Chaguaramas, 25 Feb. 2009

Hi, Doug and Jan and Janna – and hi to everybody else (I think most of you will cope with my English…)

Doug wrote that it is a pity that he cannot read German – you are not alone with this „problem“, and this time, you will be able to read one blog entry at least…
It is Carnival time – well, nearly over, but the Trinis do not care that much about Ash Wednesday, I can still hear „…hands in the air, dance in the air, prance in the air…“ from far away, and there will be a huge final show on Saturday. Yesterday, we went to the „Band Parade“ and the result was that finally we are sure that both of us suffer from that widely known northern german gene deficiency – the Carnival gene is missing. Very strange – every band (literally all of them) played the same tune, which was the above mentioned techno rave-type song. There was only one band – or major group of bands – which caught our interest, Macfarlanes „Africa“, and I was happy to read in the newspaper today that they won the competition, but to be honest, the judges had no choice…

The rest of the parade (from the national anthem at 8 to departure of our bus at 5 in the afternoon!) was nothing but „… hands in the air…“ at deafening loudness +  nicely (un)dressed ladies „whining“ their way through Port of Spain.

As I mentioned – we are northern Germans which means, we do not understand what was happening and if you really want to know you must ask somebody else…

So we are back to everyday life aboard AKKA – Andreas diving in the engine compartment for a leakage on the hot water reservoir –  and part of this life are the Frigate birds above our heads and the pelicans around us.  Which leads to the „make them smile“ part of this entry.

The photograph is for Doug, as the other two are just in the middle of it all, but the following limerick is dedicated to the three of you,  Jan, Doug and Janna. An old school mate sent it to me recently when I mentioned pelicans and I just pass it on:

A funny bird is the pelican:
His beak holds more than his belican –
He can take in his beak
enough food for a week!
I am darned if I see how the helican!

That’s it for now… I promise: no further entries in English!

Note: it looks as if the internet connection is a bit too slow for the pictures today. Will have to try later!