An Old Story, American Goes to DR, gets the Runs

Traditionally, the winter is the dry season here in the Dominican Republic, but for this Arizona boy, something must be lost in translation. It has rained, to say the least. The past few weeks, there honestly has been more precipitation than there was upon our arrival amidst the ‘rainy season.’ The rain causes Dominicans to run for cover, open umbrellas and drive crazier than they already do, but the rain has a different effect on me. I run in the rain. I love running in the rain, it’s a very spiritual experience for me, some of my best memories come from activities in the rain.

At the end of January, I ran a half-marathon distance from my apartment north to and north of Villa Mella, a suburb of Santo Domingo. The cats and dogs were out that day, and while fielding the abundant “mira ese gringo loco” looks, I ran north along the wet Metro route, to the end of the sopping Metro line. Now, Villa Mella is a very densely packed metropolitan area with plenty ‘mixed-media’ sidewalks and roadways that I love. Known for its ‘fritura,’ Villa Mella is one big barrio also known as la Zona de Chicharròn. There is a half-mile long market welcoming you to Villa Mella with anything you could ever want. In this commercial stretch, fruits and vegetables from outside of the city, household items and surprisingly, many name-brand belts, shoes and handbags are available, if the price is right.

The day after Valentines’ day, I headed out for a rainy run along another one of my favorite routes which similarly traverses a market, just as crazy as the one at the entrance to Villa Mella, maybe even longer. This market along Avenida 27 de Febrero after Chinatown and just before Rio Ozama is in the sort of ‘garment district’ of Santo Domingo. Here you will find a concentration of ‘paca’ stores.

A ‘paca’ is a packet of third-hand clothing from the states. After going through the thrift store circuits, clothes that are not chosen and purchased are sold by the pound in these ‘pacas.’ Many of those donation bins that are abundant in US metro areas send the clothing collected to these export centers and there they are bundled tightly and sold by the pound like produce. For more information, read my article Not All Donations go to Nonprofits or contact Tony Tiedemann directly. That last part was kind of a joke...

But I digress, back to the post-V-day run; the weather effectively evolved from a light sprinkle to a deluge and devolved back to a sprinkle. Needless to say every national that I encountered huddled under an awning stared, trying to comprehend why someone would willingly run for fun, and worse, run in the rain.