My new favorite thing: fresh mango. And roti. And fresh grapefruit juice. And Stag beer. Even though apparently that is the man’s beer, I like to break the confines of genderized drinking categories. I love how fresh everything is. It makes a huge difference eating fresh vegetables and fruit straight from the market for good prices and then cooking it up fresh. Today we did just that and learned how to cook proper roti up on the hill in Tunapuna with Sunity at her house. As the eggplant, chicken, and chickpeas cooked and the chutney was being mixed, we lounged on the hammock on the porch, climbed the mango trees out front and indulged in the juicy yellow flesh, and chatted about whatever came to mind. We made a feast of bust up shut roti and the other kind of roti and boiled tomatoes and chickpeas and curried chicken and potatoes and eggplant. It was delicious. I can’t even tell you. Although maybe I will learn and be able to show you sometime.
Moving slowly with our satisfied full stomachs, we embarked upon the journey home which although not far would prove to seem farther in the heat of the high afternoon. We stopped into a little book store owned by one of the scholars we will be working with, Rawle Gibbons. He apparently is an important guy around here and will be teaching us a lot about Afro-Caribbean music and the Orishas religion. As we were leaving, another man walked in who introduced himself as Desmond Waite (sp?) who is a well-known calypso composer in Trinidad. The long morning had brought us to the market full of rich colors, smells and flavors, had led us up the hill to a welcoming home and happiness through a meal, good company, and sweet mangos, and had introduced us to new people who although new to us now could soon become our close mentors and the characters of our research.
After the long walk home, dripping with sweat and almost unable to stand, we all crashed for a full-afternoon nap after which we awoke to attend our nightly meeting. We reflected on our brief time here so far in which so much has happened already. All of us are enjoying ourselves so far and everyone seems excited about everything that we are doing and everything we have planned. We mostly have had similar reactions to what we have experienced so far. We all have to adjust to the new surroundings. It is difficult to be in a place where you stick out like a sore thumb no matter where you go or what you do. If you don’t say hi sometimes people will call you out on it, something that would never happen in Boston where people rarely even make eye contact. There is also a lot of attention and cat-calling from the men but at least for me and my experience with that in Cuba, it doesn’t really phase me much but can take getting used to. It is also really intimidating to hear from almost everyone how dangerous it is here for us. Because we are so clearly foreign and don’t know the area and don’t know the people, it is super easy to be taken advantage of or to get into trouble with the wrong people. I’m always on guard in Boston but I feel completely safe and here my sensors of what is safe and unsafe and who to trust and who not to trust are completely off because the circumstances and boundaries are totally different. But the difficulties that we have along the way will only teach us more and I’m looking forward to the challenge that I feel we are being given.
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