A Trip to the Beach (12 page)

Then the relay race began. Our food was packed in giant insulated boxes with cold gel packs and delivered to the Miami airport. From there it was flown to St. Martin, where it was off-loaded on the runway—in the sun—and transferred to a private plane operated by an enterprising Anguillian named Benjamin Franklin, who flew it over to Anguilla. At that point paperwork slowed down the race, and often our baby lettuce and raspberries wilted in the heat. Customs inspected each box, matched it up with invoices, and separated, stapled, stamped, and initialed several colored forms indicating the duty owed. Little Joe, previously the electrician, now our trucker, loaded the boxes and drove them to the restaurant, at which point I'd make last-minute menu changes after discovering that something hadn't arrived.

It wasn't until our ice cream machine stopped running that I truly realized the costs of doing business on a tropical island. I called the store in Florida where I'd bought the machine, and because toll-free numbers don't work from Anguilla, it took a $90 phone call to determine that I needed a small rubber belt—only $3, they said.

“I'll just stick it in the mail and you'll have it in a few days,” the man offered. I explained that the last package sent to me by mail still hadn't arrived and it had been six weeks. No, I said, I couldn't take chances with the mail, and I asked him to send it by Federal Express. Several days later I got a call that the box had arrived and was in the customs warehouse at the airport.

Bob drove to town immediately, hoping to get the part in time to still make at least one flavor of ice cream that night. The three o'clock scene at the airport resembled any other tourist destination when new arrivals are welcomed. Concierges displayed signs identifying which hotel they represented, porters with dollies offered to help with luggage, and taxi drivers lined up waiting for a fare. Unfortunately for us, customs was tied up for over an hour when American Eagle unleashed its thirty-something vacationers. Bob had no chance of clearing our little box until everyone had been shuttled through the system, so he chatted with taxi drivers and hoped he'd be out in time to get ready for work.

At four o'clock Bob was finally allowed into the customs office, where he was handed the invoice for the part ($3) plus the receipt for Federal Express ($85).

“Where's the package?” Bob asked. The officer nodded toward the warehouse.

“How much duty do I owe?”

“You gotta do an entry and pay at the treasury,” the man explained.

Bob's frustration must have shown on his reddened face, because the man apologized for the procedure. He handed the invoice over to Bob, who then had to locate Tippy. Three days passed before we could pay the duty and were permitted to take our little rubber belt back to the restaurant. The $3 part cost us $215.

During dinner Blanchard's turned into a hub of activity for more than the staff alone. Taxi drivers hung out in the kitchen, and I gave them samples of coconut cheesecake and Caesar salad while waiting for their customers to finish dining. They'd talk with our staff about politics or boat races or business in general. For me, it was like taking a night course in island life, illuminating fragments of Anguilla through these little snippets of conversation.

“Mel,” they'd say, “you seen Vanessa's wedding Sunday?”

“Who's Vanessa?”

“You know, she Cynthia's husband's cousin. She work Cap Juluca. She drive the yellow jeep with number six-three-four-two. Mel, she have the biggest wedding yet here in Anguilla.”

I had no idea who Cynthia was, much less her husband or her cousin, but I was curious to learn about the biggest wedding in island history. The fact that I was supposed to know everyone on the island, what they drove (including their license plate number), and where they worked was a constant challenge.

“Mel, she go Puerto Rico for her dress and everybody else's outfits in the whole wedding. Her cousin from St. Thomas come to make the cake, and they say it the biggest, most beautiful cake ever. People say there was four, maybe five hundred people there. The cars from church go for miles. I know you see it, Mel. They go right past your house. It was a breakfast wedding, so they passed early, and they was tootin' their horns all the way.”

Everyone was disappointed that I had somehow missed the wedding, so Clinton changed the subject. “I ain' never wearin' a seat belt. Not me. You seen that car accident in North Hill? That guy was lucky he ain' had a seat belt on. They jus' make it so you can' get outta the car.”

I started to explain about car safety, but nobody listened. Bob and I might be the only people in Anguilla to wear seat belts. Clinton actually was worried that I might be putting my life in danger with this practice and had tried to convince me to listen to reason.

It was a happy kitchen. Without question, Bug had the most tedious job in the restaurant. Most people would complain after hours of washing dishes. Not Bug. He stood bent over his sink of scalding water, telling funny stories to keep the rest of us in good humor.

Bug loved to mimic me, much to the delight of the rest of the staff. From behind the line I'd call, “Table six,” indicating that a waiter should come pick up an order, and Bug would echo, “Table six, table six,
please
come get this food.” If nobody came immediately, I'd yell again, “Table six.” Mirroring my animated orders, Bug would place his soapy hands on his hips, stamp his foot, and yell in a still higher register, “Table six! Does anybody work here anymore? This food is getting cold. Table six. Now. Please!”

Clinton learned to dice, chop, puree, and julienne like a pro. He carefully saved the seeds from any vegetable and wrapped them in paper towels. Each night he would carry them home to plant in his garden the next day. As he worked, Clinton bounced to the rhythm in his head. One particularly hectic evening he sang quietly to himself, “He's got the whole world in his hands . . .” I joined in to lighten the mood of a crazy night, and within minutes the entire kitchen was rocking: “He's got the whole wide world in his hands . . .” Garrilin decorated desserts with a new flair, Shabby knocked the spatula on the grill to the rhythm, Bug blew soapsuds into the air, and Ozzie's body wiggled to the music without ever moving his feet. Had a stranger walked into the kitchen just then, they might have thought I had completely lost control. Nights like that were the best.

I stopped in the road just a hundred yards from the restaurant, waiting for our neighbor, Elbert, as he coaxed his herd of goats in front of my car. The lead goat—I assumed it was the patriarch—was out in front, dragging a black rope behind. A few stragglers wandered at the rear, and Elbert rounded them up, prodding with a stick.

Every morning he waved and smiled as he drove his herd of goats down to Meads Bay, where he tied the leader to a tree or sea grape. The rest of the herd—apparently unaware that they were not tied up as well—spent the day close by, foraging for food. Their ears were soft and floppy, and they flicked their short tails in play. The babies frolicked in and around the group, rediscovering their mother's milk when hungry.

The lead goat intrigued me, though. If untied, would he run off to explore the island, racing wildly up the road looking for adventure? I pictured the rest of the gang trotting along behind, heads down, embarrassed by the rebellion.

Elbert's herd safely crossed the road, and he waved goodbye as I continued toward the restaurant. Elbert's day was pretty open. His entire life was pretty open. I thought back to my years at Blanchard & Blanchard, recalling my calendar jam-packed with commitments. Sunday nights Bob and I would study the week ahead, wishing there were more hours in a day. Waiting for a herd of goats to cross the road would have stretched my patience to its limits, but now I was starting to look forward to stopping in the road in the quiet of early morning, waiting as Elbert and his goats, rope dragging behind, leisurely crossed to the other side.

Cornbread

With Uncle Waddy watching carefully, I continued making cornbread to serve that night. We talked about how to combat the problem of cornbread being dry and crumbly, and I promised him a piece when it was finished. Customers often requested this recipe, and I was always happy to oblige, if only to see their surprise when they heard the ingredients.

Cream 1 cup butter and 3/4 cup sugar in a mixer. Add 4 eggs, beating well after each addition. With mixer on low speed, blend in 1 1/2 cups creamed corn, 1/4 cup crushed pineapple, 1 cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese, 1 cup flour, 1 cup cornmeal, 2 tablespoons baking powder, and 1 teaspoon salt. Pour into a buttered 9-inch-square cake pan and bake at 325° for about an hour, or until golden brown. Serves eight.

“Where do you get your cornmeal?” Uncle Waddy asked.

“Florida,” I answered. “Why, would you like some?”

“Oh, no. I grow my own corn and take it to the Agriculture Department in The Valley, where they have a grinder to turn it into meal. I used to walk all the way to town carrying my corn, but now somebody usually give me a lift. “I hope you don' mind,” he continued, “that I pick some sea-bean vines for my goats. Come.” He motioned for me to follow him outside.

Two round, green bundles of the vines that grew wild on the beach lay on the ground, tied into neat bales by their own leggy shoots. Lavender flowers poked through the strands.

“I pick these out in front of your restaurant. I hope you don' mind,” he repeated.

“Of course not. It is your land, you know. But how will you get them home?” I asked.

“I just live up the hill in Long Bay.” And with that, he hoisted the two big bundles onto his shoulders and strode down the driveway.

I stared after him, astonished. Eighty-five years old, dressed only in a bathing suit, with the body of a thirty-year-old, and carrying two heavy bundles of greens for his goats. “Will you come to dinner on your birthday?” I called out. “Our treat.”

Uncle Waddy stopped and turned with a wide smile. “I would be honored. It next Wednesday. I be here at seven o'clock.” And off he went.

Maybe Anguilla is the fountain of youth,
I thought as I returned to work.

The chatter in the kitchen each night continued to further my education in Anguillian culture. Heated arguments about a boat race or a cricket game would often get out of hand and I'd have to quiet everyone down, reminding them we had guests in the dining room. Bug was always in the middle of these disputes, and his high-pitched voice easily rose above the rest.

“Hey, Bob,” he asked, “what go faster, a cruise ship or a speedboat?”

Although he was anxious to get back to the busy dining room, Bob could see he had been appointed referee for a touchy issue. But before he could answer, Shabby said, “Bob, tell he what go faster. A cruise ship
must
go faster. Tell he.”

Bob pondered the question briefly as Clinton, Lowell, and Miguel circled around, waiting for the verdict, leaving the diners to themselves. The debate escalated when it became clear that Bob had absolutely no idea which one went faster. The group argued about engine sizes, the weight of the boats, and which could get to Tortola first, a speedboat or a cruise ship. I reminded them that we had a full dining room, and everyone went back to work for a few minutes. Then Ozzie raised a new subject for discussion. “Mel,” he said, “you think Saddam Hussein should be assassinated?”

I was sautéeing corn, steaming baby green beans, and stacking portobello mushrooms with spinach and shaved Parmesan, and wasn't sure I'd heard him correctly. “Saddam Hussein?” I asked.

“Yeah, Mel,” Ozzie said. “He evil. He gotta go, right?”

“Mel, what you think about the new airport?” Clinton asked a few minutes later as he sprinkled coconut on a cheesecake. “Everybody in Anguilla have a different opinion on this one. What you think?”

Now here was a truly difficult subject, and I took time before answering. The government was considering building a new airport that would change the island forever. I had learned to tread lightly on political issues, and in fact I could see both sides of the debate. How grand it would be to bring in more tourists—more business for everyone. But the thought of jumbo jets roaring over our secluded beaches, disgorging hundreds of people onto this tiny island, cast a shadow upon my visions of tranquillity. Where would all those people stay? Would our exquisite dunes be bulldozed to make room for high-rise hotels?

Anguillians had watched St. Martin lose its innocence. Over twenty short years, the arrival of giant resorts and casinos combined with a poorly managed immigration department had made it a haven for unemployment, crime, and a population that had lost control of its own destiny. “Not in Anguilla,” Joshua always told me. “Daughter, we will never let that happen here,” he would say. “Never.”

But Joshua was of the old school. There was also a generation of young souls torn between the conservatism of their parents and the lure of the outside world. Instilled with respect for the simple life in Anguilla, they were still drawn by the promise of more jobs and more money. Change had come quickly to Anguilla, and people were caught in the middle. Only twenty years before, most had not had the luxury of electricity and telephones. They had taken a giant leap through cultural time, and a new airport would be an irrevocable step again.

I finally came upon an answer. “I'm sure Anguilla will make the right decision.”

We had a run on jerk shrimp that night, so I asked Shabby to get some more from the walk-in cooler. He just stared at me.

“What's the matter, Shabby? Are we out of shrimp?”

“No, but I can' get it. I got gas in my shoulder, and that'll make it worse.”

“Gas in your shoulder? What are you talking about? All you have to do is get some shrimp,” I said.

“I can' touch the cold shrimp after I be near the grill. Can' go from hot to cold. Not only my shoulder get gas, but the cold give me arthritis.”

Health issues were forever under discussion in our kitchen, and how colds were caught was an especially fraught topic. Our theories about germs had no foundation, Bob and I were told, and the perils of sudden temperature changes were impossible to dispute. Cooking in any restaurant kitchen calls for frequent trips into the walk-in cooler, but in Anguilla this took some coaxing. When necessary, our staff dutifully went in, but not before placing a small towel on top of their head. This, they agreed, would ward off the flu.

One day, on our way to The Valley to do some errands, we heard a shriek from a fellow on a bicycle.
“Blanchard,”
he yelled as we drove by. Neither Bob nor I recognized him, but he was waving frantically to get us to stop. He had turned his bike around and was now chasing us down the road. When we pulled over, he bent into the car window and with a giant smile revealed a gold cap that had been carved into the shape of a star on his front tooth. He was a Rastafarian with thick, fuzzy locks of hair down to his waist. Out of breath from the chase, he said, “Good morning. My name I-Davis. I Clinton an' Shabby brother. They tell me all 'bout you. You come see my shell collection? I like you see it.”

I-Davis gave us directions to his house, and we promised to visit later that day. After we bid I-Davis goodbye, Bob explained that he'd read somewhere that Rastas always put an
I
in front of their last name—something to do with their religion and positive energy. They believed it added strength and purity to a name. We arrived in what we started to call “Davisville,” since Shabby, Clinton, and at least seven of the ten other Davis brothers and sisters had settled on the same piece of land. I-Davis gave us a hug as he welcomed us into his home, and sure enough, he gave us a tour of his collection. He and his wife had strung hundreds of sand dollars, olive shells, cockles, and pieces of conch shells with fishing line and hung them from sticks to make wind chimes. They swung musically from doorways and windows in all directions, making the house feel like some sort of sacred place. Thousands more shells were sorted in rows by shape and color all over the floor, and I-Davis told us stories about where he'd found them all. He loved the ones with purple and orange most, he explained, but some of the plain white ones made the prettiest sound.

Before we left, we were handed a pencil and asked to sign a rock wall in the living room to show we had visited. Names and messages covered the surface, and it was hard to find a bumpy little space to leave our mark upon I-Davis's stone guest book. He smiled brightly, showing his gold star once again, and insisted we choose a wind chime to take home as a gift.

On Sunday mornings in Anguilla families gathered in churchyards for the service. Little boys wore jackets, usually handed down from a long line of brothers and cousins, and girls were in pastel dresses, lacy socks cuffed at the ankle, and shiny black patent leather shoes, their hair braided with ribbons and bows to match their dresses. The big children held on to the littler ones and clutched a Bible under one arm. As they walked along the road to church, fathers often carried a tambourine along with their Bible, sometimes giving it a little warm-up shake along the way.

The music was the best part. Women in straw hats sang with voices that soared through the churches' open doors. Congregations belted out hymns of all kinds, some wild and frenzied, others soft and tender. Through the windows we could see the crowd sway back and forth, the whole building seeming to move to the rhythm. Congregants cooled themselves and their babies with makeshift paper fans.

We were listening to the music outside the pink church in South Hill when Garrilin and her six-year-old niece Roxana pulled into the yard. I complimented Roxana on her braids, which were finished at the ends with alternating silver and gold beads.

“Mel,” Roxana said, “I went by Brenda yesterday to get my hair done. I got there eleven, I finish one. Mel, she plat sooo fast.”

“Plat?”

Roxana giggled at my ignorance. “Braid, Mel.
Plat
mean ‘braid.'”

“Two hours sounds like a long time to sit still to me,” I said.

“No, two hour fast. Sometime it take five hour.” Roxana held up five fingers to emphasize her point. “These a lotta braid, ya know.”

Garrilin and Roxana urged us to join them inside, but we weren't dressed for the occasion. We listened to the music as it flowed like honey through the front door.

After his last finals, Jesse left Walla Walla at four A.M. on Horizon Air. He connected with a seven-thirty American flight to Dallas, then on to Miami, where he spent the night. The next morning he caught an early flight to San Juan and then the American Eagle to Anguilla. Christmas travel plans were a challenge, since it was high season in the Caribbean—Jesse was lucky to get any flights at all. Thirty-six hours after leaving school, he stepped off the plane, looking a little bedraggled and clearly in need of a haircut, but otherwise healthy and happy to be home.

We drove to the house under a barrage of stories about school and questions about life in Anguilla. Jesse asked about Clinton, Lowell, and Shabby—there was so much to catch up on. We talked for hours that day until it was time to go to work.

“Jesse reach?” Bug asked as soon as we walked in. “He marry yet?”

“He's here,” Bob said. “He's coming in later and no, he's not married yet.”

“We gonna be at the wedding when it come time, right?” he asked.

“Bug, Jesse doesn't even have a girlfriend,” I said. “It's too soon to talk about a wedding.”

“Jesse gettin' old. He need to give you some grandchildrens,” Ozzie said.

“Jesse's still in school. I promise you that as soon as he decides to get married, you'll all come to the wedding.”

Bug added one last thought. “We make gumbo for the wedding?”

“What?” I asked, not sure what he was getting at.

“That gumbo you make with that spicy sausage—I think Jesse would like that. We make a great big pot for he wedding.”

Clinton explained to me that each night after dinner, Bug finished up whatever gumbo was left. I had no idea he was such a fan of that dish.

“Okay, Bug. We'll make gumbo for Jesse's wedding,” I said.

“I see you was late getting Jesse at the airport,” Garrilin said with disapproval.

“We got there before he cleared customs,” I said. “How'd you know we were late?”

“I see the plane go over before your car pass through South Hill.”

“You're kidding. You saw me driving to the airport?”

“I can see the road on Back Street from behind my house. I knew American Eagle was a little early, and I worry you be late.”

Dear Betsy,

Moving to Anguilla is a little like having a second childhood—I learn something new every day. It's eye-opening to be a minority for the first time in my life. Skin color here seems to have little significance, though. There are only a handful of foreigners on the island, and every now and then someone refers to me as the
“white lady,”
but it doesn't make me uncomfortable. In fact, sometimes, I feel like the whole island is watching out for me; people know my every move.

For me, the pulse of the island is in my kitchen. It's really the hub of our existence. Beyond earshot of the customers, it's where our staff talks about politics, love affairs, boat racing, and all sorts of topics they hear about on TV. They get more channels on TV here than we got in Vermont, so they're up on world events. CNN is as popular as wrestling and religion.

We had an early-morning sprinkle today, and the color of the water seemed to turn more green than blue. There's little change in the weather in Anguilla, but life in the slow lane allows us time to detect the subtleties. You just
can't
be in a hurry here. Our staff, though, is the best surprise of all. It's like we have a whole new family.