Observation from the Frontier !
Hola amigos mio,
I now live in Cabral full time ( 2013 ) but before that, while my parents were still alive, it was eight months here then four months in the US. For over ten ( 10 ) years the cycle was in a four months here in Cabral, two months there with Mom, four months here. two months there with Pop.
Hey, Mom had a beachfront condo in Destin, FL and Pop had hideout on a " wilderness " river in central FL. Had to be a " good son " and visit...what can I say !!
Could say my home country was the USA but I was born in California, lived there 18 day and then spent most of the next 16 years living elsewhere in the world. Eight ( 8 ) years in Panama, one ( 1 ) year US, three ( 3 ) years in Japan, one ( 1 ) year US, then three ( 3 ) years in Germany. Yep, Pop was career military, thirty-three ( 33 ) years and a veteran of WW II, Korea, and three ( 3 ) tours of Vietnam.
After college and a brief business career working for someone else. I got involved in the early birth of the new computer generation and worked world wide ( Europe, South Africa, Japan, Hong Kong ) as a consultant in this field. Was able to " cash out in '85 to entertain individual projects " of my choice ".
One of these was my first visit to the Republica Dominicana in 1993 on an invite from the government to consult with them on various projects. Liked what I saw here and started planning to make it a " permanent " home in 1995. Had a brief setback in ' 96, don't blow yourself up in propane explosion it tends to hurt a bit, but by 1999 had it together enough to start the process. I have always centered my involvement in RD around the SW portion of the country but early on did venture out to live in SD, visit " hillbilly " in Santiago, and see the north and east coast. But I always returned to the " wild west " and its rough coast where the mountain go right into the sea and life in more natural, quite and non polluted with the scourge of IA tourism development.
Never married to a Dominican. But I think my ex in the US still owns our lawyer friend her half of the $ 150.00 it cost for our divorce back in '85. She had something of an " attitude problem " with my living and working all over the world and never being home " making babies with her " !!! Hey what can I say...did give her enough $$ so she was able to quit working and travel the world herself for a couple of years...we parted friends.
Will be 69 next month, in good health and in over twenty ( 20 ) years here have experienced both the good and the bad that the country has to offer. For me the GOOD has far exceeded the few bad situations, for they were mostly part of the " learning curve " of living in a foreign land.
Enough of my BS...so to you all I say " live and let be " life is what we each make it to be, nothing more...nothing less.
take care,
kFrancisco de Cabral