A Week in Review

Wow, today is hot! Well, I guess it’s not any hotter than any other day this week, but it definitely doesn’t help I have a sunburn. How did I get a sunburn? We had a softball double header today and I forgot the sun block. Our softball team lost both games pretty badly, 1-12 and 8-14, but they were still quite a bit of fun. I play left field and did pretty well, if I do say so myself! I had about ten pop flies hit to me and caught everyone but one, which was hit way over my head. I got on base three times and even managed to score once! I know that doesn’t sound like much, but as a pitcher in high school, I rarely got to hit. Our team didn’t let pitchers bat for fear they might get hurt. Tomorrow I have a volleyball game right after church which should be pretty fun, but if it goes like last week, I’ll be getting my helping of humble pie this weekend.
It started raining again on Tuesday which is usually no big deal. But down here, rain always means the water supply is going to be messed with. Luckily we didn’t lose water pressure, but our water did turn brown. Not exactly something I want to shower and wash dishes in. I took Beyla down to the beach for the first time and she loved it! She was terrified of the waves crashing but liked the sound they made, so she was in quite a quandary. Every time she would run into the water she would jump as high as she could in order to miss the waves. It looked hilarious! She made the mistake of trying to drink the water and got quite a surprise! She gagged and hacked and showed her teeth and carried on for about a minute every time water got in her mouth. I almost fell over laughing every time! What a funny dog!
Wednesday I spent the day in class with Kelsie. Pathology was pretty interesting but they showed some pretty gross pictures of different diseases. I can see how a lot of medical students get paranoid looking at all of the things that can go wrong. Later that evening I was invited to an ‘unofficial’ spouses’ meeting. There were only twelve people there and I was the only guy. It was pretty awkward at first, but after a few minutes I was included in the different discussions going on. I met a lot of new friends and after the meeting some of us went back to my house and played the Wii while Kelsie tried her best to ignore us and attempted to study. Here's a picture of us all loaded into our car on the way to my house. Thursday I went grocery shopping for the first time. It was quite an experience. There are four stores in our little section of town and in order to get even half the stuff on a list you have to go to all four stores. It gets kind of frustrating, but I’m told you get used to it. A lot of people go to Roseau, the capital, on Saturdays to go shopping. They have a much better selection at much better prices. Everything here is unbelievably expensive. Kelsie had told me that cheese is incredibly expensive down here and hard to find so I brought down twenty pounds of different cheeses. I know, I know, that’s a lot of cheese! We like our cheeses! I brought down a six pound block of mozzarella cheese I bought at Costco. I found the exact same block of cheese down here for just over SIXTY US dollars!! If that isn’t robbery on the high seas, I don’t know what is!
Tonight we went and ate at a new restaurant in Portsmouth called Adaj for a late celebration of our friend Justin’s birthday. It was pretty good but much overpriced. Kelsie and I both had the Mahi Mahi. It was good but not worth the 143ec we had to pay. The conversion rate is 2.6ec to every dollar. It was worth the money to spend time with friends and to make new ones though. Liz and Justin are two people Kelsie met the first day she arrived and have stayed in very close contact since. Liz has her own blog which I read religiously before I came down here in order to stay connected with what was going on here in Dominica. Both Liz and Justin have become very good friends to us and have helped me and Kelsie out a lot while Kelsie’s been here. I’m sure I’ll tell you more about them over the next year. Liz is a trip! They are both from Arkansas. It seems like everyone down here is southern or from Canada except us. Back to the dinner. There were thirteen people there and everyone had a good time. Kelsie and I arrived on time, half an hour before everyone except one other couple, and so we had time to get to know a couple, Jake and Christi. They are really nice and we instantly hit it off with them. Jake and I had so much in common that after five minutes, Jake asked me, ‘Are we going to be best friends?’ It was pretty funny. I guess it’s one of those ‘gotta be there’ moments. Jake and Christi also told us of a restaurant in Roseau that we can get all you can eat lobster tails for 60ec! That’s awesome! We’re definitely going to head down there soon. I look forward to more meals out with friends. It’s nice to get to know more people and start putting down roots, even if it is only for a year.
I apologize for taking so long to put up pictures and post another blog entry. I’ll try harder in the coming weeks and months to be more prompt in my updates. It sounds like such a long time when I put it that way. Weeks and months…

This is Kelsie and I at the dinner at Adaj.

As promised, I put up a few pictures. There is a picture of our highly competitive volleyball game in action and a couple pictures of a panoramic view from our house. The view from our house is spectacular and the pictures do not do it justice!

Inaugural Posting

Whew! I'm finally here! What a trip! After getting lost in Miami after my GPS battery died and being delayed a few hours in San Juan I arrived in Dominica. I'm glad to finally be here! Before I begin telling about the last five days I've been here, I feel I should let everyone know why I'm writing the blog. Before leaving home, my brother-in-law Brent tried to convince me to start a 'Bill Blog' so the whole family could keep up with what is going on in this section of the world. I initially dismissed his idea due to my great dislike of blogs in general. After I got here and thought about beginning the daunting task of emailing everyone to let them know I got here safely, what I've been doing and so on, I began to rethink my refusal to write a blog. It’s a whole lot easier to write my weekly goings on in one central place so anyone who cares can stay abreast with the fascinating journey that is my life without the need for me to email and cc everyone. That's the expanded version of why I am writing this. Hopefully someone will actually take the time to read it!
I'm not sure how often I'll write in the blog. I'm sure I'll start out writing quite a bit and will taper off as I get bored, tired, or just too busy, but until that time, I'll start posting at least once a week. I'd post more often, but I don't think I have enough going on down here to warrant writing every day. If anyone has questions or can think of something I may have left out or wants me to post something on a specific topic, such as grocery shopping, driving, what to bring if you're planning on visiting or moving here, just let me know and I'll see what I can do. I'm sure the format of the blog and writing style will change frequently as I figure out how to use this website or realize I'm completely boring everyone reading, so bear with me and feel free to give me constructive criticism! Swearing at me or calling me names is not constructive. Ok, enough on that topic; now to what I've been doing for the last few days...
Thursday
After I arrived on three hours late and endured the hour long ride to my new home, Kelsie paid the taxi driver, $100!!!, and let the dogs out. Beyla, our German Pointer, and Marley, Wire haired Dachshund, hadn't seen Odin, other Dachshund, for a couple of weeks so they ran around barking at each other for quite a while until Beyla and Marley got too hot and came inside. The dogs and I were so exhausted from the travelling and packing we didn't really have much energy for anything but sleeping. I was looking forward to eating and taking a nice, long shower. It had been raining steadily for about two days due to a very large, slow moving storm located directly over Dominica. Why is that important? Well, it wasn't until I turned on the shower. The running water here is pumped directly from the 365 rivers on the island and when it rains, the once calm rivers turn into churning, angry masses of water that fill with boulders, dirt and anything else that happens to be in the rivers' path. Our house is located on the side of a large mountain at the top of a hill. There are several other houses in line to receive water before us, so if there are any problems down below, we lose water pressure. When it rains heavily, the people at the beginning of the line turn on their tap and get brown sludgy water that no one would ever want to drink. The only filtering our water goes through looks a lot like the filter for irrigation back home. I know it sounds disgusting, but it’s actually some of the purest, best tasting water in the world. I would rather drink it than any bottled water you can buy. Back to my shower. Or lack thereof rather. The water came out in a slow dribble from the shower head and washed my away any hope of a nice, long shower. Well, it was long, but it wasn't nice. It was kind of like trying to shower while trying to rinse off with a small squirt gun. It took a while. That's alright though, Kelsie had bought me some fresh fruit juice that day and that took my mind completely off the stupid shower. After my shower I had a couple of large glasses of mango and passion fruit juice, completely disregarding the cardinal rule of taking it slow with the fruit juice when you first arrive. It took me a while to fall asleep, but it was still nice to be in a comfortable bed with my wife.

This is how much water pressure I had for my first shower. We didn't get water pressure for four days after that. Welcome to Dominica!
Friday
The fruit juice did its job...not that anyone wants to know. If you ever have any trouble going to the bathroom, drink some Dominican juice; it'll clear you up faster than a bottle of Draino! Ok, enough, I know, I know! Not a whole lot went on Friday except a lot of unpacking. A student organization Kelsie is involved with called Ross Christian Fellowship had a semesterly dinner so that took up our entire evening. We were in charge of the Mac n' Cheese, so I slaved over the stove and got that ready. We helped serve until about nine or ten and then went home. I got to meet a lot of people whose names I forgot as soon as I heard them, but we had a good time.
Saturday
Not much happened on Saturday except more unpacking. Kelsie and I spent some much needed time together and hiked around the trail by our house a little bit. We spent the evening playing Wii and enjoying each other's company. Sappy, I know.
Sunday
After church Sunday I had a volleyball game. I know I just got here, but I've already been signed up for a volleyball team and a softball team with prospects of soccer! The game was a lot of fun, hot, but we lost pretty pitifully. Although the games are just for fun, I kind of knew what direction the game would take when one of my team mates asked what the rules were just before the other team served the ball. Not a good sign! After the game, we went home and Kelsie studied while I read and watched soccer on tv. You'll hear that a lot on this blog: Kelsie studied. She is in med school after all! I'm sure I'll write more about the church services in later blogs, so those that feel their curiosity being piqued, I'll do my best later to satisfy you with pictures and maybe even video! Wow!
Monday
Today I have spent a good chunk of my day setting up this blog. I went grocery shopping today and hung around here mostly. It took me four 'stores' to get everything I needed for the pizza I'm making tonight. Shopping is quite an adventure, let me tell you! I'll complain about that later, right now I have to do some dishes before I go pick up Kelsie. I'll write more this week as things happen.
Because I am responsible for meals, I have to come up with things to make. I'm not very good at this so one of the things I'm asking of my very few readers is that you help me come up with ideas. Nothing extravagant because I can't get a lot of things here on the island, but any help would be greatly appreciated! If you can, recipes would be great!
Well, I hope you have fun staying up to date and reading this blog. I hope I do a good job and keep your interest! Let me know if you have any ideas for me. I'll get some pictures of this place loaded this week, so continue to check back.