Ay yi yi I’m bad at this whole blog thing. I didn’t even post in the month of October, and October is a long month! I apologize for letting down the loyal readers out there. Please don’t give up on me. The longer I have been here the more established I have become in my own routine and I put blogging on the back burner. I also don’t want to post without pictures; what is a good travel post without pictures? I’m not using my camera here because it eats through a set of batteries a day (which aren’t cheap) and I don’t have the expensive transformer to charge my rechargeable AA batteries. Unfortunately my solution is to not take pictures. It kills me a little to not have photos of our first term, but I will bring my other camera back with me in January and unleash all my suppressed photography desires then. Before I begin today’s topic, let me quickly catch you up on the things that have been recently filling my time here in Grenada.
I’ve started doing enough stuff that I actually have to schedule things now. That is fantastic for me and more than I ever hoped for. I have this inherent need to stay busy. If you recall an early post in which I talked about adjusting to my new domestic duties of cooking, cleaning, laundry, grocery shopping and volunteering, use that as a base. Now let me add some additional things I’m doing. For starters, I am going to be on the Significant Others Organization board as treasurer next term. I’m really looking forward to that and it means I will have even more to work on next term. I’m also working on a project for the university. SGU is trying to boost enrollment in a USMLE Step: 1 prep course and I am working with the Department of Educational Services to figure out how to get more students interested in taking the course. I’m attending workshops hosted by the Photography Club on campus because one of my goals is to become a decent photographer while I’m here. I’m attending SO support group sessions hosted by the Department of Psychological Services and occasionally joining a group for board games on Wednesday mornings. Jade and I went to a Halloween party where we won ‘scariest costume’ by dressing as Bella and Edward from Twilight. I went on an all day island tour planned by the SO group and had a great time. We pretty much drove all the way around the country. I attended a self defense class last week that proved to be really good. I went to Prickly Bay’s bingo night a few weeks ago and won $50EC. Jade and I are trying to work out together three mornings a week, which has been really good for us. I renewed my visa so I can stay in the country legally until we leave for break. (You may have wondered why I mentioned that, but it’s a whole morning process in and of itself.) Jade and I went with a lovely group of people one weekend to hike to Seven Sisters Falls recently. What a beautiful place that was, but again, no pictures. We went to a talent show on campus hosted by the Indian culture group where I was once again reminded how bad I wish I was Indian. It was an awesome, awesome show. I’ve coordinated and am hosting our first Thanksgiving next week that includes a small group of our neighbors. I’m pretty excited about that! Oh, and I finished the book The Host and am about 80% through with the first Harry Potter. I’m ridiculously giddy about getting HP jokes now and being able to make HP references. I FINALLY joined the club! The Help will be the next book before I continue the HP series because the next book club discussion will be over The Help. And don’t forget the social things; I’m still going to the pool and/or beach about once a week and hanging with friends. So I know it’s not like I’m working full time and having to take care of kids, but in my own way I am keeping busy.
I’ve realized that I haven’t yet given much general information about our newly adopted home. I know this will come in bits and pieces throughout the next two years as I learn more about this country and its culture. Observing those around me and listening to conversations exchanged helps me immensely in figuring out what it means to be Grenadian. I don’t want to get into any deep topics yet though. I’ve come to my own conclusions and made some generalizations that summarize what I think I’ve learned so far, but I don’t assume they’re correct and I certainly won’t publish them on the internet in this stage. I’m still just a naïve observer at this point, making assumptions that may or may not be false.
As for surface topics, here is what I can tell you. It’s HOT. Have I mentioned that yet? It is hot as heck here. For this I was not prepared. “How,” you say? Not because I didn’t check the weather before packing (I’m a compulsive weather checker)! Depending how you check the weather, internet or cell phone, you see information displayed differently. My iPhone said it was a pleasant 84°F every day with the percentage chance of rain varying by day. It sounded heavenly to me! I even checked weather.com’s monthly average temperatures to find out what “winter” was like here. Winter doesn’t exist here by the way. Well, you know that fine print that says ‘feels like__’ when the daily forecast factors in the wind chill or heat index? I didn’t see that. At all. We’re in the rainy season right now and when you factor in the humidity, every day ‘feels like’ 100°F, sometimes more. I’ve seen it ‘feel like’ 107°F many times! Since I thought it was going to be a lovely 84°F every day with the occasional rain shower I brought some pants, a sweatshirt and a cardigan. I also packed layer-able items. I have worn pants twice, and once was for a costume. I don’t wear layers unless all my other options are dirty. In fact, every day I strive to wear as little as possible (that sounds risqué, but isn’t at all). Shorts and tanks are my daily attire. And my hair goes up… everyday. It’s hot here. And I already know what clothes are going back with me in December and what will replace them in January.
That being said, December in Arkansas is going to be excruciating for me. Besides seeing my friends and family, being home for the holidays and eating my parents’ food, I am not looking forward to the cold and barren land that is Arkansas in the winter. Getting used to this heat and then going to that is going to be tough on me.
It’s HOT here. Is my point coming across? The only other places where I experienced heat like this and worse was Egypt and India. Grenada has redeeming qualities though. The breathtakingly beautiful ocean, the tropical breezes and rainfall and the rainforest climate on the inner part of the island definitely make up for it. It may seem like I’m complaining about the heat (and let’s be honest, sometimes I do complain about the heat when I have to carry groceries up the ginormous hill in our neighborhood in the middle of the day), but I would still take this over moving to Alaska or something for medical school. I just really want you to know that it’s pretty warm here.
We are adjusting though. In the beginning I don’t think either one of us thought we would see the day, but our bodies are getting used to it. The heat makes us less tired than it originally did and just recently I made coffee and drank it hot rather than making it into an iced coffee. That says a lot.
While on the topic of weather, my other obvious thought was the rain. I don’t think I need to tell you any more about the rain though, as it has been a common topic of my blog posts. I believe somewhere on the island gets rain every day, even if we don’t see it. The storms come on suddenly and it is very difficult to predict. Sometimes they appear to be coming right at you, but soak a different part of town. I’m sure you’ll hear more about the rain later, or lack thereof in the dry season.
Here is a particularly fun fact about St. George’s (and I assume the rest of Grenada): there are hardly any street names and even fewer physical addresses. Jade likes to remind me that Leslie, Arkansas was like that not too long ago. While the town of Leslie may have been that way, we’re talking an entire country of no addresses. It really boggles my mind. I know when we first moved here my parents wanted to know the address of where we were living, you know, just “in case”. Ha! I’ve seen envelopes like our electricity bill and it literally has our landlord’s name and the general area we live in printed on it. Apparently everyone knows where everyone else lives. Having no street names is pretty funny, too. We were warned during welcome week that in Grenada you use landmarks for everything, and I’ve found that to be absolutely true. On the bus we’ve had to ask the driver to drop us off by the goat. And yes, there are a lot of goats in our neighborhood. And stray dogs. And crowing roosters.
Animals are actually another good topic to help paint the scene of where we live. This part is actually sad, but there are an outrageous number of dogs here. Stray dogs are known as pothounds. I have a theory that they’re all inbred because they mostly all look the same. These dogs aren’t really pets, they’re just strays or pseudo guard dogs. I don’t know if they get fed or if they scavenge. They’re all really itchy and mangy looking and they’re EVERYWHERE, especially in our neighborhood. The SGU vet school has a program where they spay and neuter pothounds to help control the population, but I can’t even fathom what it would look like if they weren’t doing that. I don’t even think most Grenadians like dogs. The dogs here are smart though, and smarter than American dogs for sure. As in many countries I have visited, people drive crazier here than in the States. You would think more aggressive driving would mean more road kill, but quite the opposite actually. These dogs could probably dodge a speeding bullet. Ugh that’s horrible imagery, but what I mean is that they are really good at not staying out of the road, but running out of the way when a vehicle is coming through. American dogs just stand there and watch it coming. I think it truly shows something interesting about learned animal behavior.
Another animal we have in abundance here is lizards. It’s a good thing I like lizards. There are even some huge, bright green iguanas. I’ve seen three so far: two wild and one pet. Jade and I even have our very own “pet” lizard that I named Reptar. S/he hangs out in our front gated area and sometimes on our hanging laundry. A few times s/he has been clinging to our screen door. Reptar is about six inches nose to tail. It’s only a matter of time before Reptar or another one of the abundant lizards or geckos finds its way into our house. We’ve already had several frogs in our house.
The frogs are my favorite! Call me crazy, but I absolutely love them. Let me clarify… there are two main types of frogs that I know about here. There are the tiny sonar frogs, as I like to call them, and then there are the giant frogs as big as your foot that are rarely seen alive, but more often seen in flat patties in the street. My theory is that they are so large and slow they can’t hop out of the way fast enough. This is a frog so big that you’d have to hold it with two hands if you picked it up. Cool, but not my favorite. I also heard that these are the kind of frogs you can lick to hallucinate, but I’m not positive about that and you’ll never see my face close enough to one to try. My favorite is the little tiny sonar frogs that you can practically see through. They come out the second it gets dark outside and they sing all night long. Together they are a chorus as loud as the summer bugs in Arkansas, but if you hear one individually because of its close proximity, you’ll hear that it lets out this sonar beep. Meep…meep…meep… all night long. Because there are so many it just sounds like constant chirping, but individually I think it sounds like submarine sonar audio from a movie. And how can you not love anything that tiny? They’re just so stinkin’ cute! They seem to dehydrate really easily. A few have come in from under the door, but we saw them and saved them. Two others made it in, but we didn’t find them until they were a dehydrated frame. One had to have just been overnight, too. I think they must be very fragile.
Ready for the not so awesome creatures that inhabit our area? Ninja mosquitoes. That’s right. Ninja. Mosquitoes. The mosquitoes here are stealthy I tell ya! They’re stealthy because they often gnaw your legs up and down without you ever noticing. They’re also stealthy because they seem to come into our house in groves. Now Jade and I are fairly smart people; we should be able to figure out how it’s possible to have 60 mosquitoes in our house all at once, but no. We can’t. We’ve brainstormed every possible explanation and solution imaginable with no luck. They’re ninjas. The best part is that some of the mosquitoes here carry dengue fever. I’ve been told the ones that carry dengue are the ones that are out during the day. So there are basically rabid ninja mosquitoes here. I’ve already come to terms with the fact that I’ll probably contract dengue at some point over the next two years. At least the bats are plentiful and I like to think they’re keeping the mosquito population down and putting off my illness a little longer.
There are also cockroaches. Ugh my skin crawls just typing about them! In the first week of living here the mother of all cockroaches came running from under our bed while Jade and I were in our room. Jade practically wrestled it to the ground and used his hand to smack it so hard against the wall that it stopped moving. I know the only way to kill them is with an atomic bomb and I actually don’t remember what Jade did with it after that. I guess I blocked it from my memory. The second one we never caught but I sprinkled poison powder around and haven’t seen it since. The third was a very small one that went flying through our living room one evening last weekend. Jade kicked it out of the air and then burned it for good measure. I don’t know what I would do without him.
Grenada is also one giant ant hill with one queen ant deep in the center of the island. I’ve never seen so many varieties of ants in one place before. I hate the ones that bite me outside and the ones that scavenge for food in my kitchen. But that’s life. Everyone gets bit by ants outside and everyone has ants in their kitchen.
The last bugs I’m going to complain about are the millipedes and centipedes. The millipedes are basically harmless and found fairly frequently around. The centipedes are terrifying and I dread the day I come across one. They’re long and fast and aggressive and they have about a billion legs and apparently they really, really hurt! Ehh I don’t want to think about them anymore. I’ll just let you know if I come across one and not talk about it again until then.
Alright, well I’m going to quit rambling on and on. I won’t promise, but I will try to not wait so long before I blog again. Until then… enjoy. And thanks for being patient.
