Internet is scarce.

So I went into the city of Azua to find some. It seems like to find something functioning here, you have to find 2 to 3 broken ones. Hence, I had to find 4 internet centers to find this one.

I´m never going to inhale tobacco ever again, if I can help it. (Okay, I may have a caigar at the end of this trip.) I say this because I´ve expereience a kind of sickness I´ve never thought possible.

The process of tobacco harvesting and preparation is something that should be done with safety gear. This plant is serious business, toxic and sticky even when it is young and green. In the process of de'leaving, which means going through the rows and snapping off the leaves at incredible speed and karate type skills, a worker becomes covered in tar. Then spending more hours weaving them into bundles means that a guy doing this inhales a lot of fumes.

Whereas the guys here are used to this, and even smoke while doing it, I am not. Spending all day doing it was like smoking countless packs, unfiltered.

I walked home in the afternoon, tired and tar covered to have some coffee and wash up. We washed ourselves using the leaves of a plant I have no name for, lemons we picked from the tree, and a scrub brush which in the past would have hurt, but does not phase my now calloused hands. Semi clean, I spent a few minutes playing with a new puppy, already covered in parasites and insects, and jumped in the river, scrubbing of the rest of the tar by covering myself in the gritty river sand.

Walking back to the house I was hit by the consequences of my desire to learn all about Dominican agriculture. In that instant nauseau and fever hit me hard, to the point of me almost failing to make it to the house. About half an hour later I started vomiting and didn´t stop until late that night.

I was almost forced to go to the hospital in Azua. Some of the old ladies even assumed, that because I´m American I had most likely never thrown up. That gave me a moment of humor in my misery.

The next day I was fine, though everywhere I went I was met with jokes and concern. ¨How are you? All better?¨ ¨Looks like you learned too much about tobacco... Don´t touch it again.

Naturally, I didn´t listen. I figured, 2 days later, I could handle a few hours of it, as I had done before I got sick. I hopped on to a truck heading out to collect finished bundles. This meant throwing a big bunch of tobacco over one´s shoulders, nearly covering one´s entire torso and head, and trudging across the acres to the truck waiting at the muddy entrance.

About halfway through the loading it started to rain, so we had to finish at a sprint. The fields, and the road (more of a path) were already swamped from rain the night before. We finished loading and hopped on top of the tobacco to head back. The truck struggled with the water and mud often more than 2 feet deeps, and we had to hop off and push , getting covered in mud, about 10 times. I finally stopped getting back on, and ran behind the truck, enjoying the fun we were having shouting and cheering the truck along, laughing when one of us fell face first into the swamp or slipped off the back of the truck.

It was all a game, but then got serious as the rain persisted. We got into town, and had to unload and hang the bundles under shelter before the rain ruined it. Hanging is hard enough, but at double speed in the rain, those knots are hard to tie, and the strings all seemed shorter than normal.

By the end I was tired, though I had had a lot of fun. The rain stopped and I went to wash up. Along the way one of the girls made a throat slitting motion and pointed at me, signifying that I was in for it. SHe was prophesizing a return of sickness, Tobacco Attack 2.0.

How right she was, and how dumb I am. Long story shortened, I am not allowed to touch it anymore, nor do I want to.

Life is getting more and more beautiful for me. I spend more time wandering around and talking to people and learning new things. Luis and his family (one of the farmers) are like my family now too. He and his wife call me their son, and even give me orders and tell me to fetch this or that. Maria, my mother, even forced me to shave yesterday. It makes me feel more of a part of here than I could have imagined. I´m even given normal coffee cups and not special ones, and am not forced into taking someone else´s seat when there aren´t enough. (Before, even if I walked into a room full of elders, someone would get up and stand against the wall so Don Tomas could have his throne.)

Sometimes strangers call me rubio instead of Americano or Gringo, because I´m tan enough and speak enough spanish for them to believe I am a Dominican of European descent.

I am sick of a few things. The same bachata tracks being overplayed, the afternoon sweatbath, the drunks that walk around the neighborhood at any given time, the eveangelicals in a competetion to save their first American, and the accusations of being gay because I´m not ¨plucking the ripe and abundant fruits available to me.´

Yet for the most part, my days are filled with things I´m not going to get sick of. I´ve eaten rice and beans literally every day, and will happily do so for the rest of my time. I still laugh everytime a produce truck rolls by with a loudspeaker and says in a funny, indescribable voice, ¨hay batata. Hay pina¨ and commenting on the people coming to buy from him, saying ¨you definitely want some,¨ to the large lady sprinting out to halt him. I could eat fresh fruit for eternity, and it seems like every week a fruit I´ve never seen or heard of comes into season. Similarily, I love learning this language and learning new meanings for words I though I knew. (The word to describe ripe fruit, maduro, was used by a 70 year old man I can hardly understand to describe a pimple on my face ready for removal. Lastly, I love noticing the changes (most of them) I´m going through the the percieved dependencies I´m shedding.

I´m comfortable with using a bed pan at night, chopping things with a machete, killing a tarantula, walking around in the pitch black during power outings, communicating in a new language, negotiating with farmers, and washing my clothes in the river.

I no longer feel the need for internet, television, 10 minute hot showers, mirrors, cellphones, and a whole host of things I used to do or have.

I find it hard to believe that I was afraid of this place as I was. In this moment, my only fear is tobacco.

It reminds me of the time this past summer that I fought a snake in grandma´s cabin. I was afraid of snakes, but I knew we had to get it out, so I went after it, letting my adrenaline go. It was big, more than 5 feet long, and managed to bite me and throw it´s muscle around pretty well. I finally got it by the tail and ran out of the cabin swinging it in circles and throwing it into the field. I went back to my sleeping bag and slept soundly, whereas the others were still afraid of another snake coming, in reality and in their dreams0. I had conquered reality, so therefor had no fear of it in my imnagination.

This relates because it taught me something. The best way to avoid fear is to conquer it. You may get bitten in the process, but on the other side is beauty and tranquility you never could have seen through the fear. Like I jumped on the snake, I hopped on the plane to this country, and the gua gua to this village. I´ve had my struggles, but here I am on the other side of fear, learning and experiencing so much that I can´t fully appreciate it.

Don´t worry. I miss you all terrible and think of you often. (Note to Betsy, my friends are in love with you. After telling them how cool you are , and showing them the family photo with you´re big smile, they instisted that Dona Elisa menor has to come here.)