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Archive for the ‘Helping hands’ Category

Saturday, May 14, 2005
Every cloud has its silver lining. The cloud, if you should remember reading our blog of 08/04/05, was the frustrating delay we experienced when we finally made our move and asked Verizon to take us into the modern world with a high-speed DSL internet connection. The silver lining is now double layered for we remain not only as pleased as ever with this new service but we are also able to announce laptop friendly WiFi connections anywhere within the Playa Vista territory including the sunbeds on the beach! This service – that finally scatters away the remains of the cloud and lets the sun shine through – is available to all good Playa Vista customers free of charge and is made possible by the kind sponsorship of DR1, via their donation of a wireless broadband router and the installation skills of good old Rob.

Wednesday, May 4, 2005
We are pleased to say that we have a couple of genuine ‘good-guy stories’ in the pipeline for you… the first goes like this:
Massachusetts Man, our good-guy number one, has developed quite an onerous but benevolent habit of carting something like 150lbs of produce down from Boston to donate to the local Boca Chica high school “Elvira de Mendoza“, and this he now does a couple of times a year. In good old entrepreneurial fashion he saw a market opportunity that he has developed over the years… with the single entrepreneurial omission that he doesn’t make any money out of it!
One fine day he noticed a lot of good paper was going to waste around him at his place of work. The match up was that he in his mind’s eye saw this paper being well used in poor old Boca Chica and where better than one of the local schools he thought. He had the brilliant idea that a lot of the notepads and business paper pads, when finished with, could simply be recycled by using the blank obverse sides. So, he made a point of asking all his work colleagues to put these pads and papers aside for him. From this simple beginning he has extended his product range asking all his friends and colleagues for any kinds of paper pads, pens, pencils, pencil sharpeners or anything of that ilk, that they might be able to spare to add to his haul. Not satisfied with that he also visits the local dollar stores just before setting off to see if he can pick up some additional inexpensive bargains to make up the full load. This is of course working very much counter to pure entrepreneurship because this now involves money actually coming out of his own pocket. However, a recent market diversification has him back on track spotting an opportunity for low value products with large potential demand. He came across the chance of 200 free sample tubes of toothpaste with toothbrushes and promptly stuffed them also into one of his carrier bags and brought the whole thing down to Boca Chica. Once in town he phones the school to make an appointment with the principal of the school in order to present his offering. She, as well as all the contented recipients, is quite rightly very thankful and everybody is now more than ever looking forward to welcoming the creative and generous packhorse the next time he can make a run.
So… if you see our Massachusetts Man struggling through either Boston or Santo Domingo International Airports you might like to give him a hand with his baggage knowing that it is all in a good cause. Perhaps others of you out there have some other creative ideas along the lines of Massachusetts Man’s… we would be only too pleased to pass the information on and keep the supply of good intentions running if that were the case.

Thursday, July 29, 2004
A good and trusted friend of Playa Vista came to us with a very discomforting personal story recently. For a living he teaches in an inner city New York high school, by all accounts not the easiest job in the world, and clearly a man deserving of his summer vacation in the warmth free from all the stress and strain of responsibility that he usually bears. Well… he is such a good and trustable friend that another New Yorker, but Boca Chica resident, asked if he would look after his dog for a couple of weeks while he sorted a few personal matters out in the Big Apple. No problem said the trusted friend in a telephone conversation before he arrived. The day after his arrival and his supposed holiday began he was thus in charge of a young and extremely healthy male dog in his hotel. Unfortunately, not long passed before said dog got entangled in a very serious encounter with two other long-term resident dogs ostensibly due to his desire to satisfy a natural instinct with the female and the other male being somewhat reluctant to allow this kind of hanky panky in his territory. Anyway… the virile dog was held fore and aft by the two other dogs and our valiant teacher friend called for water – thinking that a nice big bucket of the cold type might quell their dispute. Unfortunately the hotel maid came running with merely a cup, but full nonetheless, that had zero effect on the snarling dogs even when she offered to refill it. By this time the dogs were getting into a serious frenzy and our vacationing teacher now had to prove his valor and came rushing with a large broom. He succeeded by finally separating all the dogs after a considerable struggle only to find that his charge was quite badly mauled down one leg. With blood dripping from the wound he then arranged and paid for a vet to visit and apply the necessary treatment including administering antibiotics.
This in itself was a very sensitive point because our teacher knew only too well the sad story of what happened to wounded lover boy’s doggie predecessor to whom the owner was very attached. On one ordinary Boca Chica day a vet visited and injected the dog merely as a precaution against an illness picked up by one of the other resident dogs… and within 48 hours the poor dog very sadly died of a seizure.
Nevertheless… under the supervision of our good teacher the battered dog spent a couple of days recovering under the bed, but having got through several responsibility hurdles our teacher friend was now very apprehensive about letting the dog out of his sight let alone out of the his hotel room. Meanwhile he had to feed, walk and clean the dog as usual. Our baby-sitting teacher was really on the job and was last explaining his concern to us that he still hadn’t had the owner confirm his return as planned after 2 weeks which would leave our teacher a full week to finally get down to some more traditional Boca Chica relaxation after his hard day’s night working like a dog!

Meanwhile seven years later:
The dog did indeed fully recover and our teacher not only enjoyed the rest of his vacation but has continued to visit Boca Chica over the years but I believe he never offered to look alter anybody’s pet again!

Monday, June 28, 2004

It is alluded that there are different ways of getting a driving license in this country, but this week we discovered that the “correct” way requires you to make repeated visits and engage in repeated waiting in different lines at the principal driving test center found on Avenida Tiradentes at the offices of Dirección General de Tránsito Terrestre (Ministry of Road Traffic) in Santo Domingo.

We ventured out of Boca Chica and off to the capital on Wednesday to help a good friend of Playa Vista get through the Dominican driving license process. We have to be honest and say that he had already been considerably helped along the way by other friends by the time we got involved, but he had hit a small language barrier in the form of the examination on the Highway Code which is presented solely in Spanish. We arrived at about 10 am with a view to immediately taking the 45 minute test but were told that the system, a system that our friend had used on two previous occasions, had changed, and that we should have been present in line at 8 am in order to get one of the 250 allotted numbers. So… we returned on the Friday morning and took our place near the front of the line, #21 to be precise. We then proceeded to the next line which did not move for at least an hour and a half. Finally #21 was called and we leapt towards the door only to be told that a special permission would be needed for the accompanying translator because… the system had changed! One of our German speaking regulars had previously tried to help our friend out with the translation, but the technicality of the questions, and the fact that he was trying to help an English speaking guy – in other words two languages removed from his own native language – had already resulted in two failed exams. Nevertheless… another 20 minute wait and with the sub-director of the institution’s signature on the newly acquired special permit for the translator we were now really on our way.

The test was taken and, thankfully, passed… and then we waited some more in our final line of the day for the permit to be handed out.

In this three hour sojourn in the driving test center we learned quite a bit about this very evidently out-of-synch official driving license process. Firstly you have to line up to pay the tax – at a branch of the national bank Banco Reservas located inside the building – in a line that at the time looked like the most formidable of all the lines. Our friend had, by the way, already astutely worked out that, as a tempting alternative, one could actually bypass this line by paying the tax at ones own convenience at any Banco Reservas branch before arriving at the driving test centre. Next you line up for the eye test and when that is over you have to line up one more time to give a blood sample to determine your blood type!

After that you can pass to the line we were in that day for the Highway Code test. Our friend was under the impression that all was finished, after this his fifth visit, so he was naturally disappointed to learn that he would have to return after 45 days in order to have his actual driving approved and undergo an hour and a half lecture thrown in for good measure even though he is a fully validated Massachusetts driving license holder… now how about that!.

We were told though, by somebody in the Ministry that you can get a letter from your consulate verifying your own country’s license which helps to shorten or even eliminate the line-waiting torture. Having learned this, our American friend need not have been crestfallen about all this unnecessary effort he might have taken, because we were also told, by the same source, that the USA embassy is the only one in this country who is not prepared to offer such helpful letters of verification.

Meanwhile seven years later:
The situation does not seem to have changed too much and is of course straightforward!

Getting a Driver’s License in the Dominican Republic

Getting your license in the Dominican Republic is a straightforward process. Bring your cedula and a copy of the document with you to La Direccion General de Transito Terreste (DGTT), which is the equivalent of the department of motor vehicles. Make sure you have studied the driver’s manual before you take your driving exam. Next, you must pay taxes in order to receive your license:

Driver’s License: RD$455
Exam: RD$200
Medical Exam RD$40
Classification Fee: RD$75
Taxes: RD$20
Cost of Forms and Services: RD$85

Total: RD$855

At DGTT go to window # 1 and present your cedula and one copy, and pay for the driver’s license. Next, go to window #2 and present your cedula, along with the receipt of payment of taxes, and the receipt of payment for the driver’s license. Thirdly, go to window # 5 and present your cedula with the previous receipts, so that the information can be checked to make sure it’s accurate.

After that, present all previous documents to window # 6, in order to take the written exam.

If you pass the written exam you’ll be asked to take a road test. You have to wait 45 days before you can take a road test. Once you pass the road test, you can then obtain a Dominican drivers license.

Wednesday, April 21, 2004
The fragility of the body is unfortunately a fact we all have to live with and an unavoidable part of life… even here in paradise. Clearly the warm air and hot sunshine are helpful to most forms of good living and we savor that greatly as we bask in sunshine close to 365 days a year. However, two stalwart residents of Boca Chica and regularly convivial visitors at our bar are this week battling against nature’s harsh hand. ‘Ronnie’ and ‘Captain Frank’ are the two Boca Chica veterans who many of you will know if you have ever visited the bar in the late afternoon to early evening. ‘Ronnie’ is winging his way back to the US of A for a triple by-pass operation and is optimistic that in 4 weeks or so he will be skipping around Boca Chica again. Meanwhile ‘Captain Frank’, known as such because as he lives on a boat in Andres-Boca Chica harbor, has suffered a hospitalizing stroke. Good friends are trying their best to accommodate him and make way for his return to US territory in San Juan where he would be able to get the very best treatment in the veteran’s hospital.
We naturally wish them both a very speedy recovery!

Meanwhile seven years later:
Ronnie actually needed a quintuple by-pass operation and has continued to frequent the bars of Boca Chica in his own convivial way ever since. Unfortunately Captain Frank did not recover and died soon after his initial stroke. The ashes of his cremation were carried through Playa Vista and sprinkled in traditional naval fashion in the waters of Boca Chica bay one bright sunny afternoon attended respectfully by friends and family!

Monday, March 22, 2004
Post-visit to still winter-cold Europe, as promised, here we are right back! Europe clearly has a few things going for it but one of them is definitely not freedom from urban terrorism. After passing through Madrid and London you would have to be deaf, blind and stupid not to be aware of the problem lurking ever ominously. Talking of political disputes it is natural in Europe to assume that a problem in a neighboring country is also your problem and hence quite a number of people their asked what the affect of the political upheaval in Haiti was on our Dominican half of the island… Pleasingly the answer to all was and still is “nothing whatsoever”.
A brief scan around Boca Chica on return reveals for example that the high street is still missing the Hexenkessel, but the three recently renamed bars are in full flow in the middle of a still bustling high-season Boca Chica and of course Playa Vista has soldiered on through the absence with the help of its many friends. Our thanks to them and let it be known that it is good to be back!

Meanwhile seven years later:
My how things can change. You are very much in the picture regarding the old key night-time establishments in Boca Chica but a massive earthquake and an outbreak of cholera in Haiti have very much changed the “nothing whatsoever” effect to quite a lot. At the same time it has to be noted that European cities have thankfully been much quieter terrorist-wise than you might have anticipated seven years ago.

Sunday, November 30, 2003
Being a public bar in a very public culture we tend to be witness to or engaged in all kinds of fare… in fact acting as a sort of public assistance bureau. The other day was a case in point. We felt very much as if the scene was temporarily transferred to Philadelphia, because it was by way of a number of good customers emanating from that fine city, including ex-members of the Philadelphia police department, who were trying to help out a poor woman from the neighborhood here who had been robbed of her most valued possessions – her credit card and cellular telephone… the credit card being her financial lifeline and the telephone her communications lifeline. She had been given the credit card and the telephone by her husband who was resident in, of all places, Philadelphia Detention Center. After quite a discussion over whether a detainee at such a place had access to receiving fax or telephone messages and after an internet search did not come up with a fax number, it was decided by this willing group of Philadelphian helpers that a phone call would not get through as this was obviously one of the privileges denied to such residents. The woman then presented a ready-made letter explaining her situation and was prepared to post it to her husband, but was concerned that it could take either 3 weeks by snail mail… or would cost an exorbitant 900 pesos to send by air courier.
After all aspects were thoroughly debated, the collective decision was made to provide a clean crisp envelope, address it to the PO Box number that went with her husband’s name and detention number and give it to the member of the assembled group who was due back in the States first to put in the regular mail.
The woman was exceedingly grateful, for she believed her husband would now be able to cancel his credit card and order another one for her – that is if Philadelphia Detention Center inmates are allowed to contact their bankers of course. Time will tell!
So folks,… take your problems to Playa Vista and we will work it out with a little help from our friends!

Meanwhile seven years later:
As is often the way with sudden appearances we never heard any more of what happened to the letter or the woman in question. We like to think that the problem was resolved or she would have been back to ask for further assistance wouldn’t she?