21. Island times

With our permanent departure from Prospect Reef and Cayman only four weeks away, it is time for me to reflect on some experiences that I have had here. 

On Friday October 21^st 2005, I retired from teaching.  The last ever class I had, I can’t say “taught”, was 9X Maths and they achieved bugger all in that lesson.

The first ever class that I taught was on Monday September 8^th 1969 - 2C General Science, at Roman Hill Secondary Modern School, Lowestoft in Suffolk.  Then, I taught around 20 lessons a week, 39 weeks a year for 36 years – roughly 30,000.  I know for a fact that three of them were very good.

One week after I retired, on Friday October 28^th 2005, I set foot on Grand Cayman for the first time.  I was met at the bottom of the aircraft steps by a Caymanian with a golf umbrella who escorted me in driving rain across the tarmac to the arrivals hall.  The rain was harder than anything I had ever experienced before.  We had arrived in the tail of Hurricane Wilma.

The eleven-hour flight from Heathrow to Cayman was the most uncomfortable journey I have ever made.  A week earlier, Caroline had received a personal letter signed by the Leader of Government Business, to be presented to the British Airways check-in staff at Heathrow.  It informed them that Ms Dawes was travelling to Cayman to take up a position with the Caymanian government and urged BA to, “show Ms Dawes every consideration.”

We were excited at the prospect of an upgrade at the very least and probably into First Class.  We showed the letter.  The woman read it, tapped away at the computer and gave us our boarding cards.  We had Row 43 A and B which are known by everyone to be two of the four worst, most uncomfortable seats on a 767.  They do not recline.  They are squeezed up against the rear bulkhead at the back of the plane and if they had been one row further back we would have been sitting in the lavatory.  We’d have had more legroom in there and would have been a lot more comfortable.

First impressions of Cayman were that it was very like England but hot.  People all spoke English and they drove on the left.  Everyone we met was very friendly but that was to be expected as we were staying in the Sunshine Suites and most of the other guests were there on holiday. 

We hired a car and on Saturday drove all over the island.  We visited everywhere, including parts that were very nice but we have never been back to since.  I had my first bottle of Stingray lager on Public Beach at ten o’clock on that Saturday morning.  I was feeling guilty at the early hour but justified it with the assistance of the Australian bar staff.  They pointed out to me that it was four o’clock in the UK.  Then, I had my first swim in the Caribbean and was disappointed that the water was not as warm as I had been expecting.

At least I knew that it was the Caribbean.  Four weeks earlier, before I checked in an Atlas, I had thought that the Cayman Islands were in the Indian Ocean, somewhere near the Seychelles.  I have a degree in geography but as I said when I tried to cover my embarrassment to Caroline, “I think in terms of concepts, theories and hypotheses.  I am an academic and not a gazetteer geographer!” (She didn’t believe me either).

We found somewhere to rent.  It was beautiful and by the sea but we assumed that such locations were the norm.  It is an island, after all. 

The first time I realised that Caymanians are quite different from other people was when I was trying to find the Cable and Wireless office.  I had the map and the address but I couldn’t match up the two.   In desperation, I stopped the first pedestrian I saw and asked her for assistance.

“Are you in a car?” she asked.  I told her I was and pointed to it.

“If you don’t know the area, it’s too difficult to explain,” she said.  “I’ll show you.

She walked over to my car and got into the passenger seat.

“Left at the end of the road.”

Three minutes later she showed me where to park and pointed out the building.

“Thanks very much,” I said.  “Where are you going?  Can I give you a lift?”

“No,” she said, laughing.  “Then you’d be lost again and you’d have to ask someone else.  You will be doing this all day.”   Whereupon, she got out, gave me a cheery wave and walked off. 

This open and genuine friendliness takes a bit of getting used to.  The first time I ever travelled by bus, I was all on my own and a man and a woman got on.  They greeted me with beaming smiles, sat next to me and chatted to me for the next ten minutes as if we had known each other for years.  

I have to spend a lot of time in hospital waiting rooms for various reasons.  Now, when I enter, I do as everyone else does and say, “Good morning” to those already there and they all say. “Good morning” back to me.  Caroline and I have vowed to continue this practice when we return to England.  Passengers on the tube aren’t going to know what hits them.

I’m going to ramble off on something now.  Bear with what follows please as I believe that it has huge sociological significance.

Whether I say, “Good morning,” to everyone in the waiting room depends entirely on which waiting room it is.  If it is at the dentist, I do; at the Licensing Office I don’t; at the GP, I only address the front row of the four rows; in a bar I greet no one but if the bar is in a hotel, I say, “hello,” to anyone who catches my eye.

Why?  Here are my ideas: The dentist’s room sits about 15 and all the chairs are against the walls and so there is a communal space in the middle which the newly arrived patient has to enter.  The GP waiting room sits 20 but in four rows of five chairs.  The Licensing Office is very large and impersonal.  As for the bars, I have no idea.

Something fairly similar used to take place in London but in a completely different setting.  For quite a long time it was my custom to walk to the newsagent every morning between six and six thirty to buy a newspaper.  At that time of day, everyone I passed on the pavement would smile and say something.  After about seven thirty, all that stopped.  We would approach each other, put our heads down to avoid eye contact and walk on.  5:00 a.m. until 7:30 a.m. is a magical time.  I bet good things tend to happen then.  

End of diversion.  Children here are different from children in London.  If I were walking through Muswell Hill on a Saturday morning and saw students I taught, they would either cross the road to avoid having to acknowledge me or else they would just ignore me as they went past.   In Cayman it couldn’t be more different.  If I see a child from the class I help, they will run up to me in the street or in the supermarket and give me a huge, enthusiastic hug.

A couple of years ago, I was pushing a trolley along a supermarket aisle on a wet, windy Wednesday afternoon.  The store was virtually empty.  Coming towards me was an unaccompanied, large man who was also pushing a trolley.  He was studying the shelves and he wasn’t looking where he was going.  We narrowly avoided a collision and laughed about it.  He asked me how I was and after I’d told him that I was fine, I asked how he was.

“Oh, busy, you know,” he said.  “Never enough time.”

We exchanged a few more words and went our separate ways.  I am hopeless with names but usually good with faces.  I knew that I knew him from somewhere and he obviously knew me as he recognised that I was a resident and not a tourist but I couldn’t place him.  I was watching the news that evening when it suddenly dawned on me who he was: the Prime Minister.

There are things here that drive me mad too, however.  Yesterday I needed the phone number of a store in George Town.  It is Caymanian owned and run.  I looked them up on Google, clicked ‘Contact Us” and looked for the number. PO Box, physical address and email address but no phone number.

I was seven or eight feet from Yellow Pages but as I have a painful knee (yes I have and it really hurts to get out of my chair) I picked up my cell phone and dialed Directory Assistance.  I waited.  Eventually Cara answered.  I told her the name of the store and the address. 

“I’ll put you on hold.” She said.  For the next five minutes I was forced to listen to the dreary sounds made by a depressed saxophonist until, beep beep beep, I was cut off.  I phoned again.

“This is Jessica.  How can I help?”

“Do you have Cara there?” I asked.  “She was trying to help me but we got cut off.”

“I’ll get her for you,” said Jessica. “I’ll put you on hold.” For the next five minutes I was forced to listen to the dreary sounds made by a depressed saxophonist until, beep beep beep, I was cut off.  I phoned again.

No one answered but for the next five minutes I was forced to listen to the dreary sounds made by a depressed saxophonist until, beep beep beep, I was cut off.  I phoned again.

“This is Michelle.  How can I help?”

“May I speak to your supervisor please?”

“I’ll get her for you,” said Michelle. “I’ll just put you on hold.”

“NO DON’T!” I screamed.  Too late. For the next five minutes I was forced to listen to the dreary sounds made by a depressed saxophonist until, beep beep beep, I was cut off.  I phoned again.

“This is Sue.  How can I help?”

“Sue, whatever I say and whatever you think is the right thing to do, DON’T PUT ME ON HOLD. Just look around please and find your supervisor.  Please tell her that I MUST speak to her.  DON’T PUT ME ON HOLD.”  I waited for three minutes.  No saxophone.  Bliss.

I had spent $2.50 and wasted twenty-five minutes of my life and was no further forward that when I decided that it would be too painful to get out of my chair.

“This is Ann.  How can I help?”

“Are you in charge?

“Not really, no I’m not.  Would you like to speak to the person who is?

“No, I wouldn’t.”  I told her of all the problems I’d had and finished, almost as an afterthought, by asking for the phone number.

It took her less than ten seconds for her to find it.

That kind of thing happens often in Cayman.  I never try to phone any business or government office after four o’clock nor at any time on a Friday afternoon either.  No one ever answers the phone.

As I said earlier, we drive on the left.  I should qualify that.  Most of us do.  Some Americans don’t.  The quality of driving here is appalling.  People, as a matter of course, cruise in the outside lane forcing you to undertake on the inside which is dangerous.  Indicators are rarely used.  

At roundabouts, giving way to vehicles approaching from your right is often ignored.  There is no law against using a cell phone while driving and so many people do.  Lots of cars are still driving without lights ten minutes after sunset when, to all intents and purposes, it is fully dark.

I hate ‘high-fiving’ and there is a lot of that here.  A simple’ “Well done,” is no longer enough.  In the last few years I was playing cricket in England, ‘high-fiving’ was a habit that crept in among the young bowlers.  An eighteen year old would take a wicket and then be greeted by all the young members of the side who would go high-fiving him for all they were worth.  A couple of other old-fart colleagues and I would stand, growl and stare disapprovingly.  We never joined in.

I have only once done a high five and it was ten days after we got to Cayman.  Caroline and I had found somewhere to rent and I informed the American in charge of Sunshine Suites.

“Good jaaaahwb,” he exclaimed and went as if to punch me.  I cowered but realised that he was expecting that we touch palms.  To my continuing embarrassment we did.

Cayman, in common with all other islands in the Caribbean, ignores Greenwich Mean Time.  At best, GMT is a basis for negotiation.  We work to "Island Time".  The other day the host of a radio phone-in programme announced, “It’s 8:22 and time for the eight o’clock news.”  A 90-minute session in the waiting room to see the doctor is not uncommon.

I mentioned two weeks ago that Cayman is the “churchiest place in the world”.  Today I have had more evidence of this and how different people are here from those in England.

I am ‘friends’ with 48 people on Facebook.  One of them (I’ll call her Keisha) is an unmarried 23-year-old Caymanian working in the Education department in Cayman.  Another (I’ll call her Jenny) is an unmarried 19-year-old British student reading English at Nottingham University in England. 

The other day, within 30 minutes of each other, they each posted messages that are consecutive and adjacent on my Facebook wall.

At 9:00 (Cayman time) Keisha wrote:

“The Lord your God is with you, He is mighty to save.  He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, He will rejoice over you with singing. (Zephaniah 3:17)”

At 9:30 (Cayman time) Jenny wrote:

“Gossip Girl …… Oh my fuck!”

See what I mean?

8. Toast - the proper way

I don’t get much feedback about these offerings.  The little I get, complain about the length.  I remember reading that Shakespeare had a similar problem. His agent, after Bill had submitted ‘The Merchant of Venice’, suggested drastically reducing the Shylock rôle. 

“Concentrate on the love angle, Billy.  That’s what the public wants.” 

However, when you feel passionately about something, as I do about toast, you have to let it all out.

I’ve mentioned before Travels with a wheelchair in Jamaica that I like Americans but I am not so keen on America. I have no problem at all with the fact that they pronounce ‘privacy’ as ‘pr-eye-vacy’ or ‘vase’ as ‘vace’ or call it ‘zee’ instead of ‘zed’.  

A word that has really started to bother me a lot recently is their pronunciation of the word, “herb.”  All of them, even educated Americans, leave the ‘h’ off and say, “erb”.  What? Is “ouse” their favourite television programme? Or is “Ouston” a city in Texas? No, of course not. I’ve also mentioned before that their pronunciation of “math” without the ‘s’ on the end drives me mad and I am fairly sure that they spell tyre as “tire” only to annoy because they know it teases.

I was doing some social work last weekend when I taught an American barmaid how to say, “ter-mar-tow juice and wurs-ter sauce”, instead of: “ter-may-dow juice and wus-ses-ter-shyer sauce”.  I promised her that her tips would increase as a result.

I can even put up with the very few American individuals who believe that rules and conventions that we all live by do not apply to them.  Four years ago, when we first came to Cayman, I was in a car rental office by the airport to enquire whether they had any used vehicles for sale. In front of me was an American - I suspect he was from Texas.

“I want a left-hand drive car,” he informed the counter clerk.

“We don’t have any sir,” she replied.  “We drive on the left here and sit on the right.

“Yes, I know that,” he snapped, “but I sit on the left.”

Since I’ve lived on Cayman, I have spent quite a lot of time in the States.  When we lived in Winchmore Hill and if we wanted to buy a new television, we’d get in the car and drive to Enfield to buy one.  Now it’s a case of hopping on to a plane and making the one-hour trip to Miami.

We also fly from Miami to London nowadays rather than the direct flight from Cayman.  This is because from Miami we fly in a 747, which has four engines, rather than in a 767 with only two engines from Cayman.  767s are all we are allowed here in Cayman. Apparently our runway isn’t long enough for a proper plane.  I’m sorry BA but common sense dictates that it’s safer to fly across 4500 miles of ocean with four engines than it is with only two and so it’s Virgin from Miami for us.

Caroline also has to attend conferences in the US quite often.  I usually tag along.  In the last four years I must have spent more than 150 nights in the USA and that means that I have had more than 150 American breakfasts.  Admittedly, most of those were hospital breakfasts but my moan, or ‘observation’ as I prefer to call it, applies to them all.  

When we have to find a hotel, Caroline insists on doing the booking and we always stay in 4 or 5-star places. She claims that she always gets good deals by using the Internet and I never question her because I love being pampered in American hotels. You really are made to feel special. We have had breakfast in Marriotts, Hiltons, Deltas and best of all, the Biltmore in Miami.  But they ALL serve crappy breakfasts.

Sure, they can all produce a perfectly poached egg or delightful, fluffy pancakes but none of them – not even the Biltmore – can make toast!

Toast is what breakfast is all about.  Many people are under the delusion that toast has to be piping hot with the butter melting on it.  They are as wrong about that as are those people who believe that there is an ice cream flavour better than vanilla.  Perfect toast must be at room temperature.  This is typical of what tends to happen:

It is 9:30 a.m. in the Biltmore, June 2007. I have just been asked by Eva, our waitress, if I would like anything after my pancakes and syrup.

“Toast and marmalade please.”  Then I was subject to the inquisition”

“Wheat or rye?”

“Wheat.”

“Brown or white?”

“Brown.” 

“Whole grain or multi grain?”

“Oh, I don’t care. Just bring me some toast!”

“Here you are sir,” says Eva five minutes later. “Enjoy.”  Ugh!  

She leaves me with a wicker basket containing what seems to be nothing to eat - just a linen napkin.  I unfold the napkin to discover two slices of steaming hot, toasted bread inside.

Fresh bread has high water content. When you make bread, you find that the flour/water ratio by weight is about 5 : 2.  The water doesn’t all evaporate during baking but when toasted, bread becomes hot and most of the remaining water evaporates and escapes as water vapour. It is the absence of water that makes toast crispy.  

That’s why slightly stale bread makes better toast than fresh bread.  If the vapour cannot escape, it will condense and the toast becomes soggy.  Wrapping hot toast in linen ensures that is soggy. It cannot possibly be crispy.

I have a strategy to resurrect soggy toast. I rescue it immediately from its padded, linen cell and balance the two slices on my plate in the shape of an inverted V and leave them for two or three minutes.  The steam escapes and the toast may become almost satisfactory.

I called Eva over and asked if I could have a toast rack.  She didn’t know what I was talking about.  She had never heard of a toast rack! It’s no wonder that the Americans gave up on cricket if, 150 years later, they have failed to grasp the very simple concept of the toast rack.

When I got back to Cayman, I bought a toast rack and posted it to Eva, c/o the Biltmore, Miami. I included very simple but precise instructions on how it should be used.  I was so determined to teach her properly that I even referred to the “color” of the toast and not its “colour”.  

There are good and bad toast racks.  Ceramic ones with solid partitions, are useless.  The steam cannot get away, air cannot circulate and water forms on the surfaces and will get on to the toast.  An outline scaffold of thin metal is what’s needed.

Last September I was having breakfast in the Biltmore once more and I asked for toast.  It arrived just as it had two years earlier - hot and soggy.  Eva no longer works there and I presume she took her toast rack with her.  Another possibility is that the package I sent her was opened by customs.  They would have been baffled, probably assumed that it was part of a bomb mechanism and passed it on up.  It wouldn’t surprise me to find out that the Head of the FBI is the only American eating decent toast today.

The consistency and quality of the bread is of paramount importance.  I can’t advise you as I don’t know about your local bakeries. Here in Cayman, ‘Italian Bread’, fresh from Kirk’s is superb. It’s as good as the bread I used to buy from the Victoria Bakery in Barnet and I can’t pay it a higher compliment.

However, I do have a complaint. Kirk’s wrap loaves in a transparent, plastic bag and attach a label bearing the ‘Sell by’ date.  Today is Monday February 22nd and bread baked this morning will say, “Sell by Feb. 26th.” Not even, “Best by”.  They could put any date!  That means that anyone going in on Wednesday February 24th will assume that the unsold bread was baked that day and is fresh.  It certainly won’t be.

Back in the 70s and 80s I would buy ‘Mothers Pride’ from our corner shop in London.  As I approached the bread shelf I would be saying, “BOPGY, BOPGY, BOPGY” over and over in my head.  This was to tell me when the bread had been baked.  Sealing each loaf was a coloured plastic strip:

B = Blue = Monday

O = Orange = Tuesday

P = Purple = Wednesday

G = Green = Thursday

Y = Yellow = Friday.

Wonderfully honest and helpful. They don’t do it anymore. I suppose the shopkeepers objected because people like me wouldn’t buy Tuesday’s bread on a Thursday.  All I can say is that the shopkeepers shouldn’t have over-ordered.

The way in which the bread is toasted in unimportant.   Any method will do.   As a matter of interest though, why do manufacturers of toasters make them with a dial that, if it is turned to its fullest extent, burns the bread to a cinder? What’s the point of that?  I digress.  Remember that perfect toast is at room temperature.

Americans, sort yourselves out! Come on Barack. Your figures are dropping and you need a boost. Stop talking about healthcare and the economy. Introduce something that will change lives:

Talk about Toast Racks!