Last week I had the pleasure of having a special guest visit me here at my house in the Dominican Republic. She is an amazing young woman. She is my son's girlfriend. They met last year and it's sort of ironic that my son and I are in relationships with Dominicans. Her name is Nef and she is a beautiful and very smart young lady. My son, like me has great taste LOL. It was so nice having Nef here to help pass the time during the day while my husband is at work. I learned quite a bit from this young lady hence the title of my post. I've learned many things over the past year about this culture but seeing things through the eyes of a 21 year old was enlightening as well. I did mention already that she is smart. She is currently enrolled in medical school here and she has been since she was 16 years old. She speaks English very well and I cannot express how wonderful it is to have someone around who speaks both Spanish and English. I joked with her that this week she was my google translate and she really was.
I learned how to make fried plantains, moro rice, chicken (Nef's receipe). How to pick the right avocado and plantains. She made Passion fruit smoothies which were very good although she really skimped on the sugar in mine. She's very conscious of my diabetes. I learned that she is that way because she has close family members who also suffer from the disease and they have not been able to manage theirs as well as I have mine. I've been here for months and hadn't figured the smart TV out. Of course it only took her about 5 minutes to master it. I think the most important lesson of the week was to always pronounce the "L" in the word Salmon here. Back home most people do not pronounce the "L" and not doing that here will get you a completely different result trust me.
We had many conversations about relationships in general. Both sharing our views on love. She was very honest with me about her concerns about my relationship with my husband. She had met him before and didn't have a bad feeling about him but she just wanted to remind me that it's kind of a thing here for people not just men to get involved with people from other countries in order to get their Visa to leave. Of course I am very aware of this and struggled for many months with this reality and how I felt about my relationship. Nef's perception of things is very different than mine of course for a variety of reasons. The most obvious of course being our age difference but there's also some cultural things mixed in there as well.
We watched a couple of really interesting movies together and she started watching the Bates Motel series on Netflix. I had just finished it the week before she came but it was fun watching it again with her. The days passed quickly and before we both knew it it was time for her to leave. I had mixed emotions about her leaving I really enjoyed her company but I also enjoy having the house to myself during the day and spending the nights alone with my husband. I say it that way because up until a month ago my husbands niece was living with us. We've recently discovered how nice and quiet the house can be with just the two of us here. It's also nice to have a second bedroom for him to throw his clothes around in. I can close the door and only deal with it when I choose to LOL.
All in all it was a great week and I'm happy that I was able to spend the time getting to know Nef a lot better since she and my son are in a relationship. Oh and she let me know that she plans to marry him. I remember being young and in love and confident that it was the love of my lifetime. Boy how things change but also remain the same.
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