Dominican Vacation – Day two with Eve.

I mention her so much because I spent 7 out of 8 days with Eve.

She is 19 years younger than me – could be my daughter.

It has been a trend in my life last three-four years  – one after another women young enough to be my daughters enter my life. Some stay to be friends, some leave and remain extremely hostile. All depends on where I and they are at the moment in our walk with God.

The truth is we are more than naïve when we think that we invite (or not) God into our lives.

Objective reality is – we all are part of His life either way – no matter if we acknowledge His existence or not, surrender our plans for life to bask in His plans for our lives or not, are aware of the fact that there is no way to hide from Him or not.

Eve told me her story on the first day during those two enjoyable lunch hours in the restaurant. Regardless of being born and raised in two very different countries, our lives had some significant similarities, faith in Jesus Christ is a major similarity, that made it possible to understand each other when big questions about life came up in our conversations.

Both she and I do not have good warm loving relationships with our families.

Both she and I live outside of our countries of origin and don’t have any intention of going back to stay.

Visit – maybe, but definitely not to stay. 

It has nothing to do with our friends in our countries of origin, it has everything to do with close and extended family relationships or absence of such. Neither one of us are revengeful or angry about it, we just wish things in our families were different than they are.

Luckily for me, Eve loves the sea and swimming, so that is what we did on day two – we swam, then read books then swam again. I ventured out to take an underwater video with my iPhone in a waterproof pouch and kept going back to the same spot to say ‘hi’ and ‘by’ to those fish from that day on until the end of my vacation.

On that day also, Eve and I went to look at each other’s apartments.
I knew she was unhappy with hers, but I was quite happy with mine, except for the shower not working, but hey, I am just a simple Russian woman, who used to wash herself in wash houses back in Russia when visiting my grandmother in a village and later in life. Most definitely those wash houses did not have showers.

I told Eve, the main thing to remember is – whatever it is in our apartments that is not quite to her (or mine for that matter) liking while vacationing – it is not forever, it is temporary. She was there for a whole month though, so it was not as easy to accept for her as it was for me – 8 days without shower, but with hot water running is not bad by any standard.

She really liked my apartment though – I had a sea view, a net to keep insects out of the apartment and no bad smell in the apartment.

We spent quite a lot of time talking about it and she told me that the idea of her living situation being a temporary one and not forever was helpful.

Eve and I spent the evening of day two in the company of our Russian friends. I must admit, it was rather entertaining to talk in 3 languages – Olga’s first foreign language was German, and Eve’s first foreign language was German as well. How true is the saying ‘if you don’t use it, you lose it’!

I could definitely recognize the German words when Olga was speaking, but it was very hard for me to build a single sentence. However, I was excited to remember more and more words.

I definitely needed them the next day. You just have to wait till the next post to find out why.

… To be continued.

Oh, if you purchase any products on the site where they sell that nice coffee maker, I will get commission 😉

Dominican Republic Caribbean Vacation - Day One with Eve

The day started as expected – with sunny calm weather and a gorgeous sea view from my bed.

I actually had a good coffee maker and yes, spent some crazy money at the food mart located right on the resort property when buying coffee.

I think the sales person makes up prices as she goes.

I spent quite a bit of money there on my first night when I was not emotionally stable because of events of the previous month and what happened on my way to the resort.

As of this writing, just over 3 weeks after the events, I actually got an apologetic phone call from Southwest Airlines that inaccurate info on their website caused me some stress during my vacation!
This is one more reason I will stay loyal to Southwest, just love how they treat their customers. 😊

Back to prices in Dom Republic.

I am very glad that I did some research about being a tourist there.
What I found out is – when I ask about price, rule number one is to always remember to bargain, because the locals name very high prices on everything when they realize that they speak to a tourist.

That worked very well for me when hiring a taxi to take me to theresort, but I completely forgot about it when shopping for coffee, wine and chocolate on the first night. All I cared for was that all of it was available.
Big mistake. Never to be repeated again kind of mistake. 😊

So, after a cup of good local coffee made in my apartment, off to the beach I went. My friend Olga was on the dock already enjoying the sea and after a short conversation with her I went swimming. That is how my morning went all the way till lunch time.

I spent a lot of time in the water swimming to the deep water, marveling at how clear it was far away from the shore. I got into trouble with a security guard as they did not want people swimming all the way into boat routes, as it is most definitely not safe.

Olga left for lunch a little earlier as her son was bored on the dock so she followed him to the resort water park. That is when a young woman came up to me and started talking to me in rather broken English.
We started talking and she asked if she can make me company for lunch. We spent about two hours in the restaurant together enjoying the food and the scenery.

Both Eve (was her name) and I were renters of condos and did not technically qualify for all inclusive buffet, which included tiny pastries and fresh cut fruit. Dessert buffet looked so incredibly good!

Eve and I asked our server if we could have some, expressed readiness to pay.
Our server went to talk to his shift manager to find out what to do about our request.
The manager went to check with the Chef, and we were granted permission to have dessert on the house! This became our daily game during lunch, and each time the Chef was gracious to let us enjoy ripe fresh fruit and delicious pastries.

It still amazes me that I got two friends on this vacation.
Both of them were kind to listen to my story of the previous month and candid about their experiences.

Eve does not have children and will not have any if she stays married to her husband.
She is happy in the marriage, so I told her that not having children is not necessarily a tragedy, things could be really grim when children become completely different adults than their parents had hoped they would.

That can be quite painful and make parents question if their efforts and years of life were wasted while raising that child.

Earlier in the day when talking to me Olga looked at the issue of why some young people struggle to find their path in life, comprehensively – how we feel physically and emotionally is largely dependent on how well we take care of our bodies.

This is where a lot of problems start. It looks innocent and everybody is inclined to give themselves permission to indulge in food and sweets and be a lazy coach potato. But results can be devastating both physically and psychologically.

Being fat (overweight, obese – whatever term applies to your particular life) is only a tip of the iceberg. What’s hidden are consequences of this imbalance. Fat cells in a human body become a source of chemicals which throw off balance many processes regulating our physical and emotional well-being.

What seems to be an innocent indulgence leads to lack of motivation, low self esteem and loss of purpose in life.
Yes, it is that serious. We are created to be lean and able to be of service to others.

As attractive as it seems, constant entertainment and indulgence don’t lead to better satisfaction with life, quite the opposite – lack of meaningful activity leads to loss of purpose in life and joyless existence.

… To be continued.

Oh, if you purchase any products on the site where they sell that nice coffee maker, I will get commission 😉

Want to guess what my new Russian friend’s name is?

On the first night at Cadaques Caribe I took my book and went to find a place to read. It’s a habit of mine to do reading and reflection while on vacation at the beach.

So, I went toward the beach in the dusk and realized, that the deck under the hut which has stairs leading into the water actually had lights on – so I could read a regular paperback!

In addition to that there were a number of blue lights shining into the water. The fish congregate to the light and of course, people feed them. That’s quite a show to watch them.

The next morning, I woke up to the sound of waves and the ocean view from my bed.

As much as I love beach vacations, I must tell you that I struggled all the way through 9 days that I spent in Bayahibe, Dom Republic.

Stress of the previous month and especially the night before the trip knocked me off balance emotionally to the extent that I actually bounced between not wanting to be there and realizing that being at home was pointless on one hand and impossible to manage on the other, as I gave my car to my son for the next 10 days, and he was expected to come back home one day after my return from vacation.

Back to the things I enjoy about beach vacation so much.

That view that I saw from my bed was definitely calling my name, so off I went. The narrow ‘streets’ and the warm air were so welcoming!

When I was already on the deck, wind took my hat off and threw it on the steps leading to the water. A security guard, who was right there caught it for me.

That security guard was extremely kind to me the whole time of my vacation. From my conversations with him I realized, that that’s simply who he is – a kind person who treats every guest the same. With hospitality and kindness.

He has my cat’s picture for the wall picture on his phone now. This is just a sweet and funny tidbit of my first Dom republic trip 😊

One more unexpected and pleasant thing happened on day one.

I am very used to meeting Russian people everywhere I go on vacation.

This time was no exception.

I heard a child’s voices saying in Russian ‘wow – look at that’. The little boy was snorkeling right in front of what appeared to be rows of rocks in the water. I saw those dark spots in the water on the pictures of thestudio and the location on booking.com, but did not realize that it was not sea weeds, but rocks.

When I actually was close to those ‘rocks’ in the water, I realized that they are man-made concrete structures to allow reef to grow and give fish place to live. That’s when I really regretted not taking my snorkeling gear with me.

Later I put my iPhone into a waterproof plastic pouch that I did take with me from home and fish have not disappointed me – they gathered around me and I have this video to remember that daily show.

I greeted the little boy’s mom in Russian and asked her name. She is my third Russian friend with the same name – Olga.

I must say, that usually I don’t make any friends while on vacation. It’s not like don’t communicate to people at all, but I think that everyone comes to their vacations with their own ideas of how and with whom they will spend their time there, and making friends is simply not what people have in mind.

But this time I did make friends with Olga. It started with small talk, but pretty quickly we were talking about our families and how to parent boys – Olga has two sons, so she has plenty of experience to share.

She did give me some good advice and introduced me to two Russian couples who used the same tour agency for their Dom Republic vacation. Those people were also very welcoming and accepting of me and a friend I made on day two.

But this is a story for next time.

Stay tuned!

… To be continued.

*oh, if you go to Amazon from this blog post and purchase something, I will get commission ;-)

How one gets to their Dominican Republic Vacation

I was really excited to book this vacation.

I tried to go to Dom republic in September 2017, but two back to back hurricanes stopped me from going there. As a matter of fact, the second one arrived to Dom republic on the day of my scheduled arrival.

Needless to say, I did not go there then, but ended up in Cancun and ‘suffered’ through it. 

It was a good experience overall and an excellent opportunity to have an end of vacation season trip to Caribbean, but stormy sea and not getting it my way took away from the experience. 

Not to mention, lack of knowledge of Spanish made me feel ignorant and awkward the whole week.

This time I was determined, so without waiting till hurricane season, I decided to go at the beginning of vacation season – starts with Memorial Day here in the US.

I talked about it to my hairdresser and she said multiple times, that if I were to go to Dom republic, it had to be on the Caribbean side, not Atlantic side.

I actually listened!

It took some digging around vacation rentals sites but I did find a great deal for a studio right on the beach on this vacation booking site. You can scroll down to see the pictures now, or just keep reading.

Can you tell that I was excited to have that vacation when I booked it in mid-March 2018?

Well, a lot happened between mid-March and the day of the trip.

I spent the whole month before the trip struggling with conflicting emotions about a sad event in my family.

From disappointment to anger (at myself), from lots of unknowns to resolve to trust God, from being upset with somebody else’s choices to understanding that my behavior needs to change too so I can become a part of solution instead of being part of the problem.

Then the night before the trip came around and my worst suspicions were not just confirmed, situation was actually much more severe and better at the same time – given that between the worst part and suspicions and my knowledge about it a whole month of hard internal work took place.

For that I am grateful. Big time.

My God never disappoints, that much I can openly and boldly say.

My flight to Punta Cana was uneventful. Coming from Atlanta any airport seems small, Punta Cana one was not an exception.

I read on Southwest Airlines website before the flight that all tourists from the US are supposed to purchase a tourist card upon arrival for a 30 day stay - $10. I was determined to do just that.

I am sure there is a competition between taxi drivers who gets passengers – people have to make a living one way or another, so I found myself being walked toward a vehicle, negotiating the price of the ride – it takes an hour to get to Bayahibe where my studio was, and on my way even before I had a chance to find where tourist cards were sold.

About 15 minutes into the drive I remembered about the tourist card. It took some persuasion but I got my driver to go back to the airport to get the card.

No one – not my driver, not his manager, not people who worked tour kiosk – I mean no one had any idea what I was talking about. Finally my driver after a short conversation with his manager took me to Southwest Airlines local office.

In the office I got my confirmation that I did not need a tourist card to be in Dom republic legally – the rules had been changed about a month before my arrival.

Considering what was going on in my life the whole month before the trip and the night before the trip, my emotions were pushed to the limit, and yes, I did cry when I had to make my driver turn around and go back to the airport, and on and off until I arrived to my vacation place early enough to enjoy two good hours of swimming.

... To be continued.

Oh, pictures of the pier with chairs and first morning view from my balcony are below. Enjoy!