II –HAITI
Maybe this world is another planet’s Hell.
-Aldous Huxley
1982 wasn’t a bad year for me. I’d been working part time in the teaching profession and I wasn’t struggling financially. I’d been fortunate enough to appear on a national quiz show on which I managed to remain champion for a week, garnering lots of bounty along the way - how many washing machines and canteens of stainless-steel cutlery can one have? Another of these treasures was a cruise for two to the South Pacific islands of Vanuatu, Tonga and Fiji. Debbie and I had just moved in together so it would have been rather injudicious if I didn’t ask her to join me for those two weeks. Not that I had anyone else in mind. Well, not really.
So off we cruised, along with probably another 1000 or so intrepid travellers, for our two-week adventure. Adventure and intrepid indeed. They’re just two words that one should never associate with such vacations. Alcohol and vapidness would be more apt.
It was a soulless experience, the fine dining, the mindless entertainment, the colourless days on the high seas. We called into, maybe, half a dozen ports where I took photos to remind myself of the experience. I really needn’t have bothered. On returning and having my slides developed (remember slides and slide nights?), one could have shuffled the entire collection of 200 or so and I wouldn’t have had a clue which belonged to which island. It’s probably analogous to visiting different countries and staying in hotel chains; they all look alike. We left the enchanted isles without tasting the culture or the history of these destinations and feeling like real tourists.
I remember saying to Debbie “shoot me if I ever go on another cruise.” Fast forward to 1988 and load the ammunition. I must have been fitted with a cerebral bypass because, lo and behold, off we were on another. I’d seen an ad in one of the local rags for a two-to-three-week cruise through the Caribbean. And because the Aussie dollar was sitting comfortably at US$1.20, we paid a pittance for a trip that would begin in San Juan and wander through the Caribbean visiting many islands and countriesen route to Venezuela before returning to San Juan.
We could’ve saved the air fare and done another South Pacific cruise. We were deposited, daily, at various ports, and wandered around the tourist spots for a co
