Fearful of growing a set of gills in this winter’s record rainfall has led to an affair with a sunny seductress named Barbados. On this Caribbean island where fish fly and the rum’s not shy, much has changed over the 31 years since our last visit, but fortunately the weather is not one of them. A steady diet of sun-believable daytime highs averaging 30°C year round means it’s always shorts and sandals season!
Another big plus for the country is it happens to be the birthplace of rum; my tranquilizer of choice. Back in the 1600’s a wooden barrel with fermented sugarcane inside was discovered, and the unusual find was all Barbados needed to hit the ground rum-ing! Originally called ‘kill devil’ or ‘rumbullion’ and later shortened to rum, exports of the golden nectar now total more than $57 million BBD each year. Not too shabby for a pipsqueak country a mere 21 miles long and 14 miles wide!
The island is also home to some head-scratching legal legislation. In need of a rethink, one khaki-wacky law declares camouflage coloured clothing is strictly reserved for the Barbados Defense Force, and illegal for anyone else to wear, including children. The folly of the felony is apparently based on the possibility of it being used to impersonate military personal for criminal purposes.
Man, if the country is that freaked about some being kids garbed in ‘camo’, perhaps they should give some consideration to bolstering their Defense force. Either that, or commit to never engaging in conflict with anything more significant than one of the little banana-swiping green monkeys roaming the island!
One crime surprisingly that’s not illegal quickly becomes apparent when friends meet us at the airport with beers and wine in hand. Likely to put M.A.D.D. into cardiac arrest, Barbados turns a blind eye to drunk driving! Perhaps it’s because the cops are too drunk themselves to administer breathalyzer tests, as the closest we see to any of the enforcers are the road speed bumps locals call ‘sleeping policemen’.
aving the airport our first thought is all the drivers here are alcoholically enhanced, but as it turns out only about sixty percent actually are; the other forty percent are simply swerving around the street’s yawning potholes. The island’s rutted roads offer clear evidence of past corrupt governments being much keener on using any accumulated cash to fill their pockets rather than their potholes.
Sidewalks in Barbados are as rare as rocking horse droppings and turn running or walking into activities for only the most courageous. Further exacerbating the island’s traffic calamities are shaky vehicles with even shakier drivers, who often drive at night with no headlights, believing they will drain the car’s battery. Yes, on these roads one must watch out for both potholes and A-holes, because if stupid could fly this place would be a fricking airport.
This morning we’re startled by an eerie and barely ambulatory bat unnaturally crawling about the tiled floor of the townhouse. Using its velvety black wings as a crutch and looking like a crumpled a plane taxing onto a runway the bald-eared mammal apparently missed the memo that its ilk are meant to be nocturnal and travel strictly by air!
Being in the early days of the COVID pandemic we wonder if the bat may be sick, and knowing they can be a potential carrier of weird diseases I am taking no chances. Cautiously scooping up the mini-mammal from behind onto a magazine, it promptly does a 180 degree turn and creepily starts crawling towards my hands. Like a Herculean discus-thrower I instantaneously dispatch his furry ass outside by flinging it across the balcony and out into orbit to restore calm in the casa.
In the parishes of Barbados many people live in wee wooden shacks either clothed in bright jellybean colors or paint-naked. Tenants own these chattel houses and their coral-block foundations, but not the land, and if told to move, they simply dismantle the abode and gather it up to resurrect at a new location.
As the epicenter of rum, Barbados is awash with small no-frills rum shops. A buddy and I venture inside one that is sporting an Old Brigand Rum logo; a brand that locals refer to as ‘the one-eyed man’ because of the eye-patched pirate on its label. Since rum is not sold by the glass we order a small bottle, and the barman plunks it down in front of us along with cheap plastic glasses and a bowl of pulverized ice.
Propping up the bar while introducing the Caribbean Kool-Aid to the back of our throats, our ears are tormented by the rapid-fire Bajan dialect. With all the oddball slang emanating from rummed up patrons getting to know the bottom of a bottle, trying to decipher the Bajan conversation a head-scratching task!
I think back to our cab driver’s previous warning that a rum shop’s clientele may be a bit sketchy. In his exact words, ‘dey heads dey not dey own’! Beside us, a couple of sozzled patrons have put a bottle of rum in ‘short pants’, and slumped on their stools they look as if they implanted their ass on a tranquilizer dart. Time flies when you’re having rum, but we need to make an exit before our heads too are not our own!
Of the island’s approximate 287,000 people, a healthy portion are Rastafarians flaunting tentacles of knotted dreadlocks either roping down over their shoulders, or tucked beneath crocheted Rasta caps resembling a tea cozy. Recently Barbados legalized marijuana to the Rastas for ‘spiritual purposes’, which has me wondering if the island might possibly have any wigmakers up to the task!
With 1,500 rum shops on the island, the numbers would suggest one out of every 190 Bajans owns one, with the other 189 simply designated as consumers! Yes, these folks are pretty damn serious about their revered rum and a sign in our friends kitchen pretty much sums up the island philosophy; “Rum – because no great conversation ever started with a salad“!
Partaking in a Hash Harriers run at Black Bess I incur a blur of fur when a fleet footed mongoose explodes out of the underbrush and almost collides with my ankles. Coming as no great revelation the Hash trail is harder to find than a missing sock and leaves lost runners constantly in an all-out search to relocate it. The large fly in the ointment however is that nobody planned on the presence of the dastardly ‘Cow-itch’ vine.
Its toxic stinging hairs leave a fierce burning itch, and make it a tall order not to rub our limbs to try and lessen its wrath. But rubbing the skin only spreads the burn making the damage worse, and a Bajan guy tells me “keep your hands away from your face and jewelry”, referring of course to the below the belt danglers. Heeding his sage advice makes great sense as I cannot imagine the agonizing consequences of the toxins migrating south of the border onto my ‘crucials’!
So many of the harried harriers are in such excruciating discomfort they throw in the towel and force the run to be abandoned. The only positive of the abbreviated run is the bar will open sooner than planned. Donned in a judge’s robe and flowing white wig, the Grandmaster doles out penances for alleged offences committed during the run, but to our chagrin the two ‘hares’ responsible for laying out the route and causing the colossal clusterfuckery are not sentenced to be hung by their ‘jewelry’!
Visiting an old buddy residing on the island I introduce myself to his roommate Ray who is definitely the silent type. With the limited communication due to Ray being a pet Tortoise, I pluck an offering from a hibiscus plant and watch the terrestrial turtle devour the flower down its ugly wrinkled neck. And since running is not a consuming passion for Ray, he awkwardly clomps off like an ambulant piece of furniture; making it abundantly clear why a group of tortoises is called a ‘creep’!
At night the rowdy little adult polliwogs, known as tree frogs, are about as welcome as a rock in a sock. As the frogs argue about whatever it is that frogs argue about, their shrill nonstop chirping sounds not unlike the back-up beepers on an industrial vehicle and leaves us married to our earplugs.
At Oistins fish market we stock up on flying fish, barracuda, and dolphin. Don’t worry, the latter is not Flipper, it’s just a blunt headed mahi-mahi fish that’s so tasty they had to name it twice! No longer pillaging the seas, the Pirates of the Caribbean are now in the restaurant business charging criminally exorbitant prices for meals majoring in mediocrity. The soups are unflavorful, the meats unchewable, the breads unbreakable, and the bills unbelievable!
The island national pastime here is ‘liming’; a Bajan term for lazily mingling with friends while eating a meal, slurping rum, or ‘slamming a dom’. Of course all these activities are just runner-ups to the island’s most popular hobby; the afternoon snooze! In this Caribbean ‘nation of nod’ napping is treated like an Olympic event and reaffirms our opinion that a lackadaisical Bajan’s only form of cardio is running late!
Crescent-shaped Carlisle Bay is a known turtle habitat, and snorkeling among them is flipping magic. Scrutinizing one underwater I follow it up to the surface, and as our heads simultaneously pop out into the air I give its back a gentle rub. It dopily gazes directly at me with noncommittal eyes, and then with a slow blink and a big gulp of air, the lovely ocean lawnmower descends back to the sea bottom to continue a lunch of sea grass.
In the turquoise sea I also encounter an even more unusual bottom dweller called a Bat Fish. Looking like something from a science-fiction film it has two humanoid ‘feet’ that allow it to walk on the seabed, and huge pectoral fins that morph into wings and allow it to escape if threatened. Oh yes, it also has what looks like a human’s nose, and no, I swear I have not been into the fermented cane juice again!
Beach-running with my bare feet imprinting the sandy shores of Carlisle Bay I stride past lovable little Sandpiper birds comically engaging in a little running of their own. Chasing newly broken waves ebbing back into the sea to peck up tiny uncovered bits of birdie breakfast, they then execute a swift turn of tail feathers as they frantically sprint back higher up the shore to avoid a devastating bird bath from the next incoming wave.
Another delightful aspect of Carlisle Bay is watching muscular race horses enjoying some healthy downtime away from their stables. At dawn, horse handlers from the nearby Garrison Savannah Race Course bring their lean machines down to the beach and lead them into the salty sea.
The sleek thoroughbreds take a swim in the bay and playfully prance about in the shallows with the soft sand underfoot offering a low impact on the joints and muscles. They are much like professional athletes running in a pool, except these stunning ‘seahorses’ have the luxury of enjoying a little horseplay in one of nature’s finest hydrotherapy pools!
Concluding our Caribbean stay sitting under the canopy of aged Mahoe trees at Barbados Yacht Club, the conversation turns to the awaiting frigidity back in Canada. My island friend reminds me of an old Bajan proverb stating ‘snow belongs on the mountains and ice belongs in a glass’!
I must say, that as lifelong followers of the yellow star Christine and I could not agree more, and fingers crossed by the time we get back to Canada there will be neither of either!
Mark Colegrave February 2020