Flight To Bardados - Visit Crane Beach - Fly Home

Saturday, July 27^th. FLIGHT TO BARBADOS – VISIT CRANE BEACH – FLY HOME

We were up with the alarm at 2:30. Had breakfast and got our stuff together. We were happy that Wayne showed up at 4:00 and drove us to the airport. He was polite but cool. I thanked him for driving us around and told him to tell his brother that we sorry that we didn't get the chance to say good bye to him. We were the first people to arrive at the airport and when we walked in we woke up the security guard who was asleep on a bench. We left our luggage and went back outside for the cool morning breeze and waited until check in time. The flight left on time (LIAT: leave island any time or last in air transport). We arrived in Barbados where Irnice and I said a very short sad goodbye to George who was flying on to Grenada. Then we picked up our luggage and went to departures only to find that we can't check in until noon. So we settled in for a long wait. Shortly after we met the Project Overseas group coming from Grenada.

Olive and Marie from the PO Grenada group arrived and wanted to go to a beach. So Irnice and I joined them. We hired a cab and he took us to Crane Beach. This is a huge five star resort with a beautiful beach. It even had an elevator to take you from the cliff to the beach. We hung out there for a couple of hours. I wave jumped in the rough surf (and sadly lost my yellow SVG bracelet that Jane gave me) and walked to both ends of the beach. One end had a rock outcrop and then another beautiful beach. The other side had a short walk along a rock cliff. We walked up to a restaurant in the resort and had flying fish sandwiches. Olive paid for her and her Marie’s with East Caribbean dollars, Bajain dollars and US dollars – really glad I wasn’t travelling with her.

Then we took the cab back to the airport and flew home. Danny picked me up and I was home by 9:30.

Tenth Day - Closing Ceremonies - Dinner at Fantasea Resort

Friday, July 26^th. TENTH DAY – CLOSING CEREMONIES – DINNER AT FANTASEA RESORT

This morning when we got to school we gave the participants time to prepare their presentations. So they went through the usual rotation with one visit to the computer lab where George had them fill out evaluations on the blog. We had to have them fill out an evaluation for CTF too. Apparently they were very happy with the program, and what we had taught. But they were unhappy with the quality of the food and they complained that the union was unorganized. They knew about the ongoing union and ministry struggles and the ineffectiveness of Jimmy.

After they had lunch we all headed down to Memorial Hall for the closing ceremonies. It took them about an hour to get everything ready. All the media was there: radio, TV and print. There were the same speakers as the opening with the same order of protocol. Oswald spoke, Jimmy did not, and then George made a great speech about what we had accomplished, the partnership of CTF and SVGTU, and how much we had enjoyed our time visiting their country, experiencing their culture and exploring the sites of the island.

After all the speechs were made the three colour groups each put on a little sketch and/or song about their experience. They were excellent and made us feel really good about what they had learned. Each group gave one of us a gift from the whole group. When we were called up on stage one at a time we were cheered. The co-tutors presented us with gifts too. We presented gifts to our co-tutors, some union executives who had been especially helpful to us like: Jane (I took the Canada flag hairband out of her bag and put it on her head – the audience cheered and to her credit she wore if for the rest of the afternoon), Vibert, and Kent. George gave the union a laptop computer that the Nova Scotia board had donated through CTF. Finally the union presented us all gifts and so did Jane. It was unexpected on my part and somewhat embarrassing as we had really brought very little for them. But there were a 130+ of them plus the union people. CTF has little funds and it would cost us a small fortune to provide something worthwhile. Then George and I handed out the small tokens of Canadianna that we had brought with us. A third of the way through the line and one woman came back upset that she had got men’s socks and wanting to change. George discouraged that and told her and others to trade amongst themselves. We were embarrassed by the little gifts we gave them.

When the ceremonies were finished I was approached by a reporter from the radio who wanted to interview someone, so because George was outside smoking she took me and led me to a quiet little room at the back. She asked what I thought of the ceremonies, about our project, if we thought we had accomplished what we set out to do and what we hoped the teachers would do with what we gave them.

Then we all walked back up to the school to have our last catered lunch with the union exec and co-tutors. I won't miss the food. Gradually everyone left and there was just the three of us with our faithful guide Jane. We phoned Wayne to come and get us but he was in Georgetown, about an hour away. So we were stuck for a bit until Jane bailed us out and phoned a friend who came picked us up, drove us to Jane's house where she changed out of her dress and then to FastaSea Tours so that we could climb to the fort. We had a view of this fort on top of a huge rock just off shore, from our home when we first arrived. I had wanted to climb up to it ever since. So after asking Jane a number of times, she finally found time for us to do it. George begged off as he was tired from the hike yesterday, so Irnice, Jane and I took a water taxi to the rock and climbed the 60 metre tall volcanic plug using the 122 steps. Little did I know that Irnice was afraid of heights and the open-ness of the staircase unnerved her. Jane encouraged her to keep going. The view from the top of St Vincent and Young Island was beautiful. There was a small battery of three cannons there too. After a bit we climbed back down. Jane led and Irnice was hiding behind her and hanging on her shirt. They were so slow that I stopped and just admired the view and reflected on the visit. When I got to the bottom I found out that Jane was just as scared as Irnice, but she didn't let us know! Our water taxi came back and returned us to the mainland where we joined George who was sleeping on a beach bed.

We decided to have dinner and a drink at the hotel and to treat Jane. We ordered and then I changed and went for one last swim in the sea while the sun was setting. I had a conch roti and we had a really nice last meal, and one of only a few at a restaurant, with Jane. When Jane phoned Wayne to come and get us he gave her a hard time and he declined to come and get us. We had been aware that there was something going on with Wayne because he was very stand-offish with us the last few days. We also learned that he is Jimmy's brother and we wondered if he was upset by anything he might have heard that we said about the incompetence of Jimmy. There was nothing we could do about it since we were leaving the island in 10 hours. Jane was visibly upset with Wayne and embarrassed probably too because she believes in making sure that the union looks good, that we are serviced and that we enjoy our stay. Anyway after we all had a round of ice cream she called her friend and he came and picked us up again and took us home. We all said a very sad goodbye to a wonderful woman and great new friend.

I went down to Ken's to give his son the Canadian sunglasses that he liked so much and to say thank you to Ken and his family. Then Ken followed me upstairs to say goodbye to George and Irnice. He stayed for a half hour and we had a nice visit. He told us he had seen us on TV and heard us on the radio. Then it was time to finish packing and go to bed for a very early start.

Ninth Day - Vermont Nature Trail

Thursday, July 25^th. NINTH DAY – VERMONT NATURE TRAIL

Tired this morning...We were at school early to get set up. Today we wanted to have the groups back in their subject groups so that they could present the lessons they prepared on Tuesday. But first we had to have them in the three colour groups for attendance. Then I explained how the rotation was going to work with the presentations, George's computer lab workshop and me trying to fit an hour in at the end of one of each of their classes to talk a bit about Canada. I had downloaded a lot of photos of Canada to show them.

We finally got that all organized and they did what they needed to do. It is interesting though that none of the ministry people came to see what the participants had prepared. Oh well, we ran their workshop for them.

After lunch Jane took us with Wayne to the Vermont Nature Trail. We had to drive for a half hour to get there along the hilly, windy roads. The two women who supervised it were just leaving and walking down the road, when they flagged us down and asked where we were going. When we told them we walked to hike the trail they got in the van and we drove them back to it. The trail winds up and down hills through the incredibly lush rainforest. The plants are beautiful and many of the trees are huge. It took us about two hours to hike. It almost did George in as he has one wonky knee and the opposite hip is also sore. We heard but did not see the Vincie Parrot. This park is their habitat and has been set up to attempt to provide them a safe place to live. There are only about 500 left in the wild.

Then we came back for dinner. We got back home and found Ken  talking to two local men who were planting sweet potato in the field next to his house. They chopped up three coconuts for us to drink. Not bad, but I'm not crazy about it.

After dinner we repackaged all the gifts, typed and the like before heading off to bed.

Eighth Day - Aids Workshop - Canada Day Party

Wednesday, July 24^th. EIGHTH DAY – AIDS WORKSHOP – CANADA DAY PARTY

Today we had a different agenda for the students. They were put back in their three groups and rotated through the workshops. I was doing HIV/AIDS and water borne diseases with Raquel; George and another lady were doing gender equity and Irnice did how to run a workshop for other teachers when the participants get back to their schools. They all went very well, the participants seemed to really enjoy them and were very involved. Lots of good info about AIDS and lots of great questions. One man believes it is a conspiracy by the white man to get rid of the black. There was some ignorance but most people seemed to know the issues.

After the classes Oswald drove us in his van to the school where he is principal. He opened up some classes so we could see what a typical elementary school looks like. It was pretty sad and bleak. The rooms were full of ancient furniture, the walls were bare and the staffroom was a disaster. We had wanted to see one since we arrived, so we were happy. He also took us by a natural spring “spa” that was just a hose that had fizzy water coming out of it from the mountains above.

Then we went to two grocery stores in a vain attempt to find ice, but we bought a couple of last minute things for our big night. When we got home Ken was sweeping up the place and he helped us get set up for the party. We had invited all the union executive and the co-tutors over for a social. We hired Ken for $300 EC to entertain us with his son singing while he played pan steel drum to pre-recorded tracks. We asked people for seven but no one came before eight. However, they did all come except for Vibert and the course director Jimmy.  Jane got George up dancing and then Wendy got me up. I had had a couple of beers and actually found the beat simple to follow. So I went into my room and put on my Canada shirt, sunglasses and Canada flag ears headband. I looked ridiculous but they all seemed to enjoy it and it knocked the fun level up a bit. We partied until 11:00 and by the time we cleaned up it was midnight. I did not sleep well as I had really itchy mosquito bites.

Seventh Day Of Teaching - TV Show

Tuesday, July 23^rd. SEVENTH DAY OF TEACHING – TV SHOW

We arrived at school at the usual time. The ministry wanted to do four subjects, science, social studies, math, and Early Childhood Education. We knew that some of the participants had signed up for subject specific workshops and that they were all mixed up in the three classes because we focused on special education. So, after we took attendance in our regular rooms I had to call all three groups into one classroom and tell them what today would look like. We have five rooms available to us so we set up one subject in each of four rooms and assigned the ministry math lady to one, the ministry science lady to another, the social studies expert to a third and Wendy took the ECE group. The social studies guy did not show up so Eugena, Netta and Mavis supervised that until he showed up an hour and a half late.

We were to go to the local TV station for 10:00 but apparently they had a power failure and had to postpone. So, we hung around and watched what the co-tutors and ministry people were doing. I hung out at the computer lab for a bit where it was air-conditioned and talked to a couple of the participants. Talked to a 21 year old first year grade 3 teacher. I asked her if she had gone to teacher’s college and she said she will a year from September. So she will teach and learn on the job for two years before going to college. One of the co-tutors told me that she has had a couple of years of special education training in England and has a principal who knows nothing about special ed and criticizes her on her lesson plans, so she tells her principal not to write nonsense on her plans. It sounds like there is a lot of who you know rather than what you know when it comes to promotions.

Then the lunch for the participants showed up really late. There was a lot of complaining and a near revolt. Jimmy took most of the flack. Apparently the catering company had a vehicle breakdown.

Our lunch showed up early because we had our TV show rescheduled to 2:00. So we drove with Oswald and Vibert up, up, up a very narrow, winding road to the station. The view up there on a clear day would be amazing. It looks out over the city and all the way to Bequia and the other Grenadines. The other side of the hill looks inland. On the top of the hill there is a little public school. It would have been great to see inside but it is locked up for the season. The TV studio was very simple and low tech. They recorded on super VHS and had three small Sony cameras. Vibert was the host and George and I sat on either side and answered his questions about CTF and the workshops. I think we did very well again and were good spokespersons for CTF and Canada.

After that we drove back to the union offices to meet with three people we are to co-teaching with tomorrow. I will do HIV AIDS and water borne diseases with Rachel, a local expert; George will do gender equity issues with another local expert and Irnice is to do facilitating a workshop with the Social Studies guy, but of course he did not show up.

Then we had Wayne drive us downtown so that I could buy the St Vincent and the Grenadines shirt that I wanted in a souvenir shop. Irnice bought a couple of things too.

Finally back home for our own debriefing and for dinner. I decided to cook spaghetti for the troops. I defrosted the beef, cut up the onions, peppers, mushrooms and then opened the jar of sauce and found it was moldy!! We have no car and no access to any store anywhere near us, so I walked up the hill and borrowed a jar off of Alan, the British neighbour. He was glad to help out.

Dinner was great. Then the usual evening entertainment of typing, talking, preparing for workshops and reading. I have finished my book about the 6 drinks of man and the epilogue talks about how the new drink is water. The other chapters were all about how to drink something safe because water has been contaminated for most of our human history. Perfect for my water borne disease workshop!