Campo Cocktails

A young Dominican man who had recently left the Evangelical church made me a cocktail one night. Evangelicals in the DR are famous for not drinking. It had been two months since had tasted his first sip of the devil’s libation which was made blaringly evident by his cocktail technique. He handed me a tiny, plastic cup of thick, red liquid and asked me to guess what was in it. A game I am very good at. Which is the Islay scotch out of these three? Which white wine is the Albariño? Which of these brandies is the Solera Gran Reserva?
My question to him was: “Is there or is there not medicine in this?”
He responded with: “Close! I crushed up some cough drops and shook them with some sweet red wine (La Fuerza), sugar and water.

[end scene]

I made my own bitters…because although I live in a wood hut, use a latrine and bucket shower outside…ya gurl has to get her bouge on sometimes.

1  At the nearest Colmado (convenience store) purchase

a.       Cinnamon sticks

b.       Star Anise

c.       Cloves

d.       Nutmeg

e.       Malaguetta (I don’t actually know what this is…)

f.        Coffee

g.       Mamajuana, this is the bittering agent. V important

h.       Get some sun-dried cacao pods from your neighbor. Use four pods.

i.         Flask-sized shitty rum

j.         1 heaping spoon of sugar

k.       If you’re feeling ballsy, ask your doña about tea leaves. You’ll probably get a good hour-long tour of the yard and circa 5 different leaves that you could make tea bitters with

l.         Honestly, add whatever your terroir-conscious heart desires!

How-To Guide to Campo Bitters

1.  Toast all the spices over low heat for about 5-10 minutes.
2. Add all ingredients to the rum and let sit for two weeks. Agitate daily.
3. Separate the solids from the liquids. Put the liquids in a jar and let it sit for one week. Boil the solids with circa one cup of water for circa 10 minutes. It should evaporate down to about 1/2 cup.  Put the water and the solids together to create a potent tea. Let this sit for one week.
4. Strain the potent tea and add it to the rum mixture (add about ¼ cup). Discard solids (or make dank-ass tea). Add the sugar. Let it sit for 3 days, agitating daily.

Now to make a campo version of a Singapore Sling! (Apologies to my bar manager, Mike Lu, for the bastardized version of this classic cocktail. Desperate times call for desperate measures…)

Campo Singapore Sling

2 oz. Gin
2 oz. Lime juice
½ oz. Manaschewitz Cherry Wine
½ oz. Triple Sec
4 drops of bitters
2 oz. Pineapple juice (b/c if not, it won’t be sweet enough for the Dominicans)

Hard shake in a cocktail shaker with ice. Serve in a tiny, plastic cup. When the Dominicans complain that it’s not sweet enough, have some sugar on hand that they can scoop into their drink. 

lice.

Written for our beloved 17-01 PCDR cohort--

A reality of the life of an Educator anywhere: LICE. One sunny day in Río Arriba, Mistty sits in a white, plastic chair as the neighbor girl brushes through her hair with an all-too-fine comb when — all of the sudden — a pajarito (small unknown bug of any class) falls onto her shoulder. She quickly tries to flick it off her shoulder, knowing there’s a possibility of it being a lice. Her head has been uncontrollably itchy the past 2 weeks. By the way, lice will make herself known, as neither Head And Shoulders nor dry scalp oil treatments will remedy the itch. Her neighbor gets to the pajarito before she has the chance, and as any good daughter would, she verifies the species of pajarito with her mother, asking “Mira este pajarito, que es?”, with a sigh of relief from MIstty, the Dona repilies “eso no es na”….. Needless to say, this foreign pajarito developed into full-fledged lice. It took several one-on-one sessions of me (haaay, Lucia here) combing through Mistty’s trillion strands of yard-long hair with a variety of lice repelente. We gathered advice from the PCMOs, but also from bonafied doñas with lice haircare experience. Next thing you know, I have lice and then my host sister gets it too. I’m sure my doña is delighted…

If you call PCMO’s, they’ll recommend you purchase a certain class of piojo veneno. While we do not officially discourage PCMO advice, we have found that Avispa does wonders (@Avispabrand, where our endorsement check at?) It comes in a 300 ml bottle, which is good enough for two treatments on Mistty’s hair and like 4 for mine. You can purchase it in the toiletries section of Sirena, or at your local pharmacy. IT ALSO COMES WITH THE COVETED LICE COMB!

This herramienta is essential to lice extinction. BEWARE: PCMO’s will only reimburse you for what they prescribe. You can always call before purchasing and say that the pharmacy only carries Avispa.They will also prescribe una pomada para quitar los huevecitos. Just skip it. I slathered this green tar all over each strand of hair. To return my hair to its former fluffy self, Mistty had to shampoo it for 30 minutes straight and I had to scrub my scalp with dish soap three times daily for one week.

Mistty preparing to scrub the green pomada wax from my hair

You can pull off some pretty rad styles during lice treatments by plastering your hair to your scalp with mountains of hairspray. Accessorize with a top-tied bandana, hoop earrings and red lipstick to maintain the visage that you are a clean, healthy, seria mujer who don’t succumb to no lice.

How to:

1. Acquire Avispa and lice comb

2. Utilize confianza to find a buddy to help you comb out lice. If you must, proceed alone. There’s a certain primal bonding that happens between ser humanos when they groom bugs from each other’s fur, em, hair.

3. Divide hair into tiers, working from the bottom-up as if you were passer-ing una plancha. Start the comb at the root and comb out to the end. Little huevecitos will get stuck in the comb. Maybe a few live squirmy guys. Pick them out as best as you can with a serviette and enjuage the comb in water, changing the water regularly.

4. When you are finished combing, apply Avispa and follow box instructions.

5. Repeat combing daily/ twice daily for three days. Repeat Avispa application in seven days. This is because lice eggs are laid and hatch in 7 days. Any suckers that don’t die the first time around as eggs will die the second time around as “mother lice”.

If you want to go balls to the wall and really make certain you don’t re-infect yourself: change pillow cases/ sheets each night for 5 days and boil all of your headbands, brushes/ combs. Enclose your helmet, which you’ve obviously been wearing, in a plastic bag and let it sit out in the sun for a week before wearing again.

Mother lice will be about the size of the eye of a needle. They are dark in color and lay eggs near the scalp. There are certain “hot spots” that they seem to prefer: the crown of the head and the nape of the neck. Mistty describes the huevecitos as dried honey drops that are attached to the hair follicle and are difficult to quitar. After applying Avispa, they darken in color (perhaps because dey dead?)

This is what the lice eggs look like

To prevent lice, Lucia recommends never hugging children or allowing them to touch your hair. Carina has recommended always wearing your hair up when working in the school. Anna recommends using lice shampoo weekly.

Good luck. If you have any preguntas, you know who to call: LICE BUSTERS.

ps — or skip all steps and shave your head.