13/7/84

I was almost afraid to look at the date of the last entry. It's been nearly a month now. I'm losing control of this journal. It is impossible to adequately relate the past months events and that is my fear and the defeat of the purpose of this journal. Hopefully, I'll be able to do a better job in the future. But, the ‘race to the finish’ has already begun and right now I'm lagging the pack….

Trinidad and Grenada were good experiences for us. Grenada was a pleasant surprise. We pulled into Pearls at the marvelous hour of 7:00 a.m. The airport buildings reminded me a bit of Canefield in Dominica: small wooden buildings with galvanized roofs and a ‘well-worn’ look. This is the place the U.S. first invaded, but it shows little signs of being molested. There is an ‘Air Cubana’ plane on the tarmac and a small biplane from russia. If that is Soviet air supremacy, we have nothing to worry about. Leftovers from the golden days of the revolution. We cooled out there, waiting for the sisters who were to take us into St George's (connected through the sisters in St Vincent). The sisters did show up but we're only going as far as Grenville - about 10 minutes away. Since it was a national holiday (Corpus Christi) we couldn't find cheap, local van transport into St George's so we finally took a cab to the tune of $50. But at least we got into town. 

The sisters at the convent in St George's were wonderful. They showed us to a spacious but spartan room, got us a bit of morning tea and whisked us out on a tour of the south and end of the island. We saw the more affluent areas built up under Gairy then mostly abandoned during Bishops reign. We also saw the well-bombed-out remains of the Cuban training camp at Calivygny where I did some shell collecting (gun shells…). We also saw some impoverished areas, the Cuban workers barracks, an asphalt plant and an impoverished American barracks (they occupy the two best hotels on the island). Then they took us back, fed us again and gave us a siesta. That afternoon we participated in the Corpus Christi procession with the Anglicans and had a casual after-procession cocktail hour with the sisters. Then off to bed. 

Next day we scrounged up the PCV’s on the island as well as paid a visit to the hospital so Deb could meet the physiotherapist and check out the facilities. We found two PCV’s at the Ministry of Agriculture, who I had wanted to make contact with, and ran into a third on our way to lunch. Much talk about the current ‘Grenada situation’ and being PCV’s in general. It was nice talking to our counterparts there. Gave a sense of continuity to the whole thing. That afternoon we caught a ride down to Grand Anse beach. A beautiful stretch of beach marred only by the barbed wire enclosed hotels that the soldiers occupy with sandbag gun placements ‘protecting’ the place. We walked down to the medical school ‘true blue’ campus. Buildings spattered by hastily plastered up bullet holes. That was enough for one brief visit to Grenada. The most impressive thing was the people. Warm, friendly and none of the ‘Gimme dollah’ obsession of Vincentian street people. 

The next day took us to Trinidad, a mind-blowing change of pace. Like flying into New York (from our East Caribbean point of view). Cars, cars, cars. Big buildings, high rises and affluent living. We toured the Northwest end on several occasions seeing much beautiful greenery and topography. But what I remember the most was the horrendous traffic. We stayed at a very nice condo owned by Ron's late grandfather. And Ron's ordination was beautiful and moving too. I had a chance to check on some info at IBM and a Gestetner dealer and we spent a long hour filling out visa forms for some Vincentian who who needed visas for India. With business out of the way, we just kicked back and enjoyed it. Then suddenly, it was back to St Vincent.