St. Lucia -- The Sights Part 1: The People and the Towns

There's so much to blog about! Not only our St. Lucia trip, but three birthdays (Elise, Forrest, Jonas), a 2nd place Pinewood Derby win, Elise's school musical, and Ethan getting cast in his first big part in a high school play. Somehow, I'm going to try to tackle all of it before Easter rolls around and I get completely swamped, but the St. Lucia posts are going to be biggies all on their own. I decided it would be best to break the trip down into a few different posts: "St. Lucia Sights"(in at least two parts, I'm discovering as I write this all out) and "St. Lucia Experiences." A day-by-day blow-by-blow would simply take too long.

Not that these posts won't be super long, of course. I can't help it. You might just want to click through the pictures and save yourself the screen time. (Seriously! I'm mostly writing all of this down for myself and for my future posterity who will be held in thrall to detailed descriptions of their great-great grandparents' twentieth anniversary trips.) So without further ado . . . St. Lucia!

This is a glimpse of the beautiful island of St. Lucia outside the airplane window. For those of you who are interested in a little history: St. Lucia is an island in the eastern Caribbean. Venezuela is its closest non-island neighbor:

It's about 200 square miles and its center is covered in dense forest. It is famous for its mountains, most notably two tall peaks called the Pitons.

Forrest and me with the Pitons in the background

St. Lucia was originally inhabited by indigenous people called the Caribs, but when the Europeans arrived in the early 1500s, many Caribs were wiped out due to exposure to European diseases, as well as the Eurpoeans' propensity to enslave and then work to death many of the native people with whom they came in contact. The European settlers soon brought African slaves to the island to work on plantations as well, and it is from this African heritage that most native St. Lucians descend today.  (There's also a smattering of Indian heritage, also stemming from  Britain's desire to colonize the world.) The French and English fought over St. Lucia for years, and the island changed hands between the two countries 14 times, with the British ultimately claiming it in 1814. Although the national language is English (all the signage, commerce, etc. takes place in English) there's a decidedly French influence as well: not only are most of the place names French (Soufriere, Gros Islet), but native St. Lucians speak what they call "patois" (pronounced "patwah") a French/English/local Creole language that we American English speakers can't understand at all. One native St. Lucian told me that many of them speak patois at home, and it's not until they get to their British-style public schools that they start to learn English in earnest.

The people of St. Lucia are really beautiful. Nothing like sitting in a scuba boat with a bunch of shirtless 20-something St. Lucian men to make a person realize how much the tourists' freckly, pasty, puffy, hairy, sun-burny Northern European bodies were not, in fact, the genetic lottery winners on planet Earth. (I am generalizing here, of course, since I'm married to a prime specimen of Northern European good looks who is aware of the fact that I can admire the St. Lucian physique without being at all threatened. :-). I took a few candid photos of some of the local people, which horrified Elise ("Mom! Did they think you were stalking them or something?") But, for most of the photos, I had the camera with me in the car and was clicking and clicking out the window at all sorts of stuff. And I used a zoom. Just so nobody's horrified:

I loved the big blue turban on this woman's head. There are all sorts of women walking around dressed in business attire, too, especially in the bigger cities. I saw a lot more women in business attire than I did men.

Not our scuba boat! I snapped this shot from the beach outside our hotel. I'm guessing these guys were heading out to do some fishing.

The owner of our hotel, Colin, and the two very helpful women at the front desk.  So friendly, and gave us so many excellent insider tips.  

Two older women I snapped from our moving car. I loved all the color in St. Lucia: the clothes, the paint colors, the green green foliage, the flowers.

There was lots of dreadlocks and tie-dye: the island had a more Jamaican feel than I was expecting. And yes,  as this home shows, there was also a lot of poverty.

The terrible disparity between the poverty in the small towns as opposed to the luxury of some of the super-ritzy resorts was really disconcerting. Although part of me was glad to be contributing to the local economy, another part felt really guilty about the unfairness of it all. I'm very, very glad, though, that we decided to be brave and rent a car so we could see more of the "real" St. Lucia; in fact, zipping along the narrow streets, driving on the wrong side of the road (that British influence again), trying to negotiate all the hairpin bends on the steep mountain roads without killing ourselves, taking a wrong turn and getting lost in a small neighborhood full of banana plantation workers traipsing to the fields with machetes at their sides (and staring at us like we were the craziest white people they'd ever seen) -- those were some of my favorite experiences of the whole trip. Well, okay, I could have done without the grasping-the-door-handle-closing-my-eyes-and-saying-a-prayer style of driving . . . but now that we're home, and alive, I'm glad we did it. The vast majority of vacationers in St. Lucia either arrive via cruise ship or stay at all inclusive resorts, leaving only when a tour bus pulls up to transport them to the next tourist spot, but if anyone I know is heading to St. Lucia? I'd recommend they do it our way (of course!). Provided that they have guys like Forrest or Darrin who are willing to drive. I never could have done the driving myself. Oh no.

Here are a few more shots out the car window:

There were crosses and memorials etched into the sides of mountains all over the island. I thought of them as Forrest honked the horn while we rounded a hairpin bend to warn any oncoming traffic not to crash into us.

Not a lot of signs in St. Lucia. Very few street signs, a handful of speed limit signs. I think the Hairpin Bend signs were among the most common of all.

One of our favorite signs. Wonder why they can't rent out that house???

And here's a few shots of the biggest city in St. Lucia, Castries, where the cruise ships come in to port. We were only 10 minutes or so outside of Castries and mostly drove through it, but did spend one day going to the local fruit market and visiting the maze of booths set up to sell souvenirs to the cruise ship passengers:

Darrin and Katie checking out the papayas. My favorite local fruit were the guavas -- you eat them rind and all.

Some local fishing boats in the bay.

A cruise ship docked in the bay. Every day there was at least one new ship, and this one was on the smaller side.

And that's enough for today. Tomorrow I'll delve into the flora and the fauna, the ocean and the flowers, the mountains and the lizards. All that beautiful stuff. 

Ch Ch Ch Ch Chaaanges

**So the new blog design was bugging me, mainly because I need my Peeps link to work more than anyone else does. Wasn't too hard to redo this (although some of the fonts are different.) That was a fun little experiment, wasn't it?**


So the blog's different, yes? I decided to try the new "dynamic" blog that Blogger's touting, and I like the look of it. Only problem is it won't import a bunch of my gadgets. Many of you are probably most concerned about losing my "peeps I pop in on" gadget on the sidebar because you use it to navigate around to other people's blogs (or maybe just my mom does?). The good news is that it really is here -- there are rectangles on the far right side, and if you hover over them, the peeps pop up. The bad news is that I've lost the ability to have the newest post show up; you're going to have to click on it and go check for yourself. Hopefully I'll be able to install that function again soon (they're working on expanding their gadgets) but until then, we're kinda stuck because I lost my old template. Whoopsie! But isn't the green pretty? I like the clean look of the layout too. And I really love being able to see more past posts. You can also go to the right hand side, click on "magazine," and a whole bunch of other blog views are available, if you don't like this one. Check it out.

Speaking of blogging, some of you (or, again, maybe just my mom?) have noticed that I haven't updated my blog quite as often. To be honest, I'm getting a little blog fatigued. Although I still plan to update my blog regularly, it will probably be every 2-4 weeks or so, instead of once a week. (And my three regular readers gasp in dismay! :-O). But now I don't have to feel guilty every time I see a two-week-old picture staring back at me. Right? So that's a good thing.

Now onto real-life stuff. Today is a gorgeous spring day (even though it's not really spring, oh no). The sun is shining, the little kids are out running around in the backyard. See?

Wyatt the Poser saw I had a camera

We're even bbqing for dinner. I did make the mistake of walking outside without my shoes on to light the charcoal and ruined my left sock. Sunk straight down in the mushy muck that is our back lawn. Appearances can be deceiving.

But it makes sense because a little over a week ago, this is what Wyatt was doing in the back yard:

Wyatt and his good friend Max

The kids have been busy with all sorts of things. The trimester just ended, and Ethan and Elise were especially busy with tests and projects. I helped Elise write a bill for her civics class -- it was a tough assignment, I'll tell you what -- and I just found out that "she" (okay, we?) got a B. Her civics teacher drives me a little batty. Luckily she's only in the 8th grade, so her report card doesn't matter nearly as much as it will six short months, so I'm just releasing that B into the universe of ridiculous grading. Elise has also been busy with play rehearsals after school every day and preparing to become a 14 year old almost-woman the end of this week. Oh, and she got bangs!

I just made her pose for this pic, even though she didn't want to. But this post needed her smiling face, and I also needed the opportunity to type, "She bangs! She bangs!' (In our old ward, there was a middle aged woman with the last name Vang, and Forrest would always sing "She Vangs, she Vangs!" under his breath when she'd walk by, just to try and make me crack up. It still makes me crack up, just thinking about it, actually.)

Along with Ethan's busy school schedule, he's been speeching it up. He's placed a few times, most recently earning second place in creative expression. Here he is wearing a stoic expression, holding his medal:

Creative expressionist by day, hit man by night

And just for kicks, here's a commercial he made for his English class. He said the "Thanks, Obama" line got the most laughs:

Jonas has been busy too. His Battle of the Books team from last year reunited: Revenge of the Nerd Herd was a force to be reckoned with, but a group of 5th grade girls barely edged them out for the class championship.

Only socially confident children can nerd it up so unselfconsciously

The traditional nerd herd pyramid

You can't see the poster very well -- I should have taken a picture -- but it included flying sea turtles.

He had a pretty good time on his academic triathlon team, too, even though they got handily trounced by the 6th grade teams they were required to compete against:

My only Academic Triathlon picture. Not very compelling, I realize, but it's better than nothing!

And Wyatt's just been hanging with his mom, chillin' like a 5 year old. The other day he took my camera and went around the house, taking pictures of whatever piqued his interest. So here's a photo essay, by Wyatt Dean:

Look at the proportions! A truly symmetrical shot.

Wyatt's meditations on the jarring juxtaposition of "play life" with "adult spaces" in the 5-year-old universe

This particular shot says something about the human condition, I'm sure of it.

Actually kind of pretty

And a little haunting, wouldn't you say?

Then he turns the camera sideways and takes a blurry picture of his mother.

So I took one of him:

What a kid! And a great way to end this post. We have a bunch o birthdays and a fun trip coming up, so stay tuned. For at least 2-4 weeks. :-)

Goings On

I'll be darned if I can come up with a good title for this post, since I don't have an organizing principle for it. Mainly I just need to catch up on our goings on. That's what I'll call it. Goings On. Which reminds me . . . do you watch Downton Abbey? I know mom does. Anybody else out there? Oh, it's so much fun. So sad the season is over -- it was fun to shoo the kids to bed by 9:00 on Sunday nights and watch my DVRed Brits in blissful peace. And aren't these paper dolls a riot? Ah, the things one can find on the Internet. What did we do without it, truly?

Not a lot of earth shattering news at the Hallstrom house of late, although Jonas did get contacts. That's kind of a big deal, no? Just look at those baby blues, all unfettered:

The lady at Target Optical said Jonas was one of the quickest students of contact lens application that she's ever worked with. "Quicker than most grown men!" she said. After fifteen minutes he had it down, and he's been totally responsible for his contacts without needing any help or guidance from me ever since. I think he's enjoying not having to push his glasses up the bridge of his nose hundreds of times a day.

I also got to go see Wyatt's "Grandparents Day" performance. I was among the cadre of parents-standing-in-for-Grandparents. It was mostly the Mormons who were grandparentless -- every last one of us a transplant from the west. Although our bishop's wife did come and stood in as a surrogate grandma, which was SO incredibly nice. (Speaking of bishops: I had a dream last night that Forrest was called as the bishop and nobody even told me. They just called his name and he stood up, all smiley and content. I woke up in a panic. Did you know that George Albert Smith was called to be an apostle at General Conference and didn't even know it? He wasn't even there. He was taking his kids to the fair and got home and a bunch of people were on his front lawn, informing him of the matter. How the Church changes over time.)

ANYWAY . . . here are some cute pictures of my Wy-Diggity, for those grandparents who weren't able to make it:

During this particular song they had to stick their tongues out and wiggle their bottoms, much to the chagrin of one of Wyatt's friends who's very shy -- she ran off the stage in dismay.

Instruments!

This one's a little fuzzy, but I love how happy he looks. And his cute little exposed belly. (Wyatt has the best belly.)

I would have taken video but, alas, my phone didn't have enough battery. I know, I know. Why does that always happen? It's like a conspiracy.

And now I've got to get busy really writing. Now that "Field Walking" has a home, I'm rededicating myself to my oft-abandoned YA novel. Wish me luck.

Hoary!

"Hoar" is one of those words we don't use in modern American English very often. (At least, not H-O-A-R hoar.) But in a strange coincidence, the very same weekend I was studying 1st Kings for seminary and came upon this verse:

1 Kings 2:6 "Do therefore according to thy wisdom, and let not his hoar head go down to the grave in peace." [For those of you who are interested, this is David, on his deathbed, speaking to his son Solomon, asking him to exact vengeance upon the hoar(y?) head of Joab, his former military commander who betrayed him.]

Anyway, that very same weekend we had one of these:

Who doesn't like a good hoar frost? It happens when fog gets frozen in the night and there's no wind to blow the frozen crystals off of the trees. Isn't it beautiful?

A hoary weekend indeed!

And with no relation to hoariness of any kind, Jonas performed in his school's play on Saturday and did a great job. He was a "cool cat," and I went to the play assuming that he would be an ACTUAL cat who was also cool. But no. He was just a cool kid from the 50s. Aha!

Pictures weren't allowed during the performance, but I snapped some at the very end as they were giving flowers to the directors:

Jonas is in the red, on the far right. Such a cool cat.

He got his very own pair of sunglasses.

Doesn't he look cute with his hair slicked back? I mean, doesn't he look "cool"?

 In other news, Wyatt is mostly asking me dozens of questions every day.  Here are some examples:

-How do they make the stoplights turn red at the right time?
-If God has a body, is he bigger than Dad? Or just bigger than Ethan?
-What is the name of the biggest toad in the world?
-What do bullies look like?
-(Pointing at the crosswalk.) If we don't have one of these by our house then how can we cross the street?
-Why do we have to be babies before we can be people?

Important points to ponder, all. I finally gave up trying to explain how stoplights work because, frankly, I'm not sure. And who knows? Maybe God is 5'11". Something to think about.

I Am Not Concerned About the Very Poor

Actually, I am concerned about the very poor, but there's something about that line, right? It just makes you want to click on it. I'm guessing that the day after the Florida primary there were some Romney staffers who just put their heads down on their desks and moaned in the way that Billy Crystal moaned when he was on the phone all depressed with Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally. Remember that scene? "Will you be able to sleep?" "If not, I'll be okay." "What will you do?" "I'll just stay up and moan. [Moan, moan, moan.]"

Anyway! Enough about politics and timeless 80s movies. (But I just have to say . . . isn't it weird that I'm older than both the Harry character and the Sally character at their OLDEST in that film?)

So here's what's going on at our house, in age order:

FORREST is currently sitting beside me playing Angry Birds on my Kindle. He's a little obsessed. It's cute. He's not much of a gamer at all (and real "gamers," I realize, would not call playing Angry Birds something that qualifies you to BE a gamer) . . . but anyway, it's cute. He's been doing strength training, which is more handsome than cute, in that "Hey, look at those new muscles, hon!" kind of way. We haven't had enough snow for him to go cross country skiing at all. He made a really yummy baked potato soup tonight for dinner.

ME, Angela (Angie, Ang, Mom, Mother, Sister Hallstrom, Hey Lady), well I have a couple of fun things to report. One is that Dialogue is going to publish my story, "Field Walking," this summer, which makes me very happy. Another is that a former professor at Hamline, Sheila (who is actually more than just a former professor -- she's been a wonderful mentor and example) asked me to sub for her in April in her point of view class. I wrote my first draft of "Thanksgiving" in that class and she's had her students read it over the years, so I get to go and talk about it with them and help run a workshop. Should be fun. A little intimidating, but fun.

Also, I got my first shipment of books for my new gig as BYU Studies' literature review editor. Jonas asked, "Do they pay you?" And I said no, and then he said, "But I guess they pay you in books, so that's kind of like paying you." I agree. It was fun to slide the new books into the "Mormon lit" spot on my bookshelf. Actually, the Mormon lit shelf is now officially full. (And I don't even have The Lonely Polygamist on it, since I have it with my "hardback novels" shelf.) (Also, true, I might not be keeping all the books I get, because if I ask someone else to review them then I ship them off. Anyway.):

Yes, I realize that for many of you it's disappointing that there are no pictures of kids, but instead a picture of my bookshelf. It's early February, aaight? Give a girl a break.  But back to the books: in the far right corner you can see a poetry anthology called Fire in the Pasture. I just got it a couple of days ago and it's excellent. So many wonderful poems. (I'll be writing the notice in BYU Studies for that one because I'm keeping that puppy.) Why in the world there aren't more Mormon Lit courses at BYU is beyond me. Dispensation, Fire in the Pasture, The Lonely Polygamist, The Year My Son and I Were Born, Sense of Order and Other Stories, On the Road to Heaven, Hooligan -- the syllabus just writes itself, and the quality of the writing could stand toe to toe with that found in any other lit class. Sometimes I have this little fantasy that if we'd stayed in Utah I could have started teaching it at the SL Center (I'd already started asking around). But we'll not go there. Anyway, I hope Mo Lit courses can be taken more seriously, and offered more regularly, at BYU Provo. I know they're doing a pretty good job of it at BYU Idaho.

ETHAN has started to get scads of college recruitment mail because he took the PSAT and rocked it. (It actually was a "P"PSAT for Ethan, since it doens't count until your Junior year and he was only taking it for practice.) I remember getting recruitment mail in high school from places like Bryn Mawr and even though it seemed completely outside the realm of possibility that I would actually GO to Bryn Mawr, it was cool they were sending me mail. Also, he took 3rd place in varsity creative expression at last week's speech meet, which is very cool considering how many students were competing and how new Ethan is to the category. He has a very handsome eagle trophy show for it.

ELISE is in the ensemble of Lake Middle School's musical, Honk Jr. At first she was a touch disappointed that she didn't get a speaking part, but now she's really enjoying herself. The ensemble is in lots of scenes and the songs are fun. She also told me this afternoon that she has to "flirt in slow motion" with the boy lead in one scene. "It's hard enough to flirt," she said. "Try it in slow motion!" Very true.

JONAS is playing a "cool cat" in his school's production of Cinderella: A 50s Version. They do it all in one week, staying after school till 8:00 p.m. every day until Saturday, when they perform it. It's his first play and he seems to be having fun. Looks as if the Hallstrom family is going thespian.

WYATT completely skipped over "eel" in swimming lessons and is now doing the more advanced "ray" class. He could swim all day. He's also really, really focused on asking questions right now. I can't even listen to NPR in the car any more. "Hey, Mom -- Why those guys in Egypt so mad?" "Hey Mom, how come everybody keeps talking about Primary?" (Perhaps if Newt Gingrich had GONE to Primary he'd be a little less Gingrichy. Just sayin.)


And now I need to turn the laptop over to Elise so she can study for her science test. Do YOU know the difference between foliated and non-foliated metamorphic rocks? Me neither, but Elise does.

Happy Birthday Wy Diggidy

Wyatt Dean turned 5 on Saturday. Unbelievable! I remember talking with my mom when he was born, telling ourselves that in 5 years all my kids would be in school and my mom could retire. It seemed so far away. And wouldn't you know it? Time marched on as time does, and now my baby's a kid. And my mom's still working. (But not for long, right Mama!?!?! :-)

The family celebrated on Friday night by heading over to the Water Park of America (billed as the world's biggest indoor waterpark, but I'm not sure how they were measuring. By volume? The ceilings were high and all, but I've seen bigger indoor waterparks in my day. Maybe they excluded all indoor/outdoor waterparks? It is a mystery). Wyatt loves swimming and had a ball. The rest of the family did as well. Although I will say: parents, do you not have ANY opinions about the swimsuits your daughters wear? There are two piece swimsuits, I understand that, but then there are teeny tiny bikinis that serve no purpose other than 1. to objectify a pretty girl and 2. make a girl without a perfect body uncomfortable. My favorite girl of the night was a very attractive blond who didn't look any more that 15. She had a scriptural tattoo on her back (reference and all). 1 John 4:18, "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear." Classic.

But back to Wyatt's birthday! Wyatt asked for a Nerf battle axe for his birthday, and because he is the last child and I am a pushover, I acquiesced. The maniacal gleam in his eye does. not. worry. me.

I also got him a remote control car, since just giving him a battle axe seemed wrong somehow:

He also requested a chocolate cake with white frosting and strawberries. An excellent choice, and very mature!

(I didn't realize until it came time to light the candles that I only had ONE candle left. Luckily there was the one. Bad mom, yes, but he didn't seem to mind.)

We wish we could have had a big family bash like the days of yore, but Forrest did take a video of the single-candle-blowing-out. At least we can all be virtually together:



Happy birthday my boy! We love you.