ANTHONY’S ST LUCIA BLOG – PART 5

You may remember that Allie put me in touch with a young Expat called Zac who has been living here with his wife Ruth and 3 year old daughter Emmie for 3 months and we arranged to meet for a lunchtime drink. We got together on Wednesday for couple of beers at lunchtime and had a good time. He is in his 30’s and is on a 12 month sabbatical from Barclays whilst his wife, who works for the Commonwealth, is working as a consultant for the St Lucia government consulting on ways of minimising or taking advantage of the effects of climate change. She’s on a 12 month contract but that may be extended and if so Zac will have to make a decision about his job. We both like sport and also have retail property in common. He used to be a project manager specialising in refrigeration in new supermarkets in Dubai where he was brought up. Anyway he asked me if I’d be interested in volunteering at SLAPS, The St Lucia Animal Protection Society, and as a result yesterday morning he picked me up and took me to their dog pound in Gros Islet, home to about 80, I think, abandoned or homeless dogs, some sick or injured, and I started my new role as a dog walker! Not what you’d expect perhaps but I enjoyed it and met some nice ladies, Kerry, Tracey, Kay, Julie and Rose, all British except Rose who is Lucian, and so I walked four dogs over a 2 hour period in blazing sunshine. It was fairly exhausting but entertaining. The dogs have got very different characters, some rather lively, and get very excited as they only get a decent walk twice a week. We walk them about 5 minutes’ to a large field where most of them can be let off the lead to have a good run. They get photographed and videoed to help with re-homing them. I intend to try and do it one day a week.

At the beginning of the week I noticed that a cyst I’ve had on my chest for many months, which the NHS won’t touch these days, had become inflamed and, as it turned out, infected. I decided to visit the surgery recommended by Allie’s colleagues and was very impressed with the service. I saw a doctor who carved it out and was on my way out within the hour and all for about £60.00 against the £250-300 I’d been quoted to have it removed privately in the UK. Sadly it means I can’t swim or shower for a week so Allie is having to give me sponge baths, starting tonight! I’ll let you know how that goes. I’m going to have the dressing changed this afternoon….have now discovered it’s £20 per dressing as well but still looking good value overall. The sponge bath by the way went well! We’re going to try a hair wash over the sink today, such an exciting life.

On Friday night we went to the Yacht Club where they were holding registration for a local fishing competition accompanied by Karaoke. Somehow Allie got me up singing first and we then. for reasons alcoholic. decided we should both sing Bohemian Rhapsody, always a challenge but no-one threw anything so it can’t have been too bad. Luckily no-one took a video either! Allie then got 5 girls including the club manager and barmaid up as well, to sing Mama Mia, and a jolly time was had by all, again mainly due to alcohol.

Saturday lunchtime brought an unusual experience for me, Allie beat me at Scrabble! I’ll say nothing about unlucky letter picks or anything like that, I was beaten fair and square, suffice to say I think this may crop up in conversation again!

Last night, Saturday 21^st, we went with Elaine and Tony to the Darren Sammy stadium to watch St Lucia Zouks v Trinbago Knight Riders in a 20-20 match. Lords it is not but the atmosphere was tremendous, the noise including constant drumming, calypso and Caribbean house/garage (probably) and vuvuzelas, remember those, remarkable! The match started at 8pm with St Lucia, having lost the toss, batting and they were 99 for 4 after 12 overs when rain and wind, courtesy of the edge of Tropical storm Karen, sadly stopped play and brought about the demise of our folding brolly which wasn’t up to the task. On the plus side every boundary (about 10) and six (about 6) brought the cheerleaders out on a little platform in front of us very enthusiastically shaking their rather charming “booty” to great applause. Allie wanted to know why there weren’t athletic boys in tight shorts offering the many female spectators a similar spectacle! It was Allie’s first time at a professional cricket match and I think she’d go back for another.

The forecast today was pretty bleak due to Karen so we planned to stay home and chill and do a few chores and so that’s what we’ve done thus dodging some pretty torrential showers and strong squalls although the sun has shown its face a fair bit too. We might have ventured out to the Yacht Club for the results of the fishing competition but it’s a 15/20 minute walk and with no brolly…

It’s only 8 days now until I head back to the UK for two weeks so this may be the last missive from me until mid-October . Hopefully see some of you back on the Island or here should you venture out.