my friend mayra came to visit me this past week. she flew into kingston tuesday, made the trek on the knutsford express safely to montego bay, where i met her with rocksan and marie. i had spent the morning working on my students’ graduation program and trying to catch live updates of the brazil vs korea football match. en route to montego bay, we had to deliver one of smiley’s dogs, a rottweiler, to a man in bethel town. that was an experience… between trying to get the dog in the kennel, lift the kennel from the backyard to the front and then to load it in the van. somehow the three of us managed? the bus didn’t reach till nearly 10 and a good thing i convinced them to come with me because i would have ended up waiting at another bus stop on the main road. that could have been risky and equally sketchy. we made the trek back up and reached the yard nearly at midnight.
wednesday was spent at school. she was a hit. the kids loved her. we had a free day, due to the fact we had already given our final exams, the kids and we were burnt out and the fact there was a visitor. so we opted for a spanish day… spanish lessons and spanish music and dances. everyone also loved the fact she ate meat. i received both concern and slack for this fact. we headed to pick up the kids in bethel town and ended back at the house. we hung out with marie and miss pansy and she got the full rundown of everything, if anything my day to day life. after dinner and helping shanice with spanish homework we headed home. the current was gone. we spent the night watching the stars and recounting old stories.
thursday turned into a lazy day… i think we both had been longing for it. we chatted all day, catching up and throwing ideas and theories around. as soon as we began cooking we were greeted by a giddy asam. he carefully studied us and our cooking habits. he offered himself to be added to the pot. we soon were feasting on jelly coconuts and chasing a long-chained polo, tafari’s growing puppy, around the house. rain soon came and we just took the day in… even into the evening. i got a call from marie saying she and rocksan and all my neighbors below could hear us laughing and carrying on. they said it made them laugh to hear us laughing. couldn’t ask for much more than to spread joy and happiness through the sound of laughter. i also received the great news that all of my students had passed their sat exams and would all be attending a high school this upcoming school year. that made my night. that made all the sleepless nights and long, hot, draining days teaching worthwhile.
friday we made our way to school, en route to catch a ride to y.s. falls. i got to congratulate all of my students with hugs and see their marks. the boys ended up scoring higher than the girls, which was a pleasant surprise. we averaged way higher than the national average. it was a long school year, but our hard work definitely paid off. after several run-ins and quick passing chats we managed to find a quick way to y.s. and we were on our way. we were greeted with much rain, but we made the most of the day. we opted to ignore it and jump straight in. the water was near frigid, but it was almost a cleansing sensation which came over me; granted i haven’t been exposed to free, running water in some time. it was certainly therapeutic and renewing… much needed. we climbed the path up farther to the waterfalls and opted to do the rope jump a couple times. that was rejuvenating and a sort of release for me. we then made our way back down, hit the rock ‘pool’ and after 30 minutes or more of shivering we hit it back to the ‘cabana.’ as the sun began to shine down, we scored a table and took in the rays. we were soon greeted by staff and taken in for discussion with about 4 guys who worked the canopy line. we talked about life in jamaica and the tourists take versus the local take. needless to say they were impressed we weren’t the regular bussed in hotel tourists. without knowing it, we ended up staying past the regular working hours… we rode back with the staff and our new friends who begged us to come look for them again. a quick call to the taxi driver from pisgah and we made a stop at the cook shop. an hour later i called him again, yet again i was greeted with another ‘soon come.’ some of the remaining staff and the owner refused to leave till we had caught our drive. this left us waiting for about 2 hours and finally he showed up.. on an empty tank. lucky us. we made the trek back to seaford. as we made the taxi switch in pisgah, a group of guys promoting a party in amity the following weekend, tried to wave us down. the entire way to … they kept looking back pointing at me and signaling some sign language. as we reached the square they made our driver pull over to ask me who i was and where i lived and if they could come link me. we laughed with the driver as i told them i was from seaford and had no interest in them linking me. we hiked up from the square, with a quick stop at the shop for some essentials, including a new mop. as we reached up, the music was pumping and we figured the evening’s celebrations of some neighbors’ conjoined birthday parties had begun. we were greeted by everybody and soon headed to clean up and make our way back down. we picked up rocksan on the way down and soon everybody else showed up. the evening kicked along well into the morning hours and mayra got her first taste of a small scale dancehall party. we headed home fairly early, for dancehall standards that is.
as i woke saturday morning bright and early the music was still pumping.. and so it continued even till we left at around 10/11. we made our way back to the square to head out to hanover. we were greeted by a rain shower just as the bus reached montego bay. luckily the lucea buses from bay always pack up fast, so we didn’t have to wait long. we met up with jess in lucea and made our way up to askenich to meet up with dave, melissa and her friend darren. we had planned on going on a hike up dolphin head, but the rain had caught us and we waited for it to pass and soon headed out on a trek with keva and some boys. it took a few hours, but we finally reached up to the sound of running and splashing water. we looked down and saw the waterfalls. unfortunately the way down was steep and nearly impossible to make it down. we did what had to be done… slide. i grabbed bamboo here and there to guide my way down and slid the rest of the muddy terrain. mission accomplished. dave had a brief fall which led him thinking he might have broke his foot. but all was soon forgotten as we all jumped in the water with the kids. the water was freezing but it felt soo good and refreshing. a man came from nowhere and effortlessly made his way down to tell us it was even more breathtaking and amazing further down the way, but we would have to go earlier in the day, as it would soon be approaching the sun setting. we decided we best head back, so we all attempted to make our way back up this steep incline, back to the rocky, dirt road. it was easier managing to get back up then coming down. we washed the mud off in the spring and started the trek back to dave’s place. an hour or two later we made it. we cleaned up and headed to the road to get a ride back to lucea. as we made it we hit up the store for some food and made a quick stop at steve’s cook shop for some food to carry with us. we all piled in a taxi and jess, mayra and i bid melissa and darren farewell at green island. we soon reached cauldwell and made it home. we were all dead with exhaustion and soon passed out.
sunday we met up with natty in negril for an afternoon of football on the beach. melissa and darren headed over to hang out and watch the brazil vs cote d’ivoire match. 7 rastas and 4 white girls surrounding the outdoor bar in grave suspense. of course all the jamaicans were for brazil. one of the rastas claimed the game would end 4:2 favoring brazil. needless to say, it was close enough and he was quite boastful in his aforementioned premonition. we hung around for a while then caught a ride back up with natty and his friends. we got home to learn the pipe had burst in the back and there was no water. we attempted to get cleaned up and soon headed to the long awaited bike show with the kids in tow. we trekked it to upper cauldwell and i caught up with bukoy. during all of this a mad man on a bike approached me asking me if “[i was] pon wa [him] de pon?” i figured he must have been talking about the rum which was choking me with every breath he released. nope. definitely not. he was talking about the ‘pum-pum.’ i informed him i was most certainly not and this just led to more harassment and his professions of love to me. meanwhile everyone’s just staring and laughing, including myself and my friend who just steps away to laugh and take in the show. i thanked him for his gracious efforts to help me and tried to hide from the crazed man for the rest of the night.
monday morning we headed back to seaford town and mayra got the experience of waiting over an hour for the bus to fill up in montego bay. we managed to outrun the rain, which began to fall as soon as we reached up the mountain on the way home. lucky for us the current was out. we unpacked and nearly passed out from exhaustion. coffee soon brought us back to life and with that the kids soon made their way up. mayra got a hairstyle, the kids made fathers day cards and i passed out on the sofa, with the kids showing me their cards every 2 minutes asking me how i liked it. i made my way to rocksan’s to figure out the transportation dilemma and instead ended up watching highlights of the portugal match. we figured out how mayra would reach kingston at 7am and scheduled to meet up at 1am so brown could drive her to savanna-la-mar to catch a bus leaving for town at 2am. we slowly made our way back home and took our time cooking dinner. we saw no point in sleeping as it was soon 11pm and the possibility that we could risk oversleeping, so we laid down and mayra packed. we tried to keep talking so as not to fall asleep and luckily we made it without fail. we made our way down the mountain.. it was almost as if we were on some secret mission, the time was eerily quiet and every move we made echoed in the valley. the drive to savanna-la-mar was gorgeous; a clear, dark night full of stars and a beautiful view of the milky way. it was a magical moment. we made it just in time, with barely enough time for a quick hug and a farewell, the bus was off like that. brown, rocksan and i made the trip back exhausted. i think i passed out a couple times to find myself nodding in and out of sleep. we didn’t reach back till about 4 something and i headed straight to bed to wake up just a few hours later to head to school to prepare everything for the upcoming graduation.
all in all the trip was much needed, i think i can confidently say for both of us. it was very therapeutic, inspiring and insightful. we both exchanged a lot of ideas, energies, dreams and helped each other along. i am quite grateful that she was able to come when she did and i appreciate the food for though she left me with… including the puerto rican coffee which she towed along for me. muchisimas gracias mayra!!
