Friday, July 04, 2008

Santiago, Dominican Republic


Last weekend one of my colleagues got married and invited the whole office to the wedding. Six of us piled into a car and took off for Guatapanal, a small town near Santiago, the DR's 2nd largest city.


The wedding was a bit sedate- not a lot of dancing, which surprised me. Every was really there for the chivo, goat, that is traditionally served at weddings. I'm not the biggest fan of goat, but I have to admit that this chivo was excellent!

We spent the night in Santo Domingo and on our way out stopped at the Monumento a los Heroes de la Restauracion. The story of this monument is interesting. It was built by dictator Rafael Trujillo- like any good dictator, he built it in honor of himself. After he died it was rededicated to national heroes. The musuem part was closed because it was early Sunday morning but we had fun taking pictures and taking in the nice view. For me, it was nice to get out of Santo Domingo and see a bit of the DR.
At the base of the monument. There were several of these iron-wrought sculptures around the monument.
My favorites were the rooster above and this little chick.

L-R: Jose Rafael, Rafael Romero, Oneida, Marta and me. This bull was definitely everyone's favorite, I have approximately 30 pictures of them in various poses around it!

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Great entry. Makes me feel like I am there. I am home in the good ole' USA for a month or so. But your posts make me realize why I like living in a foreign country. Also, I am sure you know, but Louisiana named it's state prison, Angola? Especially since most of the prisoners are African Americans.

Unknown said...

Didn't finish that properly. It's weird that it's a prison named after an African country, and the majority of the people incarcerated are black. It's freaky.

Leslie said...

Apparently the name of the town (and state pen) comes from a large plantation- apparently the majority of the slaves were from Angola, so there you go. A large percentage of slaves were from Angola... Interesting.

dedmond979 said...

i enjoy reading your postings on Lagringas blog and i also love the dominican republic. if you ever have need opf a nurse, just call me and ill come for sure!!!!

Leslie said...

Thanks dedmond! Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it! ;)