Bat Caves and Body Surfing

Yesterday I was happily thinking about what a perfect day it was while I was cooking dinner...a hike up to the bat caves with friends...lunch at home, then an afternoon on the windward beach swimming and body surfing.  While I was cooking I was thinking about all the animals we had seen that day and I counted 12, let me see if I can remember everything:

1. Bats
2. Whip Scorpions
3. Cattle
   
4. Horses
5. Donkeys
6. Goats
7. Sheep
8. Birds  (pelicans, doves, bananaquits, cattle egrets, frigatebirds)
9. Cats
10. Dogs
11. Mongooses
12. Monkeys
    

Ava says to add humans.  So make it 13.  That was my first trip up to the bat caves.  On the way, we stopped by some ruins and were dismayed to find that someone is stealing the old building stones, probably selling them to a hotel that is being renovated, passing them off as newly quarried rock.  The sad thing is that these buildings probably used to be an old leprosarium, so of even greater historical interest, one might argue, than the old plantations on the island.  The fact that none of the old maps have the buildings labeled adds to their mystery but ultimately leaves them unprotected from scavenging. 

I've seen plenty of bats before, so for me the coolest thing in the caves was the whip scorpions, a first for me.  Seeing them made me super duper careful not to brush up agains the walls, even made me wish I could levitate.  Other animal musings: due to a bounty on donkey carcasses, the island donkeys have adopted a nocturnal habit (how clever!) so sightings are more and more scarce.  I think an unforeseen consequence of this is we are often woken up by their bloodcurdling braying in the night.  Bob assures me they are...having fun...but you would NOT believe the racket.  They indirectly provide entertainment: yesterday morning (before light, thank God) one was SO loud and SO close to the house Bob felt obliged to stand on the front porch in his boxers and yell, "GIT!  GIT ON OUTTA HERE! SHOOO! SHOOOOOOOOO" in his best cowboy imitation, and the donkey just flipped him off and kept at it.  But later in the day on the way to the beach we saw a female donkey and two baby donkeys crossing the road, and NOTHING is cuter than a baby donkey, except possibly TWO baby donkeys.  Loooong fluffy ears, omg.

So I was musing about all these wonderful animals we got to see, smiling because I loved waking up to the sound of doves cooing, feeling refreshed by all the exercise of the day, hungry for dinner...and as we sat down to share our meal together, the lights go out.  No electricity. This happens about twice a week, but almost always during the day.  Earlier we had lost water, and now no juice.  I wasn't worried, because usually it comes on in under an hour.  But the hours inched by, nothing.  I missed my House rerun.  Finally we just got bored and went to bed.  And sweated.  No fans.  NO breeze.  A couple times the power blinked on, which let me know which lights we had accidentally left on, but nothing.  ALL night.  I think I was up all night, hot and miserable.  We still didn't have power this morning, and I was so cranky Bob took us out to breakfast at Oualie Beach.   That's when I decided to scrap my list of wonderful things about Nevis and give my top eight least favorite things:

1) Losing water and/or power is a weekly occurance.  And it is HOT here.
2) Ants. Lots and lots of ants. I have ant bites on my toes.
3) No bookstores, no sushi, no movie theaters and the library is crap.
4) Groceries are twice as expensive and the selection is small and inconsistent.  And you know I love me some groceries.
5) Litter.  Lots of litter in some places and nobody does anything about it.  No recycling.
6) Stray dogs and cats.  Nevisans can get FREE spay or neuter, but don't.
7) Dog fighting is a sport here.
8) People stop their cars in the middle of the street, to chat, to pick up or drop off riders, to run in and buy a loaf of bread...it's cute and weird unless you happen to be in a hurry. 

But then,  the power blinks on, the taps run hot and cold...another great swim in the ocean, a good laugh watching the goats frolic, a spectacular sunset...a shooting star, a double-rum punch...and all that other stuff doesn't seem to matter. 

The photos: This afternoon Ava and Ishita having ice cream and cookies one minute, then the next minute Ava has lost her tooth. 

Now for some tooth fairy magic!  Then bed.  And donkey serenade.

Hors d'oeuvres and Horse Bite

Great weekend!  Friday we had a faculty party at Mount Nevis Hotel...the last time I had been there it was dark so I didn't get to see the amazing view of the ocean in one direction, the volcano in the other.  Ava had fun getting dressed up and sampling all the fun cocktail food, and then racing around with her buddies...then the bats came out and gave quite a show over the pool before we headed home.  It was so cool--are they drinking the pool or eating insects when they divebomb the water?

We had a playdate at the house on Saturday, then took all the kids to the beach.  On the way, we decided to stop and pick tamarinds...all the easy ones are gone so Bob parked under the tree and climbed up on the van with the pruning shears to get them.  I noticed some curious horses watching us by a fence, so we went over to pat them.  They seemed very friendly, snuffling our palms for treats, but then in a flash one of them put his ears back, opened his mouth all the way and CHOMP right on Ava's face before I could even bat an eye!  She fell to the ground in shock--the skin barely broken on the bridge of her nose and on her cheek.  And to her credit, after getting up she wheels around on me and says, hands on hips, "This is WHY I need my OWN horse!"  oh...I am in so much trouble.  She drew a picture today of what her future horse will look like.  (She told me to nevermind the green crayon)  Oh, and horses love tamarinds--we took the high road and forgave Mr. Chompy and gave him some nice sticky fruit to chew on.

Today we took Ava and the goats to the beach with friends--and it was crowded!  Palm Sunday, spring break...and next week the Nevisians will do their tradition of flying kites on Easter morning, we love that.  So Ava got to swim her heart out, a little saltwater on the horsebite, and even got in a surfing lesson ...as did one of the goats. 

Happy Birthday, Alden!

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Rachel Hearn <rachelhearn@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Mar 28, 2009 at 10:40 AM
Subject: Happy Birthday, Alden!
To: RachelHearn.volcanolife@blogger.com


Twenty years! What a treasure you are to your family and all who know you.  Enjoy your day. We send our love! 

What I Meant

What I meant when I said, "I do not wish for any more goats." was I do not wish for any more goats OR SHEEP.  Or anything that has to be bottle fed.  It pays to be specific.  Our neighbor was walking his dog Monday when he spied a newborn lamb in the bush.  The dog ran up and grabbed it by the neck so the neighbor intervened and delivered US the little bundle of joy.  So far its mama has not showed up to claim him.  I keep one eye peeled for her but no luck.  Yes, it's adorable.  But it doesn't know how to drink from a bottle and it needs to be fed every two hours minimum.  UGH.  We had named him "Little Debbie" but as you can see there is a gender mismatch going on there.  People who are bottle-feeding every two hours cannot be called upon to come up with adorable lamby names.  And just like the third child, I haven't even bothered taking a picture of him!  I'll try to get to it before he's in college.

Do I sound cranky? 

Goodbye Winter

Thursday, March 19th

It's 83 degrees in the house...can't wait for summer!

Ava is having her Subliminal Spanish Lesson (playing with her toys while her Spanish cds play) ...go ahead and mock, but I hear her singing the songs later, so I know something is sinking in!  And I don't have to butcher it for her.  We are so thankful to Aunt Beth for the wonderful Spanish kit.

It's bug week!  We've been learning about the life cycles of all sorts of creepy stuff.  Did you know that birds like to stuff ants into their armpits?  Oh, they do. 

Our little goats are doing well.  Peanut had his reproductive potential curtailed, and is recovering nicely.  Gypsy (or Sheba or Thumbelina, depending on Ava's mood) is still very tiny--about the size of our small cat-- but she makes up for it by being LOUD and PUSHY.  Goats aren't a lot in the personality department--they will never learn their names, for that matter--but they do have different temperaments.  Peanut has learned to butt the clothes off the line and lie down on them for his goat naps.  He also rushes into the house to be with his people anytime somebody forgets to set the latch on the door.  But the cutest thing he does, and What's-her-name does it too, is JUMP up in the air and kick ALL legs out at once while twisting.  You can't help but laugh when you see it.  Spastic and gleeful.  Ava does a good imitation.  OH, and we saw little black Angus goatie that we rescued; his herd passed through and we watched him get stuck in a fence and struggle five minutes to get out.  I was so proud!!  His mama watched me the whole time, a little suspiciously, I thought.

Ava has her swim lesson soon, so I'd better go find matching swimsuit parts.
Vamos!
Adios, amigos!
Raquel

The Lord Giveth and the Momma Goat Taketh Away

Well.  Today we lost (fill in the blank with whatever name Leah picked out) when his momma came to our yard and called him home.  She paid him a visit yesterday, and they both spoke to each other through the fence, but when she left without him we thought it was a false alarm.  That gave us a chance to get little Fill in the Blank wormed, with spectacularly disgusting results.  But he perked right up after disgorging his parasites, and although still dehydrated, ate a few feed pellets out of our hands.  Later today Ava watched him slip through the fence and rejoin his mom.  Momma Goat thanked us for rescuing him, bottle-feeding, bathing and worming him, and left a little donation by the fence for our trouble. 

Ava took it very well ONLY because Bob brought home an adorable three-day old little girl goat from the rescue center during his lunch break.  She is the prettiest goat I have ever seen, and she and Peanut are starting to play with each other.  So, for several hours, we had a herd of THREE baby goats.  But for now, please say hello to Not Yet Named Baby Goat Girl.  I do not wish for any more goats.  The end.



 

Peanut's New Friend --Leah, can you name him?

Well, we have a 2nd baby goat. Ava has been attempting to add to our herd by stealing baby goats right out from under their mothers' noses, but I have made her return BOTH of those. Two days ago our neighbor found a baby goat down inside the cattle grate. People lay wide grates at the bottom of their driveways to keep cattle out, but if goats or sheep try to cross some make it but others will get their legs stuck, or in this case, the whole baby slips through the grate. Ava has rescued several stuck sheep from these grates in the past.

Anyway, this baby is not in good shape, dehydrated, won't drink from a bottle, skinny and covered with mites. Just covered with them. And his tongue is white, that can't be good. So we thought he might die, but he's hanging in there. We're force feeding him liquids. Peanut at that age was not eating any greenery, but this one does eat leaves.

I'll put a picture up, and Ava would like to know if her cousin Leah can pick out a name for this one. He's all black, and very sweet.

If only the mangoes were in season, this would be THE perfect time to be here. I was actually chilly last night, and that is perfect.

Saturday we took the ferry to St. Kitts to act like tourists. Unfortunately, there was a Carnival Cruise ship making a call on St. Kitts, so there were a couple thousand people with the same idea. Much less charming. Paying a man to let Ava hold his baby monkeys felt kind of sleazy. We had a wonderful lunch and got out of town...made it back to Nevis in time for a sunset swim.

And today was the Humane Society fundraiser--a kid's carnival and barbecue. I helped a little with the games but we got to just go and enjoy. Ava threw beanbags, dug in the sand for the "lucky dip" (her favorite, no surprise) raced in feedbags and had her face painted...and just had fun.

Twice this week Ava has stolen a baby goat--true kidnapping, I guess. She goes into the fields near our house and hunts down a newborn that can't outrun her. And just takes it! I've had to put the hammer down on that. She dragged home this poor baby (in the picture) three days old at the most. It was so exhausted from the ordeal it just collapsed in her arms--flat on his back with his head thrown back--I thought he was D-E-A-D when I snapped this picture, but he rallied in time for his trip back to mom. Ava...seems to have...a taste for the HUNT. Will have to keep an eye on that!

Bananas

Just got back from the farmer's market. Bob bought Ava $7 worth of bananas--turned out to be quite a bunch! But we have to wait for them to ripen. And I hope they don't all ripen at once, or we will have to get creative.

This weekend Ava had her first dance lesson--classic Indian dance. The class is preparing a show for Divali this fall. The two teachers are adorable but spent waaaay too long fiddling around with iPods and laptops trying to get some music to play, and then spent the entire class teaching a step that could be described as "one, two" (that's it, just "one, two" "one, two" over and over) OMG I was about ready to throw them in the pool after 30 minutes of it, but Ava hung in there. I could never expect that much patience/perseverance in HOME school. If she gets bored she just runs into her room and starts playing. But except for a little freestyle booty shaking when the music finally came on, she was a model student. We'll see what they add on to the routine next week, and then make a call. I really want this to work!


Ava has learned to body surf! I had nothing to do with it! We went to a windward beach a few days ago--a nice shallow beach but lots of waves. I took Ava out first, carefully holding her hand and hoisting her over the waves so her head stayed dry, coaching her to jump over the waves and keeping her knee-deep. On Bob's turn, I was SHOCKED to seem him pitch Ava in and away she went--and she couldn't get enough of it! She doesn't even wipe her eyes when her head comes out of the water, just jumps up and points her butt into the waves for the next ride. It was exhausting. For me. She found a sand dollar on the beach and that is all she has wanted to write about in her journal this week: body surfing and her "sandy dollar".

The other highlight of our week was a Drama Club meeting at Tara and Mishka's house. They are renting a gorgeous home not too far from us. Mishka is on tour in the US until March so Tara is parenting and homeschooling on her own for a while. It turns out she and I both bought the exact same kid's drama books from Amazon.com (victims of the People Who Bought THIS also bought THAT scheme) so we were able to collaborate on some fun games and activities before the first meeting. But we did feel very unoriginal!

My stars

So, it turns out the star Ava and I were wishing on is a planet! What are the odds of that!! Astronomical. Ha, it's been SPAAAAAACE WEEEEEK in homeschool...where we find out that venus (or "weenus", as our Indian friends call it) is the "morning star" AND the "evening star" and the brightest object in the sky besides the moon. So I guess I won't be seeing that case of Almond Joys any time soon.

Ava had a scare at the beach this week...she was in a foot of water digging in the sand for treasure. She found the edge of something big (she said she thought it was a treasure chest :-)) and pulled..and out popped this disgusting fleshy creature with eyeballs and a blobby head. She screamed BLOODY MURDER and threw it over her head and behind her, and ran up onto the beach screaming BLOODY MURDER. I wasn't there, but Bob tells me he had quite a time getting her to calm down. He waded out there and found it..it turns out it was a fighting conch with the animal extended out of the shell. Scared the bejeezus out of her! She laughs about it now...but she hasn't asked to go to the beach since.

So yesterday we swam in the pool on campus and then Ava rode her scooter around the tennis courts rescuing caterpillars. She'd put them into the basket of her scooter and empty them into the landscaping. We Are Animal Rescuers.

A good week.

Things are settling into a routine, finally. Bob goes to work early, but is kind enough to make coffee and give the goat a bottle before he leaves. Ava and I feed and walk the goat every morning, then start school. And that has gotten a lot better. The first day was fun while we explored some of the cool stuff I brought/shipped down, but then there was a sharp decline in Ava's interest and attitude after that. She just wanted to play with the goat, go swimming and play with her ponies. Bob and I took her to tour a new Montessori-style private school, and that seemed to straighten things right out for both of us. So we have compromised: lots of breaks, lots of games, more fun, fewer worksheets. And wow! Progress. Here Ava paints her interpretation of the Big Bang :-)


We have a big screened in front porch and an amazing, constant breeze. It has rained just a little almost every day or night, and we have caught a rainbow or two. A real magic moment was a few nights ago when Ava discovered the full moon right over the yard. We sat outside and watched the clouds, enjoyed the breeze and just chatted and watched the bats. Wished on the first star. She wouldn't tell me what she wished for.

Goooood Mooorrrning Nevis Nam!

Happy Groundhog Day! Another six weeks of winter for those back home. It's warm and sunny here, not hot yet and very breezy. Just over two weeks ago Ava and I traded in our long johns for flip flops and flew into Nevis. It was an exhausing day of travel, even though we ended up spending over six hours in the St. Maarten airport waiting for the last connection.

Everything on the island is about as we left it except: The Four Seasons has closed, (different rumors floating around as to why), the new building at the school is finished but not yet opened, and it is the biggest building on the entire island. They're installing AV equipment and some final fixtures. And...last but not least, we are in a new rental house that has a nice fenced in yard, two bedrooms, two full baths and AC. And a clothes dryer, for that not-at-all-damp feeling for our sheets! Gotta love that. Come visit! I spent the first week and a half without internet, and the remaining time playing catchup with the internet classes I am taking.

The highlight of the Super Bowl for me was the power outage lasting through the first quarter, during which I cooked dinner with a flashlight clamped under one arm. We got only local commercials (in Spanish) so I didn't get to see the guy get hit in the head twice with a golf club, which made me laugh out loud at the sneak preview. That's bad, isn't it.