Tower Of Babel

Good morning folks. Neither Shona nor I are working today so we are going to take it easy. Big feed tonight with family and friends, hopefully outside but the weather doesn’t look too friendly at the moment. We have a new leak in the roof so I’ll get to that after lunch if I can. If not, then some other day.

Lest anyone take that as a backhand against Jamaica - nope, it is just an acknowledgment of the way things are. Everyone could use a little prayer, and I think I’ll say one this morning for the folks in Torrington Park, Jamaica…

I think this one was pretty interesting people. Some other Caribbean people are dissing up us Yardies again… tch, tch, tch… Thanks to Francis for the link. There is more to read over at barbadosfreepress with the actual post, especially in the comments. I personally lke the view expressed by the commenter “The Sexy Geek”.

You know, before I came to Cayman to live, I had never even heard of San Andres!

Since I have been here though, I have met a number of people from there and I have heard a bit about the place. Actually, there are really a couple of islands (San Andres and Providencia) and some cays that make up this archipelago which is part of Columbia. I found it strange that it was a part of Columbia since it was much nearer geographically to Nicaragua, but we can thank the European colonisers and their penchant for fighting each other and taking away the islands from each other for that, I suppose.

Now San Andres seems to be heavily into tourism like Cayman, and it has a tax free status, also like Cayman. I wonder if the cost of living is as high over there too… San Andres has the usual beautiful beaches and there are plenty watersports to get involved in, and apparently the nightlife there is pretty irie! The nightlife in Cayman is nice too, but San Andres has the advantage in that they don’t “lock down the dance” at 3:00am on Friday nights and at 12:00am on Saturdays.

The people who live there speak both English and Spanish, though their English sounds like that of a Jamaican from deep in the rural hinterlands! Its quite patois-laden, but you can definitely understand and be understood by these people.

I guess they are not at the level of Cayman economically, because there are so many of them working here. Still, maybe one of these days I will go there to visit.

No! Contrary to what some of you people with dirty minds might think (yes, I mean Doctor D., R.I. and Trouble), I am not going there to pick up Latina women! Yeah, I have heard that there is some sex tourism going on there, but hey, that stuff goes on back home in Jamaica too, and thats DEFINITELY not all there is to Jamaica, so I am guessing that this is not all there is to San Andres Island either! Plus, I plan to vacation there with Natty! C’mon now! Who takes sand to the beach, right? If I was going there for the women, would I go with Natty? Nah! Of course, this vacation won’t be taking place next week or anything, cos some money haffi run first, but one of these days…

By the way, you know how we have green lizards in Jamaica? They have BLUE lizards in San Andres Island! Very very blue lizards! Check this photo out! I definitely prefer the look of that little blighter to that of our green lizards! Pretty, man! If I was the sort of person to keep lizards as pets, I think I would keep a blue lizard like that one, fer shure!

You know, I have to believe that my favourite colour is blue…

Recently I heard of the liger (cross between a lion and a tiger). I also heard of a donkey-zebra mix, even more recently than I heard of the liger. Tonight I heard of the wholphin, which from the name I gathered to be a cross between a whale and a dolphin! That appears to be what it is indeed! I was awestruck when I heard of this and immediately I googled the term to see what this amazing creature looked like.

Apparently there is only one wholphin in captivity, and that animal recently mated with a regular bottle-nosed dolphin to produce a 3/4 dolphin-1/4 false killer whale mix. Then I asked myself, “Whats a false killer whale? I’ve never heard of one!”. Thats turns out to not be surprising, because its a relatively newly discovered species, it seems it was discovered around the mid 1800’s. Here is a link to a page describing the False Killer Whale and here is a page with some pictures.

Apparently these two species are not that far apart though. Its said that wholphins do occur in nature, and that may be likely since these false killer whales are usually found in large groups swimming together and sometimes, in mixed groups with bottle-nosed dolphins. Who’d have thought?

I wonder whats up with this spate of mixed breed animals, and what exotic mixed animal we’ll hear of next. It seems to me that while some of these animals may occur in the wild, the chances of them reproducing increase a lot when thay are kept in captivity. Its probably not something to be encouraged, IMHO…

“…we are the single surviving species. Our existence is not secure. Just like everything else, we can be extinct too.” - Meave Leakey, of the National Museums of Kenya.

Thanks, Leakey. I will sleep deeply and soundly tonight, courtesy of you.

Call me a Luddite if you will, but don’t you just love how these scientists can discover a piece of a femur of something like a human, or maybe a skull, and after studying that for a bit they can tell you what kind of humanoid creature from the past it was from, what it used to eat, where it used to live, who it slept with and how it behaved? Its so fantastic that its laughable. Ok, it may really have happened like that… or it might NOT! It may well have been totally different!

What I want to know is, how come they locked up Miss Cleo? I’m not done yet! Click the link below to continue reading this post please…
Read more »

Ok, here is something interesting that I came across! I wonder if Trinidad and Tobago has surpassed Jamaica on the ‘tallest building’ front! Check out this picture of the Nicholas Building that I found on the site ‘Through the Lens: Trinidad and Tobago‘. Its a nice photo of a very interesting looking building, go check it out. Its got 21 storeys, and it beats out the Twin Towers, one of which is also pictured on that site (dah one deh ugly doah).

I wonder what the tallest building in Jamaica is? I don’t know if we even have one thats got twenty storeys! When I think of Kingston, the tallest building there is probably the Jamaica Hilton or the Pegasus hotels… you know, those buildings are side by side and I don’t even know which of them is taller… the Pegasus probably is. Next time I drive through New Kingston, I’ll check.

Still, I don’t think that either of them has twenty storeys… Looking around the country, I am not sure either, though its a good bet that the tallest buildings in Jamaica are all hotels, with plenty of them being scattered in Montego Bay and in Ocho Rios, but I have no idea which of them is the tallest! Probably they are not as tall as either the T&T Twin Towers or the Nicholas Bldg, however. Also, I can’t think of one thats as interesting looking as the Nicholas Bldg.

Methinks we need to start building a couple of sky scrapers on the waterfront by Kingston Harbour and even in New Kingston. What do you think?

Hey, if you stop by here and you’re from one of the other islands, ie. not Jamaica and not T&T, tell me about the tallest building in your island nuh? Campfyah, Venezuela counts as Caribbean for this one…

In the course of my daily online exploits, I came across the picture above… the stomach of a nice, slim, young woman, with some smooth, lustrous-looking, glossy black skin. In the middle of her stomach, the young lady sported a very interesting navel ring indeed…

I have always been a fan of the navel ring, and I particularly like the one she is wearing. All you women readers from Jamaica should get one like it, so you too can fly our country’s colours. Possibly if you scour the site where I came across it, you might find out where you can get your hands on these items… The site was a Jamaican Fashion site called “La Pluma Negra“. They also have some nice fashion items that I want to get for my baby to wear… (at home only though… I guess I’m kind of jealous!) There are also some irie pictures of some rather nice looking models…. see one below…
Read more »