It's Time to Draw II

Since the last post regarding drawings done for Art of the Cards, I've whipped up another two drawings.  Very exciting.

Thrilling Trinidad Trip Twenty-Thirteen

Pictures HERE. All in one album this time to save me trouble.

Not this again.

Yes, this again. I’ll go ahead and say I’m sorry for the imminent onslaught of verbal diarrhea now. This journal will be long. Probably. Maybe it’ll make you laugh, maybe you’ll enjoy yourself. At this point you should know what you’re in for. We’re three journals deep now. You’ve had time to get out. There have been warnings. You are warned.

So, sit back with me and wait for my family to get here so we can eat and go to the airport. At the moment I am more excited for the food. It’s been nineteen hours since my last meal. I could really do with, you know, proper nourishment.

I’ll keep you posted.

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23^rd of February, 5:41pm

On the plane now. The family came to pick me up and everything went off without a hitch. It was grey and rainy outside as we went to the airport; exactly what I wanted. If it’s sunny and beautiful when you leave it makes you think “Aww, why am I leaving?” and you get all sad, but if it’s miserable and cold you go “Yeah! Eat it, Canada. Keep your temperatures and biting wind! I’m out of here!”.

We didn’t end up eating out. Or…hm. Sort of. Dad brought a cold chicken which he picked at and nobody else really touched. I ate some to satisfy my however-many-hours-long built-up hunger. The main meal happened at the airport, though.

My bag weighted in at 4-something kilos. About 4.5 or 4.3? Everyone else mocked me for having ridiculously light baggage. I checked it, too. I checked a bag weighing under 5 kilos. Is there even a point? They’ll probably kick it to the side somewhere and lose it.

It was $40.20 to eat at the airport. Forty dollars! For what? Fish and chips? “Authentic English” fish and chips, I think it was.  Yeah, right. I’ve had fish and chips in Britain. In England. In London. On Tower Hill. Don’t you tell me what’s authentic English.

It was pretty good, though.

Oh, and I lied. It was $40.20 for fish and chips, a Heineken, and a plate of hot wings. Still. Still! I’m outraged.

The plane ride so far is uneventful. Each of us took a self-shot in our seats. I want to put them together in a frame or something. They’re just so beautiful.

I want to do that thing again where I take a bit of what I’m drinking and smear it on a page of my journal. First up: plane tea. Oh no. I was just reminded of the Tea Pee Fiasco of 2012. Why do I keep ordering tea??

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6:25pm

The sun is setting as we watch. The colours of the sky are so vibrant above the clouds that t looks like the earth is on fire below us. Going from the horizon up to the sky were getting a near-perfect rainbow of colours. My only regret is that my camera can’t capture it. I tried, internet. Oh, how I tried.

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9:07pm

So our plane left fifteen minutes early and we are landing an hour early. I don’t think I’ve ever been on such a quick flight. By that I mean time of flight regularly vs. time saved...ratio.

Oh, no, it was forty-five minutes. Not an hour. Still.

We were picked up from the airport by an entire crew. Us and our four bottles of duty-free booze. I think my parents only had me as a way to get more alcohol in and out of countries.

We got back to my aunt’s house and were greeted by shark for dinner. If that’s not slapping the food chain in the face, I don’t know what is.

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24^th of February

Why am I awake? Why. Why. I am so tired. Why. No amount of breakfast shark can prepare me for this. We were up until 1am this morning being welcomed home. It is now 8:53am. Why.

Why.

Oh, wait, we’re at my aunt’s church. That’s why we’re up at this hour. I guess people like showing off their Canadian cousiblinephieces.

Last night something I dreaded in Canada became a reality. Outside it was warm and humid, but when we got inside the car it was freezing. There was no happy middle. Before you ask yourself why I didn’t just turn the AC down, remember that I am a Canadian and refuse to inconvenience anyone.

It was the same situation in bed, I’m afraid: boiling outside, frigid cold AC inside. I shouldn’t need a woolen blanket in the tropics. 

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12:07pm

So someone stole a knife off of our landing this morning. I need a line or something for when Trinidad doesn’t fail to disappoint me. Something like “TT Life”. We heard two police sirens and a car alarm while we were sitting in church. TT Life. Someone broke onto our property and took a large knife. TT Life.

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7:32pm

In KFC. It’s different here, I promise. I am not a black stereotype. I actually has a conversation with Brent about this. In Trinidad each KFC restaurant seasons their meat themselves. This means that every local has a KFC which they consider the best. It’s weird that the KFCs actually care here. I’m pretty sure in Canada they care about the quality of the food as much as is required by law.

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25^th of February, 12:50pm

In Trinidad if you go for a drive you almost hit someone at least eight times. Any less and it must be a slow day for traffic.

This morning someone brought the knife back. Efil TT? I’m not sure whether this is good manners or just creepy. Someone had such a desperate need for coconut that they hopped a wall to steal a machete, but they brought it back? So…we’re cool? I don’t understand this country.

Watched the Oscars last night. Every award that I had a guess for I got right. I might as well have been handing out the awards myself.

I successfully managed to get Cameron into Fire Emblem. I’m pretty happy. Normally he goes “That looks dumb” and drops it, but now it’s too late. He’s in it too deep now.

…this does mean that I can’t play it whenever I want. Hm…

We’re driving to a funeral now. If we’re lucky maybe we’ll only almost hit someone six times.

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1:29pm

This funeral is for my great uncle Kendal Bharath. My brother pointed out that that Is the same name as my other brother, Kendall Bharath. Kendall Bharath who is not with us. Now, I don’t mean “passed on” or “went to a farm upstate somewhere” or “is partying with the little baby Jesus”. I mean “not with us” as in he is in Japan and we are not in Japan and he is.

I’ll take this chance to tell you what it’s like to be in Trinidad, I suppose. Sluggish. You feel sluggish. I think I’ve gotten better at handling the heat compared to when I was last here, but I want to nap everywhere. Everywhere is warm and almost exactly the temperature I keep my room at in Oakville. I almost fell asleep in church, I almost fell asleep in that restaurant, and I’m ready to fall over and have a quick doze at this funeral. It’s not my fault this entire country is perfect for naps.

Naps and crime.

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26^th of February

There was a spot marked “Do Not Park by Police Order” and my dad went ahead and parked there anyway. He might have gotten away with it if the police weren’t parked right there next to us. The officer just gave him this long-suffering look until my dad slowly got back in the car.

Unrelated: Happy birthday, Kendall! That’s all.

Every time we pass a roundabout I just think “Ah, I see the English taught you how to design your roads”. (Fun Post-Vacation Fact: Trinidad was under English rule until 1962)

We’re going on a three-hour drive to “the South”. Or, sorry, “down South”. Considering the whole island is south of where we’re staying we could be going anywhere.

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1:20pm

Being in Trinidad is sort of like being in the rain. If you’re going from AC to AC you can’t wait to get there, but if you are outside long enough to get all sweaty you stop caring. You’ve already gotten wet.

I’m damp.

I forgot how many stray dogs there are in Trinidad. Lots. We were walking just now and saw two sleeping under a parked car. If they weren’t of questionable origin, wild, dirty, and possible diseased I’d take them home and love them.

Being on a family vacation reminds me of being a child: “don’t sleep until 11am”, “don’t step into traffic”, “make sure you pee before we go”, “eat something”, “bathe yourself”, “nyeh nyeh nyeh nyehblah blah”. Sleeping until 11am makes me happy. It’s an ideal vacation if I get to laze about as I choose.

It’s not like there’s much to see, either. The attractions here are pretty much trees, slum houses, or heat. Yes, heat is an attraction. I guess you could do a ‘Count the Homeless’ walking tour. Ten points if you get looked at cock-eyed. Twenty points if they have fewer than five teeth. A hundred points for a mugging, stabbing, or biting.

Why do they have white Jesus here? I was so looking forward to black Jesuses aplenty. That must be another English-imposed thing. Build roundabouts, name your streets after English things, worship white Jesus.

When dressing for the day you are faced with a dilemma: do you wear full pants and look like you belong here or do you stop caring about what other people think and wear the shortest pants you can get away with? Choose wisely.

I miss vegetables. There is so much greasy food here. My only hope for maintaining good health is all of that grease lubing up my insides to allow for quick food passage. At least that way I don’t absorb so much of this extra fat. Please tell me that’s how food and science works. 

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4:22pm

We were in San Fernando today. Hot and sticky as always. We walked to a toy store and on the way passed by a large truck transporting prisoners. Now, I say ‘transporting’, but really they were just parked in the road. Some sort of catcalling service, maybe.

I managed to get a “hey”, “sex-aaayyy”, and…however you write kissing noises. My mother, on the other hand, got a “good afternoon, ma’am. Enjoy your day”. Politest potential rapist I’ve ever heard! It was good, though. Getting whistled or hollered at is really flattering, but when you get it from randoms on the street they can harass you or follow you home or whatever. Here they’re safely locked behind two sheets of metal fence in a metal van. Walk by, get your sleazy compliments, move on unmolested. In every sense.

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So we went nextdoor from my aunt to see a friend of my father’s and there was a puppy! It was the neighbour’s that squeezed through a hole in the fence, but I didn’t care. I got to hold a puppy! A Rottweiler puppy! It was named Turtle! Silly dog, you are not a turtle! You are a dog!

…she may have had fleas.

…I put her down after I noticed the fleas.

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That was not even the best animal-related thing to happen to me today. We went to go and see my ninety-eight year old great uncle at his house, visiting his daughter (who lives with him) at the same time. We got to talking and she mentioned that she has this pet that she keeps outside.

A pet monkey.

A pet monkey named Monkey Boy.

We were just about to leave when the monkey came by. It was amazing. She also has, like, five dogs who all want to eat him.

She told us, completely serious, that the monkey rides on the neighbour’s dog! As if a monkey will ride other animals if left alone long enough! I didn’t get to see that, but still! Can you imagine?

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27^th of February, 11:50am

I am so itchy. Mosquitoes have bitten me seven times in three days. I am like sugar to them.

Seriously, though. I’m starting to lose count of how many bites I have. I’m tempted to fill a bath with aloe vera and citronella and just go nuts. There must be something I’m doing wrong. Cameron has a few, my mom has one or two maybe. My Dad has skin so thick that either mosquitoes can’t bite him or he doesn’t feel it when they do.

I’m trying to figure out how to look more Trinidadian. You know, I don’t think it’s the pants. I’m wearing a halter top today and my cousin tells me that’s touristy. Now I don’t know what to think. Here I thought I was doing well avoiding pastel-coloured shirts and fanny packs. There is no winning.

This morning we went for a walk for maybe an hour or so. When we got back I was already a shade darker. I can’t imagine how tan I’ll be when we go out to Mayaro and I’m on the beach every day. Morgan Freeman or darker, I’d say. I figure at the moment I’m about a Will Smith.

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Fifteen minutes in a bathroom and people think you’re dying or something

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28^th of February, 8:08pm

Today we did a lot of driving. Well, Dad did. We went back down south to the Debe Market. They had corn! This sudden change in temperature is really messing with my mind. I’m wearing shorts every day, so I think its June. Corn season is in August. In reality it is February. It’s too much.

Sorry I don’t have more to write. There’s nothing too exciting about driving, shopping, and family visits.

You know minimum wage here is fourteen dollars TT? That’s a little over two dollars Canadian per hour. No wonder everything’s cheaper here. Any more and they couldn’t afford it. Here’s an example: a box of Red Rose tea was twenty-one TT for a hundred bags. That’s only three dollars and thirty-three cents Canadian. Half price. What a savings.

In case you’re curious I’m up to twelve bites. That I know of. I’m sticky and hot and itchy and sticky.

Don’t envy me.

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1^st of March

Dear Journal,

Today I ate a bug. We went for a walk in the morning and a bug flew into my mouth. Now, I didn’t feel it fly into my mouth, I just felt something there. I’d just eaten, so I assumed it was food that had been caught in my teeth.

I chewed.

It made a crunching noise.

I quickly spit to see what it was. I’m no entomologist, but whatever I spat out consisted of several black, leg-like pieces. I then proceeded to spit a lot more in some vain attempt to undo what had been done.

And that was the most interesting thing to happen to me today.

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I lied. I went for dinner at my second cousin’s house.

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Fifteen minutes in the bathroom and people act like you have a problem or something.

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So Trinidadians have a sort of cycle they go through. Allow me to explain.

1) Eat this food.
You are too thin. Or too average, even. You simply must come and eat. That’s not enough. I cooked chicken, lamb, goat, beef, duck, more beef, different chicken, and fish. Did you try them all? Every single one? Twice? You must try the vegetables. And more meat. Are you ready to vomit yet? No? There’s still time for fifths!

2) Are you ever fat.

Well, you are. Must have put on at least ten pounds since I saw you last. Look at your belly. Gosh.

3) So, you’re on a diet?

You exercise and everything? That’s great! Good for you. Cut back on sugar? Fantastic! No more chocolate or desserts? Extraordinary!

4) You’re so thin!

Look at this boy/girl! Wasting away! You don’t eat nothin’.

5) Eat this food.

This is very much what I went through at dinner. I took what I felt to be a very reasonably-sized dinner. A bit much, but other people were still saying “That’s all you’re taking?”, “This girl doesn’t eat, you know”. I ate! I ate a reasonable amount! I could only turn down so many extra helpings and drinks before they just started giving me food without asking first. I didn’t want a lime breezer, but I got one. I didn’t want ice cream, but I got ice cream.

I turned down offer after offer, then went to the bathroom. About ten minutes into it I realized that they might think I’m bulimic. I’m not, I just don’t want seconds.

My third cousin told us the story of the time that she, while walking to her car from her work, had a mental patient run up to her, slap her clean across the face, then laugh, What an exciting life she leads.

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2^nd of March, 11:30am

Oildown for breakfast. Lunch. Brunch. I suspect it’s very bad for me. It is called oildown. It’s a sort of stew made with breadfruit and pigtail. Do I ever love me some pigtail. Mmmmm mmm.

Today we go to Mayaro Beach  and I finally get to relax with my Canadian relatives. Now I won’t need to struggle to remember names or try to understand any especially slurred-sounding accents.

Mostly I’ll enjoy being on a beach. Get a tan, maybe? And I’ll finally escape all this talk of people I don’t know who go to live in England. I feel like everyone but me gets to go faff off to London whenever they please.

Lucky bastards.

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7:16pm

We’re at the beach house. It’s always windy here. Sea wind. Is that a thing? I think so. Warm and wet.

The ocean smells like farts.

You don’t hear that in your poetic journal nonsense. It does, though! It smells like wet sand and salty water farts. You can see jellyfish as you walk along the beach. They are awful and I hate them. It makes me wary of swimming. Last last time I was here I got stung by one on the leg. I was so shocked that my swimsuit leapt from my body. Well, just from the boob area. Unfortunately. I’m fairly sure nobody saw. Not that it would be particularly sexy: a thirteen year old girl jelly-stung, crying, screaming and with one boob to the wind. To each their own, I guess.

This time I’m sticking to walking knee-deep in the sand. Knee-deep in water, I mean. Getting knee-deep in sand would be quite a feat. Or quite a feet. Ah HA ha haaa.

There is no toilet paper, no sheets, no pillowcases, no nothing at this beach house. We went into town to remedy the situation. My grandma requested lemon cake for her birthday, so we stopped by the grocery to get some lemons. We walked up and down looking, but couldn’t find any.

Or so we thought.

We eventually asked some indifferent employee where the lemons were and got pointed to this bin. This bin full to the brim with these brown/green/yellow/beige, dusty, soft, mouldy, squishy, lumpy, diseased-looking “lemons”*.

*If you can call them lemons.

We left without lemons.

Now I’m in a house with sixteen Trinidadians. You do not know what loud means until you have shared a house with sixteen Trinidadians. 

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3^rd of March, 11:21am

It’s eighty-one murders so far this year in Trinidad and Tobago. Keep in mind that we are March. Early March. I’m pretty sure it was at around sixty-nine when I got here. That’s twelve murders in just over a week, if I have my numbers right. I guess this sort of informs my next journal topic.

I dreamt of brutal murder last night. More specifically: how you could break into this beach house and assault everyone therein. Herein. Both.

What makes it worse—or, two things that make it worse—is that I’m both new to this house and it was one of those dreams where you’re not sure whether it really happened or not. So here I was in the middle of the night listening to the wind rattling the roof. A rattling roof sound surprisingly like a team of burly rapists breaking in, by the way. Rattling isn’t even the right word. It was more of an unholy bashknockslamming cacophony. It was like the Haunting: Caribbean edition.

Well, we’re going for a walk along the beach. I’ll be back.

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12:45pm

I’m back now. Is the beach ever fun. Brent made a game of finding chip chip. I think that’s what they’re called, anyway. It’s these molluscs or shellfish or somethings. They just look like two shell halves stuck together. It’s the strangest thing; you see this shell lying on the beach and it just sinks. They say that they dig, but they…don’t. Can something with no arms or legs really dig? I don’t think I could. I’m less resourceful than a shellfish.

Speaking of shellfish, we had a new friend this morning. A crab set up…hole. But he’s gone now. Who makes a home for one morning? He dug it, stepped into it, made a point to hide when I said “there’s a crab”, then he left.

We watched the sun rise this morning. As luck would have it my nightmares woke me up just in time for the sunrise. We’re on the east coast, so we get the full show. It’s almost worth waking up at 6:00am. Almost.

I caught up with a two-hour nap. Don’t worry about me.

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Cooked the chip chip. It was sort of good, but mostly not. Nobody told me that these sand-creatures would be so sandy! It came out of nowhere.

And I only caught enough to fill maybe two tablespoons. When I say sandy I don’t mean one grain per chip chip. I’m talking more like ten+ per creature. I offered everyone a taste then promptly threw them away.

We watched a few minutes of Django Unchained, then went to bed.

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4^th of March, 6:20pm

Woke up just after sunrise. Frustratingly so. It was up far enough that I know I missed sunrise by a few minutes at the most. If I’m going to get up for ten minutes before I crash again I want to see the sun do magical things.

After a brief three-hour nap I got up again. My dad and uncle went out to the beach to pull seine. Pulling seine is fishing. Well—okay, no. It’s hucking a net into the ocean, then pulling said net back in to the shore from the beach. The catch varies from net to net, day to day.

It’s surprisingly like a video game.

You know in games you help a distraught villager and they give you a reward? When you see these people pulling in the net on the beach you can help them regardless of whether you’re a fisherman or not. Then, once the fish are brought onto shore and the fishermen have had their pick, you get your fish. You obviously don’t get first pick of the big fish, but you do get fish. Not bad for strolling by and lending a hand.

I’m pretty sure they gave my mom more than her share because she’s got boobs. Seriously. They gave my dad and uncle three fish between them. She alone got two big ones. One per boob.

We went for a swim on the beach at some point. Dried off. Got wet. Dried off. Got wet. That’s life by a beach, pretty much. Get sandy, wash off, try not to get sandy, get sandy.

My aunt roped me into walking into town. It’s 1.6 km both ways. That’s not bad, but try doing it with heavy grocery bags under the hot Caribbean sun. It burns. Literally! My aunt, brother, and mom all have sunburns already. I do not plan on joining them. I will get to that Morgan Freeman tan. Just you watch. 

Anyway, town. Town consists of a grocery, pharmacy, a general store, and a bank. Depending on the time of day you can get vegetable market stands and homemade ice cream. I paid twenty TT for a tub of peanut flavour ice cream. (post-vacation note: It was amazing)

That is what made the 3.2km walk bearable: plunging my face in some sweet nuts.

You heard me.

Since then I’ve been relaxing. We went for a leisurely stroll on the beach and met a dog. He was black and playfully mouthing at our hands, so I named him Nipsy Russell. He wasn’t really biting, though, don’t worry. He was playing and probably trying to get us to feed him. I choose to interpret it at love.

Stray dogs! Everywhere. Here’s how you can tell the gender of a stray dog: they are either freshly pregnant or boys.

Now it’s time to find a good place to read the rest of this book (Lord of the Rings). They keep insisting on playing loud music in the living room. Constantly.

Wish me luck, reader.

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9:53pm

I forgot to describe the beach. It’s not as smooth as people might think. The smoothest part is by the sea that gets hit by the tide. Even there there are areas that are riddled with broken shells. Broken shells, chip chip, stranded jellyfish, sea cockroaches or sea cockroach holes, bits of coral, and whatever palms and plants that have fallen apart and drifted along.

What are sea cockroaches, you ask? They are bugs that hide in the sand. I have touched three by accident and I don’t want to talk about it anymore.

The point is that there are also crabholes. Some of these crabholes are dark, which is fine. Some of these are empty except for flies. Flies that erupt forth from these holes when you draw near. I believe that these are portals to hell. Don’t quote science or sense at me. Let me have my fun.

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5^th of March

Happy birthday, Grandma!

Today I went to the market with my aunt and uncle, mom, and dad. It was about as eventful as walking to the grocery can be.

My dad and uncle are funny. I think they spent all day swimming against waves or knocking down mangoes/coconuts with a stick. Seriously, with a stick. They found a big stick and said to each other “let’s poke high-up stuff”. I’m only paraphrasing a little.

I helped make a birthday dessert with my mom. Well, I stirred the cake and wrote Happy Birthday 80^th” on it in icing. Not even icing, actually.  Well, not completely. We had no food colouring, you see, so to make the icing for writing a different colour we mixed the regular icing with a beer cocktail. It worked, so who are you to judge?

Tried to take a picture of myself on the beach. It must have taken at least sixty shots to get one I like. I feel like truly hideous people have an easier time than I do. At least they can go “click, that’s as good as that’ll be” and leave it. Meanwhile here I am on a beach going “Get it together, Jamila. Less like a serial killer this time. Less squinting. Less than that. More teeth. Less teeth. You’re taking a photo, not telling someone what you did to the last census-taker who tried to test you. Aaaaaaannnnnd I guess this one would be okay if everything was a little bit better. It will have to do“.

We sort of have a cat. This newborn kitten wandered onto our property today looking little and pathetic and wall-eyed like cats do. I named him Pussy Boy. My dad made the mistake of giving him fish and now he won’t leave. We left him by the gate and he came home. We left him there again and he came home. We left him on the beach and he came home. I guess he stays.

Not long after he came back another one popped up. From where? No idea. Both kittens. Must be related. We named the new one Lisa. Well, my four year old cousin did. Pussy Boy stays Pussy Boy.

Now they have a milk dish and an upside-down box house. Like family.

I’m allergic to cats.

I don’t even really like cats.

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6^th of March, 2:00pm

The cat is dead. Well, one is. Lisa died at some point in the night while cuddling with her brother. Pussy Boy is fine. He’s stumbling around a meowing and sleeping and all of those things that kittens do. I think he will be wall-eyed from now until we leave.

We walked very far today. I said I wanted to make it to the end of the beach and we did. The sand had too much give, the waves were too rough, there were jellyfish everywhere, and the beach was covered with sharp shell pieces.

I don’t know what people who have never been to the beach think the beach is like, but shells are not all big and colourful and beautiful. There are a lot of white, small, broken shell pieces that are mostly a nuisance. You’ll get a nice shell once in a while, but for the most part they’re white and stabby.

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Pussy Boy meows when he wants stuff. We’ve been feeding him milk and fish. We’re not exactly stocked up on cat food.

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7:53pm

Sometimes a child will hug you with no ulterior motive and it makes you think they aren’t so bad. Then they poop everywhere and cry for no reason and the nice things don’t matter.

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7^th of March

Then they get you sick even though you made a point not to touch them to interact with them in any way. I’m mad.

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6:45pm

Not as mad. The cold’s gotten better with time. Time and tea.

I’m almost done Lord of the Rings. Almost. I’m only a few decades late to the party. What an epilogue this is. They make sure we know what happened to Sam’s horse. Does it really matter? He lived? Who cares. He died? Who cares! I don’t need to waste reading time learning the fate of a horse.

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No date, no time.

Sup guys? It’s Cameron, Jamila’s brother. I had a blast in this country. I finished "To Kill a Mockingbird”, I drank a lot on Sunday, and I ate a bunch of delicious food. Missions accomplished.

I watched the news and it said that Chavez was dead. I know, I know, don’t disrespect the dead. Too bad. Pol Pot was an asshole! See, no one cares. Hypocrites.

Jamila was pretty cool this trip. She’s frowning right now, but I love her and she’s really talented. Now she’s smiling.

Auntie Fern made oildown, calalalou (too many “la”s), and pelau. Delicious. Andre made saltfish. Delicious. I wish Zoe (Jamila post-vacation note: our cousin who is almost two and is very, very, very, white) would talk. She’s taken so much crap from us for being white, she deserves a chance to fire back.

Me and Dad didn’t talk too much, but we’re still cool. I’m not homeless yet, so I guess that’s a good sign. Fern said she and Dad talk a lot, which explains a lot. She’s very devout, which must inform his views. Also, if he loves her a bunch, it frees him up to talk. I wish me and Jamila were closer.

Megan’s great. She’s a brat, but I love her anyway. If I find someone, I bet I’ll be putting her (the love of my life) down while making her breakfast in bed.

Diaries are cool. They let you reflect. Not enough people do that. Sometimes it feels like Twitter was created so that people can jot down 120 characters while simultaneously forgetting the previous 120.  #FuckTwitter

Um, I guess I have to wrap this up. Trinidad was great. Things can only get worse from here. Also it’s snowing in Canada, which I’m kind of looking forward to. I hope Tobi’s not dead. He’s great.

I miss working out. I hope I don’t let up. It provides a release, and I want to consistently max out the machines. I can already bench more than Dad. I want to do the rest better, too.

C.

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8^th of March, 9:36am

At a certain point in the night you give up swatting at the mosquito and just go limp. My mantra was “Take what you want, just leave me alone”. It stops being worth it when swatting makes that same mosquito bite you two more times.

I would say that that was the worst night’s sleep I had, but it wasn’t. If you recall I recently spent a night thinking I would be murdered by intruders. I think fearing for my life tops this itchy, drooly, sore-throaty, can’t-swallowy, mosquito-in-my-eary, broken ACy, surrendery, sweaty fiasco.

Just slightly.

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1:10pm

You know, I don’t think that mosquito bit me. These bites feel bruised. I’m starting to think he beat me first. Taught me a lesson, took out his tiny mosquito knife, and stabbed me. In true Trinidadian fashion.

That landlord is definitely going to kill Pussy Boy. He said he’d “take care of” her. That’s a universal “I’m going to kill it” phrase, no? Oh, and yeah, Pussy Boy’s a girl. Lisa was a boy. We’re terrible at naming.

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8:10pm

Watching terrible Indian soap operas. There is so much secret-revealing and crying. I don’t think I’ll watch any more Indian soaps.

We mostly just came back from Mayaro today. It’s a two and a half hour drive. We visited a few of Dad’s relatives, too, as well as some souvenir shopping. It was a good time. I finally got gifts for everyone. Well, everyone I can be bothered to buy for.

Now we’re having a going-away party. I’m mostly tired. Sick, tired, and eager for a time when there isn’t sand under my nails constantly.

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10:32pm

We met a boy who used to like me. Probably the only boy who has ever had any feelings for me. He is now very flamboyantly gay. This is no coincidence.

I have six new mosquito bites since last night. Rather, ones that I got last night. From the same mosquito. There may even be seven. I’ve lost count, really. If it sounds like I complain about my bites a lot it’s because EVERY SECOND IS ITCHY AGONY. I don’t scratch, yet the bites get worse. Someone do something.

The amount of grease I just ate is going to come back to me in a bad, bad way.

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9^th of March, the Final Day, 8:21am

Someone stole my bra! I have no idea how or why, but one of my favourite bras is unaccounted for. I don’t know where it was before we left the beach house, but the rooms were all clean, so I didn’t worry. Turns out it’s gone. Here’s the strange part: none of the sixteen people who stayed in that house were even my size! I bet it was that knife borrower. Knives and bras: his only weaknesses.

We are leaving today. I really love planes and am getting a bit fed up of being sticky, so I’m all right with this.

Yesterday! Yesterday. Yesterday Phyllis gave me a pizza that tasted like a hot dog! It was perfection. I don’t really like pizza, so it was the best of both worlds. Or one world. I would have liked just a hot dog.

This is a pretty short journal, you know. Way shorter than my last two. Maybe this can serve as an introduction to my work. I’ll lure people into a false sense of journal shortness then trap them with one of my eighteen thousand-word monstrosities. And hope they forget this part.

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12:45pm

In the food court at the airport. The choices are fried chicken, fried chicken, and fried chicken. There’s a Subway a bit of a walk away. Subway is the only non-fried chicken food they will tolerate here. I’ve seen maybe three McDonald’s total. Even they struggle to prove that they, too, have chicken.

I already regret the fried chicken I just ate. I’m greasy enough without piling on more. Or maybe I’ve hit the point where I’m so saturated with grease that any more will just…

Think of a way to poetically say “explosive diarrhea”, then report back to me. Why do my journals always come back to poop? What kind of trash is this?

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2:25pm

On the plane now. It’s much fuller this time and I doubt I’ll be able to play musical airplane seats. However, nobody has come crying to me with some sob story about how their mother needs my window seat to cure her cancer. “My” window. I stole it from my mother. That’s a mom’s job.

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7:55pm

The end of this vacation has really snuck up on me. One minute I’m watching Being Human with my mom at 30,000 feet and the next it’s time to land.

Do I ever love planes. I love the sun. Being in a plan is just like Sun+. Go closer, feel warmer. It’s enough to make me forget my itching and cold.

I’m looking forward to hanging out with my friends. It’s surprisingly comforting to be with people who choose to be with you purely through your own awesomeness. I’ve earned good times through being an extraordinary, fun, happy, attractive, and outstandingly humble human being.

No! Rrroll Up the Rim to Win! I’m missing it! Nonononono! The biggest price a Canadian can pay! It burns my heart.

Right! Wrapping up! I guess I’ll leave you with an impression of Trinidad: hot, sticky, mosquitoes, stabbings, and poverty.

But some nice trees.

Now I’m remembering everything I forgot to write. Comic Sans. They use Comic Sans everywhere.  Their advertisers have the worst taste. But there was an ad for White Oak rum that had the slogan “When it pours, you reign”. I’ll be darned if that isn’t the cleverest slogan I’ve heard in a long time.

So I guess what I’m trying to say is…

BUY RUM.

Sincerely,
Jamilams