Hi, loyal readers.
Stephen has accepted my offer/request to guest-blog here at Bajan Solo during my stay in Barbados. I’ve been here for 3 days now and I have a lot to report. I know Stephen has already addressed some of this, so please forgive any redundancies.
I arrived on Sunday afternoon in the wake of Tropical Storm Tomas, which threatened to cancel my flight entirely and was responsible for the cancellations of several flights to the Caribbean that day. Thus, despite our 2-hour delay, I was understandably relieved to be making this trip at all. My spirits were dampened considerably when I stepped into the humid, disorganized mess outside the Barbados airport, only to discover that I was on my own to get to Stephen’s apartment. I abandoned my fears of looking like a clueless tourist (inevitable) and went about desperately asking informed-looking people how the hell I could get a taxi. One man asked where I was going and then barely gave me time to answer before throwing my suitcase in the back of a van and ordering me to get in. I asked the driver if he knew Crusher Site Road and he nodded and said yes, but as we drove through Prospect, it became clear that he wasn’t being completely honest. After a few conversations with pedestrians and a few phone calls with my host (who eventually had to come flag us down on the main road), I was finally dropped at my destination.
Stephen kept insisting that his place is actually very nice when everything works, and now that everything does work I am happy to report he’s right, but that first day I had no choice but to take his word for it. Fortunately, Monday night saw the return of electricity, gas, and real food.
Even with 21st century conveniences, life in Barbados is not what I expected—I was expecting more sidewalks and fewer chickens. Clearly, Stephen’s Barbados is not a tourist’s Barbados. Anyone who assumes he is spending a year drinking rum on a beach only to be rewarded with a master’s degree is sorely mistaken.
Speaking of rum, yesterday we toured St. Nicholas Abbey and saw the historic mansion and rum distillery located there. The grounds were beautiful, the rum was delicious, and the staff was great. In short, a highly recommended destination. Our cab driver, Orville, even took us up to the top of the very picturesque Cherry Tree Hill, a natural passageway connecting the east and west coasts of the island. The views were spectacular, if a little foggy, and Orville was an excellent guide (Stephen and I now boast an impressive knowledge of sugar cane!).
Today, since nearly everything is closed out of respect for the late Prime Minister’s funeral, we went to two nearby beaches. The first was too rocky and the tide was too high to sit on the sand, so we strolled through a swanky hotel lobby and used their beach. Don’t worry—there are no private beaches here, so what we did was kosher. Anyway, the water was perfect and we swam and bobbed around for a while until some stormy-looking clouds moved in.
We’re taking it easy tonight, partly because getting anywhere is always such an ordeal. Tomorrow we plan to check out Speightstown, one of the island’s larger towns with a few attractions, including an old house/museum and an art gallery. Speightstown’s tourism website also claims it’s common to spot turtles there, but I’m skeptical.
That’s all for now. Thanks for patiently indulging me, readers. This blog will now return to its regularly scheduled Stephen.
--Nora
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