Sailed with Bernie on the Huey Too on Old Year’s Day (Dec. 31st) in Nelson’s Pursuit out of English Harbor. This was quite a race with nearly 40 boats racing. After sailing, there was a "Beat the Retreat" celebration at the Dockyard with the Antigua military band , a wreath laying, and then the prize ceremony followed. We finished second in class, fifth overall. The prize was 2 bottles of French champagne and a bottle of rum. We saved the rum for Bernie, but the rest of us split the champagne for our New Year's celebrations!

Have not written in awhile – have either been too busy or too tired to really even think about it. This Monday I started my first full week of work. All my classes have now begun for the term, so I’ve been spending a lot of time preparing for the lessons, creating assignments and handouts, and in general, just getting organized. I am teaching 2 State College computer classes – the same course to each group, which is good because that minimizes the prep time required. I’m teaching the last 2 modules of that same course to a group of Primary school teachers (they began the course last term with another PCV, but didn’t finish). And I’ve also started computer training with the staff at the Culture Division. All of the training that I’m doing is based on the ECDL, an international computer certification/training program that covers word-processing, spreadsheet, database, and presentation software applications, along with Internet, basic computer theory, and Windows. It gives a very good overview of all the programs; quite enough to get people started using the applications. Depending on the students, I may also cover some of the advanced features of the various programs as well.

Things have gone okay so far. There were some glitches in the computer setups and getting the student logins, but for the most part, was able to work around the problems. A bigger challenge I think will be dealing with the constant traveling around. I am typically at 2, sometimes 3 different locations each day. And without my own transportation, that can be exhausting just by itself, even without the heavy backpack that I lug around with my books and papers and whatnot. The worst part is that with the early hours and late nights, I haven’t been able to get in any significant or consistent exercise (except for all the walking that I do by default). I’m going to have to get settled in a routine and make that a regular part of my day.

One nice note – today I began computer training with Aunty Esther at the Culture Division. She’s the local culinary expert and writes a weekly social column for the Antigua Sun. She just turned 60 years young this weekend and has decided that she wants to learn how to use a computer. Her family is buying her one for her birthday. She has never touched a computer before, nor does she even know how to type. We started with how to turn the computer on, and how to hold the mouse. I spent an hour with her one-on-one this morning and when we finished, she gave me a hug of thanks. I thought that was a really nice touch. She is quite a lady; she has accomplished much, all from her heart, and wants to live a very long life so she can continue to help people. I’m looking forward to meeting with her again.

Have not been able to find much time to write in my journal and am extremely far behind in answering emails. To those who have been patiently waiting (or think I’m ignoring them) – I’m so sorry. The start of the school term has me quite overwhelmed with all the planning and prep work. I expect it will be like this for a little while longer, then should ease up, especially once I’ve been through the term once and have all my notes in place.

In the meantime… the following excerpt was written by a fellow PCV. I’d like to say that he was just having a bad day (I think he finally snapped!), but in my own experience, pretty much everything he wrote is true. So, for another view of Caribbean life…

I’ve been in the Caribbean for almost six months now, and while I still have my hearing, I sometimes wonder if hearing loss will be one of the consequences of living here for two years.

Life in the Caribbean is not the tranquil image you may have. I used to imagine a beach with a palm tree gently rustling in a breeze and the soothing sound of a gentle Caribbean Sea washing upon the powdery sand. Before I knew better I imagined the song of exotic colorful birds whispering out of the depths of a tropical forest. And in my dreams I thought of the solitude of midnight, under a moonless night sky illuminated by a million gemstones burning in the Milky Way, where there would only be the cool silence of space falling upon the Earth. Not.

Here, noise rules the day; And the night; And the twilight in-between. Some might say it is cultural arrogance to object to the noise. My Midwestern ears are accustomed to a Wisconsin decibel level. And so Antiguan ears have their own pain threshold, not worse, not better, just different. To claims of cultural arrogance, I disagree. There are behaviors that are irrational and harmful no matter the cultural perspective. Noise is pollution as sure as any other kind of pollution.

For instance: Recently I arrived home to Swetes to the distant sound of Caribbean-style gospel music. How quaint, you might think. As I walked down the road, it became louder, and the distortion pouring out of the speakers became more obvious. Soon, I found that a church choir, accompanied by electric piano, drum set, and electric guitar had assembled in the yard of one of my neighbors. On either side of the yard two piles of public address speakers, eight feet tall, were blaring painfully. The choir and musicians didn’t seem to notice that the amplifiers were working well-past their design limits and adding their high pitched wail to the mix. I had to put my fingers in my ears as I walked by.

I take a bus to town every day. The West Bus Terminal sits at the end of Market Street. Along this street thousands of people walk to and from the fruit and vegetable market and to and from their bus. So here the self-appointed religious people practice their compulsion to sing, sermonize, and proselytize. Of course, electronic amplification is employed. And since the rush of buses and cars, and the din of the passing parade of thousands must be drowned out in order to hear someone’s idea of a god’s words, the volume level is set very high. The lowest-quality instrument of tonal reproduction, the hand-held megaphone, seems the favorite means to amplify the off-key a-cappella hymns sung by a pair of pensioners who are regulars at the market.

Antigua is getting ready for an election. So the talk-radio, the newspaper headlines, and the buzz is all about the latest example of corruption (no discussion of issues, plans, solutions). I no longer need an alarm to get up at 6:30am. Most every day someone with two giant public address speakers mounted on the roof of the car drives nearby, yelling into a microphone. The message is more than obscured by the echoes, distortion, and squawk of the PA microphone. My fellow PCV Jim says a car goes through his neighborhood in St. Johnston’s Village at 5:30am. I count myself lucky.

Last Sunday a parade came through Swetes. The Antigua Labour Party (ALP) had a caravan. If it had been a parade of clowns, floats, bands, and dignitaries in convertibles, my Midwestern ears might have enjoyed the event. But this was a typical Antiguan noise fest. Instead of marching bands, the Antiguans mounted piles of speakers on the back of pickup trucks, and set the volume level to eleven (on a one-to-ten dial). The usual Hip-Hop, Calypso, or Reggae blared out. Cars with speakers mounted on the roof competed for attention. The caravan went on and on for better than an hour. The sound echoed among the hillsides, buildings and down the valley drowning out everything, blending with the lawn mowers, weed-whackers, barking dogs, and neighbors’ televisions and radios. I didn’t bother tuning in National Public Radio on my computer because I wouldn’t have been able to hear Weekend Edition over the noise coming in my open windows.

I’ve been to five different church services on Antigua and St. Lucia. In all five, music played a prominent role in the services. In four, the music was performed accompanied by electrically-amplified rock-combo instruments and the choir sang into microphones. The volume was far in excess of what was necessary.

Several of my bus drivers have added speakers and in-dash CD/DVD/radios to their minivan buses. None have any understanding of acoustics, speaker cross-over circuits, amplifier load, or the hazard their playback poses to their passengers. Every bus is named and the name is prominently displayed as part of a tinted panel on the windshield or painted onto the bodywork. I rode in “Cancer” recently. His sound system lacked any midrange at all. He obviously had a subwoofer, since the entire van body vibrated with the beat of the music. The treble was painfully screaming through tiny half-inch tweeter speakers mounted inside. But there was no melody, harmony, or vocal because there was no midrange speaker. Not the driver or any of his passengers seemed to care that we were riding in pure noise. I don’t know which is worse, the loudness of the music, or the amazingly stupid and dangerous driving behavior of the buses here. A quick death in a traffic crash sometimes feels like it would be a relief.

Like most places in the world, the young men take great pride in their automobiles. They wash and wax them, accessorize, customize, tune, and try to impress the ladies with them. Cars are very expensive to own here, and there really isn’t any place to drive them for very far without having to slow down and drive around a pot hole. But this does not prevent car culture from flourishing. Antigua even has an oval and races on Friday nights. And like elsewhere, one of the most important auto accessories is a sound system, particularly one with huge speakers in the trunk. An interesting vehicle I saw recently was a van with speakers mounted on the roof. I’m sure they were not simply being transported – there was plenty of room inside for that purpose. This was a cruising accessory to broadcast the driver’s idea of excellent music.

A popular pastime is a street “jump up” on a Friday night. The neighborhood will BBQ and sell alcoholic drinks at the side of the road, and someone will arrange for “DJs” to select a sequence of CDs to be played. The music will blare out from stacks of speakers wired to over-taxed amplifiers. The DJ will scream into a microphone between sets of songs. The party will last long into the night. If you happen to live near the party zone, forget getting to sleep.

And not to be outdone, the natural world is very loud. To my Midwestern ear, unnaturally loud. Donkeys bray; cows bellow; roosters crow; frogs and crickets chirp; dogs bark (nobody complains; in the US if your dogs barked like this, the animal control officer would be serving you notice). So if you are born here, it is only natural, of course, to shout into an overloaded amplifier, play Reggae cranked up to number eleven, and drive around with speakers strapped to the roof.

I believe that Antiguans have concluded that if the message is not understood, that turning up the volume will make it more understandable. Or if you disagree, certainly that playing the message louder will turn you to the correct point of view. Or if your faith is wandering from the straight-and-narrow, a louder volume will make you see the light. And if nothing else, you, too, will enjoy the selection of which-ever bad recording is on the radio or tape deck if only you will listen carefully enough to hear it. Can’t hear it? Here, let me turn it up.