 | |
| The view from our balcony |
 |
| pool waterfall |
 |
| The view the other direction from our balcony |
Today is the day we move from the apartment in the mountains to the resort (Grenada Grand Beach Resort) at the beach. Although it was fun getting a tast of Kenzie’s everyday life and seeing the culture in it’s natural form, I am looking forward to being a plain old tourist for a little bit. If nothing else I have truly realized just how spoiled I am as an American. I mean I know I am accustomed to air conditioning, as well as “fast” everything, and take for granted getting in my car and driving 3 minutes to the grocery store or 7 minutes to work. But it’s the things that we don’t see everyday that are astonishing.
Just today we were talking about a new tax imposed on everything. Grenadians used to have no taxes on things now with the new tax, EVERYTHING is taxed 15% - no slight increase until they get to that point, no basis on income or product purchased.........everything and immediately. It has taken a toll on the people, people who had little to begin with have even less. Unless you are selling mangoes on the street corner and I suppose then you might slip through the cracks.
So when I got to the resort I did feel a little guilty about the opulence. What made me laugh was that this was a palace for most of the people here and in countries like this around the world.....and yet, I would see things that would cause most Americans to turn up their nose at the minor inconveniences. The ice machine in our end of the resort did not work, I wanted to scream - it’s freakin’ hot out no wonder it doesn’t work! And bugs, there are ants and bugs everywhere, you just get used to it, just competing to survive, just like all of us. And the internet, we should have it in our rooms, but of course, ours wasn’t working......I found myself very out of sorts over that fact. Anyone that knows me, knows I am very internet dependent, I look up everything. I was really looking forward to having steady service in my air conditioned room to pass the evenings. I called the desk and informed them of the lacking signal. Mackenzie did not have one either so I knew it wasn’t just me. So I trotted my indignant self to the desk but somewhere between my room and the front desk I realized this is nothing more than an inconvenience, however I did not like being completely disconnected in case someone needed me. And when I got to the desk, I was very calm and smiled - genuinely smiled and discussed the situation with the night manager. I discovered I did get a signal there and the man assured me that by tomorrow night all would be good, it suddenly wasn’t that big of a deal. He got me set up in the business center area and was even going to turn on the air conditioner, but it seemed to be broken. So I got my fix and lost a few pounds in sweat and came back to my climate controlled room. Truthfully no worse for the wear.
Mackenzie taught me a new phrase they use here on the island and that it, “one time”. Now it doesn’t mean one time like a single time event, it means “right now”. And obviously I am quite accustomed to everything being “One Time”. Sighs........sometimes the simple things are the hardest to learn.....
So even without all the little things I think I deserve and am entitled to,
Life is good.
Adventure within the adventure 3:
Met a little girl at the pool, from London with her mum and her auntie. She is 5 and her name is Sky. Sky had great fun splashing about the pool with us and laughed and played and we discussed disney movies. At one point I had gotten out and was asleep in my chair when all of the sudden I hear a little voice in my ear shouting, “WAKE UP, wake up Miss, this is not time for sleeping, this is time to play in the pool!” After I regained my wits it made me laugh, she did get in a bit of trouble for “bothering” me, but she sure was cute.
No comments:
Post a Comment