Island Adventures

Well this time of year has finally come again and I had my first day of school yesterday. After a busy week preparing, I was able to teach my class of 11 for the first time! It's amazing the backgrounds that these kids have and the experiences they have had throughout the past few years. I have an extremely diverse class: 1 from Ireland, 1 from Argentina, 1 from Germany, 1 from France, 1 from South Africa, 2 from England, 2 from Canada, 1 from Grand Cayman, and only 1 from the states. Of these 11 students, only 4 are girls. We'll have to stick together throughout the year.

The first day went well. I gave a math pretest for the first unit and had 95% of my class score an "A" or above, so there will be a definite need for enrichment. It's amazing the amount of work they can finish in a whole day too. I'm definitely working with students who will need that extra challenge this year.

The students are expected to wear their uniforms each day and can't go outside if they don't have their hat. This helps prevent some of the sunburns since the heat is so bad. Fortunately for me, teachers can wear whatever they want as long as it adheres to the school dress code.

I'm trying to get back into the routine of things. I was extremely exhausted yesterday afternoon but trucked through it and didn't take my nap. I was in bed by 9 p.m. and up this morning by 5:30 a.m. This might be the new norm for me since I'm able to get more work done in the morning. We'll see how that goes.

Some quick pictures from another trip to Rum Point. We ate, sunned, and snorkeled the whole day.

We spent a wonderful day in Georgetown today.

It all started at a beachside restaurant called Hammerheads. We shared a few appetizers and a bucket of Bucannero (our new favorite beer from Cuba), which you can't get in the U.S. After lunch, we set our bags down, grabbed our snorkel gear and went snorkeling in the harbor right off the ladder from the restaurant we ate at. We swam out about 100 feet to a shipwreck. It was pretty amazing. The visibility was about 100 feet and you could see all the way to the bottom. Huge tarpon swam by as we were exploring the wreck.

After the shipwreck, we swam over to the reef and were instantly surrounded by hundreds of fish. The beauty of being surrounded by fish that were nearly an inch away from your face was quite the rush. Pictures to come soon! The variety of fish was also unbelievable. The colors were extensive and it was a sight to see.

The next stop on our GT list was Paradise restaurant for a quick Pina Colada, then the water trampoline. Paradise has this huge trampoline over the water that they allow their customers to swim out to and jump on. It's pretty crazy jumping on a trampoline over water and feeling the water splash through the netting at your feet as you're jumping. After quite a bit of jumping time, we all just laid down and sunned for a while in the middle of the harbour!

Lastly, we did a quick walking tour of GT. Made a stop at Margaritaville to swim in their pool and slide down their water slide. It was a good day in GT!

It's official, we have found our favorite place on the island: The Dog House. They have it all. Tuesday night trivia, Wednesday night $0.25 wings, $1.25 pints on Thirsty Thursday, and even a free buffet and $2 rum and pops on Friday. We have become "regulars" and frequent this sports pub about twice a week. Food on the island is not cheap, but if you know the specials at particular places and the day of the week to go, then you're golden.

One of the most interesting thing about The Dog House is their "Eat the Wall" challenge. It's a burger eating contest. The size of the burger started at 2lbs and once the first person finished that in under 60 minutes, then he/she got his/her name on the wall. After each person beats the previous weight of the last burger eaten, then they increase the weight of the burger by 1/2 pound. We got the opportunity to watch someone try the 5lb burger challenge. Coincidentally, it actually turned out to be the husband of a teacher at our school. It's such a small island that you run into people you know all the time.

Well it's almost that time again-WNDC goes out for Round 2 tomorrow.

It's ironic that the two biggest clubs on the island both meet on Wednesday nights. Along with the WNDC, there is also the WNRC (Wednesday Night Running Club). The running club is a good way to train for the Cayman Islands marathon, half marathon, 10k, and 5k races that will take place on December 5th. I'm still undecided as to whether or not I'm planning on signing up for it, but it's a definite possibility if school doesn't take up too much time.

Back to WNDC...it was quite interesting. The club met at 7:30, but in island time that means they don't actually leave until 10-ish or so (I'm starting to realize that island time is a real thing). The bar that the club met at was called "The Attic." As soon as we walked in, we noticed about 4-5 beerpong tables and a decent amount of young, medical students playing. They were playing with Heineken, which is pretty hardcore.

Three buses arrived around 10, right after they passed out some jello shots. We quickly loaded the bus and it took no time for me to meet our driver, Dennis. Imagine a tall, dark, very muscular, bodyguard-like Jamaican who had a bit of road rage. You know what they say about Jamaicans and their driving. He definitely made the ride seem like a roller coaster (great, just what we need when we're drinking!)!

Our first stop was at the Cracked Conch right on the ocean. Our WNDT fee of $10 included the bus ride and a free shot at each of the three places we stopped. I think we probably had about 3 free shots at our first stop. It's hard to resist the islanders as they are walking around with a tray full of shots and keep telling you, "no prob mon, you have a ride."

Our next stop was Calico Jacks, again on the ocean. CJ's is known for their parties on the beach when it's full moon. They are supposed to be the biggest beach dance party on the island. I'll report back once we have our first full moon.

Our last stop was at "The Jungle." I think our shot consisted of some Jungle Juice that tasted somewhat similar to Jager. Now if you've ever tried jager before, then you know it's something that tastes like someone squeezed straight out of a fruit that one might find in the jungle (yes, it's that terrible). The place was decorated with vines draping from the building and stuffed jungle animals hiding among the trees.

WNDC was a good way to meet new people, enjoy some drinks for a fairly inexpensive price, and have transportation from bar to bar. It's definitely something that will be short-lived after school starts, but for now, it is a good Wed. night tradition!

It's true, you can always find a little bit of "home" wherever you go. I've managed to find my comforts of home two ways so far:

1) The beyond annoying chickens that roam outside my apartment door and cock-a-doodle-doo at 5am each morning. I can only hope that when I'm at the grocery store and buy chicken with the "local meat" sticker that the Caymanians are doing us all a favor and trying to decrease this chicken population.

Less chickens=more sleep=happier people on the island

2) Any southern gal knows that a thrilling bull ride is the way to a good country heart. One would think that I based my apartment choice on which location had a mechanical bull, but it was actually a complete surprise when I saw it there the other night. Supposedly there is only one on the island and the different places host it about once a month.

Two teachers on the bull at once=entertaining.

Three teachers on the bull at once=a mess on the ground about 0.2 seconds later!

Bull pictures to come soon!

As a way to "adjust" to the island life and meet new people, we have decided to join the WNDT. Here's a clip from their website discussing what they are all about:

The WNDC (Wednesday Night Drinking Club) is a great way to meet new people (usually a mix of tourists, locals and students). It costs CI$25 to join and includes a t-shirt, wristband and drink specials. Meets every Wednesday at 7:30pm at The Attic and typically visits three local bars and ends up at the O-Bar at 11pm. Transport is provided for free.

Luckily for us, Attic and O-Bar are the two closest bars on either side of T.I. so it's a quick, 5 minute walk to get there and home. I'll report back after we check it out.

Shiver me timbers! Today brought a whole new meaning to the David Shannon "How I Became A Pirate" book. As soon as we boarded the Jolly Roger's pirate themed booze cruise, I quickly learned that there are 2 main things that pirates do/say.

First, you have to like grog (rum). And I'm not talking about a splash of grog in your drink. They mix about 2 parts grog with 1 part punch to make their deadly punch. How else do you think the pirates get all of that hair on their chest? Argggggg!

Secondly, you have to learn the pirate lingo. Just throw in a few "arrgggs" and "scalliwags" and make sure you drop your endings, ye hear? It would probably help to use a rough and tough voice, too. Oh and ladies, you need to be ok with being called a "wench." Just think to yourself that it's about the same as a nice gentleman calling you beautiful...

Now, one might ask what happens to someone who doesn't abide by the pirate rules? It was immediately obvious that they have zero tolerance for "lubbers" (people who spend their time on the land). Well that's when they FORCE you to walk the plank. Yes, those childhood nightmares that you used to get from watching Peter Pan are real. And the pirates definitely don't play around.

On the otherhand, they were nice enough to feed us some grub and instead of throwing away our chicken bones, we threw them out to sea. A positive person might think that this is to feed the wonders of the ocean, but those tricky pirates are smart. They are just attracting the sharks for when someone "gets the boot," or walks the plank.

It wasn't long before we won over our B.W.I. (British West Indies) pirates. It might have been that we showed them how to fish with just a line and a chicken wing attached on the end. Or maybe it was the fact that we introduced them to Ludacris and the newest hip-hop dance moves. Now you want to talk about crazy...imagine pirates seeing "how low they can go" after a few rum punches.

To say the least, I think it's safe to claim that by the end of our adventure at sea, we were truly pirates. We drank the pirate's blood a few times to prove it. Don't worry, pirate's blood is a mixed shot of rum, red wine, and a splash of rum punch. They even trusted us enough to let us shoot off the canon...ahoy mateys!