I went to give Mom a few biscuits after hanging the laundry yesterday and she was gone. This time I don’t have to ask; I know. When I petted her last week she was just a skeleton with a thin layer of fur clinging to her bones. I can’t help feeling that I could have prevented this, not by giving her more food, but by waking up my landlords to the (obvious, one would think) fact that dogs need food and water and exercise. Tied to her tree with only a few feet of rope, she ate maybe a few times per week, if that, got water only when it rained if a few droplets managed to make it into her bowl, and only then if her bowl was upright and within reach, and the only exercise she received was from jumping up at the end of her rope, begging for attention or something to eat, whenever someone went by. I’m so sorry Momma. We had several days of rain this weekend and she had no way to get out of it and get dry or stay warm. I think that’s what finally did her in.

Counting Mom, Scroungy, and all of the pups and kittens that never made it more than a few weeks, they have killed 6 dogs and 3 cats in the year that I have lived here. It’s not that hard to keep an animal alive. It’s just criminal. But the funny thing is, here it isn’t. I don’t understand a society that allows this to happen, one that has such a low regard for animal life.

Got out and did some exploring this weekend; there actually are still parts of the island that I haven’t been to yet, but I have to work harder to find them. Friday after work George wanted to head out to the Carib Coffee Bean Company on the edge of Liberta to pick up some coffee beans so I rode the bus out there with him. Unfortunately they had closed early, but we headed down a side street and walked the back roads behind Liberta and up a hill for a nice view overlooking Falmouth.

Saturday the Antigua Hash was starting from Curtain Bluff, which is the beach directly below my house, so we let Bernie know that we wouldn’t make it sailing and met them in the afternoon. The Hash House Harriers here do things a little different than in San Diego in that they don’t run a live course – the course is set out the morning before, and most of the participants walk rather than run. Anyhow, this one was particularly interesting because I know the area very well having walked most of the roads and trails many times, but even still, they managed to take me into areas that I had never been before. At one point, after a short walk down Fig Tree Drive, the trail took a turn down a side road that leads to an old chemical factory, now just a large empty corrugated metal building. Since the trail was heading towards a mountain, which George and I both knew had no roads crossing it, we assumed that we would just loop back on ourselves and end up on Fig Tree Drive, a little further down the road. However, once the road ended, a narrow trail continued, (which really wasn’t much of a trail, sometimes the weeds and brush were up to our chests) and it lead up and over the mountain and, surprise, surprise, popped out directly behind my house! Literally. As we exited the brush we were standing looking at the backside of my neighbor’s house, directly behind mine. I never knew there was a trail there. Funny thing is, once we exited the brush, you couldn’t even see the trail anymore, that’s how nondescript it was.

Keeping with the exploration theme, on Sunday we took a walk up the road a little ways to a peninsula in Cades Bay that sticks out into the water and is lined in palm trees. You can’t quite get there by walking the shoreline because the coast is interrupted by mangroves, but we found a way around and spent an enjoyable day on the beach there. This peninsula is somewhat secluded, away from the main road and in an area where they are few houses, so it was nice and quiet. A few other people wandered by, the reef there is very shallow and extends out for quite a distance, so it’s a good location for fishermen to catch bait fish, we learned. But the best part was that there were no barking dogs, no blaring stereos, only the sound of the sea washing up onto the sand.

Coming home the other day, the neighbor behind me stopped and told me that they had gotten a computer and asked if I would be willing to teach her and her husband how to use it. The wife, Julia, is a teacher at the local primary school and her principal was one of my students. She actually is eligible for the free classes that the Ministry of Education offers, but of course it’s more convenient to be taught in her own home rather than go all the way into town, her husband can participate as well, and they don’t have to make arrangements for someone to watch the kids. They’ve been very nice to me, sharing the fruit from their trees and offering rides when they see me. I also liked the idea of getting to know a local family better, so I told her I’d do it. (Actually, she is from Dominica but her husband is Antiguan.) I went to her house to check on what kind of computer she had and verify that she had all the software that we needed, and they did, so we start Wednesday. Her boys were quite interested in what I was doing, so I expect we’ll have an audience. She offered to pay me, but as a volunteer, we’re not allowed to accept money for employment, so I told her she could just continue to share the fruit from their trees with me; I went home with a very ripe sugar apple, two plantains, and a bag of guava. Then this weekend I came home one day to find that a 3-foot wide path had been cleared from the road to my back gate, and when I turned around, noticed that my neighbor’s yard was freshly weed-whacked. What a nice gesture. I know I made the right decision.

Day One of my private computer class with Michael and Julia went fairly well, except that I discovered the downside of not getting someone to watch the kids – the baby (1 1/2 years old) required almost constant attention and the boys found it nearly impossible to resist the urge to grab the mouse from their mother’s hand and do everything for her. So it was a family affair, which is okay. I doubt the boys have done much more than play games or use the Internet, so they’re learning as well. In fact, they seem to grasp things faster, so while I’m working with one parent, one of the boys is instructing the other on how to do what I just explained.