Discovering/Encountering the New World for myself

Great news! I made it though my first week!

The last eight days have gone by quickly. There's too much to do, and listening to and producing Spanish all the time is so mentally tiring that I come home each day physically exhausted. We finished orientation on Monday, and on Tuesday classes started at Bonó, a university where I’ll be taking two of my four classes this semester.

Bonó is a seminary. With the exception of the North American students in the CIEE program, Bonó’s students are all males training to be priests. In the three classes I have visited so far, more than half of the students have been Haitian. It’s really comforting to know that at Bonó, I’ll never be the only student who speaks Spanish as a second language!

Initially, I was intimidated by the idea of taking classes at such a religious school. I know next to nothing about Catholicism and have always had fairly liberal influences in my life. In the U.S., we oftentimes equate Catholics and Catholicism with certain political tendencies and behaviors, ignoring the differences between the distinct orders and theologies of the Church. After my first Social History of Latin America class, which was taught by the head of the university, it became apparent that Bonó is a Jesuit school with inclinations towards liberation theology, a school of Catholic theology that emphasizes the relationship between Christianity and political activism, social justice, and human rights. Followers of liberation theology try to understand and teach Catholicism from the perspective of the disadvantaged (the poor and oppressed), and many professors at Bonó try to teach their classes from this perspective as well. In my Social History of Latin America class, we discussed and critiqued a speech given by the Pope last year, in which he chronicled the history and glories of Christian Latin America. The students in the room were quick to point out that Pope Benedict XVI completely ignored the arrival and influence of the continent’s African population, and noted that by beginning his account of Latin American history with the arrival of Columbus, His Holiness was essentially affirming that God did not exist in Latin American before the arrival of the conquistadores. By the end of the class period, we had concluded that the Pope was not a very good historian.

I expect that my classes at Bonó will be really interesting, but my time there will also be incredibly valuable for another reason: it’s refreshing to talk to and be around Dominican males who have no romantic interest in American females. The guys at Bonó are incredibly friendly and helpful, especially when compared to the men I pass or meet on the streets of the city. Instead of tossing us meaningless piropos, or pick-up lines, they ask us if we need help finding a classroom or if we know their good American friends who were in the CIEE program last semester.

My host family is still wonderful! I’ve posted pictures of the girls so you can put faces to the names I’ll mention here so often. Marisol, their mother, tries to feed me too much but is extremely conscious of the food she gives me. She always wants to know if I like what she prepares, and is really good about serving fruits and vegetables at every meal. That said, today’s fruit was fried plantains. Oh well, you can’t win them all.

Santo Domingo is a beautiful place. I really enjoy being here. I am endlessly entertained by the fact that I can post a blog entry via wireless internet while listening to a horse and cart clip-clop its way down the street below my window. My perspective is still very superficial, but it seems that much of and about this city is like that—“progressing,” but retaining a certain degree of antiquity and character.

I have to go now. Nicole, the seven year-old, is anxious to take me out to explore the Colonial Zone. ¡Nos vemos!

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