Today was the first day of the rest of my Peace Corps experience—and boy was it an experience! Most likely, I will never forget this day for the rest of my life (for multiple reasons detailed below).

The day started off at 5am, with packing up in Santo Domingo (my three large bags) and heading to a nearby conference center to meet my Dominican community project partners (for the first time!). Obviously excited and nervous (first impressions are very important), I was greeted by 3 women from my future community and passed the morning in orientation sessions. They were well-dressed young/middle aged women who were kind and friendly. My initial thoughts on my project partners:
• Women—shucks, I need some men to carry these bags!
• Women from both El Guayabo and Los Ramones came—I really will be working in more than one community.
• These women started traveling at 1am from El Guayabo to make it to Santo Domingo by 8am..this is very telling.

After informative sessions and lunch, we left for Santiago Rodriguez. Luckily for me, 6 project partners (all located in the Santiago/Santiago Rodriguez area) rented a bus to drive us to our sites! I didn’t have to lug my bags on public transport (although it would have made for a great story)!

This is where my adventure begins (so “Peace Corps”):

So we leave Santo Domingo at 1:30 and speed 5 hours north on a bus (stopping after 2.5 hours to drop off the 3 Santiago volunteers), and arrive in Santiago Rodriguez around 6:30pm. On the way we stopped in some random town and went to the most wonderful colmado with wine, peanut M&Ms, fresh yogurt and cold apples and fried chicken. Heaven. Okay, continuing. So just as we roll into Santiago Rodriguez it starts pouring cats and dog, with flash flooding on the road. So we pull over. Turns out, this is where Meg, one of the Santiago Rodriguez volunteers, needs to get off to go to her site. This is very unfortunate for not only is it flash flooding and Meg doesn’t have a rainjacket, but Meg had conveniently chopped her fingertip off that morning in a fence (and went to the hospital) and now has to ride for 30 minutes on the back of a motorcycle. In the rain. With a bandaged finger. Fording 3 rivers (no joke). We all nervously laughed and said our goodbyes. Very ominous. Me and the other Santiago Rodriguez volunteer rode on the bus for another 20 minutes in the rain (meanwhile I quickly changed out of my shoes into my tevas and got the rainjacket ready). We got let off on a corner, and then got on in the cab of a pickup truck, that would take us further into the countryside (which is the only means of transportation to our site). Our project partners, without rain jackets sat in the bed of the truck with our suitcases, amidst the rain (I passed my rainjacket to the people in the truckbed, but it ended up being worn by a random man). I prayed for the survival of my laptop, which I had tucked under a pile of clothes in my suitcase.We off-roaded in this pickup truck for another 40 minutes into the countryside, barreling through the rain and up the mountain side (no speedometer, no defroster). Me and the other volunteer joked about imminent death, while in reality this was probably no joke. The truck barreled through the water of 2 rivers, which were not yet flooded beyond capacity. Then, the truck stopped in front of someone’s house, and I unloaded my goods and said goodbye to the other volunteer. Turns out, the truck was going no further to my community. I sat in this random family’s house and shared my last cookies with some little boys, as my project partners tried to contact someone to come pick us up in the rain (no signal, of course). It seemed as though I was going to have to leave my bags at this house overnight and begin walking to my final community. However, at the last minute, the man of the house got his old Tracker SUV to function and offered to give us a ride up to my community. Hurray! So, we ventured over land (a grassy path—not even an unpaved road) by car for another 20 mins in the rain. By this point, it was around 8pm and I couldn’t help by laugh at how absurd this journey had become. Literally, I was smiling like a madwoman. This was truly a “Peace Corps” experience. As we neared the final river separating me from El Guayabo (final community) we stopped. The river had overflowed and was uncrossable in car. So, we unloaded my bags at some random person’s house next to the river (once again) and said goodbye to the Tracker. It seemed as though I would have to leave all my belongings at this woman’s house because they couldn’t be transported past the river. So, I packed the essentials into a small shoulder bag, and we ventured for the river. Turns out, my community was waiting for me in the rain on the other side of the river! With help from a young man, I hiked up my skirt and waded thigh-high into the rushing river (refusing a piggyback) and made it to the other side, into the arms of my host family! My host father took my hand and we walked straight up hill for another ½ mile to my future house IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE on top of a large hill/mountain. Half the community had come to see me, and they entered the house with me, smiling and talking and watching me eat dinner. It was 9pm. Everyone was wonderful and it was truly a great introduction to my community after an insane journey! By 9:30 I was asleep. What a day. Inolvidable.

Summary of the journey: 71/2 hours of using a bus, pijavascript:void(0)ckup truck, Tracker and walking to reach my final destination. Rural and isolated on a mountain, could you tell?