Santo Domigo Esta Bien

On our way out of Santo Domingo today and we had a pretty good time, but were not blown away. Perhaps we are going through a bit of Latin American Colonial Cities O.D., and I fear we have become a little bit too familiar with them (when you start making comments like, "It´s cobblestones aren´t quite up to the San Juan standard", it might be time to move on). Although we felt it did not quite match up to some other cities we´ve visited, the historical aspects were pretty crazy. Like having a drink in the first house of the new world (built 1502) or walking down the street where Diego Columbus´s wife would march, and you could determine a person´s standing by how close they were to her.

Our first night here we were pretty confused. We went out to dinner latino-style late (aided by pacific-timed stomaches) and when we tried to go to some hip and happening bars after, they were all closed. And actually, the whole Zona felt dead. This seemed very unfestive of them and we found out the next day that there were 2 culprits to blame. The first was that the Hard Rock Cafe had opened and it was drawing all the Santo Domingo cool kids. The second culprit, and much more impactful, was that the state had issued a 12 am last call on all bars in the country. That´s right. Oh, and when had they done this? Yes, that´s right, 8 days before our arrival.

Still, there were good times to be had, even if we couldn´t drink past midnight. My favorite night was when wife befriended a bell hop and he took us out to a conveniant store down the street. There, we drank Presidentes (their beer) at the counter, while loud music blasted out of a juke box. It became quickly clear that our bell-hop friend had a drinking problem, considering he was still supposed to be working and he admitted to dealing with the 12am curfew by drinking more in the mornings. But still, he was a nice guy, and it was by far the best time I have ever had at a conveniant store (my apologies to my local Plaid Pantry).

Anyway, today we leave to go to Santiago, the second biggest city in the Dee Are and also close to the town where wife lived during high school. I think it´s going to be better than the capital and am excited to spend more time with some non-tourist industry employed locals. It´s hard to predict our reception since wife was here 18 years ago, but we will see...