Cayman Islands

I am just finishing up my four days in the Cayman Islands with two of my friends from work. I arrived in the Miami airport at 5 am last Wednesday, and promptly became one of those people you see, who is curled up on the floor trying to sleep. It was going all right for me until someone opened a door or something and an alarm started to blare. No one came… And no one came… And no one came. (So much for security in the Miami airport!) I think I lay there for about 10 minutes listening to this constant wail, for my body was incapable of moving. (I’d gotten about half an hour of sleep on the plane from LA, and not slept enough the previous three nights, so I was a wreck.) I found a new spot, dozed a bit more, and eventually gave up around 8 and started wandering the Miami airport. (Brookstone foot massage chair…. Gooooooooood.)

DeAnn and Claire arrived from St. Louis around 9:45 and there was much rejoicing. We talked, we laughed, we caught up, and, when we got on the plane to the Cayman Islands, we fell asleep. We stayed with a friend of Claire’s who emigrated to Grand Cayman not too long ago. (It’s good to have friends with friends in nice places.) Trevor was an excellent host this week, driving us around the island (literally… we drove around the entire island this afternoon), taking us to fancy restaurants (all you can eat Brazilian beef on swords) as well as good old dives (doner kebabs).

The famous (although I’d never heard of it until I arrived here) Seven Mile Beach was just a few minutes’ walk from the house, so we headed there each day. Being with two pasty people who haven’t seen the sun in months (poor souls), we sought out shade, but there were trees conveniently located along the beach. One time, though, we apparently set our towels in the wrong place (just in front of a sign that said “no trespassing beyond this point”), and this Irish (although Claire thought she was Scottish) woman proceeded to try to tell us that the beach was private. She kept saying something about the water’s edge, but I wasn’t understanding exactly what it was she meant, so I asked her to repeat herself about three times. Of course, it could just be that I was distracted by the fact that this woman, while nicely telling us to shove off, was, to all intents and purposes, fondling her large aqua bosom (as Claire put it).

Yesterday we had a fantastic day (despite the lack of large aqua bosoms—we three don’t quite add up to six lentils nailed to three boards). We went on a five our boat tour through North Harbour. First stop was to conch dive. Masks and fins donned, into the water we went. DeAnn wasn’t so sure about going the 8-10 feet down to get a conch, so we compromised. I got the conch, then went back under water 3…4…5…6 feet so she could get it from me. She claims she could see me smirking even with the snorkel in my mouth as I held the conch deeper and deeper and made her swim for it, but I don’t know what she’s talking about. From there we went to the Coral Gardens for some proper snorkeling, then to Stingray City, were we got to swim with, hold, and even kiss some stingrays (apparently it brings 7 years good luck, so we’ve got 21 good years coming our ways). Last stop was lunch, where we ate the conchs we caught. (We got to keep the shells. Claire is VERY kindly carrying mine home, as I certainly am not willing to shove that massive and heavy thing in my backpack and take it to Central America.)

One might think that the day couldn’t have gotten better after all that fun in the sun (and a scorching sunburn on my back. Haven’t had one of those in decades!), but it did. We went out to dinner at a relatively non-descript place, but the music that they had playing was fantastic. Every late 80s/early 90s song that we knew and loved, starting with, of course, Ace of Base (or at least that is when I focused on the music, for I can hear “The Sign” from miles away). It was not a karaoke bar per se, but we had a good old raucous sing-along for about an hour, probably much to the amusement of those around us—certainly to the amusement of Trevor. (No we were not in our cups—they’d each had only one beer, and I’d had nothing to drink.) The best part was that a number of times we mentioned a group or song, and soon thereafter it would play. It was freaky, and we actually looked around to see if there was a microphone listening in on our conversation, but we decided that we just would be really good friends with the DJ, for clearly we all had the same taste.

Today was a somewhat lazy day, but really, when you are on a Caribbean Island, what day isn’t a lazy day? Tomorrow we head off at the crack of dawn and head our separate ways… they back to STL and I to Guatemala. It has been really great to catch up with them (to get the gossip from school) and just to hang out with people I know. It has been confusing again, though, for me, and I have wondered where I was many times. (But not which direction I was facing as I watched the sun set into the ocean, as DeAnn did.)

Tomorrow I return to my life as a nomad among strangers. Hopefully this interlude of two weeks with friends and loved ones will have been good and won’t set me into a homesick spiral. (Anyone know how to say “homesick” in Spanish?) But the light is burning pretty brightly at the end of the tunnel. I think I’ll be home in two months (and wondering what to do next… suggestions welcome).