Grenada Update 2

We have been in Grenada for four days and are enchanted by the Spice Island. If we don’t leave tomorrow, you’ll have to send in the blackhawk helicopters to extract us from this spell. We’ve spent the last two days touring the island in van cabs and can’t begin to relate much of what we’ve heard and seen. It is rather overwhelming, so different, so beautiful, so friendly, so culturally rich, in such transition. 

“Rock”, our first cab driver and tour guide (473-459-1971 fyi), is a wonderful historian and teacher. For five hours as he drove us from one amazing place to another, he delivered a personal account of the island’s history of brutal conquest and bloody revolution. Wow. As I recount it here at the Tikii bar hotspot, the historical narrative in a nut(meg)shell goes something like this:

- peaceful Arawaks are conquered by warlike Caribs, hypothetically enslaving the women and eating the men and boys,

- French colonial rule after extermination of the Caribs, who chose a suicidal leap off of the northern end of the island over enslavement,

- African slave trade and sugar cane and spice plantation economy,

- unstable post-war economic disparity under British rule,

- independence in 1974 with fascist greed and repression under Gairy (complete with rigged elections, power-control patronage, police and paramilitary brutality, executions and disappearances and the flow of money to Swiss bank accounts), to

- the 1979 coup by the socialist New Jewel Movement under Maurice Bishop that instituted significant reform in labor and land ownership, to

- the 1983 coup by his communist Deputy Prime Minster Bernard Coard, the proximal support of Cuban and Soviet military, that executed Maurice Bishop and his cabinet and a slaughter of something like sixty of the 10,000 supporters by the military in (Soviet-made) armored vehicles, to

- a social democracy that seems to be stable and supported by the people, but that also seems to frustrate them with lack of “doing more” to improve things.

The bloody political events of the past twenty years seem to have generated a very positive community outlook. There is a vibrant expression of national pride and unity, of social and economic progress, and of hope. The three Rastafarian colors of gold, green and red are the colors of the Ethiopian flag and are also those of the Grenadian flag. They are pervasive in the form of fluttering pennants on houses, schools, churches, clothing, head scarves, clothing, sandals and sign posts. Depending on what you read, they symbolize bloodshed for liberation and social justice (red), wealth (gold), and beauty (green). If my memory serves me, Rock said that here they stood for justice, love and hope. Our second driver, “Crabby” Arnold Charles (473-414-4832) and our guide “Arthur” mimicked the same sentiments about a progress that departed from the kind of power and greed of the past.

From conversations and from signs posted on buildings, Grenadians are thankful to the US for the 1984 intervention by the forces of the U.S., Jamaica and the Eastern Caribbean states.  It's complicated, though.  I heard on more than one occasion that when the NJM ousted Gairy, Fidel’s Cuba stepped in with help when the US didn't, and built a much-needed airport. But then bad things began to happen and the rest is history. USAID appears on tarps and building materials that I’m guessing remains from US contributions after Hurricane Ivan that devastated the island in 2004. There are relatively few tourists on this island (as compared to the Virgin Islands) and most of them seem to be from Europe, mostly from the UK. We’ve met few Americans, mostly boaters or past-boaters. Arthur reported that as many Grenadians are living in the U.S. as are living on the island.

We visited two nutmeg processing facilities,that were operating they have done so for two hundred years. It was a photographer’s heaven with amazing light and visual textures. Emily and I took many pictures. The smells were amazing. We brought some of those with us as samples for Mindy back home.

We visited the Grand Etang rain forest, and the next day we hiked to the Seven Sisters waterfall. We expected brontosaurus heads to appear above the lush tropical growth. Mountain streams flowed down ravines and brilliantly colored flowers and fruits were everywhere. It is supposedly still recovering from Ivan, but I had never seen anything even close to this. More on this later.

Off to Cariacou tomorrow if the northerly swell subsides, as forecast.