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Many cultures have left their stamp on Dominican society. Traditional Taíno foods and medicines are familiar today,
and Taíno words - like hammock and tobacco - still pepper the language. Spanish settlers gave the country their language,
the Roman Catholic faith and a deep strain of machismo. Africans brought here as slaves brought their own faith, inextricably
bound in the dominant European offering, as well as art and music. Even US troops left their mark - Dominicans love baseball.
It is a heady mixture.
Music and dance is at the heart of Dominican culture. The most popular form is merengue, which will be blasted, full volume,
almost anywhere you go in the country. A tad more pastoral is bachata, Dominican country music, with plenty of songs about
heartbreak and loss. Salsa probably makes the third favorite musical type in the DR's holy trinity, though you'll find plenty
of jazz, rock, hip-hop and just about anything else that'll keep your feet moving.
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Sosúa is more than just another perfect beach town with good diving opportunities, still in
the early stages of development yet impossibly rich in wide sandy shores and coconut trees. There are scores of sunbathers
there, taking advantage of the pleasant restaurant scene and lively nightlife. The northern coast of the Dominican Republic
gets its name from the world's richest deposits of amber found in the hills near here. Its reputation is squarely based on
the 120km (75mi) string of beautiful beaches stretching east of Puerto Plata. It's the most developed stretch of the
island, much of it geared toward the desires of package tourists, although there are some small towns where the laidback atmosphere
of palm-thatched restaurants and local guesthouses still prevails over the concrete box architecture of the resorts.
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