Last week I looked out my window and saw two or three monkeys climbing on the coconut tree and fence in my back yard. Even though I've the occasional monkey around the island, it was still exciting to see one in my back yard. Of course I wanted to take a picture of it, but my camera was disassembled and I had to take it out and put it together before the monkey ran away. I somehow managed to put the camera together and step outside to take a picture while the monkey was still out there. Unfortunately I was less than diligent in keeping the battery charged and was unable to take the picture. The battery charges pretty quickly, so I plugged it in hoping to give it enough juice for a couple pictures. Thinking that the battery had charged, I put it back in the camera and tried to take a picture, only I forgot that the current had been off all morning so the battery had not charged at all. So no picture. Thankfully, I had my small camera ready and got a short video of the beast.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shAfSHNqRcI
Since the monkey incident I've been keeping my eyes open and battery charged hoping to catch another. The day after thanksgiving we were cleaning up and I was told by someone in the kitchen that there was a monkey in the backyard. Much to Saira's displeasure (she dislikes monkeys with a passion) I was able to get a couple shots of the monkey. Thankfully (for Saira) taking the pictures also scared it off.
Part 2: It's a piece of cake to bake a pretty cake
Julie Ann and Saira have been a pretty good influence on me. One reason is because they've been encouraging me to make food other than rice, tuna, and macaroni. The other week Julie Ann spent a couple days in St. Kitts at Saira's house and my house. If you visit Saira's blog you can tell that she is an excellent baker. One day she asked me what my favorite cake was, so I told her it was my grandmas yellow cake (which is called buttercup cake). We were all grateful when grandma emailed me the recipe. Since Saira and Julie Ann love to bake, and I love to eat what they bake (and I want to learn my self) we decided to make my grandmas buttercup cake. The recipe can be found on Saira's blog. The cake was pretty good, and I'm sure we'll do even better next time. Here are some pictures from the adventure.
The batter
Testing the batter
Ready to put it in the oven
The finished product
Part 3: Moonshine by the hulk
Integrating into my community and meeting people has been slow. It's not an easy process that happens quickly for me. My house is in a fairly quiet location. Belle Vue is a very small village, and I would guess there are maybe 20 or so houses here. My apartment is on the edge of the villiage along the main road. Because my side of the apartment faces the ocean, I don't see any neighbors or people walking by when I'm out on my porch. Determined to start integrating a little more, I went down to the Black Rock Pub to have a beer. By doing this I am just making myself seen by the locals in my village, and hopefully they will realize that I am here to stay, and not just a tourist. Belle Vue has many taxis stop by since Black Rock is located here, which brings in the tourists. For the people here who don't know me, they think that I am off of the cruise ship.
It was a hot day and the beer was refreshing. The owner of the rum shop chatted with me for a bit, in which I told him I'm with Peace Corps which led him to warming up even more to me. By the end of our conversation he invited me to lime with him in town sometime. Excellent! This is just what I wanted to do in order to help integrate.
One Caribbean drink I really like is Ting, which is a carbonated grapefruit soda. It's delicious. During my first month here I've acquired a nice sized stash of empty ting bottles, but I didn't throw them out because you can exchange them for cash somewhere. I don't have the means to take a bunch of bottles into town an exchange them for money, so I told the owner of the rum shop that I'd give them to him. There was a lot of bottles and he was pretty grateful, so he offered me a free beer. After he gave me the beer he asked me if I wanted to try some moonshine. It sounded dangerous, but what a better way to integrate than try a local drink? He pulled out a big jug from under the bar that had lots of stuff inside of it, which included peanuts and coconut roots. Apparently sometimes they put centipedes in it, but this particular jug had none. The jug had a picture of the Hulk taped to it; this scared me. He poured me a good sized (too much) amount into a dixie glass and told me to try it, which I did. It actually wasn't too bad. It was strong and smooth, but not something I could drink straight. While I was trying the moonshine some locals came up and were taking an interest in my experiment with the drink. Eventually they started buying me beer ontop of the moonshine that I was slowly drinking. There was more drinks than I wanted, so the owner told me he would save them for me next time I came back. The moonshine really packed a punch (I had to take a nap shortly after), but it was a great way to meet some of the locals and let my face be known around the village.
part 4: Happy Thanksgiving
EC80 is apparently very enthusiastic about many things, such as our work sites, projects, and planning events. For the past month (at least), Saira, Julie Ann, and I have been planning a Thanksgiving feast at my house. After much planning it finally happened, resulting with a lot of fantastic food and great people. Here is what was on the menu: Turkey, glazed ham, breadfruit curry, lasagna, green bean casserole, pasta & gree veggie casserole, coconut brown rice, stuffing, mashed sweet potatos, fried okra, lumpia (Filipino spring rolls), buttermilk biscuits, cranberry sauce, guacamole, green fig tater tots, egg and tomato dish, collard greens, squash and onions, cheesecake, pumpkin pie, banana guava pie, coconut pecan cookies, passion fruit cake, apple and cranberry crisp.
There were approximately 40-45 people who attended.
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