Warning: Epically Long Post

Because tomorrow is going to be kind of busy (more on that later), I don´t think I´ll have time to post. But, since I had to book it this morning and because today was so action-packed, all of my (no longer entirely hypothetical, thanks to Sam Clark´s comment on my introductory post) readers are being treated to a bonus post tonight. If you so choose I recommend you split this post up into a couple readings. There´s kind of a natural break after the ninth paragraph, so you can catch your breath there if you want.

Before I go on to discuss today´s events, though, I´ve got to share one thing that was left out of this morning´s posts: our vaguely creepy hotel with Eurotrash nightclub lighting (pictures to come, I swear) has a really sweet rooftop. After dinner last night, we killed a few hours sipping on Presidentes and enjoying the cooler night air. I imagine I might be headed up there again after I finish this post (but not before--I care that much about my readers).

As I said earlier, today was action-packed. It began with breakfast on the aforementioned roof--although I didn't try the coffee, Sam, I hear they used the good beans--which was followed by a presentation on Dominican culture by John Seibel of the MLB's Dominican office. This was the sort of presentation that would have assuaged many of my fears about our un-preparedness before the start of this trip. Although any hour-long cultural crash course is bound to have its failings, if that's where I'm getting the bulk of my knowledge of the DR then I'm glad my presentation was from John. (I also imagine most people would agree that a cultural course of any length is bound to have shortcomings, as cultures are multifaceted and diverse, not homogeneous monoliths). He first came to the Dominican Republic in 1971 as a Peace Corps volunteer, and has been here pretty much ever since, and he and his wife have raised " a couple bi-lingual, bi-cultural children" (his endearing word-choice, not mine). His primary work was in economic development, but he has long done consulting for the MLB and, since it opened in 2003 (?), he has headed the league´s Office of the Commissioner here in Santo Domingo.

Among (what I believe to be) the most useful and relevant information Mr. Seibel shared with us was that the Dominican is the most Spanish of the countries in the Latin Carribean, as its identity is defined in large part in opposition to the identity of the country with which it shares the island, the former French colony of Haiti. He also briefly touched on the history of the eradication of the islands native nation/tribes, which we would learn more about during our tour of the Colonial District later that morning, and shared with us his belief that, despite their habit of giving sometimes seemingly insulting nicknames (because of his somewhat over-sized melon he´s been dubbed cabezon--fat head), they´re actually a very accepting people--unlike America, people of different skin colors aren´t assumed to be different but are rather all considered to be just Dominican. It´s worth noting, though, that there is some pride in the heritage of their native peoples, as indio, a sort of pale brown, is considered to be the"perfect" skin tone.

Mr. Seibel also noted that the DR is yet another Latin American country which has a long history of American meddling--it has been invaded by US troops twice, once in the 1910s and again in the 1960s. That´s gotta make Dominicans feel good, because, really, if we hadn't invaded at least once, they would have to feel awkward around all of their neighbors.

(Seeing the above linked list is absolutely crazy--thinking about how impoverished and generally effed up a large part of this region is, it makes me especially glad to see the US occupation of Iraq end. I certainly believe we owe a large thanks to those who served over there, but I believe that best way we can say tell them thank you is to allow all of their work and sacrifice to actually amount to something good--and the best way to do that is to get them out as soon as we responsibly can.[ /editorial] )

I also enjoyed John's baseball-related asides. He made the interesting claim that due to its diversity (black Americans such as Josh Gibson, Satchel Paige, and [warning: best name ever coming] Cool Papa Bell were allowed to play alongisde white and Latinos) many believe that in the late-1930s the best baseball in the world was played in the Dominican Winter League--those game would have been something to see! He also noted while talking about nicknames that although he's gone on to great things in the big leagues (PED use? What PED use?), Miguel Tejada is still called guagua (the local word for bus) for the way he runs to first base.

Mr. Seibel's run-through of our itinerary assuaged some of my other fears, as he confirmed that we would be flying a little less blind than I thought--among our stops over the next week include visits to the Esperanza International offices and an organic coffee and avocado plantation tomorrow (where we will be eating lunch--YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and an award-winning cigar co-operative which sells directly to American buyers (I obviously don't have the full story yet, but my hunch is its buyer/seller relationship is similar to a local farm buyers' club, except instead of getting local produce the buyers get Dominican cigars). I´m very happy that we'll have these experiences under our belts while trying to figure out what sort of form our micro-credit operation will take.

Lastly, John also confirmed that the guys would be staying on-site in the dorms at the Padres' training facility while we're in Najayo, which should be an unique and cool experience. Don't feel too bad for the ladies, though, as they are staying at La Playa Planque, which is so-named because one walks out its back door and finds oneself right on the beach (the eponymous playa). So I think all parties are pretty happy with those arrangements.

Following Mr. Seibel's presentation we were given a guided tour of the Colonial District by the irrepressible Lynne Guitar. Lynne, a Vanderbilt PhD in history and anthropology who has lived in the DR for twelve years and whose expansive local knowledge is matched only by her ability to talk, showed us many of the neighborhood´s buildings and landmarks, including La Plaza Colon, El Alcazar Colon (the house of the Governor of the Indies, Christopher Columbus´s son Diego), and the Colegio Santa Clara. Goings on at Santa Clara were the basis for the novel Don Juan--basically, back in the day, there was a Dominican Supreme Court jusitce who loved deflowering the nuns there. It will surprise those of you who know me well very little that this quickly became my favorite building in the district.

Lynne also filled in some more gaps in our knowledge of Dominican history. She explained that the US invasion in the early-1900s was a kind of pre-emptive strike before there was such a thing as a pre-emptive strike: the US was concerned that the DR´s sugar debts would cause European countries to invade, so, in order to protect its own interests, the US struck first. The invasion in 1965 was driven (as most [all?] American foreign policy was at the time) by the fear of Communism. The dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo fell with his assassination in 1961, and the Socialist Juan Bosch won the 1965 popular election. The US, of course, would have none of it, and after its invasion installed Bosch´s right-hand man, Joaquin Balaguer, as president.

Lynne also elaborated greatly on the native culture, her specialty. There were between 4 and 6 million natives and 5 and 9 major nation-tribes on the island at the time the Spanish discovered Hispaniola for themselves. Chief among the nations was the Taino (a term which is often used as a catch-all for all the nations). Within three generations of the Spanish occupation, though, disease, mistreatment, and a system of indentured servitude (which Lynne tried to convince us was somehow better than slavery--my somewhat less expert opinion goes something like, "You say potatoes . . .") reduced the Taino population by almost 90%. It is important to note, though, that intermarriage between Spanish men and Taino women resulted in the birth of many children whom the census counted as Spanish but were Taino in many significant cultural ways (children being raised almost exclusively by their mothers at that time).

After that we enjoyed a wonderful lunch down the street from our hotel. The candied plantains (do bananas need to be made sweeter? No. But can they be made sweeter? Hell yes!) were probably the biggest hit, although the meat-eaters also really enjoyed a dish which may have been either pork or chicken, no one was sure.

On any other trip what we did immediately following lunch would have been a highlight--a visit to MLB´s Dominican office. Mr. Seibel again played host (again there was coffee, and again I passed--I´m saving myself for the plantation), and he and his staff discussed issues facing both individual clubs and MLB as a whole in the Dominican: identity and age falsification of prospects, the management of teams'Latin American academies, making sure that the league and teams give back in the community, relations with the Dominican government, and the possible institution of an international draft (although they said several times that they have no official stance on the issue, they seemed to hint quite strongly that we could see one much sooner than we think). Mr. Seibel and his staff were gracious hosts and very interesting speakers, but our time there was grossly overshadowed but what we did next.

(Warning 2: What I am about to write is probably going to be very cliche. That makes it no less true.)

One of our guides, Danny, lives in a barrio a ways across Santo Domingo from the offices. We had been told before leaving that we were going to visit this barrio, and my classmates and I had accumulated quite a collection of sports equipment (and scratch-and-sniff stickers) which we were told we would be able to distribute at a local ballfield. We showed up at what seemed to be the tail0end of a game, and then the players and their coach sat down with us while Danny translated for the coach. He told us how all of the players on his team were required to stay in school, and how in the Dominican families hope that their children will become one of two things: a working professional with a good career, or a ballplayer. He spoke of how, due to their lack of equipment, he often trains players by having them swing sticks at either kernels of corn or bottle caps--one can only imagine that hitting a twelve-to-six curveball gets a little easier after waving a broomstick at a wobbly plastic disc.

And then the kids who were probably about ten-to-twelve years-old kids played a couple innings. I found it especially poignant when, after one batter circled the bases on a series of errors, clearly missing second base, the coach called time and walked out to the mound to show the pitcher how to properly appeal. The player then came to a set on the rubber, stepped off, and threw the ball to the shortstop who was standing on second base. The batter was called out. (Warning 3: cliche gets really bad right here.) This moment really struck home with me because I think I was almost exactly that age when my and I had almost the exact same interaction when I was almost the exact same age. These kids and I grew up a couple thousand miles apart, but maybe really closer than that, eh?

I admittedly still have misgivings about this sort of interaction. A couple of us had a little discussion upon arrival about how we felt sort of voyeuristic, and for me the feeling didn't ever entirely go away. I had this roll of stickers, and while some people pulled theirs out and got swarmed by kids and gave them away one-at-a-time, I just couldn't bring myself to do it and instead just gave my whole roll to one kid while no one else was looking. ("Quieres?" Silence. I hold one sticker up on my thumb and stick it on his cap. He continues staring. "Quieres?" I hold up the whole roll. More staring. "Toma [I don´t know how to type accents on this keyboard, but I feel the need to tell you that this "a" had an accento, because I´m pretty sure that's the correct command-form conjugation and I´m proud of myself for remembering ] , amigo." He takes the roll. [Yeah, it was awkward. ] ).

Regardless, though, I came to the conclusion that this was one of those moments that just went best if you got over yourself. The kids were obviously happy while swarming my classmates to get their stickers, and some other kids had fun playing soccer with Diego, my Brazilian classmate who had brought them a brand new soccer ball. Sometimes, postmodern crises are overrated. I've just got to get better at remembering that in real-time.

Dinner was at what seemed like a pretty touristy place, where several of the staff members put on a quite a show dancing the merengue. This is another moment that I might have enjoyed more if I could just let myself get over questions of authenticity, but it was still really cool. And it was questions of dignity, not authenticity, that kept me from getting up and dancing when one of our guides tried to pull me up on the floor to join her.

Like I said, it was an action-packed day. Tomorrow (which is now today) should also be a good one--along with the aforementioned visits to Eperanza International and the organic coffee and avocado plantation, we´re also supposed to visit the Mets baseball academy on the way back. I imagine several more ice cold Presidentes will be consumed tomorrow night, as it's our last night in the big city before we leave for Najayo.

I leave you with a couple notes that I didn't know where to fit in this post:

1) Our buses are awesome. There will be pictures of them at some point, I swear. I´ve been trying to convince the class we need to name them, but so far haven´t gotten any traction. I don´t understand why my classmates aren´t as excited as I am about riding everywhere in buses dubbed "Big Papi" and "Jason Bay."

2) There is a lot more spaghetti in the Dominican diet than I had realized.

3) There is exactly as much white rice in the Dominican diet as I had thought there would be.

4) 2 and 3 are a bad combination. I´m thinking if I can keep it under 10 pounds in 10 days I´ve done good work.

5) We've started playing this game where when we´re out we see who can find the most obscure American athlete´s jersey. I saw a dude in a Lavar Arrington jersey, which was pretty good. Other finds include LeBron and Jordan (obviously), a sweet Charles Barkley Suns uni which was way too tight for the guy wearing it, unconfirmed Magic Tracy McGrady and Redskins Warren Moon finds, and the current leader: a Milton Bradley Oakland A´s shirt. Although it´s not a jersey, I´m holding out hope for a Buffalo Bills, Super Bowl Champions sighting.

6) Good night. My other posts will be nowhere near this epic. I promise. Maybe.