Semana Santa

It's Holy Week in the DR and I've had some interesting activities.

First, crazy cave day. I didn't know we were going to the cave at 10:00 until 9:50. We take the regular guagua to Ave. Duarte. From there we walked about ten blocks in one direction in order to turn around and walk ten blocks back to the initial starting point. On purpose... Not. So we are at the place with all the jam packed guaguas and the cobradoors who are yelling at everyone to get on their guagua. Mind you, it doesn't matter if you are going in the direction the guagua goes, it is their job to convince you to get on their guagua anyway.

So we are looking for the one we need and a helpful Dominican man finds a guagua that states that he is going in the direction of the caves. The directions we had state that we need to find a guagua going to the caves, so we decide to get in. The guagua is rickity, but everyone has what I would call a seat of American size, so I'm happy. As we are riding down the highway next to the beautiful water someone points out that from the point in the city that we were in and the direction of the caves, we shouldn't have gone anywhere near the water... Um. Okay.

We consult the driver. As expected, he had NO IDEA where the caves were and just wanted to give a ride. He was winging it on direction. We turn around eventually. Then stop. On the highway. In a random spot. Someone else jump in. Okay, that makes sense. He picked up his homeboy who knew where the caves were. That was a thing.

Eventually, after other shenanigans (Crossing a highway, getting gas, making a U turn) we make it to the caves.

Cut to, hungry. We make it to food. It's Chinese food though. The big debate is, do we trust ANY Chinese food after it was decided then proven that the Chinese food we were all served a few weeks ago at the training center made many PCT's and staff members very, very sick. Three of the nine trust the food. Good job DR... 1/3 of our group will still eat your Chinese food and one even trusted the vegetables (that were cooked).

As we walk back up Duarte we receive a call from our friends. They have their own PERSONAL guagua waiting for us. We are lost. They can't find us. they already waited for the rest of our group to decide if they even wanted to get on that guagua. They promise to come pick us up, their friends, from whatever spot we are lost in. Good job cobradoors. They will do anything to get a person on their guagua.