It’s been a while but the blog is back! Truth is, between
all the liming and swanking in Tobago, followed by a severe bout of
homesickness and tiredness, followed by a challenging 10-hour work week that I
have yet again been faced with, there has been little time for blogging. But
here I am, yet again sweating away in the room (even though it’s 9pm) I’ve got
trance music on in the background- partly because I’m half asleep, partly
because it’s the only music on the computer since I can’t be bothered to plug
in the hard-drive. Anyway, here goes.
Last
time we spoke, we were in Georgetown. It’s safe to say that that feels like
months potentially years ago, and not the actual 12 days that have past since I
last wrote. We had thought ahead, and, as Georgetown is considered fairly
notoriously dangerous in these parts, we decided on a hotel with a club
downstairs to avoid any awkward walking home scenarios. This was a très bon
plan. We grabbed the cards and headed down to the bar for around 8. So, Mr.
Barman, what time does it get busy around here? Barman: Er, around 2am if
you’re lucky. Hmm, ok, whats the cheapest drink.... Barman: well girls, looks
like buying a bottle of rum is going to be your best option. Us: Ok! I guess we
could manage that. He was right, the party didn’t really get started until
pretty late and by this time we were on bottle of rum number two. Somewhere along the way
we ordered the spiciest noodles and chicken on the actual planet, and Lucy took
the tactic of stuffing her mouth with napkin, whereas I ran to the room tears
in my eyes in a desperate search for the last gulp of water. Olivia at this
point was somewhere on the other side of the bar sandwiched between two dodgy-looking
creatures trying to escape without being
taught how to dance Guyana style :P Not quite sure if the food came before or
after the gunshots, but I guess thats how it goes in Guyana. We heard four
shots fired, in CLOSE proximity to the bar, as in, outside. We looked at
each-other as if to say, surely not? We then looked at the barman, who shrugged
as if to say, classic Thursday. Lucy ran
outside, ran back in to announce that a man had been shot dead in the car... oh
wait correction, the shots were fired into the air and everyone should just get
on with their lives. Shortly before being tempted by bottle number 3 we trekked
home (up the stairs) and all managed to pass-out leaving the room key in the
door the whole night. Who said Guyana was not a safe place?
The
next morning was NOT great. Lucy was searching for A bank, ANY bank, that would
accept her card, Olivia was tired and wanting to go to museums, and I was
beginning to feel the ramifications of the noodles with a little thing that
starts with a D and rhymes with Onomatopoeia. Great. We somehow made it lunch,
after having got far too close for comfort in the room toilet which
conveniently had no door, and then we were off to Guyana’s version of
centreparks. Turns out, Guyanas version of centreparks is not like centreparks.
Its more like, a dirt track with a small sign and a couple of umbrellas next to
a toilet block round a lake. We didn’t have a reservation (even though we had
called ahead and been assured this was fine) so getting us a tent set-up seemed
to be quite an effort for the staff. As did taking the boat to get us some
water for the night (silly us, presuming there would be somewhere to buy
water). But by the evening (apart from the fact i spent most of it in the
toilet, we were beginning to like the place. As we had accidentally refused
security guards thinking it was joke, the manager and 2 employees had to sleep
on a bench outside our tent to protect
us... from spiders apparently :S I don’t think they often have groups of 4
young white Europeans coming to stay often as we were about the only white
people we saw in the whole country apart from the airport, and some guys on a
dermatology conference! Random :S
Over
the weekend we made friends with most of the staff, played volleyball, went canoeing, played lots of cards, Introduced
Guyana to vodka and coke... when we ordered it, the bar lady was like, you do
know you drink that with sprite right. Ahem... you may win on the Rum front,
but, I think the English (ok, maybe Russians) know what they are talking about
when it comes to Vodka. We also came across my roommate who appeared like a new
castaway on shipwrecked on a boat across the lake. Apparently our instructions
to get to Georgetown, call this number and speak to a woman called Susanna
worked! She had traversed all of Suriname and Guyana in about 36 hours due to a
doctor’s appointment required for her visa. But she made it. Taxi was ordered-
again Susanna, what a life saver!
Next
morning we were on the plane to Trinidad!
Oh, not before we had paid the departure tax. Olivia, who had bought
pounds specifically for the purpose as for some reason they were accepted, and
had NOT forgotten to mention her good planning MANY a time, had a minor (read
HILARIOUS) breakdown when the woman looked at her SCOTTISH tenner and was
like... er, no. HA! Olivia: But this is legal tender! Woman: No Olivia: This
country is soooo racist (rather too loud). Ok great, time to get through
security :S
We
arrived at the hostel in Trinidad and were swiftly taken to a bar by the
owners. Fun fact: the Trinidad accent, is tres WELSH. Literally, on the plane,
me and lucy were like, hold up, are we off to port-of-spain or Cardiff??
Anyway, we got the bar at around 1:30pm and were persuaded to have one drink
before some sight-seeing. Do I even need to tell you what happened next?
2-hours later, barely able to string a sentence together between us, we were
stood in a line for a party boat, half a fried chicken in one hand (lining the
stomach came a bit too late) 2 vodcrans (new abbriev for Vodka Cranberry)
balancing in the other as we boarded the boat. I wish I could say it was
amazing, you know what, from the pictures it looks that way, but unfortunately,
we all have a memory blackout from approximately the same point in time, i.e
the time between boarding and being in bed at the hostel. What I do know is
that apparently my taxi-ordering skills are not that great at this level of
drunkness as no taxi appeared soooo we had to hitchhike to the airport, and
missed our flight :S Luckily, the kind people of Caribbean airlines put us on
the next one to Tobago, and off we went. The hostel was by far nicer than my
house here, we had a room just for us, ensuite air-con, for a bargain 10 pounds
a night. Plus, on the first night, we got a free dinner (fish fresh from the
ocean, with CABBAGE (we don’t have that here in the forest)), rum, and to round
off the evening, a boat trip to the middle of the sea. There is this part
called nylon pool, about a 15 minute boat ride from the bay where the water is
shallow enough for you to stand up! Music on, rum in hand, dive in! Thats how
it is done in Tobago. We were Liming (drinking/ going out) and Swanking
(dancing) and Winding (more dancing) for a good couple of hours before it
started to get a bit chilly.
The
next day was an all day boat trip of much the same. We did a cruise round the
coastline, followed by a tasty bbq on a deserted beach, followed by more liming
and a bonfire on another beach. We were told that the trip officially finishes
at 4/5pm but that if you are loving it sometimes its more like 9pm. I think I
got back just before midnight :S Oh and the boat left without me and Olivia so
we had to sneak onto another boat and hope for the best. I did have a cheeky
nap on the ride back. Managed to find some munchies on the walk back... yet
again my stomach did not thank me for this .
Yet
another busy day the next day- we rented a car :S So you needed to be over 25
and have your license with you. We were like, ok, we have 3 over-25s, none of
whom have their license, two 21-yr olds with licenses and 2 useless people (me
and Olivia) what can you do for us? As we had acquired 7 people by this point,
it was more of a minibus but it was fun and Lucy did an admirable job
driving. We got to drive round most of
the island throughout the day, found a lovely beach for lunch. Admittedly I
napped through most of the scenic sunset, but I did awake in time for us to
pull up to the cinema for the opening day of SKYFALL. Now, this may not sound
that exciting to you lot, but you have to understand, a) the cinema is St.
Laurent has fleas, was last redecorated sometime in the 60’s and has a sound system
equivalent to hearing the person next to you’s headphones. B) it is in French.
Neither of these factors are conducive to James Bond viewing. Thus, we were
tres excited to see it in a nice cinema, that sold popcorn, and that was in
English. And we loved it! Although at the first shot of London, Lucy grabbed my
hand and we both sort of had an awwww... look at our rainy homeland, I want to
be there :S moment. Olivia, being Scottish, nearly died of happiness at the
line: welcome to Scotland. Thank-you to the banter bus (the rental car) for
getting us there and back, although we almost didn’t have time for a subway
beforehand. Wouldn’t have mattered anyway as they had run out of meatballs and
the toaster was broken. WHAT EVEN IS THAT??
We
almost made the sunrise the next morning in the banter bus, except we always
seemed to be on the wrong road, oh, and one the wrong side of the island to be
able to see it. Oh well, we had a nice drive around and got some delicious
doubles- Tobago breakfast food. Hard to explain, but basically a sweet, eggy
half omelette half pancake thing wrapped around spicy chickpeas with sauce and
deliciousness. Stodge alert, but at 40p each it was rude not to have two.
And
this is basically how we spent our days in Tobago, boating, liming, EATING,
chilling, beaching, exactly what we had planned for. Oh, and I did spend a
casual 20 hours sleeping in the air-con on the last day- totes knackered and
not looking forward to my sweaty place back in French land. Oh, and the 8 hours
we sat at Trinidad airport waiting for our transfer, reading US tabloids
(English magazines= excitement!!!) We timed it just right, as the man was
replacing all the ones on the rack for the ones for the next week. Erm, excuse
me sir, (flutter eyelashes) what is it that you do with the old ones exactly,
now you have the new ones... you see we are English and we would LOVE some
English magazines, as we are going to a place where this does not exist. He
must have seen the desperation on our faces as
we managed to get away with 9 Tabloids for the price of 3. YESSSSS. I
now know far too much about every celebrity on the planet, but I don’t care. I
needed a bit of gossip after 6 weeks in the middle of nowhere.
And then we got on the plane back to Suriname and the
holiday was over. Getting back was a little traumatic but we will talk about
that next time. I have just racked up 2,098 words of a blog post (for anyone
that is stilllll reading (hi dad!). This is approximately 66% of the total
amount of words I must write towards my degree this year. WHAT A JOKE.
Not sure I am lovinglife2k12 at the moment, bit of an
après-holiday downer, but don’t worry I am at least likinglife/
dealingwithlife2k12.
Love to all!!
xxx
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