We have been anchored at Black Point on Great Guana Cay for over a week. A large Atlantic high has produced strong east to southeast trade winds from which we have been well protected in the harbour here.
Black Point, with about 250 permanent residents, is the second largest settlement in the Exumas. Although it has somewhat of a mixed reputation, we have thoroughly enjoyed our time here. Although certainly not prosperous, from an American perspective, the houses are nicer and better kept than in several of the other non-tourist settlements we have visited.
The thing we personally like when we travel is to meet people from different cultures and heritages. While we enjoy meeting other cruisers, for the most part their backgrounds and heritages are not different than ours. The Bahamians, on the other hand, are fascinating to get to know. Bahamians are 90% of African slave heritage with the remaining dominant culture British loyalists. In many places there is a lot of mixing of the two. In Bimini, for example, many of the residents are quite dark, but speak frequently about their Scottish heritage. At the Anglican church in Bimini one of the lay priests engaged Joyce about her facial features and asked if she was Scotch - she is English and Welsh, but close enough. He had quite African features, but talked about his Scottish heritage and joked that his daughter was whiter than Joyce. In Black Point, many of the residents have the last name of Rolle, which is the name of the British Loyalist that was granted land in this area. It was common, both before and after emancipation for slaves to adopt their master's name.
But back to Black Point. In general the people have been very friendly and in particular we have gotten to know the extended family of Paymon Rolle. Paymon is a delightful and fascinating Bahamian woman. We have been very impressed, that in spite of relatively limited economic opportunity, they work incredibly hard to make a living, but also one gets a sense that it is not just about the money, but that they are sincerely interested in helping people. The other striking thing is their strong sense of family.
Paymon is the matriarch of the family. She has had 10 children, most of whom now live off island. She is a master baker and bakes almost every day supplying bread to visiting cruisers. Her speciality is Bahamian coconut bread which contains an inner layer of cooked and sweetened coconut. We pretty much assumed that the coconut came from a can, but as we talked to her more we found that she starts with whole coconuts, from which she extracts the meat, combines it with sugar and some seasoning, and then cooks and cools it before using it in the baking process. She also does laundry, although she is cutting back on that these days.
But as we visited Paymon, we kept meeting different young people at her house. There was her young great granddaughter that she babysits almost every day. But there was also Joshua, her 3 year old grandson (more on him later); 'LG' her 10 year old grandson who is living with her, so he can go to primary school here, rather than Nassau where his mother works and lives; Princeton, her youngest son visiting from Nassau and helping her with her bread sales; and several other young people that we have not quite figured out their relationship, but seem to be quite at home at her house or her daughter Lorraine's cafe.
Paymon is a deaconess at the Gethsemane Baptist Church which we attended this last Sunday. She handles a lot of the 'administration' of the church, led the service this Sunday, and frequently preaches. We enjoyed the lively service and are getting better about the extended 'meet and greet' in Bahamian churches where it seems you MUST greet and hug EVERY other person in attendance.
Paymon's daughter, Lorraine along with her husband Uriah run Lorraine's Cafe - a restaurant, internet cafe, and local hangout. The food is great, but what is unique is the way they strive to make everyone feel at home. From the serve-yourself beverages, to the internet access available with only a suggested donation, and the home cooked food, it is a place where you can almost forget to pay, because it feels so comfortable. Uriah tends to be mostly 'behind the scenes', but we got to talk to him on Sunday after church as he 'held down the fort' until Lorraine returned from church. He talked about how they will not deny people food or internet access if they cannot pay. They ask them to send them payment when they can. While in no way am I suggesting that they don't make a decent living with the restaurant (by island standards), I really do believe that it goes beyond money - that they do it to be of service.
Joshua is Lorraine and Uriah's 3 year old son. He is outgoing and smart as a whip. I cannot believe his computer/electronic device skills at 3 years old. He was using the mousepad on my laptop like a pro. He is drawn to any computer, phone or electronic device like a magnet. He took the following picture of his mother and grandmother with Joyce's phone.
I could go on about several other members of the family, but I hope you get the picture.
As we have walked around the north end of Great Guana, we have been surprised how hilly and rugged it is. We expected all Bahamian islands to be flat, but that clearly is not true.
On one walk down the the 'King's Highway', we saw several corn fields shoe-horned into a relatively fertile pieces of land. The Bahamas have limited opportunity for agriculture, but the people use the land as best they can.
We will probably stay here until Wednesday or Thursday of this week, when we will head north a bit - back to Cambridge Cay and then Staniel Cay.
Tom
Black Point, Exuma
Map
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