adventures in st. kitts: WHEW!

This was such a week of highs and lows. Long story short: I passed all my first exams (yay!) and bought a car (double yay!). Mal, Debbie and I have been testing driving cars for about a week from other students on campus. We didn't love any of them, so someone recommended a local man named Steve who sells used cars. He had a couple cars in our price range and we wound up buying a silver (aka faded to gray) 1996 Nissan Sunny. It's nothing special and is basically a few steps above a piece of junk by US standards but it runs, has A/C, is automatic, has power windows and locks which actually all work, has a cassette player (for ipods of course), and is a right side drive car. For a St. Kitts used car, it's pretty nice which is pathetic, but it will get us from our apartment to school and that's all that matters.

Getting insurance and transferring over the ownership St. Kitts style was a long and tedious process, but I expected that. Just to have the police officer sign ONE piece of paper took about a half an hour. When we walked into the "station" if you can call it that, it was like a staring contest. No one spoke and we all just stared at eachother. You could hear some prisoners locked up in the back. The officer working there looked like she hated her life and just continued to stare at us. She put out her hand (we had no idea for what) and still didn't speak or smile. Good thing we had Steve with us so he could help us through the process (another reason we got our car from him). Then, insurance took about an hour and consisted of a woman asking us if we were good drivers and if we've gotten into an accident. Yes lady, we are horrible drivers and will probably get into an accident so give us insurance. This was similar to getting a license ... can you drive? Yes. Here's a license made out of paper. Only in St. Kitts. An hour later we were at internal revenue which I'm still not sure why we had to go there or for what purpose. I showed her our car papers and she took some more money from us and we were on our way.

Driving on this island is interesting to say the least. It's weird getting used to the steering wheel on the right and driving on the left. I'm not used to judging the car yet, especially on the left side. Out of the three of us, I have been the driver so far with the help of three of my friends. Sam in the front directing me and explaining the traffic laws, and the girls in the back being two extra sets of eyes and ears. You never know when there's going to be a dip in the road where you can bottom out, a chicken/horse/cow/donkey/sheep/goat/dog running in front of the car, and people and cars basically doing whatever they please. It's a fun experience...

here are some pictures....