travel log: day 7

Day 7 in Santo Domingo

This may sound quite obvious, but all places are what they are. It’s the perspective that creates the impression. 

I had no knowledge of the Dominican Republic prior to coming here, outside of the gym I was headed to. All I knew was the language they spoke was Spanish, and the country shared an island with Haiti.

Now that I am here, it isn’t so different from home. There’s nice weather and beaches, and there is also traffic and pollution. 

If you drive east on the highway and look to your right, you’ll see blue water, palm trees, beaches and cliffs. If that’s all you really saw you would think this place was paradise. However, if you decided to look left instead, you would get a different impression. You’d see crumbling infrastructure, rundown homes, and misfortune, all the while with children playing, and families spending time together. But this place is neither one, nor the other. It’s all of it.

There’s good and bad. And the unique perspective I think I will walk away from the DR with is that its as broken as everywhere else, it’s just that no one here is trying to hide it.