Getting it

Each day there seems to be at least one new discovery, but more often than not, there have got to be more like ten. My last post had a lot to do with some of the new discoveries in our backyard. To be honest, I had thought we'd have sucked this place dry of discoveries in the agriculture department. It turns out there was one (at minimum) place we hadn't sucked yet. We have sugar cane right in front of our face and we had no idea. It was not until our landlord (proxy) offered a couple stocks she'd cut to us that we even realized it. She found it pretty amusing that we didn't know. To eat sugar cane you need a good knife. Our stocks were about 2ft in length and we thought we'd try something a bit smaller. After a solid ten minutes of hacking, I finally got us down to a more manageable size—and then I had to peel the skin. I resorted to YouTube here. Sometimes you get good how-to videos; other times you get baby monkeys riding a pig. In our online search we found out that sugar cane in the Caribbean was a lot like cotton in the days of slavery. Slavery is a big part of Grenadian history and most of the inhabitants are descendants of slaves that would have worked on the sugar plantations here. Having this sugar cane now really makes us appreciate where and when we come from. I did find videos on peeling sugar cane though. Many people use their teeth where I was having a heck of a time with our largest knife. To make a long story short, I got it skinned. To eat it, you just take a bite of the stock, chew it, suck it dry of its yumminess, and spit it out. It's not a snack for someone who is hungry; in fact, it is quite the opposite. It's very delicious but unsatisfying for the stomach that anxiously awaits food.

There are a lot of stray dogs that need food here. But as it turns out, most of the stray dogs here are actually owned dogs that freely roam. SGU has a program to help owners in need. They have their dogs fully checked out and spayed or neutered for free. Actually, the only exchange is that they MUST have their dogs spayed or neutered by SGU students. The program is called Pothounds Against Pregnancy. There are enough unspayed and unneutered dogs that every Sunday they pick up at least 15 or 16 dogs. They accept volunteers to come with them on these trips and help collect the dogs from owners; this past Sunday we went for a ride. The benefits were three-fold. We got to see some new parts of the island; we got to help out some dogs; and PAP got some help. Our destination was Morne Jaloux (its supposed meaning in French is Jealous Mountain. We're unsure where the word mountain is though…). There were a couple old forts up there. It makes a lot of sense because there was a fantastic view. We also met a lot of dogs in sad shape. Dogs here are treated quite differently than what we are used to in North America. In a word, I would say they are utilitarian. You can tell by the dictators' names one owner dubbed his canines. The names we give things tend to say a lot more about ourselves than the thing we name. On our trip we met a cute Mussolini, a splendid Hitler, and even a likable Bush. One fellow, who was apparently not an owner of any of the dogs we picked up, was fairly adamant that we could experiment on Hitler because "Hitler can't die. He's been poisoned so many times". To be honest, everyone around thought this guy was an idiot and I am inclined to agree. Along the way we gave flea and deworming medication to quite a number of different animals that weren't coming with us. It was great to be a part of something that is helping the community and animals alike. Everyone was pretty interested and pretty happy to see us, including this little guy:

Puppy

Back at home base I've got a new friend. He comes every day at around one or two in the afternoon for lunch. And every day I chase him down with my camera trying to get a good shot. So far, this is the best I've got:

Dine

Dash

Also back at home base, the frog saga continues. We now know there are three main kinds of frogs in Grenada; none of them are poisonous; and we can apparently discern which kind is which by their individual chirps; we have done so listening to the outdoor frogs through our window at night. I found our indoor amphibian buddy relaxing poolside on our tub the other night. This is the first I have ever seen him outside of the confines of under the bathtub. He's about the size of the end of my pinky. I told miss frog-hunter and she came rushing in with the duct tape. We closed the bathroom door and sealed the place off. I had a small Tupperware container and she had a wooden spoon that she gently used to prod the frog in the direction we needed him. By the way, frogs tend to jump in whatever direction they want as we discovered. He eventually ended up right behind the faucets of the bathtub. This is a very precarious position for us because of the awkward tiny space. She managed to inch him out and I was at the ready with my temporary holding pen waiting for a flat surface to cup him on. He got to the wall of the tub where we very suddenly noticed the one hole we neglected to duct tape. We scrambled, and before we knew it, he had slipped betwixt the cracks and was off chirping on his merry way. We've since tried coaxing him out with a very tempting frog pond, but he doesn't seem very interested. Our next best bet might be to bring in a fake froggy female friend. I think he likes the talkative type though.

We spent a couple hours at Grand Anse on the weekend. We have yet to bring our snorkel gear, but are looking forward to it. I can't say enough great things about the beach here. Every time you are there the sea seems to marble differently depending on the time of day. I think it's the kind of place that is breath-taking every time you see it. There are some resident beach bums, naturally. We always see some guys playing some sort of Ping-Pong without a table or net. There are also some artisans that traverse the surf and offer their hand-crafted trinkets. The frog-hunter considers us locals now, so she figures they should stop asking us soon. I'm pretty sure they'll ask us every time we are there for the entire length of our stay in Grenada.