The North Pole, Canada, same thing isn’t it? This past week I was lucky to have my mom, pops, bro and bro’s girlfriend, Rachel come to visit me. Or rather, they were lucky to escape from the arctic and get a taste of what the tropics are all about.
I made it my duty to give them a true authentic Jamaican experience. No rented car, no all-inclusive resorts, many compact but ”efficient” taxi/bus rides fitting at least 5 more people and a few parachutes (backpacks) more than you would have thought possible. Even cold showers, until they figured out how to work the hot water. I do not get this luxury very often and have to admit enjoyed listening to them suffer. One night we were also blessed with a power outage, in true Jamaican form, at which time we took the opportunity to sit around kerosene lamps and poke fun at the parents. Oh what an endless source of entertainment that is.
And how can I forget the food. Jerked chicken, jerked pork, ackee and saltfish, Julie mangoes, rice and peas, curried goat, tropical fruit smoothies, conch soup, stewed everything, curried everything, bami, plantains, blue mountain coffee, and of course Jamaican pattees. And lots of great non-Jamaican food in between. I am still full a week later.
We visited many beaches in Mobay, Duns River Falls in Ocho Rios, Ron and Gus in Kingston, the Blue Mountains, CUMI, my school, my house, my church (which happened to be a baptism day – add another tick to the authenticity score). And of course we can’t forget, after an entire week of hearing Phil chirp about it, we visited the bird sanctuary. All packed into 7 short days. Expertly planned by me, I must say. I think I may have wore them out though. Mom went home with laryngitis, Pop with some undiagnosed pussing poison rash (yet again – who’s surprised really?), Si with self-diagnosed sunstroke (yeah right Si, you just ate too much), and Rachel continued her travels to Portland covered in mosquito bites.
I must say it was a great little vaca for me who suffered none of the above. Seriously though, it was really good to see the fam, even considering the few times I found myself, to my horror, helplessly sandwiched between the rents. Nothing triggers a panic attack like the overwhelming stifling feeling that you have somehow reverted back to an infant cradled between two doting parents. Now that I have exposed this phobia I’m sure, when I come home, they will take every opportunity to exploit it. I know I really shouldn’t complain and feel more than slightly guilty saying this after visiting the over-capacity children’s orphanage down the road.
But the week flew by and it was definitely hard to see my visitors go again. Partly because it meant back to work for me. I found myself jealous of my brother returning to school. Oh what a great life is that of a student. At least in January. Of couse, if I were a student still I would box myself in the face for saying anything of the sort. I now only hazily remember writing my last paper of University (my third or fourth all-nighter of the week) and saying- remember this, never again. Simon tried to help me gain perspective though by assuring me that Jamaica is “infinitely more exciting than Canada”.
But for some reason, returning to work here was preceded with much angst. I don’t know why. Yes I do. I am my mother’s daughter.
Angst is the worst feeling. Somehow it builds up the the littlest thing I have to do to be the most dreaded painful thing I have to just get through and over with – even though logically I know its no big deal. The daily tasks I have to perform clump into one cumulative overwhelming unbearable heap. And then on top of that I often have this little voice in the back of my head telling me its pointless anyhow. Me being here is meaningless and a waste of time.
Fortunately all that is through with for now. I’m breathing a sigh of relief as the first week back comes to a close and I realize that all of that worrying whatever it was, was as per usual unfounded, unnecessary ridiculousness. I’ve been surprised to have each day turn out kind of great, and have new exciting things to look forward to like teaching arts and crafts to 2 classes a week, piano lessons to one girl, and holding cute little spitty-upy-babies.
Jamaica is so chill. I love the chillness that is Jamaica. Jamaica no problem.
Ahhhh ha ha ha. Sue, I love it. Classic. You’re a great story teller and I enjoyed every word. Thanks for a perfect essay about the Derst-Marties. Big smiles. Hugs. -Ging-er
I wanted to rent a car in Jamaica. With 5 of us traveling around, I thought it would be simpler and maybe more efficient to have a car. Of course, this desire was stoked by a number of unspoken assumptions rooted in the North American psyche of the “open road”. Cars equal independence. No waiting around or depending on anyone else. With an automobile, we are in complete charge of our own destiny. (Perhaps this is why traffic jams enrage us so much.) On a deeper level, cars symbolize and embody a sense of freedom. There is nothing as invigorating as embarking on a road trip into the unknown wilderness (which ironically, we are destroying with the very vehicles of our imagined freedom). In some sense we are living in the romantic afterglow of the cowboy culture and cars are our horses. (It is interesting that on the advice of a wise marketer, Jeep made its headlights round to simulate the eyes of a horse.) And finally, in a culture that is becoming obsessed with security, our motor vehicles have become self-contained vessels of comfort and safety. We travel around in our bubbles, insulated from those awkward encounters with others, a world unto ourselves (unless, of course, we should get into an accident).
But Suzanne seemed obsessed with giving us an “authentic” Jamaican experience. Several times in preparation for our visit I broached the topic of renting a car. Each time she shot down the notion. We would have to live as she does. There would be no car rental. We would have to rely on public transportation and our own two feet.
We walked a lot in Jamaica. I am used to walking or riding my bike to school. But I walked way more than I was used to, traversing large parts of Montego Bay numerous times during our one-week stay. I would suggest that relying on a bike in Jamaica could well be suicidal. Normally laid-back Jamaicans seem very aggressive as drivers, and many roads are narrow and winding. But walking is a relatively safe and effective means of transportation, even for distances that might, to my North American sensitivities, seem too large.
For inner city distances beyond a few kilometers, Suzanne uses “route taxis”. These are basically cars that operate much like buses in Canada, traveling along designated routes, picking up and disgorging passengers along the way. The first time I got in a taxi with Suzanne, we sat in the back seat of this car with a red license plate. We waited. I asked Sue what we were waiting for. She said, “We’re waiting for the car to fill up.” In the meantime, we watched our driver engage in a heated exchange with other drivers also parked in the neighborhood. I understood little of this verbal barrage, since it was conducted in Patois, a local dialect that seems to incorporate a disproportionate number of English slang words for parts of the female anatomy. Before long several more passengers joined us. A person got in and then got out again. I became restless when I thought we were full, yet our driver seemed in no hurry to leave. Three more passengers piled in the car, and finally we were off.
As an outsider, I was worried that such a system of transportation would involve a lot of waiting around. Yet, there is an interesting dimension of supply and demand that minimizes wait times. As a taxi begins to fill up it becomes more attractive to prospective riders because it means departure is just around the corner.
The buses we used for inter-city travel to Ocho Rios and Kingston were really vans that operated in a similar fashion to route taxis. The five of us walk to the transit centre in downtown Montego Bay. Numerous vans sit in the crowded parking lot. Assertive drivers beckon would-be travelers to join them. We ask which vans are going to Ocho Rios. We are directed to the bottom of the lot and hustled into the back of a Toyota van with bench seats. Again we wait for the infilling (which on a hot day is almost like waiting for the rapture). As we wait, the entrepreneurial spirit of the Jamaican people swirls all around us. Hucksters move between vans, peddling their wares. We are offered everything from candy, to DVD’s, to shoe polish. Soon the van begins to fill. Soon my definition of full is once again exploded. When seventeen people (yes, that’s 17) are safely sandwiched in the van, we set off for Ocho Rios.
I must admit that I had some safety concerns. Drivers go fast. They pass in small spaces. They change lanes like jack-rabbits, the sudden sideways movement often jolting. Hills and curves through mountainous regions do little to slow down this exuberant rush towards a destination. I was a little surprised to find a traffic jam at the summit of a large hill/mountain on the road between Ocho Rios and Kingston. This, I found out, was due to the convergence of two tractor trailors, who had to stop and back and shuffle around in order to negotiate the narrow curve where they met.
The driver on the way back from Kingston avoided this bottleneck by taking the back roads (even narrower). This is the same driver who stopped along the way to receive into his arms a small child, who sat on his lap for quite a while as he roared towards Montego Bay.
My fear, however, diminished the more I traveled like this. I began to note ways in which drivers took precautions. I began to unravel the mysterious language of the horn, which punctuates travel in Jamaica. It is amazing what you can say with a horn. On a curvy switchback road in the Blue Mountains, a firm horn tap announces our presence to those around the nearest corner. Horns are frequently used to let other drivers in, or to scold, or to say “hi” to the driver going the other way.
Traveling like this certainly punctures the bubble of privacy and independence so sacred to North American travel. Simon noted that even on buses in Canada, the greatest effort seems to be to find a place away from other people. In Jamaica this is not possible. And it is possible that it is even not desired. Somehow I felt closer to people (not just in a physical sense) on these public transit journeys. There were some interesting openings for conversation. If nothing else, we shared the the camaraderie of those who endure a harrowing experience together.
I’m not sure I will ever shake the psychology of the North American open road. I will say, however, that travel in Jamaica seems amazingly efficient (in both time and especially energy.) This sense was underscored on our return to Toronto. We landed at Pearson airport at 2:00 AM. By the time we got our luggage (one hour of waiting), made our way through customs (where all bags were x-rayed for contraband), waited for our shuttle to the Park ‘N Fly (which was as crowded as the buses of Jamaica) and drove home to Kitchener, it was 6:00 AM. This is approximately the time it took us to travel across Jamaica, from Kingston to Montego Bay.
Suzanne, thanks for your insistence on authenticity. I enjoyed our travels together. You are a good teacher.
Yo, yo good entry. I apparently have this pussing rash as well. My legs seem to be telling me this. I got stuck in the Toronto airport on my return. Thoughts of tropical water and scotch bonnet have pushed me through the week. Canada’s windy city greeted me after being held up by the rare fog delay. ya man, as Rasta Ricky said Jamaica was cool.
Love da Bro soon come home
Hey there Suzi. I have been checking in to your blog regularly and have really enjoyed every entry. You are a very fine writer. Several times I have wanted to submit a comment but have ultimately been too shy. However, I just couldn’t let your observation of ‘the rents’ go by.
In 1981, I was 28, married, 2 children, and had successfully negotiated my way through a year and a half in Botswana when my parents came to visit for Christmas. I can measure, not in days, not in hours, but in minutes, how long it took me to revert back to my childhood patterns of relating to them. I felt helpless in my attempts to be who I was and who I had become in that setting. In no time, I was my parents’ kid. It lasted until they left. I have never since heard anyone else describe that phenomenon until you did it so perfectly. Thank you. (But it is kind of nice to be the one who knows the lay of the land, as it were, when the folks come to visit, isn’t it?)
I did talk to your folks later the same day they arrived back (after allowing them a few hours of sleep and settling in) and I gotta tell ya they were still pretty pumped about the trip. I fully support your determination to give your visitors the full local treatment.
Keep those entries coming, Suzi. Their warmth is such an antidote to our January climate.
Love from halfway to the North Pole,
Doug.
yo suzy-Qs,
how i love your blogs… i hope the birds matched Phil’s incessant chirping upon his watch… they both are quite the source of entertainment. i was wondering why your mom had leryngitis when she talked to me on the phone. i can’t wait to see what comes of my visit… hopefully no undeterminable viruses or rashes, i have enough of those as it is… kidding kidding. I want the full authentic Jamaican experience.. in reference to the van taxis, i had a similar experience when i was in peru.. however there was a bit of a language barrier and we also didnt have anyone to let us know where we were actually going. however those challenges made our trip way more adventurous, rewarding and memorable, and the best way to truly appreciate other cultures. looking forward to it, can’t wait to see ya buddy!!