MVP 2005 2006

WELCOME TO CARNIVAL: WHERE MODESTY IS LIMITED AND CLOTHING IS OPTIONAL. ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK. Legend has it that you haven’t experienced Jamaica until you’ve experienced Carnival. The Adult Road Parade, to be more exact. Obviously, legend is vindictive, because the parade does not carry the label of Adult for fun and this is parade is not an experience for the faint of heart. In fact, it is barely an experience for the strong of heart. Carnival is the brainchild of one Mr. Byron Lee who, in 1989, was convinced that he could unite the people of Jamaica with music; Soca music, to be precise. The first Carnival event took place in Kingston in 1990, with 1400 costumed masqueraders in parade and another 20,000 unofficial masqueraders who joined the parade festivities in Half Way Tree. ... read more

Well hello fellow Marist Volunteers and fans of our travelblog! I haven't checked in for a while so I thought I would write a quick post. There hasn't been too much new and exciting here in San Francisco although things have been going very well. Just as it seems like I am finally getting settled and have comfortably aquainted myself with all the local customs its almost time to count the days left in my west coast adventure. Work is going very well at the shelter. One of my coworkers recently left on maternity leave which allowed me to pick up a few cases of my own. Both clients who have moved out received permanent housing giving me a 100% success rate!(as much as I would like to take full credit for this I am pretty ... read more

Come On In, Dear, The Water's Fine We finally did more traveling this past weekend, as it had been far too long since we’d left the convent for a good adventure. It was about 9:45 on Saturday morning when 3 of the 4 remaining Passionist Volunteers - Jess, Maggie, and Eric - arrived in their white station wagon to pick us up. Our destination: Port Antonio, home of the gorgeous inlet of water made famous by the movie Blue Lagoon. It took us just under 2 hours to get to Port Antonio, the drive alternating between towering mountain vistas and huge green waves crashing along the northeast coast of the island. Our first stop was, in fact, the blue lagoon or Blue Hole, as the indiscriminately placed cardboard sign stated. In fact, the sign was so ... read more

Step 1: It is 11:00 on Wednesday morning. You stand at the bus stop for 30 minutes and watch 15 minibuses drive by yelling "Spanishtown, brownie?" All the while the usually reliable #22 bus refuses to rear its ugly head. Instead, a strung-out rastaman rears his ugly (very ugly) head. When walking by the bus stop, the rastaman says "hey pretty baby" to one of the girls standing by you. The lady ignores his lude comment and instead of continuing on in his merry little stupor, the rasta decides to stop and holler for 10 minutes about how the rastas get no respect from women and how people in general have no respect for others and how it wouldn't kill the pretty lady to just say hello to him and how the women will only chat ... read more

OK, we're really sorry that it has taken this long for us to write...between travelling and our crazy lives, we've been a bit delayed. Anyways, this is our attempt to encapsulate the last two months in one entry. Take a deep breath and here we go.... . we celebrated the new year with much excitement. we made jellow shots, went dancing out in the streets with our peruvian friends and their families, and watched the traditional new year's dolls burn away. we had a really great time and felt very accustomed to our new surroundings, passing one beer among us all until it was finished and needing to walk two blocks away to find a house that had a "bathroom" we could use. (by "bathroom" i mean a hole in the floor with a cement block ... read more

NOTE TO THE READER: Just so you know, this is a rant on the unfortunate cultural acceptance of homophobic attitudes in Jamaica, because I've seen a whole lot of it lately. You've been warned, so don't be angry if you get offended. Now, that said....on with the story. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It was directly after mass last Sunday and I was standing talking to Damien, Sheldon, and Tommy. I told Sheldon I liked his black shirt and he said that I was more than welcome to send him another one from foreign when I went home, because he originally got it in the US. I told him sure, I’d be more than happy to get him the a couple more shirts and would he like it in all the colors of the rainbow? That sent the three of ... read more

Happy Valentine’s Day! Love is in the air in Jamaica (don’t worry Mom I’m not running off to Vegas;) haha). I can tell that it’s soon to be Valentine ’s Day here in Jamaica because there are an abundance of horribly ugly fake flowers lining the streets for loving buyers. Who ever thought fake flowers could be popular? I’m really looking forward to this Tuesday. I’m taking Meaghan out to eat. We are both really excited to be visiting our local Subway (yes, we have the sandwich shop in the city of Kingston). We haven’t been to Subway yet, so we are both very, very excited. I sing in the junior choir at St. Pius. The “Junior Choir” is quite deceiving. It is called the “Junior Choir” because at some point all of it’s members were ... read more