To travel and live abroad can often be a long, self-reflective therapy session, through which a person is constantly reassessing and questioning oneself, one’s own culture and country, almost like looking in the mirror. Why do I do things the way I do? Why are the different people from my country the way we are(when suddenly there’s people all around me that act and do things differently)? And how is it exactly that people in different countries decide that the styles and ways of living of another culture are better than those of their own culture?

There ya go, my deepest thoughts of the moment, por el momento. In less intense commentary, I was thinking as I was running this morning that wow, this must be what it feels like to be a supermodel. I never feel more like I’m on stage or on a reality TV show or something than when I run through the streets here (or when I was in Bolivia) with a chorus of hoots and whistles trailing behind me. But then I thought, hmmm, I’m definitely not glamorous nor beautiful enough to be a supermodel, even in my sexy running shorts and pink tank top. It’s more like I’m a walking (running) 100 dollar bill or something. Like I’m the embodiment of a US bank account walking through the streets of the DR.

So I’m generally really psyched to be here. My first week has been a little crazy, since the consultant for the project of my internship, who thereby is my direct supervisor, has been out of town. But she’ll be back today, and I’ll have more direction in my work here at UN-INSTRAW.

The folks here of course are super cool, as I expected. Language hasn’t really been a huge challenge, even with the majority of everyone in the office being from either Spain or other countries in Latin America. Thus I communicate in Spanish almost all of the time, although pretty much everyone also speaks English, so I can switch back and forth if I need to. I can’t quite just be myself, however, when speaking in Spanish, which as always is really frustrating in trying to get to know people… Although as compared to when I was in Costa Rica or Bolivia or even Spain more recently, the transition back into the language has been relatively easy.

My living situation is pretty cool… The Dominican woman, Doña Ireny, who owns the house where I live, has two of my fellow interns living with her on the first floor, then there’s another intern and a Belgium dude (the boyfriend of an INSTRAW Program Consultant, who also has a husband!) that live with me in the apartment on the second floor. Our apartment has an awesome balcony that looks out onto the main street of the neighboorhood, making for some fantastic people-watching, let me tell ya.

Enough rambling for now… I hope all is well back in the U. S. of A… Did you know that Michael Jackson made it on the front page here in the Santo Domingo newspapers? Man, I was so proud.

No really, I’m serious, hehe.