- Thread starter hicksy
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Assualt and Robbery in Sosua
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Again it might be somewhat more helpful, if you didn't try to label someone simply because they have different views from you. I personally try to consider each event on it own merits, and state quite frankly that the views I state are my own, if some choose to agree, that is fine, and if others choose to disagree that is equally fine.
Either way I don't think that anything someone says on this board defines them, in some cases it may, but I choose to wait until I have actually met a person, and seen them in action so to speak, before I choose to make an evaluation of who they are or what they completely stand for. I have had the pleasure of meeting a few people on this board, and on occasion I have disagreed with some things they have posted, but prefer to judge them in how they come across, when we have had the opportunity to sit down across from each other, and been able to exchange ideas face to face.
Oh by the way just because someone is a moderator on this site or somewhere else, or has more posts than someone else, it doesn't mean that anything they have to say has more value or truth, than anyone else.
You're right - it's like they have no concept of money. Last trip I was asked for an iPod. Not just an mp3 player, it had to be an iPod. Amazing how brand conscious even poor people can be. Funny how no one ever asks my husband - they see the 'sucker' sign on my gringa forehead :ermm:
I understand completely how it happens, and it's cultural. I have to force myself to be uninvolved with paying anyone in DR, because I feel so incredibly guilty seeing someone work so hard for so little. Years ago my husband told me I couldn't 'overpay' someone, because then they will expect the next person [meaning a Dominican] to do the same. For example, one day we were sitting on the beach in Najayo on a quiet day, and some little boys in ragged clothes came by with a big can of some sort of vegetables, peppers maybe. They named their price [a pittance as far as I was concerned] and my husband proceeded to bargain with them before buying. When they walked away [I never spoke during the process] I chided him for bargaining with a poor kid for something that was under a dollar. He very patiently explained that we couldn't spoil things for the Dominicans - and for the kids, who might insist on the higher price next time and not make a sale. I do understand, but it still bothers me.
The same would be true of a maid. When we move there I will have to leave all of that to my husband, because I would probably end up 'ruining' her for her next employer. When in Rome, and all that...
It's amazing how this politically conservative person inside me becomes socially liberal when I step foot in the DR. Because I spend so much time in the campo I see the poorest of the poor, and their graciousness and smiling faces in light of their circumstances just gets to me.
AE
I agree completely with Annie, JD, and Alter on the issue of over-paying, and being overly caring.
I did not have a maid when I lived in the sates and I do not have one here. I pay the condo association to do la few loads of laundry now and again, but I also do much of the laundry myself, as well as all of the ironing, cleaning, and dish-washing, etc, etc. I also do my own electrical, plumbing, and woodworking.
While I give good tips to wait-staff and the like, I expect to be remembered and to be given good service. If the level of service drops so do the tips.
I have two points to make regarding this issue. First, it is preferable to be as independent as possible. The more you depend on others to do your work for you the more susceptible you are to being taken advantage of, or even being robbed.
And second, since we are foreigners in this country, we need to tread carefully and be mindful of the impressions we leave behind. When one gringo throws money around as if it were disposable, the rest of us are put into the same category. Being generalized is a sad fact of life.
I did not have a maid when I lived in the sates and I do not have one here. I pay the condo association to do la few loads of laundry now and again, but I also do much of the laundry myself, as well as all of the ironing, cleaning, and dish-washing, etc, etc. I also do my own electrical, plumbing, and woodworking.
While I give good tips to wait-staff and the like, I expect to be remembered and to be given good service. If the level of service drops so do the tips.
I have two points to make regarding this issue. First, it is preferable to be as independent as possible. The more you depend on others to do your work for you the more susceptible you are to being taken advantage of, or even being robbed.
And second, since we are foreigners in this country, we need to tread carefully and be mindful of the impressions we leave behind. When one gringo throws money around as if it were disposable, the rest of us are put into the same category. Being generalized is a sad fact of life.
I checked around with some of the middle class Dominicans that I know to find out if I was paying my cleaning lady too much, too little... It is hard for me, like you AE, to watch someone work hard and be paid so little.. BUT I know now that I am paying the top of the pay scale but WITHIN it.
But I am an easy employer, for the most part, I do give the double sueldo for Xmas even though she is only part time. I once got really angry and docked her pay when YET again, there were clorox stains on the clothes and bedding...... (To have a completely white spot to her is not offensive, just means it is clean... not ruined!)
But I was dismayed a bit when I learned that she had turned down another job with a Dominican family who owned a colmado.. because they were going to pay her DOUBLE the rate I was paying.. but she said.. "Oh no, I know this kind of person, they will make me work like a slave the entire day long. There are three of them. I will have to iron the husband's shirts. They will not be kind."
Unlike Catcher, I feel it is my responsibility to employ people where I can, to put as much money as I can into the hands of the people. I try to buy my groceries in bulk a bit so that I can tip the delivery boys. I even tip the postman when he delivers a package. I only GIVE money to the beggar ladies in the neighborhood... and not to all of them... and not every time I see them--- because there but for fortune goes my mother. Sometimes I will but fruit or even ice cream for the shoe shine boys... since I do not wear shoes that they can shine.
But I do think that middle class Dominicans often take advantage of the women who work in the home...because there are always more, always someone else who will work really, in the end just for food. On the border, there are Haitians who indeed work just for food. Now in Haiti, there are studies that there are over 225,000 kids living in "child slavery".. the system called "restavek" .
For me, to have household help is a great luxury... only the very very rich in the States have household help.
That's exactly it Annie - not the money we pay the maids, it's the circumstances and what we expect them to do, as opposed to what a Dominican family expects them to do. After they work for us, they don't want to work as hard as Dominicans expect them to.
AE
Let's see, first post, never an opinion here on any topic, and you demand that this thread be closed. Very interesting what the moderator will do.
Wtg, huge influx of site registration for the high season. Remember this year with unemployment at its highest ever, we see many resorting to prescription drug abuse (antidepressants and anti anxiety).
In other words, they're coming out of the woodwork. Sit tight and wait for April
That's sad to hear
My lords, why so drastic? How about some jail time!
Wtg, huge influx of site registration for the high season. Remember this year with unemployment at its highest ever, we see many resorting to prescription drug abuse (antidepressants and anti anxiety).
In other words, they're coming out of the woodwork. Sit tight and wait for April
That is so funny
Now that the "other site" has been exposed here-
--- and with lots of the posters here also posting over there with the same handles--
I wonder if that sort of publicity does not form part of the opinion of the locals..
At the very least, it may be like the maids-- with the foreigners paying such high prices that the locals can no longer afford the girls..
Happy New YEar, and I m not so sure brother. When you look at what these gross per month and what the tourist or the semi retired expat like yourself makes in a month, it is easy to see how these domestic men have to compete for the attention of the domestic women from the foreign men. A guy who may work as hard as a pack of sled dogs may not earn more than $400 a month. Guys come here for a week or two prepared to spend at least 2-3 times that. That is attractive to a women who lives in need. Even if she isnt in need, she may be in "want".
But I am with you in one respect, that the tourist didnt create the exploitation of sex, he is just using it to his advantage.
As far as the domestic men treating their women better? I guess. It would be nice if I could talk to a woman who didnt tell me that she left him because he beat her. Thats another custom that I cannot figure out. But it seems to be accepted here.
Frank is right here. See, frank you aint bogus! But he is right, a society is only as strong as its women are(ummmm, Frank I aint gonna tell no one but you know you got this from Louis Farrakhan right?)
The things that the men do to the women are trained into them by the women who raise them. So the whole thing becomes a cyclical event. And I m guessing we are putting "husbands" in quotations because we simply mean common law marriages not solemnified by legal paperwork, ie. Shacking up?
But the crime I think is a matter or poverty compounded with opportunity. If the bike was there and I could probably get some money for it, steal it. Kill the guy who did it, nope. Beat the sense into him that stealing from YOU isnt a good idea, sure.
The international drug trade? Well....who ISNT involved in that?
That was a bit convoluted there bob. Is it the norm or isnt it the norm? And what is the difference between now and then? I dont think many of these men take care of their children based on my first hand view. When they get bored or uninterested with the women they get another one. I got friends who tell me "he went to get another woman" or " a younger woman" And I m like "huh? 36 isnt old" So I guess this does tie into your old guy/teenager comment. As I see it, almost all of these guys have 2 children with one women, 1 child with 2 women and then maybe might settle down with a women who is half his age giving her another 2 children. Let me know if I m wrong.
So how did you handle this request? What exactly did you say? Because I m ure you didnt come with a $300 Ipod to be given away as a gift to someone?
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