Amazing people

We had our final concert tonight, and I fly home to Chicago tomorrow. The students did a wonderful job, and I think everyone learned a lot -- me, the musicians, and the audience. I feel particularly close to several students, including a brother and sister who play the oboe and flute. Their mother came to all of the rehearsals and watched as I coached them. He played in the quintet, and she was the flutist in the Mozart quartet. Both brother and sister (Ívan and Emily) were very good natured and quite talented, and their mom always greeted me with a hug and a kiss. They gave me a gift of coffee and cookies tonight. So sweet.

It seems like this is the beginning of what will hopefully be a long relationship between me and the students, the music teachers here, and Traveling Notes. It's likely that I might return to the country in the next year to work with students at the university. I really hope that this is the case.

This entire week was a lot of work, and I am exhausted. But it was good to get out of the U.S. again, to get more perspective on the world and on my own situation. I enjoyed practicing Spanish so much more on this trip than on the YOA tour, and I'm not exactly sure why. I didn't do my Spanish homework before going to Santo Domingo, so I wasn't particularly prepared to speak the language. I didn't even bring a dictionary or a phrase book. But I was surprised to find that I could pick out a lot of words while listening to people and understand the basic idea of what was going on. As the week progressed, I was able to comprehend phrases, and then whole sentences. Then I suddenly found myself speaking in whole sentences. I would think in my head how to begin a sentence, and what words I wanted to use, and then I would just start talking, and words would come to me, and they would be the right ones. It's amazing, and it makes me want to do more Spanish immersion in the future.

I've become very attached to the people I've been working with. Ellen Brager, the director and brain of the whole Traveling Notes operation, is one of a kind. She was born and grew up in Belgium, where she learned to speak Flemish, English, French, and German as a young girl. Since then, she's been traveling the world, living in many places and working to improve her language skills. Now she is also fluent in Spanish, after living in Peru and the D.R. She is an efficient, professional person who doesn't always gel with the laid-back culture here, but in that way she makes an excellent administrator and director for a program that needs a lot of pushing and constant vigilance.

As for Robin, Jorge, and Damaris, I love playing music with them and I respect them enormously as musicians and people. Robin is an adventurous, strong person with a deadpan sense of humor and an unwavering sense of self. Jorge, although he was sick for most of the trip, was indispensable in creating our schedule and providing translation, in addition to being a great teacher and violinist. Damaris, our pianist, was also critical to making the trip happen, as she was able to work her connections in Santo Domingo in order to get the project off the ground. She's also a great person to talk to, in any language.