Spring Break 2015 - Day 4 - Memories

4/7/15

St. George’s, Grenada

Well, here am I writing one last time from this balcony that has become my home for the past two days.  As I enjoy this view for the last time, I know with absolute certainty that this is how I will always remember Grenada.  It is funny, when you travel the way I do, the fleeting memories or views that become associated with each place you visit.  Quebec will always call to mind the Plaque in front of the Frontenac.  I cannot think of Israel but to think of Akko.  Germany will always call to mind racing down the Autobahn belting out Taylor Swift.  Dominica, the hilly capital of Rosseu; Saint Lucia, walks through Soufriere; Trinidad, that Easter dinner with the locals; Antigua, the “quaint” capital of St. John’s; St. Kitts, the even quainter of Basseterre where I spent so much time; and now, Grenada, this view, always and forever.

I have nothing but time today.  I slept in (by my standards), but I woke up around 7:30 AM to a beautiful sight: a ship in port.  I would be getting my flag pin.  It was 8:30 AM by the time I got out of bed and went down to breakfast, only having my favorites from last time.  Since I only had one plate, my coffee was not yet done, but I was able to get it to go, so I brought the cup with me and headed to the port.  There it was, open, open, open.  The city was so alive.  It is remarkable what a difference this one ship can make.  My first stop was for cigars, but they looked fake, so I move don to souvenirs.  The first place did not have flag pins, but the next one did.  Perfect.  I got other souvenirs.

There was an emergency proposal due soon, so I headed back to the hotel and lit up an Avo while I worked.  There were issues with the Wi-Fi, so I wasn’t able to get much done, but I enjoyed just sitting and smoking with the beautiful view.  Checkout was at noon, so I did have a time crunch there, but, as soon as I showered, dressed, and packed, I could return to this balcony.  I did just that, having to put aside my Rinaldo halfway through.

Once I was ready, I returned to this balcony where I resumed this entry, which I will now close, as I need to get on with my day, but I wanted to write from here one last time.  I will write more about memories later.  Oh, wait, a bit of adversity.  I called the hotel in Kingstown to let them know I’d be arriving late.  They said they didn’t have a reservation for me.  What the fuck?!?  Well, the hotels.com reservation didn’t push through for whatever reason, but there was another hotel next door that was my second choice.  I called them and they said a security guard would be waiting.  Perfect.  I booked it.  Okay, now I can close.

I guess I can actually write from here one last time.  After I dropped off my luggage, I headed across town to the restaurant, which was overpriced, but the food was delicious.  Oh, wait, I stopped to get cigars and rum first.  I wasn’t sure about the cigars, but the box of Partagas looked real.  It wasn’t sealed, but it was full, and, well, who makes fake Partagas.  The cigars looked, smelled, and felt real.  I lit one up at lunch.  They were definitely real.

After lunch, I walked up to Fort George, which had a great lookout, and back to the hotel.  I went back to my balcony, lit up an Undercrown, and started working on my “Hero’s Journey” piece.  Everything had been cleaned up, and the chairs moved slightly, so the view was off.  No one else would have noticed it, but I did, and I just couldn’t get that familiar view exactly right again.  Once I was done writing about the “I want” songs, I proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can start making my way to the airport.

Maurice Bishop International Airport, Grenada

As the sun sets literally and figuratively on my time in Grenada, I can reflect on my time here and the memories it will leave me with a lifetime of memories, though it will only like be two or three memories tops from each country, though I have no doubt in my ability to recall every detail of the trip years from now.  I wrote yesterday of the right way and the wrong way to do this trip.  Now, doing this trip the right way, it has the potential to make my list of top ten trips.  In fact, if I say “Lesser Antilles Complete” with no qualifications, if I never need to return to the Lesser Antilles, it will certainly make the list.

I love it here, and it seems the perfect way to complete my travels in the Lesser Antilles.  The so-called Greater Antilles just do not have the same allure.  I’m sure Cuba will be amazing, and Haiti will be unforgettable, but it won’t be the same as these tiny island nations.  I will always remember walking around these capitals, the contrast between how dead it is on a holiday versus how alive it is when a ship is in port.  Even on Easter, Saint Lucia was alive when the ship came to port, or, at least, the shopping area was.  It is like a souvenir shop in Vienna closing before midnight on New Year’s Eve, not gonna happen.  I will always remember that view from the balcony where I spent so much time.  I always remember that little restaurant where I ate my breakfasts.

What memories will Saint Vincent provide?  Barbados?  I don’t know, but I’m excited to find out.  It is so fitting that, two years ago, I began this Travelogue, and now, two years later, I have still recorded every trip, and it will be my last trip to these islands in quite some time.  If it weren’t for the heat, I’d want to move here.  I am all bitten up and heatstricken, but I love it because it’s only for a week before I get back to my air conditioned office and apartment and buy anti-itch cream for the bug bites.  The great thing is, I can remember this trip forever from the ashtrays and coffee mugs I buy, from the flag pins on my desk, from the cigars I bring home (well, that’s not forever), from the pictures I take, from rereading these Travelogues.

In a little over three hours, I will be landing in Saint Vincent.  At that point, Grenada will be nothing more than a memory, always and forever, just like the other 46 foreign countries I have visited.  Barbados will be my 50^th country, and that will be a cause for celebration with some of Barbados’s best rum, which is also my favorite.  Alright, so how did I spend my last few hours in Grenada?  The first thing I needed was to get an adapter or two for my electronics, since Saint Vincent uses the same outlets as here, and I did not want to steal the adapter from the hotel.  I found one at a little shop by the hotel and got two of them, the price being insanely cheap.  Next, I went to the grocery store: water, a diet coke, and a small nutmeg ice cream.

That restored my sanity.  I headed towards the mall in search of taxi.  I wound up leaving with shot glasses for my coworkers who requested them, spices, and another flag pin.  Technically, I have three flag pins and have visited two Parliaments now, but I’m sure my reader knows what I mean.  Robin Williams, if you’re listening, I meant three flag pins, one from each country, and three Parliaments, one in each country.  After I left the mall, someone asked if I needed a taxi, as I had been asked all day, but, when I went inside, when I actually needed the taxi, no one asked me.  I had actually been wondering how I would get the taxi.  If I just shouted out, “Taxi!” would a dozen people come rushing up to me.

He quoted a price to me that was slightly more than the price from the airport, and the price kept going up.  Before I was done, I wound up paying double what I had paid on the way in.  I knew I was being scammed.  I said that I needed to stop at the new Parliament.  Okay, the price went up a little, but it was still less than I’d pay for a taxi from my office to LGA, half the price of what I’d pay to go to JFK.  He had no idea where the new Parliament building was, nor did the internet, but his cohort said it was at the “trade center,” just like the security guard had said yesterday.

I had a feeling this was going to be Goshen all over again.  When I got in the car, the driver told me that his cohort had given me the wrong price and that it was actually higher.  Seriously?!?  I suppose that I should have stuck to my guns at that point and insisted he honor the price or gotten out of the cab, but I was too tired to care.  We were soon at the trade center, and one of the workers was walking out, so he stopped in the entrance to ask her.  She walked around to my side, and we had a very interesting conversation.

I’m not sure I’ll get the quotes exactly right, but it went something like this.  “This is the trade center, where Parliament is holding their office, but they usually only meet during the day.”  “This building here?”  “Yes.”  “The green and pink one?”  “Yes.”  “This is the new Parliament?”  “No, it’s just the trade center.”  “But they’re meeting here now?”  “Not right now, no.”  “But, this is where the prime minister and the legislators come to meet?”  “Yes.”  “And they’re building a new Parliament?”  “Maybe.”

I thought that last answer to be quite “quaint.”  Jamaica Kincaid would be proud.  He then went to drive in, but, apparently, he had been blocking someone who wanted to come out, and the guy kept yelling at my driver, saying that a taxi driver should know the proper etiquette, that if he wanted to have a conversation, he should have pulled over.  All my driver had to say was “Okay.”  He just stayed quiet, finally asking if the other guy wanted to “start something.”  Alrighty, then.  Eventually, my driver just pulled around him, a tight squeeze.

I took my pictures, and, when I was done, I said, “Grenada,” pronouncing it “Greh-NAH-duh” before correcting myself, “Greh-NAY-duh Complete, and let’s see what Saint Vincent has in store.”  We were soon at the airport, and I handed him a banknote that was slightly larger than the price the cohort had quoted.  He didn’t want to give me any change, and I didn’t feel like arguing about it.  The total price was about what I’d pay to go to LGA with tip and toll.  Oh, did I mention that I dropped my bottle of rum and that broke?  I’ll have to get a new one inside.

I had over three hours before my flight, so I went to check in with LIAT.  I had to check my bag, and I was a little concerned about leaving my bag with them so early.  Actually, I should reclaim my sleep machine before I go through security, and a few cigars, too, I guess.  I sat down by the charger and then headed outside, where I lit up a Jericho Hill and proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can head to the gate.  Still have two hours before we board.

Kingstown, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

“Is this how I’ll always remember Saint Vincent?” I asked myself as I looked at the view I would be experience as I worked tomorrow.  It’s not much of a view at night, but who knows how it will look in the day.  What memories will my adventures into the city hold?  I am within walking distance of Parliament and the marketplace, so I hope to say “Windward Islands Complete” by the time I’m done with my lunch break tomorrow.  However, for a while, I did not expect to be writing this entry here tonight.

When I closed, I wrote that there were two hours before I had to board.  That was at 7:18 PM.  I did not get on the airplane until almost 11 PM.  I was seriously concerned they might cancel the flight or skip the GND-SVD segment.  Reader, getting fucked by LIAT and spending five hours in a tiny airport with no real food might seem like a once in a lifetime experience, something that is a “quaint” part of your trip, something to look back on as an adventure.  You’d be right about that.  However, it is impossible to describe the panic you feel that your flight be cancelled or that no one will be waiting for you at the hotel when you arrive.

My original readers will recall that this is the second that this happened to me.  Two years ago, I had a similar experience at Melville Hall waiting for my DOM-SLU flight.  I have no desire for it to happen to me a third time, ever.  Okay, I need to pause to pour myself some rum.  Yes, I got the new rum, and I’m very excited to try it.

Well, that was disappointing.  It’s very smooth, but it lacks the mouthwatering flavor of Mount Gay.  Anyway, after I closed, I went to see if I could retrieve stuff from my bag.  The bags had already been taken away.  Reader, it was three and a half hours before my bag was on the airplane.  My flight was scheduled to depart at 9:35 PM, keep this timing in mind.  I went through security.  Wow, this stuff is as smooth as shit.  Okay, bad simile.  It’s as smooth as water.  I went to buy my rum and then food, but they just had sandwiches that looked awful, so I got a Diet Coke, which I had along with some chips from the grocery store.  I got situated with that and plugged in to the outlets.  There was free Wi-Fi there.  I was all set, so I uploaded my photos from the trip so far.

Meanwhile, my friend messaged me a picture from my apartment.  They were watching Lilo & Stitch (2002), without me!  I’m not sure if I was more upset that they went out of order (we have been watching every animated Disney film from Lion King (1994), in order, and the last one we watched was The Emperor’s New Groove (2000), so they skipped Atlantis (2001)) or that they didn’t wait for me to watch what is possibly the best Disney film of the 2000s decade.

After I was done with the photos, I reviewed a couple of inspection reports, hurrying to get them out before boarding was supposed to start at 9:05 PM.  Reader, if you’ve never flown LIAT, don’t, unless you absolutely have to.  It’s the worst airline I’ve ever flown.  There were two flights going out this evening, both supposedly at 9:35 PM.  One to Port of Spain and mine to Saint Vincent.  My flight was actually coming in from Port of Spain.  I heard the announcement for the flight to Port of Spain.  At 9:15 PM, I started to get worried.  Had I missed the announcement?  Was there are another boarding area.  No and no.

I found some businessmen sitting at a table nearby.  They were going to Saint Vincent, and one of them informed me that the flight was delayed by an hour, that it hadn’t even landed in Port of Spain yet.  10:30 PM was the new time.  “Best case scenario,” one of them added.  Lovely.  I logged back in and wrote two proposals.  Once that was done, I was left to my worries.  First, I tried to find the flight number for the flight that was bringing the airplane to Port of Spain.  By the time I found it, the flight had already landed there.  Okay, that was encouraging.  Once it left Port of Spain, I tried calling my hotel to let them know I’d be an hour late.  No answer.  That was less encouraging.  I had all sorts of visions having to find a hotel in Kingstown in the middle of the night.  It was Dominica all over again.  I kept trying to get an update on the POS-GND flight.

In the end, my update came not from my computer or phone but from my ears, the unmistakable roar of the plane landing.  It was a very quick boarding process, and it was open seating.  There was a free aisle seat in the back, right by the exit, so I could be the first one off the plane.  We were only in the air for 25 minutes, but the plane was extremely uncomfortable.  I’d have rather taken a boat up the Grenadines to Saint Vincent, but I never really considered that option.

I was one of the first to go to Immigration, so I didn’t have to wait on line, but I did have to wait for my bag.  Once I got my bag, there was a short line for Customs, and a taxi driver approached me as soon as I walked out.  The price to my hotel was cheap.  He said a number, once we were in the car, and I asked if that was EC or US.  He could have lied and said that it was US, and I wouldn’t have argued about the price.  He said that it was EC, which made it quite cheap.  It costs more to take a taxi across town during lunchtime in Manhattan (gotta love Citibike).

We got to the hotel, and we soon found the security guard.  He brought me to my room, carrying my large bag, so I gave him a small tip.  There is plenty of outdoor seating all around, and each room has a little porch with outdoor furniture (not particularly comfortable) and an ashtray.  I’m not sure if this seat will be my second home, or if I’ll move around.  I’m not sure what memories my time here in Saint Vincent will entail.  I changed into my pajamas and got myself set up on the porch, where I lit up my Tuesday Ser Jacopo pipe and proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can publish and get some sleep.

Spring Break 2015 - Day 3 - "Gaston"

4/6/15 (Easter Monday)

St. George’s, Grenada

There were two ways that I could have done this trip: the right way and the wrong way.  The right way involved me flying home from Barbados on Sunday, spending two nights on each island (three on Barbados), allowing time to relax and allowing for unplanned circumstances.  The wrong way involved me flying home on Wednesday, spending just one night on each island and hoping that everything went right.

The upside of doing it the “wrong way” was fewer vacation, but I had an idea.  What if I worked remotely three days?  It would mean fewer vacation days than the shorter trip, since I would have the second weekend to add to my sightseeing time.  I really only needed an hour or so to do my stuff in town on each island, so I could use my lunch break and the travel days to that purpose.  Remember, three countries, three flag pins, three Parliaments, that’s it.  I was more than willing to pay for the hotel room for the extra nights to work out on this balcony instead of the office and to allow for contingencies.

One such contingency came into effect.  If I had done the trip the “wrong way,” I would be on my way to the airport right now, on the verge of tears, considering praying to a deity whose existence I doubt that the airport would have a flag pin for me.  What went wrong?  See those two words after the date of today’s entry?  Well, when I have done this trip previously, I always ended on Easter.  My Easter celebrations have been remarkable, listening to Church music in Castries, having dinner with the locals in Port of Spain, walking around the town of Sal Salvador.

These countries have some of the highest percentage of Roman Catholics in the world.  Easter here is unlike Easter anywhere else in the world, save perhaps Italy or Spain.  However, this year, I began on Easter, and I did not realize that Easter Monday was also a national holiday.  Without a ship in port, everything would be closed.  There was no ship.  Everything was closed.  The only places that were opened were the restaurant in my hotel and the grocery shop across the street.  I will have to take the evening flight tomorrow.  That would not have been an option if I did the trip the wrong way.

Okay, so Grenada uses a different plug than the rest of North America.  There was one adapter in the room, which I needed for my sleep machine.  What about my phone?  Well, there was a North American style outlet in the bathroom, one of those “shavers only” gizmos.  Reader, ever since college, I have maintained an “open door, open phone policy.”  When I was at NYU, I left my door unlocked and my friends were welcome to “pop in” any time day or night.  They were also welcomed to call me or text at any time for any reason, so I never muted my phone overnight.  That is still true.  One of my friends has a key to my apartment, and he is welcome to crash on my floor whenever he wants.

I am never going to get annoyed at someone for waking me in the middle of the night.  Sometimes when my brother gets toasted, he texts me annoying messages at 3 AM my time, to which I merely reply that I’m sleeping and go back to sleep.  I have never regretted that policy.  While I knew that, even if one of my friends was in the most dire of needs, there was absolutely nothing that I could do for him or her at 4 AM from Grenada, but it felt weird keeping my phone so far away.

I woke up early and was rearing to go.  It seemed too quiet, and I couldn’t see a ship from the balcony.  Fuck.  I headed out towards the port.  Nope, no ship.  The mall was closed, and the shops would not be opened until 9 AM tomorrow morning.  Well, that bit the big one.  I went to get breakfast, and the woman at the restaurant was very friendly.  It was just like the place I went to in Nevis (what was the capital there?  Charleston?  Charlestown), but, since I had the complimentary breakfast, I could get as much as I wanted.  I got two servings of great food, all sorts of fish and pork and plantains and fry jacks.  It was so good.  The coffee was awful, though, definitely not local, but coffee is coffee.

As I mentioned, I have taken this Travelogue in a new direction each time I do this trip.  What is the one question that people always ask me when I tell them about my travels?  “Did you ever meet any interesting people?”  What do I always answer?  “Not if I can help it.”  What is the single thing with which I have the most trouble?  Starting a conversation with an attractive stranger.  Well, she was not attractive by my definition, but she certainly was interesting, and I knew that she would be thrilled to talk about her country.  I had the perfect question.

“What would you say is the biggest part of Grenadine culture that sets it apart from the other islands?”  I knew she would be thrilled to answer that question.  I was right.  The first thing she said was “service.”  What did that mean?  She spoke how friendly the islanders are, how respectful they are, that they are more genuine than other islands.  She spoke how they hold to their values, how they believe in family.  Then, she hesitated.  It was coming, the answer I wanted.  She said that families are overindulgent of their kids, that they encourage them to pursue higher education when they should be joining the workforce right of high school.  In her mind, a kid who went for a Master’s Degree instead of working was lazy.

Reader, think about that for a moment.  In such contrast to almost every other country I visited, she is saying higher education is a bad thing.  Maybe it’s just her view, but it was a view I had never heard expressed before.  Wasn’t this Gaston telling Belle to stop reading and find a husband?  Wasn’t this Pocahontas’s father telling her to stop dreaming and get married?  Wasn’t this Mulan’s family telling her to give up her other pursuits and become a bride?  It is the male version of a mindset that should have died centuries ago.  Imagine walking up to someone in Delhi or Tel Aviv or Tehran and asking the parents of a child who is getting his Master’s Degree, “Isn’t it time he joins the workforce already?”  It’s just not a question you commonly hear.

Well, on that note, I went upstairs, lit up an H. Upmann, and started working.  Over the course of the day, I got a lot of work done, far more productive than I could have been in Manhattan.  There were some issues with the Wi-Fi, but I worked around it.  For lunch, I walked around a bit, first heading towards Fort George, nothing opened there, then up to Parliament, again, nothing opened.  I was informed that there were only two places opened, the restaurant where I had breakfast, and the restaurant in the grocery store.  I got some groceries, which were unbelievably cheap, and went back to the same place I went for breakfast, bringing my lunch up to the balcony, which I had with a beer.  I then lit up a Winston Churchill, later an Ardor, as I did my work for the day.

At 6 PM, I finished up, and thought about how to plan my evening.  Parliament was right up the hill, or so I was told, and the sun was setting across the bay.  I could run up to Parliament, take a quick picture, and be back in time for sunset, but I had a better idea.  I would write my entry on the rocks while I watched the sunset.  Well, the sun then proceeded to disappear behind some clouds.  Thwarted!  Okay, I had already lit up a Padron (the Anniversario, the good one) and walked up to Parliament.

I found the old building that could only be Parliament.  There were three security guards and parking signs for various officials.  I asked them if this was Parliament?  It’s the old one.  Damnit.  Well, where’s the new one?  It was by the Trade Center.  Okay, where’s that?  Three miles away, back towards the airport.  Thwarted again!  I took some pictures here, along with the old cathedral and puppy pictures for Em (yes, I’m still doing that, let’s see how many times in this Travelogue I’ve mentioned doing that, at least 8 times), and headed back to my hotel.

The only place that was now opened for dinner was the restaurant in the grocery store.  I headed out to the balcony to finish my cigar, where I proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can take a nap before dinner.  In tonight’s entry, I will explain why I have been using the hashtag #Gaston in all of my photos today.

There is a difference between an antagonist and a villain.  An immigration officer or an airline agent or a security guard might be seen as an antagonist, but they are not villains.  They are simply doing their jobs, and their jobs requirements are at odds with my desires.  That does not make them a villain.  Likewise, the hunter in Bambi or the old man in The Fox and the Hound, they are not villains.  They are merely antagonists.  Maleficent, Cruella de Vil, Scar, Frollo, Hades, Sun Tzu, and Clayton, they are all villains.  Clayton is an interesting example.  While we are meant to dislike him for hunting the gorillas, that is not what makes him a villain.  Once he locks up Jane and her father, then he becomes a villain.  Until then, he was merely an antagonist.

Placing a curse on someone, stealing 101 Dalmatians, killing Mufasa, locking up Quasimodo, or killing innocent civilians (as Frollo, Hades, and Sun Tzu all attempt to do), those are acts of villains, acts of pure evil.  Now, what is missing from this list?  Gaston my reader might think.  Well, he’s an interesting case.  Just like the hunters whom we like to view as villains because the animals they hunt are anthropomorphized, only Belle and the audience knows that Beast means no harm to the townsfolk.  Gaston does not know that.  As far as he knows, the Beast is just that, a beast set on murdering the townsfolk.  Granted, he goes slightly overboard, and he is in no small part motivated by his desire to make Belle his wife and his belief that killing the Beast will help him to that end.

All of that makes him an antagonist, not a villain.  They story could be rewritten so that we would still hate him even if his intentions were pure.  He is also not a villain because he’s trying to marry Belle.  He wants to marry her because she is “the most beautiful girl in town” and, according to him, “that makes her the best.”  So what?  Most guys would feel the same.  That doesn’t make him a villain, doesn’t even make him an antagonist.  What does make him an asshole is when he sings, “/Here in town there’s only she/who’s as beautiful as me./”  Again, so what?  He’s an asshole, not a villain there.  During the song “Gaston,” we see all of his “manly” qualities, and, yes, a few centuries ago in that French Provencal town, it would probably make him every girl’s dream husband.  He is over-caricaturized, but that is to be expected of the genre.

In the entire movie, there is only one thing that he does that makes him a villain, only one act of evil, when he gets Belle’s father locked up and only offers to help release him if she’ll marry him.  However, that scene could be rewritten, and people would still hate him because of the other stuff.  That is a common occurrence in these animated movies. You have a character the audience is meant to hate, often a business man whose smart business decision is at odds with the needs of the main characters, but the movie won’t work that way.  Once you are meant to hate the character, then you have the antagonist (not yet a villain) do something that is evil, like sabotage his rival or frame the main character for a crime.

Take “It’s a Wonderful Life,” Mr. Potter is meant to be hated all throughout the movie, yet he is merely an antagonist.  That doesn’t work.  They need to have him do something evil, make him a true villain.  Reader, do you remember what that is?  It’s when the uncle loses the envelope of money and Mr. Potter finds it.  Rather than returning it to the uncle, he hides it, causing the bank to go under.  It’s not his money to keep, and he knows whose it is.  That is an act of pure evil.  That is when he becomes a villain.

Alright, so now whom am I maintaining is the true villain in Beauty and the Beast?  The enchantress of course.  She goes to the castle of the young prince (10-11 years-old at the time) and asks for shelter for the night.  Ignoring the prince’s age, he had no obligation to provide her with shelter.  It would have been a nice thing to do, and I would even argue that she should have done it, but he did not have to do it.  What did she do?  Well, she put a curse on him, turning him into the Beast and cursing all the innocent servants.  If that is not evil, then I do not know what is.  That is the impetus for all the conflict.

Okay, why did I break that up?  As I was walking around town today, someone came up to me with what looked like a car part wrapped in a towel, saying that it was broken and asking if I could help him.  I looked at it and told him that I didn’t know anything about it.  No, that’s not what he meant.  He asked if I could “help” him buy a new part at the gas station.  I had no obligation to help him in that way, and I turned him down.  It looked pretty cheap, probably no more than the price of a cigar or two, but why should I help him?  He muttered something about “white people.”  Does that make me a villain?  Does that mean I should be turned into a Beast and my friends into clocks and candlesticks?  Of course not.  That is why the enchantress is the villain in Beauty and the Beast.

Alright, so, what happened after I closed?  I went to get dinner.  I got two types of chicken, side dishes, and an ice cream.  The total?  Well, there are drinks at Starbucks that cost more.  I decided to do “dinner and a movie” Caribbean style, along with a Prensado cigar.  The movie?  “The Fox and The Hound.”  It was utterly adorable, and the food was as delicious as the cigar.  After the movie, I went back inside, drank my now melted ice cream, grabbed an Ardor, and came back out here, where I lit up the pipe and proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can finish my pipe, publish, and get to sleep.

Spring Break 2015 - Day 2 - Windward Bound

4/5/15 (Easter)

Miami International Airport, Florida (MIA)

Well, here I am at MIA, which, for three Passovers in a row now, has been my jumping off point to a week or so in the North American tropics.  2013 brought me to the Windward Islands, 2014 Central America, and now, in 2015, I am #WindwardBound once more.  In a couple of days, I will be able to announce “Windward Islands Complete.”  There are four countries in the Windward Antilles (note the commas): Dominica (where I began this Travelogue), Saint Lucia, Grenada, and Saint Vincent’s and the Grenadines.

February 2014 brought me to the Leeward Islands, Antigua and Barbuda and Saint Kitts and Nevis (two countries).  Though I did visit Barbuda, I announced “Antigua and Barbuda Complete” within about an hour of landing in St. John’s.  “Quaint.”  That’s the word Jamaica Kincaid used to describe the island in “A Small Place,” and it is the best word to describe these islands, the Lesser Antilles as a whole.  It is quite possible that that book, that word, more than anything has been the impetutus of the allure of the Lesser Antilles for me.

After I announce, “Windward Islands Complete,” I will continue on to Barbados, which will allow me to say, “Lesser Antilles Complete,” a task that entailed three trips, eight countries, four World Heritage Sites, and the consumption of more local coffee than I could possibly imagine.  Each of these countries has their own coffee, their own rum, and it’s all good, really good.

When I asked my coworker if he was going to miss me while I was away, he said that he wouldn’t but that he was very jealous.  Then, he paused and added that he was also angry at me because he knew that I would not spend a moment on the beach and instead spend the entire time sitting under an umbrella and smoking cigars.  How well he knows me.  To him, that is a waste of a trip.  To me, that is what the Caribbean is, the only way I can enjoy these lovely Lesser Antilles.

As I have mentioned countless times, and as I will demonstrate over the next week, it is not the beach that brings me to the Caribbean.  It is the interior.  Beaches are beaches anywhere in the world, but only the Caribbean (and Central America) has so well preserved the remnants of Colonial times.  It is a place that can be summed up with one word: quaint.  We will soon be boarding, and I want to watch movies on the plane, I think, or, actually I don’t know, maybe nap or work on my personal journal or my thematic analysis of the “I want” songs. 

Whichever way, I’ll need to wrap up with the events of today.  I slept in for once, only waking up with as much lead time as I would need to get ready and pack.  Oh, wait, the events of last night.  After I closed, well, things started going downhill.  My lighter wasn’t working, the Wi-Fi wasn’t working outside.  About half a dozen little things went wrong.  It took me almost an hour before I could start my movie, and my cigar was already well underway.  Though I recognized the irrationality of it, I was on the verge of tears.  I had it timed perfectly.  I would publish my entry, watch Hercules, and be done before midnight at the same time I was done with my cigar, which would give me some time with the family before we all went to bed.  My mom came out, and we watched about half the movie together before she went to bed.

Okay, this morning, I wasn’t particularly hungry when I woke up, but I needed coffee, badly.  Since I had overslept, my coffee had been waiting for me for over an hour.  My mom said she would microwave it, but I refuse to drink microwaved coffee.  Fortunately, the coffee was still lukewarm, so that did the trick.  Well, needless to say, it took way too long for everyone to get ready.  We were meeting my dad’s side of the family for lunch.  My mom thought we didn’t have to be there until 12:30 PM (12:15 PM was what my dad had told his sister), and she didn’t realize that I needed to be at the airport 2 hours early.  Let’s just say there was more hectic chaos.

Eventually, we all got on the road, and we were, of course, 15 minutes late.  My lighter was still not working, so my mom was going to stop at a drug store to get me butane while I met up with the family and told them they were coming.  This was the only place in the area open for Easter, so it was packed.  It was good to see everyone, and apparently I had not met my cousin G--- (my dad’s sister’s grandson) before.  He is in ninth grade, and he is about my size.  I was starving, so ordered a waffle, bacon, gyro lamb, eggs, and lots of coffee.  I ate every last bite.  We took some ceremonial pictures, much to the chagrin of the waitress.

When I got up from the table to take my last Official U in America for a week, I saw that everyone had reseated themselves to talk to people they hadn’t spoken with during the meal.  I found myself next to my cousin M---, G---‘s mother.  It was getting time for me to leave so that I wouldn’t worry about missing my flight.  I don’t remember who mentioned it, but someone was saying how much G--- looked like M---‘s ex-boyfriend, Andrew, the reason my first name is Steven instead of Andrew, which is my middle name.  M---‘s mother asked her when she last saw Andrew.  Without missing a beat, I deadpanned, “About 9 months before G--- was born.”  That caused quite some laughter, so I pulled a George Costanza.  I banged the table and announced that I was leaving on a high note.

We said our goodbyes, and I got in the car, but Mulan back on, and lit up a Cohiba.  I needed to gas up and also wanted to try again to find butane (my mom had gotten lighter fluid, not butane gas).  Well, as I was driving, I found a cigar store.  They refilled my lighter, and I got some good cigars, the kind I had wanted from the store on Congress.  Well, the lighter was clogged, that was why it was not working, not because the guy on Congress had refilled it improperly.  I bought another cheap lighter, which would get me through the week and was on my way.  I stopped for gas en route.

Getting from the car rental place to my gate took about half the time as the reverse did on Friday.  Security was a breeze, taking less than five minutes, as they put me in the PreCheck lane.  I got to my gate, where I charged my phone and proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close, as we will soon be boarding.

Aboard AA 1546, En route MIA-GND

Only people who play RPGs can understand my pain right now.  Once we reached cruising altitude, I played my game for about an hour, and my plan was to save it and then spend an hour writing the thematic analysis I kept mentioning.  I could close out today’s entry when I got to my hotel tonight, and I’d have a great entry to publish by 10 PM, perfect, right?  Well, there was no save point.  I found myself in a town, so I bought all my new weapons and armor, stocked up on supplies, talked to everyone in town, signed up for the next quest, spent half an hour in the dungeon, opening up every treasure chest, still no save point.  What the fuck?

Finally I got to the point where I was just fleeing every battle in the name of time.  Then, I saw it, the save point, but I pressed the wrong button, and I went the wrong direction.  Well, I found myself facing the boss before I saved, and it was a tough boss.  Anyone who plays RPGs knows what happens the first time you fight a boss, right?  You lose, and you die, and it’s game over, but that’s okay, because you usually have saved right before the fight, and you’ve learned his strengths and weakenesses.  That’s how it’s supposed to work.

Well, I didn’t get to save, so, I’ll need to replay all the way from the forest, do everything in town all over again, go through the same dungeon again, fight all the same monsters, all of which will take over an hour, and it will be boring af (yes, I’m using that term now, Google it if you’re over thirty) because I just did it.  These games are fun when everything’s new, and that’s the whole point, but repeating the exact same hour of the game, that’s a nightmare.  It’s like listening to the same song for an hour, or watching the same movie back to back to back.  I’m not talking about Beauty and the Beast.  I’m talking about a movie that’s decent but that you only need to watch once.

Pissed at the author for designing the game so poorly, I proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close.  I’m not sure if I’ll be able to include the thematic analysis tonight, or if I want to just publish as is.  I guess it depends what I can include and still publish by 10 PM.  Maybe I’ll just get started on the analysis and finish it tomorrow, or I can write it tonight and publish it on my other blog.  Yeah, I guess that’s what I’ll wind up doing.  Besides, I want to share that analysis with some people with whom I don’t particularly want to share this Travelogue.  Fuck, there are things in the new blog that I want to share even less with the people with whom I want to share the Travelogue.  I guess I can revert those posts to drafts.  Problem solved.

St. George’s, Grenada

The past 48 hours have really been stunning examples of Murphy’s Law.  Everything that could go wrong went wrong.  However, once I took that first Official U in Grenada, it didn’t matter what pitfalls I entailed in the journey, I was at my first destination.  That was all that mattered.  It didn’t matter our flight was half an hour late.  It didn’t matter that the lines for Immigration and Customs took an hour.  It didn’t matter that no one was opening the door for my hotel when I arrived.  All that mattered was that I was finally lying on my bed in my hotel room a quarter mile away from the Grenada Parliament.

When I travel, I define success in varying ways.  Yeah, I care more about whether my trip is successful than enjoyable.  When I did the trip last year to CA-4, the definition of success was quite clear: saying “CA-4 Complete.”  That meant 8 World Heritage Sites in 4 Countries, with flag pins, Official meals, and pictures at Parliament in each country.  Miraculously, we did it.  There were so many near misses, but it all worked out in the end.

The definition of success here is much simpler.  Three countries, three flag pins, three Parliaments (the Parliament in Barbados is actually a WHS).  That is what it will take for me to say “Lesser Antilles Complete,” and I have a week to do it.  I don’t even have my inter-island flights booked yet, I have granted myself that much flexibility.  Wait, I never travel that way.  I always have every little detail planned months in advanced.

Not this time.  This time, I need the flexibility.  For starters, tomorrow is a holiday.  It is Easter Monday.  That means that stores will be closed.  The cruise terminal will be opened if there is a ship in port.  If I can get my flag pin tomorrow, I can take the early flight on Tuesday to Saint Vincent’s.  Otherwise, I need to take the late flight, which will not get me to my hotel until close to midnight.  I do not want to do that.

I want to do everything I need to do in Grenada tomorrow, including putting in my 8 hours of office work remotely, wake up early, and be in Kingstown by noon Tuesday.  That will give me lots and lots of time there to do whatever I need to do before I go to Barbados.  I can only hope that Murphy has gotten tired of me and moved on to his next victim.

Okay, so what did Murphy have in store for me this evening?  Well, I have enough experiencing travelling to know the merits of showing up at a small hotel at 9 PM and hoping someone will be there to check you in.  This hotel doesn’t even have a website.  I had to make my reservation over the phone.  The guy spoke perfect English, and I could hear him as clear as a whistle, yet I had to repeat everything to him three times.  Eventually, I just spell name out with NATO Phonetic letters.  The conversation went something like this.  “Steven Margolin.”  “How do you spell that?”  “M A R G O L I N.” “[A butchered spelling that’s not even close.]”  “No, M A R G O L I N.”  “[Another butchered spelling.]”  “Mike.”  “Your name is Mike?”  “No, my name is Steven.  I’m trying to spell out my last name for you.  M as in Mike.”  “Okay.”  “Mike Alpha Romeo Golf Oscar Lima India November.”  That worked.  I had let him know that I would be arriving at 8 PM.

Well, I got the time of my flight wrong.  It wasn’t landing until 8:11 PM, so I called him from MIA to tell him I would be there at 9 PM.  He seemed annoyed that I called him and just told me everything would be waiting for me.  I did not have much faith in this hotel, so I looked up the reviews online.  They were good reviews, and they said that it was actually the only hotel in the city.  Reader, remember that point.  Well, the flight was further delayed and didn’t land until 8:30 PM.  It was 8:45 PM by the time I got inside the terminal, and it was 9:30 PM by the time I cleared Immigration.  Meanwhile, I was slightly torn.  The guy seemed annoyed when I called him the first time.  Did I call him again now to tell him it would be 10 PM?  Or did I just show up and hope that he hadn’t given up on me and left for the night.

I chose the latter.  I went to Duty Free, but they didn’t have any decent cigars.  There was another line for Customs, and I couldn’t find the Grenada stamp in my passport.  I had to head back to Immigration, and she showed it to me, faded out, on a random page.  I took a taxi into town, and she informed me that tomorrow was a holiday.  If there were no ships, there would be no souvenirs, which would mean I would have to take the 9:30 PM flight Tuesday instead of the 9:30 AM flight I want to take.

No one knows if there is a ship in port.  When I wake up tomorrow, I will know.  I just have to go out to the balcony and look.  Hell, if there is a ship in port, I could wake up at 7:30 AM, have breakfast (my Official meal), get my souvenirs, take a picture at Parliament, come back to my hotel, light up a cigar, announce “Grenada Complete,” and be sitting down to work by 9 AM.  Otherwise, things get dicey.

We got to the hotel, but it was pitch black and all locked up.  I tried calling while she tried banging on the door.  No answer.  She was not going to leave me here, especially since I hadn’t paid her yet.  I asked her if there were any other hotels in town?  No, this was the only one.  Finally, we saw a light come on, and the guy took me to my room.  He said that the check-in process would have to wait until morning.

I got situated in my room, and I was going to get started on this entry, but the battery on my laptop wasn’t fully charged.  Also, it needed to run some updates, and I didn’t want it to restart at an inopportune moment.  I figured that I could charge it while it updated and while I got ready to go outside.  That didn’t work too well.  The update took way too long, and I was all ready to go.  I was bored af.  The instant it rebooted, I headed outside, where I lit up my Ardor and proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can publish and see what tomorrow has in store.

Spring Break 2015 - Day 1 - "Belle"

4/4/15

Boynton Beach, Florida (Hunter’s Run)

Okay, so why have I been using the hashtag #Belle in all of my photos today?  In yesterday’s entry I wrote about my newfound obsession with Beauty and the Beast, and I tried to resolve whether I identified more with Belle or the Beast.  I made some progress on that question, but to make more progress I will need to start from the beginning.  The title of today’s entry refers to the song “Belle,” not the character.  It is my favorite song thematically from the whole movie, and I will include a more thematic analysis of the song against other similar Disney songs, but I need to first explain why I so love the song.  It is the main reason I love the movie.

As soon as the opening narration ends, we find Belle running through the streets of this French Provencal town as people sing about her.  She then starts singing about how she wants more.  Each of the Disney princesses sings about how they want more and Simba, too.  It is only Hercules who sings about how he wants less.  In this metaphor, I am Hercules.  “I would go most anywhere to feel like I belong.”  I am not Ariel wanting to leave the sea.  I am not Belle wanting to leave that French Provencal town.  I am not Pocahontas wondering what lies just around the riverbend.  I am not Mulan wondering when her reflection will show who she is inside (or am I?).  I am Tarzan wanting to know if there are strangers like him.

As for that French Provencal town, every time I see it, and I have watched the movie five times this week, even rewinding the scene a few extra times, I could imagine myself living there.  I live in the big city.  I can see the Empire State Building from my apartment block, the Chrysler Building from my office window.  I often write about how I could never live anywhere else, but whenever I watch the song “Belle,” I change my mind.  Transport me back a few centuries, and I would love to be living there.  There’s even a tobacco shop in town.  It’s a simple life, and, as I explained in the entries from my previous trip, all I have ever wanted is to live that simple life.  Belle wants to get out of that French Provencal town because she wants something more out of life, something grander.

I want to go to that French Provencal town because I want something less out of life, something more ordinary.  I am anything but ordinary.  I have never been modest, but my intelligence rivals Hercules’s strength.  It has been quantitatively measured as one in ten thousand.  That is not an exaggeration.  What has that gotten me in life?  Other than the ability to do pretty much whatever I want with minimal effort, my raw intelligence has served me almost no useful purpose in life.  “There’s nothing worse than wasted talent.”

Hercules would give it all up just to live an ordinary life, and so would I.  Belle on the other hand she does not want an ordinary life.  She does not want what every other girl in town wants. “Madame, Gaston, his little wife, no sir, not me, I guarantee it.  I want more than this Provencal life.  I want adventure in the great wide somewhere.”  I’ve had my adventure.  I’ve been everywhere.  I want the Provencal life, and I have mentioned how much I would have loved to live in that exact French Provencal town.

Okay, this is a Travelogue, but I haven’t really done any travelling today.  I haven’t even left Boynton all day.  The highlight of the day was finding Hercules on Blu-ray with the cardboard sleeve.  I woke up a little past 9 AM to an empty house or, more accurately, a house sound asleep.  I lounged around for about half an hour, and I was absolutely starving.  I did not think that it would be go over too well if I cooked some eggs for myself.  It is funny, my grandmother watches me (and my parents) like a hawk when we are here, even if we’re just getting a soda or something.  She likes everything to be just where it belongs, and a cabinet door that is left open is a major cause for concern.  In contrast, one of my friends has keys to my apartment, and he is more than welcome to spend as much time there while I’m away.  I don’t care what he does, and I told him as much, as long as they clean up after themselves and don’t rearrange any furniture.  I guess it’s just a matter of different personalities.

What did I do?  I put on Hercules and headed to Denny’s.  The meal was delicious, enough food to feed that French Provencal town, as my coworker might joke.  I took a picture of the food when it came, and it took me more time to post the pictures to social media than it did to eat the food.  I then went to the Walmart in the same shopping center, looking for Disney.  No dice.  Target was next.  I walked to the movie section.

There it was.  One copy of Hercules in a cardboard sleeve.  All of my Disney movies are in cardboard sleeves, and that is how they are shipped for the first release, but finding one that came out a year ago still with the cardboard sleeve is almost impossible.  Add that to that fact that I had been listening to Hercules all morning.  I was ecstatic.  I also picked up some socks and underwear, since I was running low.  Next was Best Buy.  No luck there.  It was slightly past noon by the time I got back.

Then there was some issue with my ID card, so that was another hour, and the four of them had a tee time at 1:45 PM, so I went to the pool.  I was already hungry again, so I got a burger.  It was quite good.  I had brought with me two pipes, three cigars, my laptop, and two Disney movies.  I did not expect to make it through all of them.  I just wanted options.  I wound up lighting up a Winston Churchill, playing my RPG for about an hour, and then booked my Barbados hotel.  They were supposed to be two hours, done before 4 PM, and my electronics were dying.

I have two friends who live in Florida, both of whom I love like sisters.  One, the girl I mentioned in the previous entry, whom I think of the adorable little sister I would have wanted, who reminds me of my little cousin in so many ways.  She lives in Orlando.  I had asked if I could see her while I was in state.  It’s three hours away, but she’s “worth the drive.”  (Bonus Taylor Swift quote.)  She was spending the day with her Prince Charming, so that was a no go, but my mom, when she heard that I wanted to consider doing that gave me a bunch of crap, saying that I was coming her to see my grandmother, not to visit friends.

Reader, it was almost 5 PM before I spent more than five minutes with my grandmother for the day.  If I had met my friend for lunch, I certainly would have been back here by 5 PM.  Hell, I could have spent half a day at Epcot and still been back by 5 PM.  I could have spent the day at the cigar store on Congress Ave and still been back by 5 PM.  The other friend in Florida?  Well, I met her on the Antarctica trip, and I came to think of her the big sister that I always wanted.  With all the meals I shared with her family,  her father I came to see as a favorite uncle.  She’s in Switzerland.  That was a no go, too.

Anyway, back in the air conditioned house and having some matzah with various toppings, I literally cooled off, and my mom suggested that I play Scrabble with my grandmother.  In 27 years, I do not think I have ever beaten her.  Correction, I may have beaten her during a game or two, but only when we played more than one game during the visit and she won the other games.  This year, I finally beat her, and I did so handedly.  It was the first time either of us had played Scrabble since this time last year when she beat me.  Granted, I got all the good letters, while she was stuck with one-pointers mostly.  That said, my 27-year-old mind was just sharper than her 83-year-old mind.

Meanwhile, my lighter needed fuel, so my mom agreed to go to the cigar store to refill and pick up some cigars while she was there.  I gave her my debit card, and off she went.  When she got back, she was quick to mention that every guy there looked at her like they had never seen a woman before.  She turned 60 two months ago.  I’m quite sure she enjoyed that.  “It was like Penny at the comic book store.”  She caught the reference and agreed.  I went out to the porch, where I lit up an Ardor and proceeded to write this entry.

Then, there was another hubabaloo.  Dinner.  My mom asked me when I’d be ready for dinner.  8 PM, I told her, so long as she didn’t distract me, as I needed to finish my pipe and this entry.  Well, of course, that did not happen, nor did my steak get cooked.  It is now 8:11 PM, and due to her constant distractions of telling me when dinner would be ready, I have not yet finished the entry.  She just came out to tell me that my steak was not cooked yet.  Wait!  Wasn’t that the whole point of why she kept coming out?  So that she could rush me along?  So that I could finish in time for dinner.  Well, now I’m pissed again.  Alright, it is dark out, and I guess I’m done with this entry, so I will close so that I can sit down for dinner and hope that it will be ready by now and that everyone else hasn’t started eating without me.

If my reader thought that the dinner drama had ended when I closed, they do not know my family.  After I closed, yes, the steak was not cooked.  I like my steak almost raw, so it would just need a couple of minutes on each side, five minutes top.  I was still confused as to why my mom kept rushing me, only for her to then tell me that my steak was uncooked.  It made no sense.  Well, here’s the catch.  The stove doesn’t work right, and the only way to turn it on is to supply with a short burst of gas from the garage, which needed to be timed perfectly.  Okay, still confused at this point.  I said that I would be ready at 8 PM.  Everyone else’s food was ready at 8 PM.  Everyone else started eating at 8 PM.  Why then did my dad come out at 8:15 PM, saying that I needed to cook my steak?  Wasn’t my steak being prepared as part of the whole dinner process?  Wasn’t that why my mom kept rushing me?  Because she was afraid that if I waited until 8 PM to eat my steak would either be overcooked or cold?

Tempers flared all around, the five of us being uniquely suited to get on each other’s nerves, even after 27 years or maybe especially after 27 years.  My dad, ever the diplomat, did not have much of an appetite, gave me some of his meat while mine was being prepared.  It was like a Brazillian steakhouse, every time I finished a piece of meat, he put a new piece of meat on my plate, the pork chop and the steak being too much for him.  After dinner, we sat down while my grandmother cleaned up before we had dessert.  That is something that I don’t understand either, and it’s something my mom does that she surely got from her mother.  Why do you need to clean up between dinner and dessert?  Wouldn’t it make more sense to serve dessert immediately afterwards and then clean up everything, including the necessarily dirty plates from dessert?

After dessert, I asked what the plan was.  I wanted to watch Hercules.  No one else wanted to.  In the end, it was decided that they would play bridge, and I could watch Hercules on my laptop and smoke my cigar while I watched outside.  That is exactly what I’m going to do, light up a Flor del Antilles, publish this entry, and watch Hercules.

Oh, so the cigars my mom went to buy.  I realized that I had made a fatal mistake.  I had asked her to get me two Padron cigars as part of the package and four similar cigars.  Well, there are two lines of Padron cigars, the regular Padron is pure crap.  The one called Padron Aniversario is one of the best cigars in the world.  At the cigar shop back in New York, the Padron Aniversario is the favorite cigar of the workers there, and they all just call it “Padron” because no one smokes the regular line.  I didn’t even think to include the word Aniversario.  What happened?  Well, my mom, since she did exactly what I asked her to do, brought me back two Padron cigars and four similar cigars that were just as crappy as the original Padron.  Completely my fault, and they are not cigars I would consider smoking.  I asked her to bring them back to Scarsdale as an emergency stash in case I ever got desperate.

Anyway, I headed outside to the porch, where I proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can get on with my evening.  I’ll have to save the thematic analysis of the “I want more” songs for tomorrow.