Waite Family Journal: DR part two- Santiago

We stayed right in the middle of the city of Santiago within walking distance to this Monument (Monumento a los Héroes de la Restauración) and the "Calle del Sol" where we went shopping for all our souvenir type stuff.

Lots of stairs. Joseph took this picture right before I pretended to be Rocky Balboa and ran up all the stairs. Que theme music.

You really had to watch where you step. There were A LOT of uncovered holes like this. Good thing we weren't walking on this side walk in the dark! Building codes are not quite the same as in the US.

Joseph took some funny pictures to share with his co-workers of the attempts the Dominican government has made to accommodate handicap people. They really expect people in wheelchairs to be pretty strong and talented in order to maneuver the ramps that are marked with handicap signs. Joseph and I did witness evidence that their disabled are pretty skilled. As we were walking along, we noticed a man in a wheelchair speeding down the busy city street in amongst all the cars and motorcycles. He was going so fast UPHILL. I couldn't imagine how he was going so fast, but as we watched he caught up to some traffic that was slowing at an intersection, grabbed onto the back of a motorcycle and hung on. Taxis and buses don't have ways to accommodate these people as far as I could see, so this must be how they get around!

I fell in love with this stone and its beautiful color! This is what google has to say about it:
"Larimar, also called "Stefilia's Stone", is a rare blue variety of the silicate mineral pectolite found only in the Dominican Republic, in the Caribbean. Its coloration varies from white, light-blue, green-blue to deep blue."

We bought jewelry for Kilynn and Marji and our babysitters.

While we were shopping on Calle del Sol, This man in the picture below struck up a conversation with us. He knew some English so I'd get little bits and pieces. He was talking about how tourists come and only see certain places but ignore other more important sites. He wanted us to visit a museum that was supposedly just around the corner. Suddenly we were following him through the streets and I was feeling pretty wary. I probably wouldn't have been so nervous if I could have understood more of what he was saying, but I was a little worried that we were being led somewhere other than what he had said. Luckily we did end up at a museum. Not much of one, but it had some tanks to look at, some prison cells where maybe prisoners of war (?) were kept, and some murals. He gave us a very rushed tour that I couldn't understand. All the while we were wondering what kind of pay he was going to expect for his services as our (un asked for) "tour guide." At the end, he said he volunteers at an orphanage and the pay he asked for was that we buy him a package of diapers and some milk. We agreed and he led us to a corner store nearby where he selected the diapers and a huge can of powdered milk. It all came to about $50! I felt good about that, as long as he didn't turn around and sell them for a profit for himself...

A mural at the museum commemorating important women in Dominican History.

Our lunch. They gave us so much food at this place! Not every meal was this huge but they all included rice and beans and fried plantains. All this food totaled to about $6.00! We gave the left overs to a beggar.

We were tired of walking, so we went into this cathedral to take a break.

An example of what the poorer houses look like. It is sad because you see a beautiful stream, but you take a closer look and see pipes going from the houses the river and as you walk over the bridges you can definitely smell the raw sewage.