Hosting students & opinion

jabuti

New member
Mar 13, 2011
77
0
0
Hey folks,

Upon telling my colleagues about my 6 weeks of beautiful strangeness that I spent studying in the DR, they only want more details about one minuscule situation. I want to know what you guys with more DR experience think of this one.

One day, my host mom said to me..."Hey, didn't you notice your bed is broken? The boards underneath are totally broken. You must have jumped on the bed or something. I guess I'll have to call a repairman over to fix it when you're in class one day." And then she just stared at me.

Now, I was ON CRUTCHES, so I couldn't have done anything too wild. I also did not hear any boards brake, or notice anything. (Frankly, the bed was not exactly deluxe.) I never offered a dime. To my knowledge, the bed never did get fixed.

So the question I keep getting is: do you think this was a ploy somehow to get me to pay to "fix the bed"?

I mean, hosting is a business venture, right?
 

rice&beans

Silver
May 16, 2010
4,293
374
83
Not a big deal...like AE said, she "took a shot"....it's called living in the "real world"

Probably wouldn't have killed ya to go along.....(ONE TIME) and give her 2-3 hundred pesos.....I mean comon...these people have nothing.......

No need to over analyze this.......
 

Hillbilly

Moderator
Jan 1, 2002
18,948
514
113
Correction: These host families have supposedly been vetted by personnel from the Foreign Student Office at PUCMM and are not poor. These are middle class and some upper middle class families that receive a pretty healthy stipend for hosting the kids.

I was a bit upset with Jabuti as she did not contact me during her stay here, not even when she was injured. I do not know her situation, but to me it sounded, from our e-mails, like a dysfunctional family, since the usual warmth was missing.

Unfortunately the university wants its foreign students to be within walking distance of the campus and that limits the geographical area a bit.

Hosting is not supposed to be a "business", but more of a collaboration with some obvious assistance to the family's income.

In fact, I think if I had been Jabuti, I would have told her to "Fix it then, because I certainly did not break it, and now that you mention it, it is a crappy bed and I am going to report this to the office at the University." That would have shut her up!!

HB
 

mart1n

New member
Jul 13, 2006
495
14
0
If you give money you set your self up as a mark. They will never stop hitting you up
 

rice&beans

Silver
May 16, 2010
4,293
374
83
Correction: These host families have supposedly been vetted by personnel from the Foreign Student Office at PUCMM and are not poor. These are middle class and some upper middle class families that receive a pretty healthy stipend for hosting the kids.
I was a bit upset with Jabuti as she did not contact me during her stay here, not even when she was injured. I do not know her situation, but to me it sounded, from our e-mails, like a dysfunctional family, since the usual warmth was missing.

Unfortunately the university wants its foreign students to be within walking distance of the campus and that limits the geographical area a bit.

Hosting is not supposed to be a "business", but more of a collaboration with some obvious assistance to the family's income.

In fact, I think if I had been Jabuti, I would have told her to "Fix it then, because I certainly did not break it, and now that you mention it, it is a crappy bed and I am going to report this to the office at the University." That would have shut her up!!

HB


Did not know that.....thanx