Samana!

Friday afternoon, I left for a 3-day weekend trip to Samana with Kelsey, a teacher at my school, and her friend April, who is a nurse with Students International in Santiago. April has a SUV, so we were lucky enough to be able to drive there-- it took us about 3 1/2 hrs to get there. April found a really nice and clean hotel, with air conditioning and wi-fi. Ah, priorities!! :-D

Saturday morning we found a restaurant to have breakfast, and our plan for the day was to go to the Bridge to Nowhere, and then go whale watching in the afternoon.

The bridge...

 The view from the bridge.... 

The view from afar... the bridge we walked across.... 

I don't have any pictures of what it looked like once we crossed the bridge, but you climbed up stairs and walked along a path there as well.

We made our way back to the main part of town, and headed out for whale watching.... 

It was really hard to get pictures of the whales, b/c they were farther away, and they moved really fast. We did see one baby whale breech-- which they come up out of the water, and saw a fin, but the rest of the time, we just saw the tops of them. It was still really awesome to see them up close. We were out on the water for about 4 hours. The tour was very informational, with giving a lot of acts about the whales-- in English, Spanish, French and German!

After we got back, we were pretty exhausted-- ate dinner at a restaurant, and headed back to the hotel. 

Sunday, we left around 9ish to go to Salto Limon waterfall, which is the tallest waterfall in the Dominican Republic. There are a couple of different paths (shorter and longer) to get there, but we took about a 45 minute path/hike up/down to get there. I didn't seem to take many pictures along the way, but it had a lot of pretty views along the way. 

We saw a smaller version of a waterfall along the way...

And these were some of the stairs going down, when we were really close to the waterfall (it was only when we got close that we actually had stairs.) 

And then we were finally rewarded for our trek...

By the end of the hike, my shoes were covered with mud-- and I thankfully had brought a pair of flip-flops to cross some of the water areas. We went back to the hotel briefly, and looked for a beach that we were going to go to, along with eating dinner there. Kelsey found Playa Anadel...

I had the best fish ever, and then afterwards we decided to go for a walk....

The pictures don't quite show all the rocks that I/we had to climb over, -- but it was not a sandy beach to walk on.....

When we finally got to the end (about 30-45ish min there), there was an absolutely gorgeous view...

 For me, it was an absolutely HUGE ACCOMPLISHMENT that I did not hurt myself climbing over the rocks, and wading through the rocks, especially with my flip-flops that I wearing (I was wearing Adidas ones that were spongy and when I walked in the water, they were weighted down...). I've never been the most limber/coordinated person in the world, and the entire way I was praying, Please don't let me hurt myself!!!  :-P
Needless to say, by the end of that, I was completely exhausted, but felt very accomplished for doing that!!
Monday morning we drove back, and stopped at 2 dams along the way. One of the dams was called Hatillo, and the other I forgot to write down. Some more pretty views...

Can't have a complete trip without a pic of a cow.... :-D 

All in all, I had a lot of fun, and it was awesome to see new parts of the country--- though today (and I was yesterday as well), I'm pretty sore from all the hiking I did!

On a slightly different note, I'm still working on the whole Amazon thing.. It's still not resolved... ;-( 

The Saga That Never Ends

In the saga that never ends, I called Amazon on Monday, b/c I was still getting emails from the seller's account-- and also from people that had ordered shoes. In all, (I think) they sold 9 pairs of shoes!! I asked them to delete the seller's account-- one of the ladies told me to go to the seller's account and delete my account there, but I get a Chinese symboled page... She asked me if I could change the language to English... Um, all the symbols/letters are Chinese. I can't exactly change it to English!! They couldn't delete the seller's account, b/c there were charges on it. I asked them to just delete my whole Amazon account, and they couldn't do that either, b/c of the seller's charges!!! Needless to say, it is beyond frustrating. They're investigating, and I'm just waiting to hear. I got another email from a buyer wanting to know where their shoes are, but I'm not about to reply to them.... I was on the phone with Bank of America for 45 minutes today (20 of them being on hold...) b/c they said they needed to contact me. I had them mail my card to my Florida address, and b/c of the different address than my mailing address, they have to verify it. I understand they have to go through all these measures, but I was transferred 5 times just to get it all figured out!!!

February

After getting a few suspicious emails from Amazon, Wed night I tried to login to my account to change my password-- I then discovered that they could not find my account... there was an email address ending in 163.com, and I figured out that my account had been hacked. I called Amazon Thursday morning, while also checking my credit card, and discovered that I had 2 transactions on my card that were not mine. :-( They took the card off the account, and are working on restoring my Amazon account. I took an Uber home from school Thursday morning to get my credit card, and as we were turning the corner, discovered that I had forgotten my apt keys! So, we went back to the school, and I came home and got my card. Returned to school, spent several minutes trying to find a number where I could get a hold of someone... finally they answered, and waited 15 minutes to talk to someone, and then another 30 minutes going through the process of getting a new card, and getting the charges off my account! When I got home from tutoring I downloaded 3 different programs, and finally got a malware remover- to check my computer.... and I thought everything was fine... S Though it was a pure coincidence where I got two emails from Paypal-- and thought that they were fake-- I tried to login to my Paypal account with what I thought was my login/password-- did the recovery password reset, and then couldn't login. I called Paypal and they said everything was fine with my account! Friday night I called Amazon, b/c I couldn't get on the account- the 1st phone call got me on the account, and they told me to reply to the seller account and tell them I didn't want them. When they sent me a reply email account, it said to click on the link for seller headquarter's and I got a Chinese symboled tab that opened! Called Amazon  back, and while I was on the phone I clicked on the seller's link and I got a Chinese symboled page again! Evidently they can't close the seller's account, b/c they are investigating it. Long story short, I won't be using Amazon for a very long time!! I did another malware scan and AVG scan and my computer came up clean, so I think my computer is okay.

On the school front, Paula and I have settled into our new schedules, and I've been helping with her in figuring out the SST protocols and routines. Fridays are still probably the most chaotic days with having Reading Tests for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade, but I do have her help with the 3rd grade tests, so that has been a big blessing! The SST department is always trying to improve itself, and we're talking about next year, and being able to provide the support to our students, with the staff that we have.
Thursday and Friday the student's do not have school, while we have inservices at school Thursday and Friday morning. Monday we don't have school for the DR Independence Day. Plans are still coming, but I think that I'm going north for the long weekend....

I've been continuing to tutor at Leonela's 4 days a week Monday through Thursday with 6 students preschool, Kinder, and a 5th grader. I've gotten pretty proficient with using Uber, with having to take it from school and home those days. Though I think I have found a parent at my school that picks up her students late enough for me to leave school on Mondays and Wednesdays, so that will at least help with having to take Uber so much. Besides being at SCS, working with Leonela has pushed me professionally as well, b/c they have been multiple occasions where she has asked me about a student, or I've helped her with something, that I have to do research in trying to figure it out. Or I've had to remember something I've learned/used to help her. After I finished my Master's, I said I would never do any more schooling, but this past year has actually made me want to pursue my Doctorate in Special Education. I started researching schools, and I would have to do an online degree, which limits my options. I found Liberty University in Virginia that I'm fairly certain that I would want to do my degree with.... It's just a matter of making the jump of doing it... and not cringing when thinking about the debt of graduate school... My previous degrees are all paid for, and I'm fortunate to not have any debt except my car loan. So, we'll see...