Define "Borrow"

Well here we are again.... the first week in February, while you all are stuck in the middle of a snow storm, I am chillin in my house in a tank top and shorts on this decent Saturday afternoon. It's not super warm here- no beach weather for sure, but a nice day, nonetheless.

School is still going ok- pretty normal. My newest decision about school is that my favorite mistake in English is confusing the words "chicken" and "kitchen." It happens at least a few times a week and I get a kick out of it everytime. Someone is either eating the kitchen or cleaning their chicken.

This week I taught the word "borrow" as it came up in a conversation in our book. But you, Dominicans and Americans have different definitions of this word. Sometimes it has its benifits but, as of this week I hate the Dominican defintion of it. You see- in case you didn't know- in the US, when you borrow something, when you are finished using it, you give it back. Here, however, you borrow something and there is a VERY good chance that it is now yours, without question. For example- One time Jenna and I had a sweet bean party and used ALL of our tupperware to give the studnets sweet beans to take home....is there any tupperware in our house now? NOPE! Last August I borrowed a grill from someone for a birthday party and they just came to get it in December. My most recent borrowing story is this...

I just had some new neighbors move in to the hosue next door. The same house where my previous neighbors were stealing my water. Well it is 3 women. They came over the first day they moved in to "use some water" to clean. I said ok even though I wanted to say no. Anyway they of course had no buckets so they had to "borrow" both of mine.... Do I have the buckets back? You guessed it....NOPE! So I tell Moreno to take care of it.... He then informs me the next day that these 3 women have a prostitute business and that if they ever ask me for water again to say no. I then told him to go get our buckets back to which he said he would do the next day....

Keep in mind, Dominicans don't like conflict and they are really weird about things. So I come home the next night from work and we have a brand new bucket in our house...so I asked...where did you get that bucket? Oh I brought it home from work. So instead of being a man and going to ask for our buckets back he is being a little baby and just gets us a new one. NOw I realize that I could go ask for the buckets back, but he is the man, he is the Dominican and I think he should do it...but whatever....

Now I will address the prostitute issue...am I happy about it? No...Am I nervous about it? Yes.... only because I am afraid taht there will always be people over there and I have electronics and things in my house that I would greatly miss if they went missing some day. But for now (aside from the bucket stealing) I have had no problems with them so I will give them the benefit of the doubt.

Although last Monday I realized how easy it was to break into a house down here after Moreno and I (mainly Moreno) locked ourselves out of the house and he had to break in through a window to get the keys.

What else is new? Not a whole heck of a lot! Right now Im just looking forward to another long weekend at the end of the month for Carnaval (independence day).

That's all I got for you all! Enjoy the snow and if you wanna get out of it...you know where to come! :) (don't worry though- I'm not holding my breath)! Love you!