ocean

It is amazing to walk along the shore of the ocean, you feel how little you are and how powerful is the nature. It rains and you already don't see further than 100 meters in front of you, it gets dark and you can't take your eyes off the sky - the moon and the clouds are just perfect.

Out life is always about "too". Too much, too little, too ugly, too pretty, to selfish, too nice, too hot, too cold, too old, too young.
"too young" - apparently i am now in this category.  whatever - life goes on :) 

new books, old thoughts

I decided today that i finally need to try Koelo just to get to know what he talks about. I even don't know how to write his name correctly and didn't want to read it, cuz he is too popularized... Read one book today - he talks about very true things. I do believe in that and agree that we are making our destiny by ourselves, we need to read signs in our life and follow our dreams. He just reminded me one more time about that :)
I miss the feeling of the backpack behind my back and the cars passing by on the highway. I think i had to be born a gipsie, or maybe i used to be in a life before. I like comfort - it is cool in the hotel now, but i think it is bad when it is too comfortable - it makes you lazy and kills desire for change.
Soon, very soon the time for the new travel will come, i still have some things to do here and after i am ready to go to whatever part of the world my life will take me.

p.s. and i am thankful to this authour for the thing that he reminded - some people just prefer to dream, without making these dreams come true. I was waiting so much for the call, or e-mail, or message that will tell me  smth like "everything is allrigh, i did that". But probably you are one of the people who just want to dream...

happy happy happy happy

Wow, sometimes it takes just one thought and one call to get what you were dreaming about.

After the talks with my friends and parents and  a small depression with the symptoms of home nostalgy, i took a decision to move away from Santo Domingo. i just felt like that.

Now i am in Hard Rock Hotel, starting with 1 week trial, which also includes accommodation in the supercool room with jackuzi.
What can i say, I came here and i had the purest feeling of happiness ever - the hotel is amazing, the music makes me sing all the time, the sky is immense, the people are smiling, i can continue a loooong list of The... i just want to give a hug to the world - that is how good i feel :)

I don't know for how long it will last, wish it will be more then 1 week. but even if not, that is worth it. definately.

It is a complete change after the last week that showed to me how bad  life can play with you, trying to make you stronger every day.  Last week tought me lessons that people don't learn in the universities, i needed it, i am sure. I feel like i have read a book about a life story, the only difference is that it was real.  I am very worried that i don't have enough power to change a lot of things yet. but i am working on it ;) and i need to hurry up, because in 18 days i will be 22 already...

searching

14 months. Or 1 year, 2 months and 2 days in Dominican Republic, or wonderland as many people tend to call this country. I think I am truly discovering myself here. I remember that in the childhood I wanted to be 1 day astronaut, another day – diver, another day – singer, another day – somebody else. I never had any single profession of a dream. I wanted it all. Try everything, a piece of each thing – good and bad. Later on I grew up, but nothing really changed in this direction. Couple of years ago I was thinking how cool it would be to live the life travelling from one country to another (cuz we have more than 200 in the world!!), or how cool it would be to try all the professions or at least as many as possible (and we have thousands!!).

Now I am doing something like that. In a weird way. Some of the friends already advised me to go to psychologist, but I don’t think that it is a solution. Maybe I am doing wrong, maybe I just need to settle and find “normal job”, and finally make my parents happy. But I am not ready for it yet, and I don’t know if I will ever be ready. I want to know life as it is. I want to keep exploring, I want to realize the project that I have started, cuz I already can picture it easily in the future, and It is like my baby, it means a lot to me. During these 2 months of the independent life I discovered more than in 4 years of the uni.  I worked in a call center - never thought I will.  I tried myself as a teacher, and I  actually enjoyed it a loooot – it is incredible feeling when all those little creatures in a small clothes are running to you and screaming “teacher, teacher”, I think I can do it for the rest of my life. I even worked one night as a bar tender and this is supercool – and “si dios quiere” I will continue.

I met a lot a good people – people with big dreams and great heart. I met strange people – types of personalities that I have never met before. I met mean and hypocrite people. I love meeting people, and listening to their life stories, and with the project and the change of jobs it goes with a double speed.

Sometimes I get the feeling that it is a time to move on(especially when the parents a friends are starting to tell it) but then I look back and: no, that would be too easy just to give up, through to trash the idea and 2 months of work and find an internship in a comfortable country. I know that The Real Thing will work, I just need to be patient and as the song says “if you want it, it will come” ;)

P.S. and yes, Zona Colonial is a special place, it just makes my heart smile

sea and this island...

I love this country more and more every day. It really teaches you that you can not be sure in anything and rely on anything but yourself. Also i have learned here that you don't need a lot to be happy.

You don't need a huge house and 5 cars to be happy. You don't need a maid and fua gra every morning. You don't need to go to expensive resorts and have a Cartier jewelry.

The simple things make you feel good. Seing  how the city is waking up and people are starting to go to work, and you know that u have a full day off. Dog, running to you with a happy crazy face at 6 a.m. and trying to play. 5 minutes on the seaside, when there is a lightning flashing and you hear sounds of approaching thunder and can't define where the sea ends and the sky starts. People, desperately devoted to god singing on the street using loud speaker. Hug of a neighbour and a handful of limoncillo right from the tree.

The good start of the day. I love living like that. And the one simple rule i would wish everybody could keep in mind is never to stop and never get devastated. The next day may bring smth good, or something that you didnt expect to happen. Still, it is all part of the game ;)

call center vs prostitution

I think you can actually compare work in the call center with prostitution.
You sell yourself for hours, some of the customers got satisfied, some of them are a bit agressive, some don't know what they really want.
I don't know in which of this job you are actually happier - i just tried one of them :)

P.S. and Zona Colonial keeps surprising me every day. the guy on the hourse with a carrige just gave me a ride yesterday.

Zona Colonial / St Petersburg

I feel sometimes that Zona Colonial was just taken from St Petersburg and put in Dominican Republic. I do feel like home here and I think i know why:

1. The buildings. Some of the buildings in Zona Colonial are 5-floor and they have exactly the same style as those in St Peterrsburg

2. Artists. If you walk around in St Petersburg, especially in the center you would meet bunch of people doing arts of different types, and f course the city itself - it is not called cultural capital for nothing. theater, music, painings, art lovers are hapy in St Pete. Aparently Zona Colonial is the same. Every day I meet a new artist and right now i have a neighbour who is an amazing person with a big dream and he is doing all the possible  arts in the world

3. River and a sea. no comments

4. Weird people. That is definetely important. It is too boring when it's normal.
Well, like my dad said - in St Petersburg you can even put a clothespin to your hair and it would be considered fashionable. In Zona and in this country in general people are not that liberal about the style, but the amount of weird people is kind of equal. You can see them walking along the streets talking to themselves, or just waving you in the park every time you pass by, or in the small local cafeterias, starting to talk to you out of the blue. Friends say that i have a special talent to meet weird people, don't know if it is true or it's just too many of them here.



P.S. and damn, apparently music is a pure mathematics

art night

Feels nice here - the roof of my house, catching a signal from Casa de teatro, some starts in the sky, warm weather. I just finished painting my jeans that i got for 10 pesos in the Duarte street.
Finally. i got a guitar. thank you, Artie. for 2 months i will be learning how to play it. I bet i will ;)
In the evenings like this you forget about everything, just nice conversations with the neighbours and now the sound of the wind here in the roof. It is a bit sad that i will have to move from this place - have just 7 days left to find smth new, hopefully it will show up. Actually i like changing the places - it feels a bit like travelling, u explore, u get used to the new environment, you discover new things. So, new appartment - i am comming ;)

Hehe, Gabriel, i love your comparisons.
"The job interviews in this country are like guys" - the next day you say "oh, why they didnt call me..."

so true.
Well, they actually called in the end, it took a long time though. Not selected, native spanish needed. come on, my spanish is almost native))) well, actually it is more dominican then spanish :) no job in IKEA, it's fine - at least i am learning smth from going to the interviews

And I am getting used to my schedule - developing the exercises on how-not-to-start-falling-asleep around 23 p.m. I start to discover people at work - they are actually interesting and each of them has own story to tell. it is an unexpected weird experience - working in this call center for fixing TVs for american people, especially after not watching TV for 4 or 5 years and having some inborn prejudies about americans that i am trying to fight with.

P.S.  i am always happy to talk about the things that inspire me, and i will be the happiest person in the world if the idea of "the real thing" will spread. And i realised couple of days ago that it is slowly starting to do so. I was amazed when I just asked my friends to "Like it" on facebook and they not only started to Like, but as well comment, re-post it and ask their friends to like.

p.p.s. I am using too much the word start right now - i wonder to which one i will switch in 3 months :)

sunday

That was a very relaxed sunday - i needed smth like that for sure after such an intensive week.
Yesterday it happened - the first excursion of the Real Thing! I was worried, excited, all the emotions mixed. But we did it good. Funny thing is that 2 dominicans participated supposingly wanting to "get to know real Dominican Republic."
That's cool to see people happy after eating the huge portion of sancocho and the faces of local guys in the barrio seing so many white girls at the same time. Project has a future. definately. And our team is cool - we complete each other. i am happy. One more cool thing is that the theory actually works - if you want smth very bad it comes to you, comes randomly - people whom you didnt see for ages appear, people whom you know start telling u stuff u never thought they know.exactly at the time you need.

And btw, I finally felt the impact of AIESEC. Not somewhere sitting in the office or going to the universty recruiting people. Right there in the finca of Carlos, where all the family gathered and before the meal pronounced a speech. You could see how happy and pround the they are of their son. Carlos, i do hope u will have a great internship and as u are crazy person, nothing should scare u ;)

And it is smth about the latin families that makes me think. They are so so connected. U have an event and everybody is there and if they are not there u receive calls from all the parts of the world. They are big and loud, with a lot of kids and grandparents. they are charming. They will count on u to continue the family business and even without any pushing u will actually feel the responsibility to continue it. You dont even need to go to the shop, u can have a natural household and exchange the goods inside the family(and for sure somebody from the family members will have a shop).They never get tired of dancing and gossiping. And thinking about that i realised i miss my family. We are not that big. and actualy if u just take family-family we are 3. But we dont need more. I remember how i used to come from school on fridays and find the beautifully served table with wine, because on fridays we usually have "the relaxation evening", or how we used to go shopping in IKEA and my dad would stay waiting for us eating hot dogs while we were running around the shop, or how we would go by car to the black sea and talk all the way about russian history, politics, business and all the talks will finish with the one about "what u gonna do in the future". They tell me every day "come back home". And every day i tell them "not yet". It is a bit sad, but the thing that makes me happy is that even being in Dominican Republic i i can call my mom to complain about the guys, or call my dad to ask what to do if the radiator is getting hot. I love my parents.

что наша жизнь? Игра

That is the phrase from the famous russian show and it is quite true for me now. Deciding to stay here for an undefined period of time after the official year in Dominican Republic ended i signed myself into the game, and even i dont know yet the rules or possible outcome of it and I prefer not to get to know them, but create them.

Every week brings smth strange and new. Monday started with a afternoon conversation in the park with Pavol, meeting the russian guy, who collected in himself more stories then any book about adventures and continued into the party with Pavol and Manuel - so called bar crawlling, where i discovered very cool place - the bar inside the appartment, which is not defined by anything and you will find it only if you know ;)

The trainings in the call center finally started  - I didn't understand yet how i feel about it. From the one point of view i am learning, from the other - it is a bit not my environment - too americanized. so i still need some more time to get into it. But the schedule is crazy thought - comming home at 1, waking up at 9 and from 9 to 14.30 trying to find the place around where i can use computer. Yes, i still dont have a laptop and i think i am going crazy cuz of that.

But this is the way how u learn to bee more efficient - cuz when u know that u have 1 hour in the spanish library u do need to manage to do everyrhing in this one hour, until the kids will start running around you trying to get into the PC before u even stand up from the chair. Yees, that gives u adrenalin rush

And finally the thing that i cant stop thinking now 24/7 is the project. "The real thing" brings me excitements and disappointments every day. It is very very interesting to be opening smth on your own, it is interesting to work with the team, it is interesting to learn dominican history. Do u know why the coconut palms grow on the seaside? Every and each day i learn smth new, i meet people who give advice - sometimes good, sometimes totally useless, people who are happy about the idea, people who criticize. Every comment is really valuable and all the things almost got settled in my head. Almost. It takes time, but it is extremely interesting.

new life

Those days have been very very weird. It was like a life from the book or movie– when you dont spend more then 30 min at home, meeting one friend after another. I realised that this year didnt go invane if there are so many good people around. And it feels great to live here, to talk with the neighbours, meet people, to walk along the old streets and to drink coffee in the place that is 90 years old. Neighbours are funny – 2 lesbian women, guy from israel, haitian guy, spanish cooker, cuban history books writer, old lady, administrador with weird life story, the girl that i apparently know, and some more that i dont know yet. I really enjoy, and even though i feel that i am not doing anything right now i cant blame myself, because from Tuesday i will start working as a slave. A bit too much alcohol on the weekend, but i just had to drink a shot of whikey, and Adaica stopped me from doing stupid stuff so its fine.J
I got disappointed again in dominican men, and confirmed my opinion that it doesnt make sence to start smth with smbd here. The funny thing now is that i am starting to have a Collection of men to whom i can call if i suddenly realise that i need a lover. But knowing the dominican men i cant rely even on that offer.
We signed the contract. It starts, the Project. I am very very excited and i am ready not to sleep to bring it to life. The Touristical route is almost done and now we need to search for the clients. The freaking rain can let the things down a bit, but it is a managable issue. We have a great team, we are starting the website already, so the things are moving on. I am sue We´ll do that. Papa Francis, i need laptoooop

new page starts

In one week from now the experience in AIESEC DR will be over. I dont really want to analyse it here, should have written so many pages before :)
but now starts smth new. I have sent to my parents the facebook message asking them to sign the contract with me, investing right now a bit of money in my development with the condition that in december I will pay them the trip to Dominican Republic. I dont know yet what their answer will be, but i do think it is possible.

You know how it feels when u are burning with the idea? when u just created smth, caught the wave? the ideas are are in the air, they come up in the conversations with random people, they are waiting for us to find them... and Bam!! it´s here! And it can be the weirdest thing ever, but u are so proud and ready to tear the world for it ;)  and the most important - you have people who want to do it with u.  i can´t sleep, i wake up at 7 a.m. with an awesome feeling

and now i´m in this state of mind - happy, anxious, ready for the new step.

the only thing that the last 3 days were not that happy. it´s true that the health is the most important thing, so, please, dear angina, let´s make an agreement that you will leave me the fuck alone starting from tomorrow ;)
 it´s impossible when outside is almost 40 degrees and your body has almost 40 degrees...