointed because we were so excited to work on the project. We had visions of tiny African babies dancing in our heads. But I suppose we wouldn't want to work with someone who didn't have time for us or who believed they were above us anyway.
Then, we got assigned a law office project which was one of our group member's uncles. We were kind of excited, but none of us are really law people, and I mean, it's not cute dancing children so we weren't really into it. We went and interviewed with the entrepreneur, and he had no idea who we are, his nephew hadn't informed him of anything that was going on. What's more is he didn't really need our help, we could have produced something for him in a day or two and the extent of it would have been: have both walk-in hours and set appts; get a better secretary. By the time it came to this, it was already Thursday and we have until this coming Friday to come up with, prepare and present our proposal, so if we were going to do another project, we needed to do it fast.
So, nothing really appeared, and the options of finding another enterprise would have had us getting in touch with them last minute, so Prof Shaugnessy suggested we make the project I was working on, a documentary of sorts, into something larger that the group could do. The videos produced will be fundraisers of sorts for the Social Enterprise Initiative and a means for TSiBA students to obtain funds to study in the US, like we have studied here.
I was disappointed at first. Ever since my Cameroon project fell through with Tita, I've really been itching to prove myself in an international project situation. I kind of felt like, I've finally gotten onto the continent, and now I'm doing this? But, I'm sure there's some lesson I need to learn out of this, to have faith and to still give my best.
I was thinking about it on the bus ride home today, and the thought occured to me that my co-op position for city year will be fund raising and attempting to work with corporate sponsors, so I guess these are concepts I need to start grasping now. There's a reason for everything, and I'm confident this situation is no exception. It'll be fun too. Our group gets to know every entrepreneur, each township community and the problems and sucesses each will face.
School and working days have been long, about 7 hours, and the people on our trip are definitely starting to feel that, piled on top of the jet lag. Last week each night was woooo let's go out to the clubs, go to Long St, go to the cafes! Today, we discovered what we will believe the savior to our gastronomic sanity in Cape Town: Mr.Delivery.com. Now, instead of having to get into a cab and go to the other side of town and eat, food will be brought to us. We just can't take the heavy cream and butter of the room service and hotel restaurants any more. It's been especially frustrating because our hotel is located in District 6, which until the 70's, was the black part of Cape Town before the government literally shoved, cleared and moved its 60,000 residents to the Cape Flats area townships and informal settlements. And, it's stayed pretty much dead since then, there are a few lazy shops, grocers and cafes that are open during the day, but they close by the time we get home from school and close on 1pm on saturdays, and completely closed on sunday. Anyways, we are pleased to be connected to the rest of the city/different food again.
This weekend was a nice and relaxing. It started out right on friday with a braai (try saying that in your classiest afrikaans accent) (aka a BBQ) which was SO much fun. Adeeb dj'ed for us and we played really fun games. I was the musical chairs champ, hard as it was for josh to swallow that bitter pill. I have the bruises on my knees from being shoved onto the ground to prove it. That night was crazy! Esther and I slept/layed around until 11, and then we met up with all the other crazy kids at Ricks Cafe Americain (restaurant featured in "Casablanca"anyone?) where they were having an American Fourth of July party. We danced to the Village People, Barry White, Rihanna, Britney Spears and all other fine products of American record labels. It was pretty darn fun/crazy. We got home around 3. Esther and I turned off the alarm and slept until 1:30 pm, which we were quite proud of, because as research assistants, we have gotten very little sleep during the week. Then we kind of putted around because it's been quite rainy and dreary here. Sunday we went to Kirstenbosch gardens which was GORGEOUS despite the gloomy weather. We kept saying that we felt like we were in Jurassic Park. It was quite beautiful and table mountain had its famous "table cloth" of fog rolling over the top of it.
So, that's the long and the short of it for this week. There's been plenty of ups and downs but now I think I've established a rythym of how to live and work here, so I'm excited for the coming weeks!
Much love,
dobbay
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
The Langa Township
their religion is street kid
what's up table mountain?
this little girl had quite the scowl
smiley anyone? and by smiley I mean seared sheep's head...
sweet photo by ben
We haven't even been here a week...
The days are so intense here! It's only our third day but it feels like we've been in Cape Town for years. Boston seems like a completely different life. Yesterday was our first official day of classes, we met all the other TSiBA students. We are already friends (Pumbla is my main girl) and we've talked about everything from family, zimbabwe, racism and usher. The dance studio project got cancelled, so we're now in charge of a law office. I'm not so excited about the project subject matter but I really like the people I'm working with. There are 2 NU students and 4 TSiBA students. Which I like, because I really wanted to get to know the people here. We went into the Khyaleshta township today to visit the law office site. It was really interesting because it was what i was expecting to see as a township, not like the one that we went to on sunday. Khyaleshta is the 3rd largest township in South Africa, with an estimated 3 million residents. It was a very different side of South Africa that I saw today. I was talking with Esther last night and we've both felt that we would have no idea that we're in Africa, aside from the bus ride to and from the hotel. We go out at night to the waterfront or to Long St and aside from the fact that pretty much everyone is black... you might think you're in the uk or europe. Anyways, two of the TSiBA students were from that township, so we were walking towards the office and they saw their friends and we met them. It made the people of the townships feel alot more real. I'm pretty pooped, we have to wake up at 7am each morning and we stay on campus in class and working until 4:00.
Well, that's all for tonight!
dobbbbb
Well, that's all for tonight!
dobbbbb
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