[h0ldem]

What´s the problem about raising a kid in the RD? we´re doing it. My wife is Dominican I´m a Brit ex-pat. Our (now) 6 year old daughter goes to a private school here in LT, if I´m not happy about her progress I go to talk to the professoresa. Every day when my daughter comes home we talk through the day then we hav e at least half an hour of english and use that language to discuss the countries on the globe and anything else unclear that happened during the day. OK she´s not always enthusiastic about this but its surmountable. My 2 year old Dominican godson is staying with us at the moment and his Mum, their english too is improving. Bringing up kids her is a lot easier than in the UK. No stupid rules and regulations, i can dry my daughter after a bath, no cold, no drafts. After lessons we can play in the garden. Discipline works the same here as it did for my first brood, if I say NO it means NO. The neighbours are co-operative, although I do wish the parents would wash some of their children and clothes more often, still an obligatory shower and no street clothes befors using the piscina help's. Thjats all for now, lunch calls, insist we all eat together with NO television. ciao, I like it here.ñ

[Jueqelyl]

i came here because i fell in love with miesposo and i am staying here because we are married and he works here.
i do not need any other reason. nor do i have one.

[PHOTOSHOPoem]

I came here with my same-sex partner 3 years ago because we could find no other place to live legally. I'm from the US, he's from the Caribbean (not a Dominican). We are biding our time until we can return legally to the States. There was nothing compelling that drew us here except the lax immigration laws. Unlike many of you, I strongly feel my life can and will be much improved when I return to the States.

Aren't any of you ex-pats close to your families? I miss mine dearly!

[moredasers]

What´s the problem about raising a kid in the RD? we´re doing it. My wife is Dominican I´m a Brit ex-pat. Our (now) 6 year old daughter goes to a private school here in LT, if I´m not happy about her progress I go to talk to the professoresa. Every day when my daughter comes home we talk through the day then we hav e at least half an hour of english and use that language to discuss the countries on the globe and anything else unclear that happened during the day. OK she´s not always enthusiastic about this but its surmountable. My 2 year old Dominican godson is staying with us at the moment and his Mum, their english too is improving. Bringing up kids her is a lot easier than in the UK. No stupid rules and regulations, i can dry my daughter after a bath, no cold, no drafts. After lessons we can play in the garden. Discipline works the same here as it did for my first brood, if I say NO it means NO. The neighbours are co-operative, although I do wish the parents would wash some of their children and clothes more often, still an obligatory shower and no street clothes befors using the piscina help's. Thjats all for now, lunch calls, insist we all eat together with NO television. ciao, I like it here.ñ

They use the RD as an excuse for children turning out bad, instead of their lack of in-home education. No matter what country in the world you live in, 90% of everything your kid will ever learn is learnt right inside of your home.

Anyone who said their social life was better elsewhere, was because you have chosen not to become part of the RD culture. Social life here is extremely rich and fulfilling and the love I receive from friends and family is something that I have never felt living in the US. I felt like all of my friends in the US were broke potheads who just hung around me because I had beer money and a nice car. In the RD, my friends have just as much or more money than I do, and hang around me because they like my company. This opinion is coming from a half-Dominican so maybe there is a different perspective, but I have some Canadian friends here who are freaking awesome.. even if they say eh all the time.. lol

[Corporal White]

There has always been comments made about how the ex-pats just complain about the country and are always negative. Remember with negativity also comes love, a deep love that many ex-pats have for this country. This is home, where their heart now belongs. Do we expats complain, h*ll yes we do because we know this country can be so much better. Ex-pats will tell it like it is, the good, the bad and sometimes the ugly. But why do we stay, because it is home and home is where the heart is.

[Qncvqpgfg]

There has always been comments made about how the ex-pats just complain about the country and are always negative. Remember with negativity also comes love, a deep love that many ex-pats have for this country. This is home, where their heart now belongs. Do we expats complain, h*ll yes we do because we know this country can be so much better. Ex-pats will tell it like it is, the good, the bad and sometimes the ugly. But why do we stay, because it is home and home is where the heart is.

Well said!

[gennick]

Well, just my two cents. I have been one year living here (came on 1st Sept last year), and Im gonna be daddy.

Since I knew I was going to be daddy I started, without no doubt, thinking of leaving this country. Enough time to realise this is not a place to raise my daughter, or at least, better to say, it is not the place if you have the possibility to raise her in a western country.

Why? I think it is quite obvious my god! Infrastructures of this country, quality of healthcare, quality of studies, violence (here you can be killed for just a few pesos) and one more thing, if you want to have JUST a medium class live like I had in Europe, I have to spend really much more money than in my home town.

Cheers.

[DeronBoltonRen]

here you can be killed for just a few pesos

In my book , that's still better than getting killed for going to a movie (Hello Batman!), or to a youth camp (Hello Bleivik!) ....
If you ask me, that's the kind of thought you have after only 2-3 years (I know I had them). After that, you just start realizing the good things.

[zoolissentesy]

They use the RD as an excuse for children turning out bad, instead of their lack of in-home education. No matter what country in the world you live in, 90% of everything your kid will ever learn is learnt right inside of your home.

Anyone who said their social life was better elsewhere, was because you have chosen not to become part of the RD culture. Social life here is extremely rich and fulfilling and the love I receive from friends and family is something that I have never felt living in the US. I felt like all of my friends in the US were broke potheads who just hung around me because I had beer money and a nice car. In the RD, my friends have just as much or more money than I do, and hang around me because they like my company. This opinion is coming from a half-Dominican so maybe there is a different perspective, but I have some Canadian friends here who are freaking awesome.. even if they say eh all the time.. lol

Home and school hold very different but equally important fundamental life skills (education), yes what is taught in the home will be the foundations for what is learned at school, but your idea that children learn 90% of what they will ever learn is learned in the home is not typical, unless home schooled which I think seriously stunts child developement on the grand scale of things.
anyone who says the social life was better elsewhere was because they have chosen not to become part of Dominican culture?
You are stating that the Dominican Republic has the most valuable culture in the world? A Sweeping statement if ever there was one.
I appreciate your experience is different to everyone else's, and your history lays between the DR and the US, but you can't make judgement on everyone else's experience based on your own. Most would not agree 90% of a child's education is taken from the home, or that the Dominican Republic has the richest and most rewarding culture in the world, as you claim.
with respect and no offense intended.

[gennick]

In my book , that's still better than getting killed for going to a movie (Hello Batman!), or to a youth camp (Hello Bleivik!) ....
If you ask me, that's the kind of thought you have after only 2-3 years (I know I had them). After that, you just start realizing the good things.

Of course, you can be killed anywhere, for any reason .... but trust me, just an example, if you are robbed in my home town, 99% they will take your belongings and thats it, maybe if you resist, some hittings, but here in DR the possibility to be shot in your head when you are robbed is so so high ....

[JOR4qxYH]

I planned my exile after the photos from Abu Ghraid

the DR was the one country on my list which I had not yet visited, and thus, had not eliminated as a retirement option.

I have savings and worked as a journalist for a while and did a gig saving about 300 Haitians in exile and now am retired...

(but about to start this really groovy farm growing snails and mushrooms as soon as the dR1 team can locate a cave for me)

Finally, after 8 years, I am really starting to have fun!

i guess you would call it economical because in the States, I would be living at a MUCH lower level than I do here. My rent is reasonable and fixed, my cleaning lady mops the floor like a ballet dancer, the English library with 6000 books is three blocks away. The pool is one block. Ditto for the grocery, the pharmacy, the flower seller, the shoe repair guy, the groovy little French Dominican air conditioned restaurant, my two taxi drivers, my three fruit salesmen...... have to take a cab maybe once a month to see a movie over in that other section called Naco....

but i am lucky enough to live in Gazcue
on foot

I like your place. If there was an apartment for rent on the first floor, I'd love to move there. Nice and quiet(back at the rear, at least)

[Kolokireo]

One word: freedom!

[Kamendoriks]

And they're really gandules. They're only guandules in RD.

Actually it is known as gandul only in Puerto Rico, in Colombia Panama and Brazil and most of latin am is Guandu, in
Venezuela is Quinchoncho, in Peru is Chicharo, in Spain and in France is Guisantes de Angola.

[Mereebirl]

In French really ? pois d'angola ? never heard it, then again I have never seen gandules in France.

[Jueqelyl]

here is a note from wiki: Pigeon pea - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
apparently guandules are also called: gandule bean, tropical green pea, kadios, congo pea, gungo pea, gunga pea, fio-fio, mgbụmgbụ, or no-eye pea.
i love the word fio-fio
and i love how we stray off topic in every single thread

[VowJoyday]

One word: freedom!

Can you tell me what freedom a person has in Santo Domingo that a person in West Hollywood CA does not have?

[Jueqelyl]

i am pretty sure he means things like blasting loud music day and nigh and getting away with it.
or maybe driving wrong way with no light after few presidentes and getting away with it.

[zoolissentesy]

Can you tell me what freedom a person has in Santo Domingo that a person in West Hollywood CA does not have?

The list is endless if you are talking about actual enforcement, or lack of as is the case.

[alias]

Can you tell me what freedom a person has in Santo Domingo that a person in West Hollywood CA does not have?

jm; for one thing you could talk with a woman on the street (trying to get some) and not be a police decoy and be placed on the ground with a gun in your head and be arrested etc. Btw. it has never happened to me

[alias]

i am pretty sure he means things like blasting loud music day and nigh and getting away with it.
or maybe driving wrong way with no light after few presidentes and getting away with it.

Dv; that is not freedom....but libertinaje...practiced by the inconsiderados low class plebs