My new house

Okay. I finally decided to write the post about my new house. Be aware, it is picture heavy. In theory this will be a nice comparison of my old house to my new house.

Edited from here to * I should first mention how I came about living in this house. My old house took me walking down the street on a super hot day looking at every house that looked empty and asking every random person in the street if they knew of any openings. Eventually, after a 3 mile walk, I found my house. The decision to move into this house was much easier. The house is rented by the organization that requested me, Project Esperanza. The house will sometimes have volunteers staying in it and I thought it would be nice to live with people who are working for the same organization and I thought it would be a nice way to get to know some new people from around the world America. There are other options similar to this in Muñoz, but for now I like living with other people when they are here. The Doñ of the house is also really helpful, so that is exactly like my old house. Dudes here really do like being helpful with house stuff. 

I’ll start with the structure. My old house was originally a motorcycle repair shop and my new house was originally a house. My old house had giant metal doors and windows and my new house has wooden doors and a lot of bars. My old house was a big cube that was frequently dark. My new house has multiple rooms and wonderful windows surrounded by gallerias with a roof I can get to easily and sit on comfortably. I loved my old house. I love my new house. 

As you can tell from the photos below I have a lot of space in the front. I was also gifted with an awesome room mate seen in the picture to the side. She is reading there, but if you look closely you will see her computer there. She and I both have Internet bandwidth sticks and the garage is where we hideout for a good signal when the sun is just too hot to go onto the roof. 

Next we have the roof access point. It looks like a lot of metal, and that is probably because there is a lot of metal. We have to go through two gates to get to the roof, but I am not complaining. We have a roof. A safe roof. A roof that has an actual staircase up to it. I love the roof. I cherish the roof. I don't like it when cat's poop on my roof.

The roof. It's hot in the middle of the day, which is why I've started hanging my clothes here instead of on the back patio. If you look toward the back that is the water tank. It's called a tinaqua and I don't know how to spell tinaka... It holds 300 gallons I believe. It runs out sometimes which sucks. They work because the pressure in the line forces the water up and into the tank. That way we don't need electricity to have water. It's pretty great having this roof and all the perks that come with it.

When you enter the house from the front you enter into the living space. Michelle and I typically have the two tables facing the window as if they were our two work desks, but this week we have volunteers staying with us so we set the tables up so they could eat and we would all have more room to play spades. You know how I work!

When you walk into the front door and into the living space there will be a hallway on the right. That hallway contains the two bedrooms on either end and the bathroom in the middle. This is the view in my room. Notice the mass of mosquito nets. Safety first! Also notice my gym shoes on the bed. That was a bit of post P90X mess. I tend to pile things on the end of my bed sometimes. Only sometimes.

 

My closet in my new house is so much better. Some of you may remember that I had a armoire full of termites holding all of my things in my last house. This house has an actual closet with actual door and an actual bar to hang things. I bought so many hangers, because I wanted to get my crap up. I also hung two shoe racks on the inside of the closet to have more space. I left 1/2 of the closet empty just in case volunteers wanted to use it. Judging by experience though, they tend to live out of their suitcases and I may wind up shifting some of my things over.

You can also see my helmets above. I do use mine if you were curious and I have an extra that my room mate and other visitors can use if they want to. I actually use my helmet mostly when I visit a friend in the capital though, so for the most part it is sitting right next to my suitcase.




This is where I should have a picture of the bathroom, but apparently it didn't upload. I'll forget to do it later, so it will likely remain a mystery. It's really nice though. Tile everywhere. I gave Michelle the 2 liter bottle I was using to store my cutlery in my old house and it now houses her teeth cleaning supplies. I should make one for myself, because my stuff is sitting in a cup all exposed to the elements. Picture this though, an actual sink in the bathroom. My old house didn't have a sink anywhere, so to have a sink in the bathroom it luxurious. We also have a hot water heater which I will show you later. As of this writing though, it isn't really working and that is something that I can't be bothered to mind. I still bucket shower and I like that just fine. I think for the sake of the volunteers though we are going to look into getting it fixed.

The last room in the hall is Michelle's room and the other room for volunteers. This is usually all I see of it. I don't spend any time here. I could hang out with Michelle in there maybe, but really, we'd rather be on the roof or in the garage, or at the beach.

The kitchen. I love the kitchen. I took this awkward photo so it would house all the elements I wanted to talk about. First, cabinets. Actual cabinets. What is this world I am living in? Cabinets are so exciting. I don't think I ever would have this much excitement over cabinets, but yeah, I love them. If you look on the very top shelf where that pink thing is, that is one place where I store my food. The pink container is an airtight container where I store my dry goods. I keep soy milk powder, oat flour, and oatmeal in there at all times. The popcorn, lentils, and saltines are housed in my cabinet along with all of my spices and other pantry type food items.

A little lower we can see my stove. It is the one to the right and it is the same one I had at my last house. I bought it for that house and it has served Michelle and I well here. I heat up water for my bath here and don't worry one bit about wasting gas. I also cook here. This is where I made a recipe for banana pancakes and learned how to make fried chicken. The other stove is the one my Project Partner bought for the house. It's bigger, but mine serves me just fine.

To the far left you can see an actual sink. What a luxury. Also a window. The fridge in the picture is mine. The volunteers and the cook use it too, but it's mine and it has also served me well since living on my own in this country. It has a little freezer in it and the almost constant electricity at my site means I can use it to make ice. Drawers... did you see that I have drawers. This is the life. Really.

Moving on through the house this is the view out to the back patio. It is really nice and also iron barred in. You were able to see some of this when I showed you how I am doing laundry in my new home. I like the back porch, and I think we would spend more time out here if it weren't for the mosquitos. I think there is just more room for standing water in this area, so they are worse out here. This is also where I tend to exercise. The neighbor kids watch me do that from their windows, but whatever. Everybody needs something to entertain them right?

This is my typical exercise area. I use the yoga mat a lot, and the box is where I will set my computer if I am following some type or exercise video.

The beds are also where we have room for more volunteers if were were to have a full house.








Some of us know that I don't particularly love cats, but I acquired these when Courtney was here. It is nice to have something living around the house, so we feed them. The one on the right is named "Primary Cat", because it was the first cat we procured. The second is named "Secondary Cat", because he showed up after we started feeding primary cat every now and then. I believe they may belong to the neighbors, but we like them around enough to let them be on the porch and give them a little something every now and then.

Secondary cat likes to run into the house and be mischievous. That is just his style, while primary cat pretty much just lounges around. We kind of live the same life.






There is a water spicket out back. I used to come out here to do laundry, but I found a better spout in the front that allowed me to attach the hose. Now I sit on the porch, sip tea, watch shows and plunge away at my laundry.







The rumored water heater. There is a switch in the bathroom that turns it on. The landlord Papito has been fixing it almost every other day this past week, because it will work for one hot shower and then stop heating. Judging by the rust and the need to fix it after one shower, I'd say it is probably time for another one, but I'm fine heating my water on the stove.

 My thing is hot showers. I told myself I wouldn't live in a place that didn't allow for some kind of hot shower in some way, be it heating water in the sun, on a stove, or with an actual water heater. Since I have access to boil hot water here I am happy.

The space in the back where we sometimes dry things. The sun doesn't hit this place as much as it hits the roof though, so I left this mess behind and went upstairs.

The other side. That is an area where I sometimes get to watch old dudes shower. I should probably remember this as the highlight of my Peace Corps service.

So there you have it my new house. As you can see it is way better than my old house. In ways it is also better that the studio apartment I had before  I left for Peace Corps. I have more than one room, which is a plus. I have a room mate, which is a big plus. I have roof access, which is a plus. I have a neighbor that sings "Happy Birthday" to a baby every day, and how can that not be a plus! 

My house (finally)

I am finally going to post about my new house. I have teased my (avid, I'm sure) readers with snippints here and there, but this is going to be a full fledged (band-with stealing because of all the pictures) post about my new home in the Dominican Republic. Also, because I don't want to make you wait until the end, I will put the customary "I live on my own now so COME VISIT ME" sentence right here in the beginning. Get ready. You will see some of the beginnings of my creative (read: money saving) ways I have already ghetto-rigged my house for ease of use.

I should probably tell you the story of how I got my house. I was living with my host family and I had already come back fro 3 Month IST. Most everyone at IST had already found their home and were just doing the "Get Security to My Campo ASAP so I can move into my new home" dance, and I was doing the "Oh, I should probably look for a house" dance. I decided to walk my street and find a house. I think I've already told the story about how my doña tried to sneak me into a different house, so I won't get into that too deep. By the time I was over walking and the sun was high I had made it to my friends house. She offered me coffee and good wishes then I took off again. When I didn't find anything and doubled back she was sitting at the future colmado with the father of her children and he said I could move into this old motorcycle repair shop. He knew the guy who owned it and said he would get me a meeting for Friday. He came to buscar me at my house that Friday and I had a meeting and the guy said I was going to pay 1000 pesos a month (US$25) and they wanted to know how much I could pay up front. They wanted the first two years, but I said I couldn't do that. I could do 7 months now and 5 in a week and they said that would be fine. I'm going to say now, paying the rent early was so that they could use the money to build the inside of my house. They had to build a bathroom  and a dividing wall. Before my house was a big open box with super secure doors and windows. I paid, they built, security came, and now I live here.

I'll be starting with the outside of my house. I've used the picture with Antonio in it because I actually took a shot of the entire house and the picture he took with me cuts out part of my house, which I did not want to do. If you look to the left you will see the funeria. I have never seen anyone go in or out of that building and people have definitly died in this town since I've been here, so I kind of believe it belonged to someone who doesn't use it any more. Like my house.

This is the colmado that will open the weekend I move in. They will play loud music for the entire weekend that i can hear from my house and it will make me almost regret moving, but after the first weekend the music will soften and become a nice background sound to my life. It's also nice that I can buy rice without putting my shoes on and refresco when I have company without much effort. 

My backyard looks like a jungle, but I am already starting work on a vegetable garden. If nothing else I will learn to succeed or fail at growing my own food in this country. I've also included a picture of my wonderful landlord who rebuilt the back door to be "mas fuerte". It is still the weakest point in my house because it is made of wood and held together by a lot of rusty nails, but it is in the back and super fuerte so I'm okay with it. 

Okay. Moving inwards I didn't have very many options. I have two big spaces and a bathroom. It's funny, I always pictured putting my bedroom in the front rom and everything else in the back, but all of the Dominicans were right. People are going to stop by and they are going to use the front and I need my private space in the back. 

When you walk in my house you will see pictures and maps on all of the walls. A bike in the corner, a yoga mat in the middle of the room and a kitchen set up to the left. I still haven't bought any chairs and am living with the one my neighbor has let me borrow until I buy some of my own, but it works. I shuffle the one chair around and actually used the yoga mat to play a game of cards with the neighbor girl during a rain storm, so it was nice. I want to get a table and our chairs, but for now, whatever, I have this. 

In my kitchen you will find the stove I bought, the gas take I use, the fridge, the water filter, and the start of my ghetto-rigged home. I wanted to contain my cutlery and keep bugs and dust out, so i used scissors to do a quick chop on a bottle I had and viola, a container. My neighbor thinks it's top notch and wants a "lesson" on how I made it, but that would really just be a lesson in how to cut a line in a bottle. I also use the Peace Corps given water filter. Everyone says I should just by water, because it isn't super expensive, but I think filtering my water will get me one extra trip to someplace cool while I'm in this country, so I am sticking with carrying a bucket of water to the filter every other day instead of paying some dude to bring me a jug. It's actually a lot faster too, and I can filter water in the middle of the night if I run out. Also, my neighbors think I'm awesome when I bring "agua frio" to lunch, because they often haven't had the time or money to buy a botellon of water. 

As you round the corner you will see pictures from my little people back home and the muñecas they gave me so as to not forget them. If you look down you will see the original back door hoisted up by rocks and covered in books. In the picture it is also covered in clutter because I was still organizing my house and that was a lie because I literally just took the picture. The rocks serve a purpose though. Maybe this is another ghetto thing. I have concrete floors and the way I clean is I basically dump water on my floor and then send it out the house. The rocks are so I can get a bunch of water up in that area without covering the wooden door and paper books with water. Also, I wasn't sure about water entering my house yet and I wanted a bit of height. Notice Harry Potter in the background there. Yeah, I've already read 1-4 in country in the past 2 weeks. I should really leave my house more. 

So this is my bed, and you can kind of see my wardrobe. This actually was while I was still unpacking everything because the suitcase is there on the floor. I have a fan. I bought it. It was (kind of) expensive. It broke the third time I used it. I probably did something wrong with the luz or something, but whatever, I don't miss it. Now I have it as a decoration. If my friend (Lobo) ever visits I can claim I have a fan, but it doesn't do anything. My house is typically cold at night though, so it doesn't really matter if it works or not. In the day time fans don't really seem to do much anyway. 

This is recent. I took this picture this morning. It looks like my normal life. I have a book on my bed (The Princess Bride, thank you Courtney (The blonde in the picture on top of my blog)), I have my socks drying on top of my mosquiterra, I have pictures of my sister and show racks holding odds and ends and bathroom what nots. 

In my bathroom, today is a water day. I get water every other day, so the sound of water filling my tank will be heard all day. I have a toilet. I bought that toilet with 4 months rent thank you very much. I don't think I ever thought I'd be buying a toilet, but there wasn't one and then I paid a dude and then there was one, so I bought it. The tank is usually half empty by the time water day hits, but I don't like reaching in that far and actually hurt my arm one reaching in a weird way, so I appreciate water days. I don't drink this water straight though, I carry it ot the filter in my one bucket and drink it later. I think I can say the water is fine in the filter after going about two weeks on it now. 

My best "invention". Notice all that open space in the bathroom adn the water tank. Well sometimes the water can really shoot out of the spout and I didn't want wet TP, so I cut another bottle and made this little TP holder. I have to use a bit off of a new roll for it to fit, but after that I pull the cardboard roll out, pll fromthe middle, and have a handy little holder here. 

I have also ghetto rigged some plastic. Both of my mattress parts came in big sheets of plastic and I didn't want to throw it away. i had to make use of it some how. The first thing I did was make a cover for my water container, because I don't want to have a skeeter breeding ground, and next I avoided buying a curtain by cutting and making my own. The water shot out as far as my bed the first day and sometimes it sputters so i needed a cover, no to mention if I EVER have a guest, they will probably want privacy in the bathroom. Living alone I haven't had that issue, but one day.. maybe... if you visit my house... 

And finally, the best place in my house... I have this ghetto rigged desk I set up outside when I want internet. The umbrella is there for when the droplet of rain want to hit my computer in the morning. That's my one chair and a suitcase I brought from America along with the bottom part of the packaging from my mini-fridge. Working together to have the most ghetto house in the DR. 

There you have it. My home. Now, come visit me! My computer has 5% charge, so I had better turn it off and wait for the luz to come back! I miss you. 

I think I found my house.

Update: be sure to read to the update. It's funny-ish.


I walked the road today and asked every woman who didn't look scary if she knew of a house I could rent. I decided to stay away from men. Men in this country are too much work to figure out.

I made it about an hour in the sun to a friends house and dropped into a chair. She said I could live with her and as much fun as that would maybe be, I'd feel better if I had my own space to lock up. I've learned that things here aren't always as they appear. So I went forward.

I went to the house of another woman I know. She had a space, but she is going to use it as for an Internet business (which I fully support!), and the other houses were falling apart and to be blunt, way to close to my project partner for my comfort. This woman kept insisting that he should be there helping me find a house. In all honesty, he'd probably be great at finding me a house, but I want him involved in my personal life as little as possible and finding me a house and knowing the ins and outs of my entire transaction feels like a security threat to my sanity.

She and another woman discussed for a long time other places I could live and people I could live with, but I gave up and turned around.

I saw my original friend sitting near her house chatting with a man. I think he is her husband. I mentioned my house hunt again. I find people don't mention this to other people, but if I mention it they get to talking and things maybe happen.

Well the husband suggested this would be store located two spots down from their house and directly next to a funeria. I checked it out. It's all secure and made of cement and cute. It doesn't have a bathroom, but part of the deal is the dude will probably build me a bathroom. So we have it. Friday I am going to chat with the owner and try to work out a deal. I'll get to actually look at the inside and really consider the option. Homeboy needs to build me a bathroom and hopefully pull up some form of running water (fingers crossed) and I may work out a deal for the casa.

After this morning (my doña went off on the little girl and hit her and told her basically that she was worthless crap and I think it's because she and I were up during the rainstorm laughing and having a good time), I have to move out.

(The little girl walked past me and looked at me, but didn't say hi, we just waved, and my doña crabbed her head and turned her toward me and told her to "saludar Amanda!" I just can't live with this any longer or I will hate Dominicans due to a semi-isolated situation.)

I already feel better just being in this part of town with different people. I haven't found the spot where I can use my flota phone and call all of my peace corps friends, but I will and it will be great and I'll use up the flota and get to know Dominicans and be happy all the time... Except when I'm not.

Update:
So I'm eating lunch with my friend near the house I want to get. My project partner creeps up like a creeper because his day isn't complete if he isn't creeping. He chats with other people, says he has somewhere important to be and can't stay so he leaves.

Not 10 minutes later he is back. He wants to talk to me. Says he heard I was looking for a house. He wanted to tell me about a house he knew of. My friend asked him about the house he said he had. It is apparently big with three bedrooms, but my friend asks him about how it's so not secure, clean, or close to any people. His response is that it's basically good because its super close to his house... No sir. Bye. She tells him I have a house and he leaves. As he is walking away my friend looks to her daughter and says "El loco viejo!"

Really?! I confirm. "Did you just say he was a crazy old man?!"

"Yes. Yes I did!"

Ha. Okay. So it's not just me who thinks he is crazy. One of his people, his friend in confianza thinks so too. I feel validated.