Utila, Dialects, and Bad Investments
As Bjorn has already mentioned, the local language is English. It took us three days to figure that out. And here I was thinking my Spanish was much worse than I'd thought.
Yesterday marked Bjorn's first experience with scuba diving. I spent about fifteen minutes with him in the water, taking a ten-dollar refresher course on the essentials (breathe in, breathe out...rinse, lather, repeat), which was enough to clear me on any one of the recreational dives the company offers. I went on two this morning. The sights, unfortunately, were limited, save for a few parrotfish and the occasional askance view of the extremely voluptuous German/Norwegian girl as she changed in and out of her equipment. I avoided her in the water, however, out of fear that the piercings that adorned her head might attract barracuda.
Oh, and a school of bright blue fish managed to swim right through/around me. That, admittedly, was quite beautiful.
Our dive instructor is, in the truest sense of the word, just plain cool. Bjorn bought him a beer last night as a form of reparation for his training mistakes. He regaled us last night for a half hour with stories from his previous jobs, diving or otherwise. I was really excited to learn that he graduated with a degree in medieval history. The most entertaining stories, however, came from his time diving in Thailand ("If you see a good-looking Thai girl...it's a man. They're all men.").
The hotel's kitchen is truly...astounding, given that, so far as I know, no one has gotten sick. (Hell, I'm surprised that the rat that lives inside hasn't gotten sick.) It's even worse than the Beat's kitchen (read through the link. Yes, it's worse). The refrigerator was cleaned out yesterday (roaches were evicted), but it still doesn't quite have the level of chill that I'd normally associate with a freezer...or an air-conditioned room. Or the shade from a lean-to. I've been putting everything in the freezer.
In that very freezer, as a matter of fact, a pineapple awaits me.
Yesterday marked Bjorn's first experience with scuba diving. I spent about fifteen minutes with him in the water, taking a ten-dollar refresher course on the essentials (breathe in, breathe out...rinse, lather, repeat), which was enough to clear me on any one of the recreational dives the company offers. I went on two this morning. The sights, unfortunately, were limited, save for a few parrotfish and the occasional askance view of the extremely voluptuous German/Norwegian girl as she changed in and out of her equipment. I avoided her in the water, however, out of fear that the piercings that adorned her head might attract barracuda.
Oh, and a school of bright blue fish managed to swim right through/around me. That, admittedly, was quite beautiful.
Our dive instructor is, in the truest sense of the word, just plain cool. Bjorn bought him a beer last night as a form of reparation for his training mistakes. He regaled us last night for a half hour with stories from his previous jobs, diving or otherwise. I was really excited to learn that he graduated with a degree in medieval history. The most entertaining stories, however, came from his time diving in Thailand ("If you see a good-looking Thai girl...it's a man. They're all men.").
The hotel's kitchen is truly...astounding, given that, so far as I know, no one has gotten sick. (Hell, I'm surprised that the rat that lives inside hasn't gotten sick.) It's even worse than the Beat's kitchen (read through the link. Yes, it's worse). The refrigerator was cleaned out yesterday (roaches were evicted), but it still doesn't quite have the level of chill that I'd normally associate with a freezer...or an air-conditioned room. Or the shade from a lean-to. I've been putting everything in the freezer.
In that very freezer, as a matter of fact, a pineapple awaits me.
posted by NateWazoo at 12:28 PM
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