I write this from GEORGETOWN, GUYANA... which means that since we last spoke I have somehow managed to traverse a couple of countries without injury or incident- win! And they speak English here, perf! Although I must say its weird to understand what men yell at you in the street, at least when its in Spanish normally I don't have much of a clue...
It all started on friday night, when Oli and Luc rocked up to our humble abode in St Laurent after hitchhiking from Cayenne. We ordered some delish flash pizza and after a cheeky photo the guy gave us not 1 but 5 stamps on our loyalty card. FREE pizza here we come! After some despo's (the cool persons name for desparados) we checked out the mombari, the ONLY bar in the whole of the centre-ville. But despite the worlds WORST dj and overpriced Caiprinhas we still managed to have a good time. Even my housemate Dmitri showed up, still wearing the bluetooth headpiece that he seems to have attached to him at all times :S
Saturday morning the plan was to be up bright and early to catch a pirougue (canoe with a motor sort of thing) to Suriname. So... mid morning we rolled out of bed, un peu hungover, had to check the internet for some important details, buy some credit SO basicallly it was lunch before we had walked to the border. Lucy, in her wisdom was all, guys, in St georges, you DO NOT need to go to the french guiana border. Great. However this is not st georges, and im pretty sure you generally have to leave one country before you enter the next one. We showed up at the stamping man post and she was like, so, how does this work? I mean, do I actually need to be here, or can i just go straight across. No. Turns out you do need a stamp- the first evidence of French Guiana in my passport.
The crossing to Albina only takes around 10 minutes and once on the other side, we went into grandma's bedroom (it literally had flowery curtains and a cutesy sign saying immigration on the door) to get a stamp. Only one of us could fit in the room at a time it was more like a cupboard. Bants. We packed into a waiting minivan after some serious bartering - seems we are finally in South America- and we were on the way to Paramaribo the capital... a 3 hour journey. After 1 and a half hours we were crossing the bridge which signals the entrance to the city- thankfully I was asleep for most of it so missed out on the horrors that were probably unfurling on the dirt track before me. After some confusion with directions and addresses we ended up hanging our hammocks in the garden of a french guesthouse and as luck would have it we managed to sneak a lift with another lady there to Brownsberg nature reserve the next morning.
We had heard about a Jazz festival going on in Paramaribo but had also been told you had to have an invitation so we werent holding out too much hope, but then, whilst drinking a casual pineapple juice in a cafe, one of the guys working there came over and was like, er, girls, if your free tonight, come to the Jazz festival, and gave us an invitation. 2 hours later, the same guy saw us walking, lost, down some random road searching desperately for a curry. GIRLS, he shouted? Where the hell are you going?? Get in. So we got in the car and he dropped us off at Roopram, the mcdonalds of curry here in Suriname. Awkward moment when: no one who works there speaks English and your Dutch is about as good as your outer mongolian. Solution?? Lucy making clucking and moo noises to indicate that we would ideally prefer a beef or a chicken based curry. After much laughing from the servers, we were presented with some food, which could have been either of the two, or something else a lot more sinister. But it was still good, despite the fact that we were now left in the middle of a road in the middle/ outskirts of a city where we deffo do not speak the language. We walked it and arrived back to the hammocks EVENTUALLY.
Time to get all dolled up for the Jazz festival. This involved turning the knickers inside out and putting on a third layer of deodarant to go with the clothes we'd been wearing all day, because a) we packed tres light and b) we all forgot shampoo or any other product that actually cleans you when you have a shower.
Upon arrival at the closing night of the Jazz festival, it became clear that there had been a mistake in giving us an invite. The cream of the Paramaribo elite were looking their best, all glammed in heels and hair that doesn't look like its been dragged through several hedges sideways. This didn't really matter in the end, as no sooner had we worked out the complicated drinks buying system, buying a ticket from one lady, then taking the ticket to another man, who then chose to ignore you for an extended period of time under the guise of having run out of cups.... was there a powercut. We heard about three or four quite cool pieces of Jazz from an international group on stage, before the whole thing went eerily quiet. Luckily no one seemed too bothered so everyone continued hanging out, and a bit later some musicians saved the day with a cheeky un-microphoned version of o when the saints. If thats not a cue to leave, I dont know what is. On the walk home, the same guy that had picked us up earlier shouted across the street inviting us to the afterparty. Despite the fact he was wearing a tshirt that had a picture of kermit in boxers that said kermit klein, we declined.
The next morning we were up nice and early for a taxi to take us to the minibus stop to take us to the town near to the nature reserve we were aiming for. Lovely experiment with Surinamese public transport. Oh well, still better than french guyana where transport does not even exist. We arrived in the town 13km away from the nature reserve and BOY I have never been so frusutrated trying to get 13km. To start off with we were two hours early for the pick up that was arranged by the woman at the hostel, so we waited. But then it didn't come, for over an hour. From somewhere we found a phone number from the place who assured us that it was coming. We waited another hour. After 4 hours of waiting some Dutch guys came along who had just returned from the park, and luckily one of them agreed to speak on the phone for me. HE, again, assured me that the bus was coming. And finally after 5 hours it showed up. We could have definitely walked it quicker. Nightmare. We first had to sneak onto the bus as we didnt actually have any right to be in the park as normally you have to have prior authorisation from the office in Paramaribo. It was shut at the weekend so we just went for it.
Upon arrival, we looked at the man and said, ok, so, we dont have a reservation but we have our own hammocks and we promise to make you smile if you let us stay :D:D It must have worked because within 5 mins we were setting up our hammocks in a little carbet and whipping out some peanut butter sandwiches to keep us going. Shortly after, Alex, the Canadian (by far the most banterous Canadian any of us has ever met), showed up and we all boarded the banter bus down to a waterfall for an evening shower. Later that evening things got a bit dangerous when Lucy brought out the 90% PETROl... sorry RuM that she had kindly bought with our money. Ok, so admittedly between the 4 of us we did manage to finish it, with only a few spilt drinks, one lost camera, one vomcano and NUMEROUS cringe-worthy video reminders to remember the evening by.
Funnily enough I managed to sleep RATHER well in the hammock that night, even got quite a nice lie-in. Olivia was feeling rather worse for wear after her stunning passing out on the table performance the night before so we decided that a 5 hour walk down and then back up a mountain would be a good cure for this. Not sure if it was but we got some exercize, some good views and Lucy even saw an Ape sized monkey hanging out in the trees! That night, though, sadly Alex had left the banter bus some newbies joined and we had a singalong with a guitar and a sunset and nature. CHeesefest! The next day after another visit to a closer waterfall- dont expect too much we were told, its basically like two men peeing over a hill. Ok, so it was more like 6 men peeing but still...
And then it was time to leave Brownsberg after three lovely days with lovely people and lovely nature stuff and not so lovely hammocks and mosquitos. Some VERY kind people offered us a lift in their truck almost all the way back to Paramaribo saving us lots of money and giving us the experience of blocking off a bus on a highway jumping out a car and jumping on the bus and paying 20p for the 40 minute journey into town.
The last couple of days have been spent doing my first ever bit of COUCHSURFING! First of all with Eli in Parimaribo, who lived near a delish noodles shop and let us have our first shower in wayyyy tooo many days, and then after a cheeky big mac and cone the next morning, we headed to Nieuw Nickerie where her sister was waiting for three random English girls and this time we had some more delish chinese food. They were both soooo Lovely and helpful and it was really nice to hear more about how Suriname came to be from people whose families have been here since the slaves came over a LONG time ago. We also got in a cheeky episode of America's next top model, which was the first tv I have watched in about 6 weeks and very much enjoyed!
AND now, after a little ferry excursion which I will get into at a later date we are here in Georgetown, heading to Trinidad on sunday and then tobago on monday. Life is so hard. not going to lie, the thought of going back to teaching heads, shoulders knees and toes in a week is not an altogether pleasant one.
Laterz Alligaterzzzz
Polz
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