Junglepixiebelize - Recollections of a Gringa Pioneer
Nancy R Koerner - Copyright@2021 - All Rights Reserved
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CHAPTER THREE
"East of Haulover "
To this day, I cannot tell you where we parked our old brukdong van that night. Might have been on the side of the road near Airport Camp, north of the city, maybe somewhere near the old Barracks. How would we know? Proximity and relevance go hand-in-hand, and we had neither. Again, these early days remain surreal in my mind. Yet, this day, in particular, I would experience a shocking, jolting cacophony of all five senses.
And here, I insert a disclaimer: I mean no disrespect, or impropriety, as I honor all Belizean people, and specifically, the people of Belize City. |
I only ask that the remember I was a foreigner, with no frame of reference, whatsoever, for what I was about to behold. These are impressions from memory, and they document observations from my own narrow gringa perspective.
Belize City was the ultimate paradox. This was Central America. We knew it was an English-speaking country, but we had still expected some level of Latin flavor. Instead, it was…what?
The people. A full spectrum of skin colors, ranging from the palest tan to darkest coffee, I could see the blended features of African, Mexican, East Indian, British, Mediterranean, Mestizo, and Mayan people. In the U.S., we consider ourselves a melting pot, but still a largely-white melting pot, mostly created from the blending of nationalities, rather than the greater scale of race. I had never seen such a variety of diverse color in one small place. And, since that time, I still opine that there is no such thing as a typical native Belizean.
The houses. The houses were wood frame, and tightly packed, many with sagging roofs or lurching walls, a hodge-podge of chaotic deconstruction, as though they had been built and rebuilt on-top-of and beside-each-other a for few hundred years. Because, in truth, they had. Odd walls with underlayers of old clapboard, now half-covered with abandoned attempts at siding. Ragged partial fences of old broken pickets separated some of the close-quartered houses. Dutch-doors, half-open, their lower halves stained with the handprints of ten-thousand little children, and the dark-skinned children themselves on the steps below, with even darker eyes, looking in wonder at the small white baby with corn-colored hair, who stared back at them through the passenger window. Large wooden cisterns, banded by iron, for collecting rainwater stood beside some of the houses, the vats so old that they might have salvaged from pirate ships, or wrecks on the reefs. Walls of concrete buildings, once painted white up near the roofs, descended into a moldering green color as they reached ground level. Due to the inescapable humidity held captive between dwellings, the green of these walls turned to dark gray, where they were routinely targeted by the cocked hind-legs of scrawny free-wheeling potlicker dogs.
The streets. The streets were narrow, only a single lane wide, or a lane-and-a-half, at best. Since the architecture went straight up, two and three stories, they were more like corridors, the human population funneled and squeezed into too-small spaces. On either side of the main streets, there were skinny sidewalks that competed for space with dangerous uncovered concrete culverts, about 10" square deep and wide, ostensibly to divert rainwater, but thick with a dark pasty goo that dated back to who-knew-when, and defied artistic description. No. I was not offended, nor did I judge. I merely looked on with interest and an open mind. This was, after all, urban life in another culture. I had not come here for same-ness.
The food. We didn’t know where we were headed, or how to get out of the city, even if we did. We were thoroughly lost within the circuitous maze of constricted streets that were most certainly one-way but bore no signs. We were also hungry as hell. Especially me, as I was still the very productive nursing mother of a voracious nine-month-old baby. Procuring food had been tricky coming through Mexico, and now still there was no sign of any kind of shop that could be called a grocery or convenience store. They were simply non-existent in this part of the world.
Then I smelled something wonderful, and salivated. A little wooden kiosk on Queen Street was selling food. Fried food. (Hmm…I thought…little fried anythings.) Seriously, I didn’t care. A dark-skinned man used tongs to fetch a half-dozen, very large, doughy, fried puff-balls out of boiling oil, and passed them to me on a piece of newspaper, saying something that sounded like *konks-flittahs fu six-dollah-BH.* Having no idea of the price quoted, let alone whatever this was that I was determined to eat, regardless, I gave him a U.S. five-dollar bill and hoped it was enough. I smiled my thanks, handed my husband his share, and then set-to stuffing my mouth with alacrity. Absolutely delicious. It was then, retroactively, that I figured out what the man had said. To this day, they were still the best conch fritters I ever ate.
Belize City was the ultimate paradox. This was Central America. We knew it was an English-speaking country, but we had still expected some level of Latin flavor. Instead, it was…what?
The people. A full spectrum of skin colors, ranging from the palest tan to darkest coffee, I could see the blended features of African, Mexican, East Indian, British, Mediterranean, Mestizo, and Mayan people. In the U.S., we consider ourselves a melting pot, but still a largely-white melting pot, mostly created from the blending of nationalities, rather than the greater scale of race. I had never seen such a variety of diverse color in one small place. And, since that time, I still opine that there is no such thing as a typical native Belizean.
The houses. The houses were wood frame, and tightly packed, many with sagging roofs or lurching walls, a hodge-podge of chaotic deconstruction, as though they had been built and rebuilt on-top-of and beside-each-other a for few hundred years. Because, in truth, they had. Odd walls with underlayers of old clapboard, now half-covered with abandoned attempts at siding. Ragged partial fences of old broken pickets separated some of the close-quartered houses. Dutch-doors, half-open, their lower halves stained with the handprints of ten-thousand little children, and the dark-skinned children themselves on the steps below, with even darker eyes, looking in wonder at the small white baby with corn-colored hair, who stared back at them through the passenger window. Large wooden cisterns, banded by iron, for collecting rainwater stood beside some of the houses, the vats so old that they might have salvaged from pirate ships, or wrecks on the reefs. Walls of concrete buildings, once painted white up near the roofs, descended into a moldering green color as they reached ground level. Due to the inescapable humidity held captive between dwellings, the green of these walls turned to dark gray, where they were routinely targeted by the cocked hind-legs of scrawny free-wheeling potlicker dogs.
The streets. The streets were narrow, only a single lane wide, or a lane-and-a-half, at best. Since the architecture went straight up, two and three stories, they were more like corridors, the human population funneled and squeezed into too-small spaces. On either side of the main streets, there were skinny sidewalks that competed for space with dangerous uncovered concrete culverts, about 10" square deep and wide, ostensibly to divert rainwater, but thick with a dark pasty goo that dated back to who-knew-when, and defied artistic description. No. I was not offended, nor did I judge. I merely looked on with interest and an open mind. This was, after all, urban life in another culture. I had not come here for same-ness.
The food. We didn’t know where we were headed, or how to get out of the city, even if we did. We were thoroughly lost within the circuitous maze of constricted streets that were most certainly one-way but bore no signs. We were also hungry as hell. Especially me, as I was still the very productive nursing mother of a voracious nine-month-old baby. Procuring food had been tricky coming through Mexico, and now still there was no sign of any kind of shop that could be called a grocery or convenience store. They were simply non-existent in this part of the world.
Then I smelled something wonderful, and salivated. A little wooden kiosk on Queen Street was selling food. Fried food. (Hmm…I thought…little fried anythings.) Seriously, I didn’t care. A dark-skinned man used tongs to fetch a half-dozen, very large, doughy, fried puff-balls out of boiling oil, and passed them to me on a piece of newspaper, saying something that sounded like *konks-flittahs fu six-dollah-BH.* Having no idea of the price quoted, let alone whatever this was that I was determined to eat, regardless, I gave him a U.S. five-dollar bill and hoped it was enough. I smiled my thanks, handed my husband his share, and then set-to stuffing my mouth with alacrity. Absolutely delicious. It was then, retroactively, that I figured out what the man had said. To this day, they were still the best conch fritters I ever ate.