Hi,
A few of you have commiserated with our various encounters and travails, which is quite thoughtful and gratifyingly loyal of you. You are to be commended.
But I must clarify our experience, less we leave you with a less than accurate vision of our lives here in the Republica Dominicana. Simply put, we love our lives here.
It’s certainly true that circumstances of life are considerably different here from those in “The Other Washington” and it’s also the case that daily living is very different for us by virtue of our heritage, nationality, color, experience, and relative wealth. Both provide frequent occasion for us to learn many strange and wonderful things, including things we didn’t know (or had forgotten) about ourselves.
Face it: the opportunity to learn something new about oneself when in the mid-50’s is one hell of a gift.
Maybe even more important than the educational moments that life here provides us are the events, circumstances, and realizations that provide amusement. Both Denise and I enjoy the living daylights out these things and I hope that fact comes across in these missives.
We’re also pretty relaxed about the physical work here in Las Galeras and generally enjoy it. If the hammock doesn’t get hung today, it will get hung tomorrow. Or the next day. I am, after all, retired and am not on anything resembling a deadline or schedule..
So, by all means, you can join us in sympathizing and vicariously dodging the very substantial potholes on the roads, but realize with us as well that the roads are populated with things and people worth seeing and meeting and mostly the road seems to wind up at home.
A note:
When we started sending these notes to this electronically-formed group I mentioned that you should feel free to forward them to friends (mutual or otherwise) who might find them entertaining and that you should let me know if you’d prefer to drop off this list.
There have been a few additions to the group, and a couple have dropped off and so I repeat your liberty to forward and your capacity to revoke our license.
By the way, our frog returned in the middle of the night one day last week. I’m quite certain that I didn’t dream him up, floating lazily in the toilet, blinking up at me in the sudden light. (We’ve taken to turning on the light when entering the room. Sort of reconnoitering before going in. I guess that’s an accommodation?)
Bill
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Tags: Denise Hanna, Dominican Republic, Las Galeras, Living in the Dominican Republic, Retire, Retirement, Samana
“Voopa, voopa” is a bit more descriptive of the sound that I wish I was making with my hand saw and this monstrous pile of “bruta” lumber. Unfortunately, my hand saw is of the toolbox variety, so “voop” is about the best I can manage.
Those of you who know from experience what a toolbox saw is can appreciate the implication immediately. It may help if the rest of you can picture me standing proudly displaying this 24″ hand saw in front of my chest. Sort of like Che Guevara with an AK-47, only smaller.
Don’t forget to picture the imposing stack of over-sized 2 x 4s in the background.
A Skil-saw, of course, is the circular saw that is the reason that carpenters and people in the masonry restoration business in Seattle can’t hear worth a damn, so there are trade-offs and I hear just fine.
Now off to work, even if I do feel a bit like one of Snow White’s dwarfs with my little saw.
Actually, it’s a pretty good saw. And the sun is shining. And if I stopped right now Chad and Heather could still make their way across the new deck and reach the WC.
The carpenter, by the way, did us a favor by presenting such a hefty estimate.
Denise and I were unwilling to move from the stratosphere of his proposal to something more nearly approaching reality, even when the carpenter realized that he had over-played his hand and broached the possibility of reducing his price by 7/8ths. There was no possibility of reconciling our original expectations because I wouldn’t have a guy working for 1/8th of his anticipated fee–even though that would be a more reasonable cost (even including a nominal, transparent, and acceptable “gringo tax.”)
I say that he did us a favor because Denise and I actually enjoy working together. And we’re pretty good at it too.
Sun’s still shining and the herd of horses has moved to their own workplace down the road beside Quinengo’s farm below our little “loma” and time is passing.
So it’s “Hey-ho and off to work I go.”
Bill
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This is a part of the walkway replaced with the rough-sawn “bruta” pressure-treated lumber. In the background you can see the deck that serves as the front porch of the guest bungalow. It also pulls double-duty as the hallway between the living room and bathroom of the bungalow.
We got our money’s worth out of the old walkways. About .98 cents worth.
…and beginning to frame the new porch.
Tags: Dominican Republic, Las Galeras, Living in the Dominican Republic, Retire, Retirement, Samana
Hi,
We’ve been preparing for our first house-guests when Heather and her pal Chad arrive on Thursday for 10 days or so. The preparations have taken on a little more substantial cast than we’d originally planned.
For example, in anticipation of a satisfactory bid from our carpenter, I’d removed a portion of the decayed deck fronting the guest bungalow. It’s the portion of the deck that one uses to transit from the bed and living areas of the bungalow to the bathroom, so it’s pretty important.
The carpenter showed up on Monday with his estimate, rather than Sunday, as planned. He must have decided that we got stoopid overnight, or that we have way more money than we know what to do with. Maybe both, since his labor bid was 10 times what we expected.
Since we’re neither stupid or rich, Denise and I removed the entire deck, located a couple of tools and some supplies that we did not have, and got the thing substantially framed yesterday.
One tool that we were not able to locate was a power saw and so I’m not much looking forward to putting the deck on today, but we’ll manage, I’m sure.
I’m betting that we’re substantially ready when they materialize and that they’re comfortable and are as captivated by this place as we are. (Heather, take note…)
We had 3 cool and rainy days in succession over the weekend; now it’s just a bit on the cool side. Still shorts-wearing weather, though, and the rain was good for the water level in the cistern.
We haven’t finished much of the furniture-purchasing, house-painting, and actual-home-making that is on our list but have made real headway on prepatory tasks: taming the garden (as much as that can ever be said to be tamed) varnishing the exposed wood on the new and much larger thatched roof over our porch, cleaning everything in sight, building a work bench and shelves in the garage, and mounting the occasional expedition to search for a dresser, lumber, lamps and such.
We’ve also made a trip to the Capital to begin the application process for a resident visa.
I’ll return to Santo Domingo on the 27th to put Denise on a plane to DC where she’ll meet up with a visiting friend from Denver. I’ll have the car serviced while in Sto. Dom.
I imagine that we’ll take a few “days off” while H and C are here and visit a few beaches, loaf and read, play Scrabble and etc. We’re looking forward to that, too.
Hope that all is well with you all and that your days are comfortable and the nights cozy.
Bill
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Here’s a look at the bungalow from the garden below.
Doesn’t require much comment, other than to observe that they last pretty well in a vase, too.
Tags: Dominican Republic, Heather Wilton, Las Galeras, Living in the Dominican Republic, Retire, Retirement, Samana
Hi,
Denise and I sprinted the 65 or 70 kilometers to El Limon on Friday to the lumber yard (“WOOD, ONLY WOOD!”) to get some treated lumber to replace the porch on the bungalow and a few of the elevated walkways over the uneven lava terrain in the garden.
It turns out that our jeepeta, which is huge, could carry only about 1/3 of the required material. This was not a surprise, but was something of a disappointment, since I did not want to spend Monday traveling back and forth to El Limon, preferring to make progress on the porch, which is also the route to the bathroom in the Bungalow. I’m sure that Heather and Chad would concur with this prioritizing of tasks.
Alternative to returning to El Limon on Monday, I checked with our local hardware store, the Ferreteria Virginia, to see if they had the lumber that I wanted and if they could deliver in to our house later on Saturday.
Turns out that they could supply some wood–not exactly what I wanted, but close enough. They would have to get it from Samana and claimed that they could accomplish that all on the same day. These are the same folks who, to my growing amusement had been going through the exercise of getting some additional roof coating from Samana for weeks.
I’ve actually SEEN the roof material in their Ferreteria in Samana, more than once, during this period, and so was not overly optimistic about their capacity to deliver the wood at all, let alone the same day.
Nevertheless, we made out a draft bill of sale and specified the delivery address: “Memo Anderson; above the farm of Quiningo, near to the house of Christian Cabon” and I agreed to pay the driver upon delivery.
I figured that, at worst, I would cancel on Monday on my way to El Limon.
Lo, yesterday at around 4:30 PM I saw the truck from Virginia coming up the road alongside the farm of Quiningo! They found us with no troubles, had all of the lumber in satisfactory condition and at the agreed-upon price, unloaded and stacked it, and were gone before 5 PM.
I’m pretty optimistic that the carpenter (who shall remain nameless) can complete this work before Heather and Chad arrive on Thursday. If not, I am quite sure that I can.
We had some friends over for dinner and a really good time was had by all. We were awake well past midnight, extremely unusual for us, in either location.
Today is dawning sunny and the sea is once again calm. The hummingbirds and butterflies are hard at work in the garden and the mockingbird is trilling his heart out from his perch atop a tree out front.
Today my sympathies are with the mockingbird.
Bill
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Tags: Denise Hanna, Dominican Republic, Heather Wilton, Las Galeras, Living in the Dominican Republic, Retire, Retirement, Samana
Hi,
I gave myself a break from intensive gardening today and attended to plumbing issues preparing for Heather and her pal Chad to visit a little over a week from now. I know that she’ll appreciate running water and the perfectly functioning toilet that were my accomplishments today.
Houses, like bodies, seem to fare best when they’re used. This bungalow is coming out of its deep storage quite nicely, but EVERYTHING needs, at minimum, a bit of attention
I’d been with tools and parts in the bowels of the toilet tank for 15 or 20 minutes before I noticed a small frog eying me warily from behind the fill tube.
I ignored him and continued about my business, replacing a few worn parts. The frog continued about his business, which seemed to consist of keeping a wary eye on my activities.
I opened the valve allowing the gravity flow to fill the tank and test my handiwork. As the tank filled, the frog inched up the inside wall of the tank. Didn’t want to get his feet wet, I suppose.
As he crept nearer the top I began pursuit, eventually leading to a spirited chase all over the bano.
I’m pleased to report that I eventually caught up with him and persuaded him that he’d be happier elsewhere. We’ll see. Thus far my powers of froggy persuasion are singularly unimpressive.
The toilet works just fine, by the way.
I never imagined that retirement would entail such focus on toilets. Early retirement, at least…
The days have been flying by here; it seems to be time to watch the sun set before I realize where the day’s gone. On the positive side, the sunsets generally are on a par with the sunrises.
We’re contemplating some construction, beyond the necessary “catch-up” maintenance. An additional and larger cistern first, perhaps followed by those portions of stone wall around the perimeter of our property that are missing.
Vamos a ver…
It’s been good to hear from those of you who’ve dropped a note. Thanks for keeping in touch occasionally.
With the scanning assistance of my brother-in-law my Dad and step-mother have even joined the era of electronic communication, an event Dad swore would never come to pass.
I hope all is well with you and yours, in every event.
Bill
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Tags: Dominican Republic, Heather Wilton, Las Galeras, Living in the Dominican Republic, Retire, Retirement, Samana