More Company & Health Matters

It's been awhile since I’ve written. We were away for several weeks at Christmas and we’ve had a lot of company. In fact, we will have company non stop from January to March 20th with more expected in April or May. A little scary when you think of it but we still enjoy hosting our friends and family.

Our first guests when we got back were Bob and Carm. We had a great time showing them around. They did the usual things we recommend such as the day long catamaran trip down the coast to Soufriere with all the rum punch and beer you can drink, as well as the morning of zip lining through the rain forest where you obviously do not drink rum punch until after you are done. We live close to Reduit Beach, the main tourist beach on the Island. They walked to the beach every day and in between took dips in our pool.

While visiting Cas En Bas Beach on the North of the Island, Norm and Bob were asked by a couple of locals to join them for a game of dominoes. It’s quite an honor to be asked. St. Lucians take their dominos very seriously and it’s fun to watch them play. They slam each domino onto the table as hard as they can when it’s their turn. I’m not sure if it’s because they’re really into the game or whether it’s a way to intimidate the competition. The games can go on for a long time. You have to win six straight rounds in order to win the game. That can take awhile and sometimes doesn’t happen at all.

We decided to dress up for an evening out at the Rainforest Hideaway. It’s a 5 star restaurant that is a little pricey but that we like to treat ourselves to once in a awhile.
The food was very good as usual.

We had an interesting experience while having lunch at one of the spots I like to bring visitors to. It’s the Wharf Restaurant. The prices are good and it’s right on the ocean so you can sit on the balcony and watch the waves crashing on the rocks below.
As we sipped our beer and ate our crab backs and fish cakes, an old man carrying a handful of huge pieces of aloe vera walked buy. He noticed a tourist from Britain who appeared to be swollen and red. He dropped his aloe vera and said with authority “Sir I can help you’’. He gently took one of the man’s legs and rubbed it all over with aloe vera. Then while he massaged his feet using reflexology techniques, he accurately diagnosed several of the man’s health problems. As it turns out the tourist is having serious kidney problems that need attention as soon as he return home. It was interesting because the old man, who seemed poor and uneducated, obviously had some kind of medical knowledge that he was able to use to comfort the tourist. I’m not sure how much they paid the man but I think he was well rewarded for his troubles.

When we’re at the market, we’ll often ask whether a new vegetable or fruit we see is good. Quite often, the answer will be “Ah yes, it’s good for high blood pressure, for stomach problems, etc’’. But when we ask if it’s good to eat, they’ll say “Well a little bitter but it’s really good for you”. They believe many of their foods have medicinal qualities. With all their supposed expertise however, you have to wonder why St. Lucia has one of the highest diabetes rates in the world. 28.1 percent of St. Lucians have abnormal blood glucose or high blood sugar and 8.1 percent of the population is diabetic. Experts believe new rates of diabetes will double every four years. Most of the people affected are women in the lower socio-economic bracket. It’s not unusual to see people who had to have a limb amputated because of the illness. It’s a serious health issue in a poor country that is already struggling to provide health care to its citizens.

And sticking with the health beat… one of the things the vendors try to sell tourists at the market is sulphur soap. It’s soap made from the mud in the sulphur springs that flow from the volcano in the south of the Island. The soap is supposed to get rid of acne, warts, eczema and many other skin conditions. It’s also supposed to be good for arthritis, although whoever did the label on the bar of soap we bought had a problem with spelling. It said the soap is good to treat arthuritis. So if any of you have any Arthurs that need treatment, let me know and I’ll bring you back a bar.

Obama Mania

St. Lucians are passionate about their politics. But it’s not just St. Lucian politics that interest them. They were intrigued, as many people around the world were, by the U.S. Presidental election.

The fact that an African American had a shot at the job made them very proud. Many people sported Obama T-shirts and buttons. There were celebrations the night he was elected and the newspapers for days afterwards were filled with stories about Obama and the impact his being elected will have on St. Lucia. It was noted that Obama likes to read poetry by St. Lucia’s literary pride and joy, Derek Walcott, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1992. And one commentator wondered if Walcott would be invited to the inauguration. No one was happier than Claudia at the market. Obama’s picture is still proudly displayed at her stall. The morning after the election, she grabbed my hand and said “The world is going to change. Black and White people will work together. The world will be a better place.”

Down the road from the market, there’s a pretty little hotel near Castries called Auberge Seraphine. Business travellers often stay there because it’s quite close to the airport in the north end of the Island. The restaurant, which a view of Seraphine Harbor, is supposed to be quite good. What the hotel is most famous for however, are the egrets that nest in trees nearby.

If you stay in room 303, you can look off your balcony and see hundreds of birds nesting. They’re fluffy and white and resemble big snow balls. We’ve seen them on several occasions and there are often baby birds in the nests. Another place to spot the egrets is next to cows in fields along the side of the road. They feed off the insects on the cows and there’s usually one egret for each cow.

And in the “Isn’t that weird category…” we took our friends to lunch at “The Still” an old sugar plantaion in Soufriere. It was taking awhile for our food to come so we explored the property a little bit to keep Tomas, the two year old, occupied. We found some turtles that the restaurant keeps as pets…at least we hope they’re pets. You have to wonder if they built the walkway to match this turtle…or if the turtles coloring changed to match his environment. In either case…it’s a perfect match.

Frog Under Glass

Every Saturday morning, we take our regular trip to the market. We haven't missed a Saturday, except when we were out of town.

As we finish up our market shopping we always pick up two newspapers, the Star and the Voice. There are others but we limit ourselves to these two. They have different takes on stories and between the two of them, we get a good idea of what’s happening in St. Lucia. The vendor knows us now. He's a young man in a wheelchair. He often has his two young daughter with him. When he sees us coming, he rolls up the two papers together and wraps them with an elastic.

An amusing section to read is the Classifieds. Many St. Lucian’s are quite superstitious by nature and that probably explains why there are so many ads under astrology. Here are some examples of what these ads promise.

Rev. Mother Kingston
Spiritual Healer
Stops Break-ups, Divorce
Reunites separated
Restores lost nature
Removes jealousy
Calls enemies by name
Grants desires
Results 7 hours

Sister Lindsey
Free Same Reading
God Gifted Spiritualist
Solves all problems
Relieves depression
Returns lovers
Clears bad luck
Guaranteed results

High Powered Spiritualist Healer
Specializes in all problems
Removes all bad luck
Succeeds where others failed
Contact this gift lady for help tomorrow






One of the first things visitors notice during their first night in St. Lucia (besides the heat) is the sound of the tree frogs. The males chirp loudly at night to attract the females. They remind us of the peepers at home. But these critters are louder, they sing all night, and they're also very small. It's unusual to see them but one of them decided to hang around our deck. We brought him inside so that Milan could take some pictures.







He used a regular sized wine glass so you can get a sense of the size of the frog. After a few pics, we let him go to resume his singing. The frogs keep some people awake but you get used to them very quickly.









They say the coconut tree is known as the tree of life because you can survive eating jut coconut and drinking the coconut water. It's very popular here for people to buy fresh coconuts. Sometimes they just want the juice. Zuzka and Milan got their first sampling of coconut water.








Then the vendor cut the coconut open with his machete and took out what he called the coconut gel. It's basicly very soft coconut. The coconut water takes some getting used to but the coconut gel is yummy. It costs about 60 cents Canadian for a coconut...or 1.50 Eastern Caribbean Dollars. But if you're in a resort, the locals will try to sell one to you for $5.00 U.S.












We were on our way to a beach this past weekend when we came across this little shack at the side of the road.


















We didn't really get the reasoning behind the air freshener...but we thought it was kind of funny.

Thanks to Milan for alot of pictures this week.
It's nice to have more to choose from.

From Prague to St. Lucia

It’s always nice to get company because we get to see St. Lucia again through fresh eyes.
Our friends, Zuzka and Milan and their two year old son Tomas are visiting for the next month. We picked them up last week and they’re already impressed with the beauty of the Island and with the warm temperatures.

Tomas loves swimming so he swims in the pool and the ocean several times a day. They arrived at Hewanorra, the airport in Vieux Fort that is about an hour and a half drive south of the Island. As with most visitors we took them to the beach before heading home. And we had a couple of Piton, ‘’the local beer’’, in a cooler. If you’re thinking of coming to visit, you can expect the same treatment :)



Now that we live in Rodney Bay, the tourist hub of the island, our visitors can come and go much more easily. We’re a five minute walk to the beach and a ten minute walk to the mall.

We ventured a little further last week when we went into Castries. There was only one cruise ship in port but by all reports, there will be even more cruise ships visiting St. Lucia this year.

Zuzka admitted to being a little intimidated walking through downtown. It does take a bit of getting used to.

This is the inside of the Roman Catholic church downtown. It’s made of stone on the outside but wood on the inside. 65 percent of the population in St. Lucia is Catholic.

Norm has been outdoing himself at the market these days. The selection of fruits and vegetables varies with the season. Mangoes are done right now but grapefruit is at its peak. Check out the red bananas we can only find on occasion and look at the size of the avocados. They are superb. For those looking for a challenge, see if you can correctly identify all 20 of the examples of produce shown in the picture. The first one to send in a correct response gets a week's stay at the Hamel St. Lucian retreat :)

MADRAS Madness

It’s been a fun filled week in St. Lucia. October is Cultural Heritage month so there have been a number of concerts and public events to mark the celebration. During the last week, many businesses decorated their offices, staff dressed up in their costumes and the local Royal Bank outlet even had a live band playing.

Like many other schools on the island, The International School of St. Lucia, where Norm teaches, celebrated Jounen Kweyol or Creole Day, last Friday. Staff and students dressed up in their madras outfits. Madras is the name of the checkered patterns in bright colors that people wear. One local school wanted to teach students about traditional costumes so after a Creole breakfast, they slaughtered a pig. Norm’s school wasn’t that brave. They stuck to costumes, song, dance, story telling and a fashion show featuring people in their madras outfits (including Norm). Here’s a picture of the outfits put together by the principal, secretary, teacher and finance person.

The biggest party always takes place on the Sunday closest to October 28th. Four villages are designated as party sites, one in the north, south, east and west. We went to the one in the North, in Grande Riviere, which is only ten minutes away from where we live.

It was very sunny and hot but that didn’t stop thousands of people from showing up in their bright costumes. There were people standing or sitting in every shady spot available. There were several booths set up with lots to drink and Creole food including pig tail stew and turtle soup. The soup was being served even though it’s illegal to catch the turtles, which are endangered.

A couple of men showed how to make sugar cane juice. One person chopped off the hard exterior. A second person put the sugar cane through a machine to squeeze out the juice. There is always sugar cane available at the market even though there is not much sugar cane grown on the island these days. It’s sold in 4 or 5 inch sticks. You chew on them to suck the juice out. They can also be used to make skewers on the barbeque.

Another display showed how people used to make wood planks out of trees. One man stood on a platform about ten feet off the ground. The platform was actually the tree that they were cutting, supported by a frame. The man on top manoeuvered the saw between his legs in tandem with someone standing on the ground below. All of them were barefoot.

People here say it usually rains during the Jounen Kweyol celebrations. There wasn’t a drop that fell this year. That was exceptional considering we have had a very wet October with some extremely heavy rainfalls. There were some landslides and many streets and some houses were flooded. Local folks say they don’t remember ever getting so much rain in October. This is a picture of the path we usually take to the beach. Needless to say, we didn’t go swimming for a couple of days.

We’re going to be getting some company this weekend. Our friends from the Czech Republic, Zuzka and Milan and their two year old Tomas will be visiting for the month of November. It will be interesting to live with a two year old again.

St. Thomas

We had a wonderful few days in St. Thomas recently. St. Thomas is part of the U.S. Virgin Islands so while you have the beauty of a tropical paradise like St. Lucia, you have better roads, a more prosperous economy (for now anyway) and the typical tourist strips you’ll find along the Eastern seaboard with lots of little boutiques (supposedly selling at good prices but I’m not convinced) and limited public access to beaches.










We were invited to St. Thomas by our friends, and former roommates from last year, Carl and Sue Ross. Their son Chip owns shares in a vacation home company and he was unable to use the four days he had reserved in a spectacular villa in St. Thomas. We jumped at the chance. Norm took a couple of days off from school so that we could fly to the island.

You’d think that flying from one Caribbean island to another would be simple but that’s not necessarily so. Liat is the Caribbean airline we usually fly on. It has the smaller Dash-8’s that fly from one island to another, but not necessarily using the most direct route. To get to St. Thomas we had to land on several islands first… Dominica, Antigua, St. Kitts and St. Marteens and on the way back, we added two more stops… Anguilla and Barbados. The island hopping took about 5 hours each way.

We have memorized the safety message from the crew, we are well versed in how to open the emergency door, we know you have to run to line up for the plane because there is no reserved seating, and we know that the stewardess will spray some type of deodorizer on the carpet at the start of each flight. Something they say they are required to do for safety reasons. .





The villa we stayed at in St. Thomas was amazing. It was an entire compound built on several levels and divided into four separate buildings. You had to go outside to get from the bedroom to the kitchen or from the living room to the games room. The views were spectacular. We could see at least ten islands from the house.




One of the buildings was home to the Honeymoon suite with its private balcony, king size bed and glass shower facing the Atlantic Ocean.








The main building in the center had the kitchen, dining room and large living room.



The kitchen counters and backsplash were made of granite. All o the appliances were top of the line, including the two ovens, double dishwasher and separate ice-cube making fridge. It was a kitchen to die for. Sue and I really enjoyed the little bit of cooking we were able to do. The cleaning staff came in every day so we didn’t even do the dishes.



The fourth building had three levels of bedrooms, each with its unique character and spectacular view. Then of course there was the usual pool, Jacuzzi…you know the usual stuff you’d find in a mansion in the Caribbean. ;-)










Despite our luxurious quarters, Norm still wanted to get out and explore the Island. So
we spent a good part of our second day there driving around. Our first walk on a beach led us to this lovely iguana. They are numerous on the island and very tame. This one was about three feet long.










This is a picture of Magan's Bay. Magan's Beach is one of the more famous beaches on the island and apparently one of the top beaches in the world. .













On the third day we drove into town and took a ferry to St. John Island.




It’s a 30 or 40 minute ride. Most of the Island is protected so there is very little development. There are several white sandy beaches that looked very inviting. It was a cloudy day though so we didn’t feel too bad about not bringing our bathing suits.




And we got to experience an earthquake while we were in St. Thomas. It happened on the Sunday. It was 6.1 on the richter scale. The epicentre was about 150 miles north of the Island of St. John but we got a pretty good shake. The quake was in the ocean so it didn’t cause any damage anywhere.


Sorry for the delay in posting this. Norm was busy and I was sick. I’ll be quicker with the next one.

Oktoberfest En Kweyol

We had an unusual event to attend this past weekend. It was the first ever Oktoberfest Festival in St. Lucia. But to make the event unique to the Island, it was called Oktoberfest En Kweyol…that’s the patois way to say Creole. It was promoted as an event to kick off Creole Heritage Month.




The entry fee was $4.00 U.S. which included a sample of beer. Since Norm doesn’t like beer, I had to sacrifice and drink his share. There were several different kinds of beer from around the world including Edelweiss, Pelforth Brune, Paulaner (which is apparently the original Oktoberfest Ferman beer) and Guinness. I tasted three different kinds and they were all good.





I tried Guinness for the first time and was quite surprised at how dark it was. This gentleman was kind enough to give me a Guinness key chain as a gift.












These girls were having a great time selling Piton merchandise. Piton is the locally brewed beer that is very popular here.











Several bands played throughout the day. This is the number one drum band in St. Lucia.







There were free bandanas for participants. We managed to find some shade so that Norm didn’t have to wear his.








As with every other festival or event in St. Lucia there was great food on hand, including pig tail soup. But where, oh where, was the Oktoberfest sausage.