Hi everybody!

It's great to hear from all of you! I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving! A big turkey straight out of the oven, the Macy's Day parade, apple cider, pumpkin pie, football, watching the leaves change... how I miss it!

Here in the Dominican Republic, the Peace Corps organized a big Thanksgiving dinner. If you can imagine it, there were over 200 of us packed into a big hotel-restaurant in the capital, Santo Domingo. Some volunteers travelled for over 10 hours just to be there! But it was certainly worth the trip. I felt right at home with my fellow Americans, inhaling as much stuffing and mashed potatoes (with gravy!) as I could. You see, in our communities we eat typical Dominican food. That means we pretty much eat some variation of rice and beans every single day. So to try some classic American foods like pecan pie, mashed potatoes or even just a salad was a real treat!

And of course, we talked about all that we are grateful for. It's not easy to live so far from home, away from friends and family. But I'm thankful that everyone back home is healthy and doing well. Family, by the way, is very important to Dominicans. It's common here in Pedro Sanchez for three or even four generations to live under the same roof, sharing household chores and responsibilities. My Dominican neighbors and friends think I'm crazy to live so far from home, especially since I'm an only child! Maybe they're right. But I still feel very fortunate to be given the opportunity to serve overseas in the Peace Corps and to have a family that supports my decision.

Here's a picture of me on the way up to our caves.
You can see my community, Pedro Sanchez, down below!

As you might remember, in my last post I talked a lot about ecotourism. My primary project after all is to help create an ecotourism project in my community that will provide jobs and protect the local environment. But what is ecotourism? In general terms, it's a form of tourism that tries to preserve the environment and improve the lives of local people. Normally when people from other countries visit the Dominican Republic, they visit the beaches and stay in all-inclusive resorts. While those resorts are a lot of fun and the beaches sure are beautiful, if tourists never leave the beaches or their hotels, they never really see all that this country has to offer. Can you imagine if people thought the United States was nothing more than Disney World? Of course it's much more than that, and we want to prove the same point here in the Dominican Republic.

You guys were correct in your last response-- it is very hard to protect natural habitats while making sure that they're open and accessible to visitors. It's a delicate balance, and one we try to achieve by practicing "Leave No Trace" ethics. We teach our guides how to take care of the local environment and then they in turn pass on the same information to visitors and the residents of Pedro Sanchez. "Leave No Trace" means leaving nature just as you found it. We make sure not to leave any garbage behind. We stick to the marked trails. We never take plants, animals or even rocks as souvenirs back with us. And if we find some trash in the woods, we go ahead and clean it up, too!

Ideally, an ecotourism project doesn't just maintain the natural environment; it strives to make it better. So whenever our guides receive a group of tourists, they take out a portion of the money they earn and put it into a community fund. We use that money to pay for volunteer projects that benefit the community. Last time it made possible the installation of public trash cans throughout the town. Imagine, before that people were just throwing their trash on the ground! Next year we hope to use new funds to enable a tree-planting project in the community.

So you see, ecotourism isn't just about having fun and traveling around. It means thinking about the impact your visit has on the natural environment and the local people. If we act responsibly and reward projects that protect the environment and its people by giving them our business, we send a message that it's important to us. That way, the beautiful places that we visit today will still be around for our kids and our grand-kids to enjoy in the future!