Pixie in Paradise

My dear friend/editor/surrogate dad/advisor/life coach Dr. Max says I should be an anthropologist. Let me start by saying I am grossly underqualified for that but it would have been a very interesting, and most likely fulfilling, profession. All I’m doing – which led to his statement – is observing humans around me. I’ve been doing this since birth like the rest of you but maybe through my lens he sees something a little extra. Whatever that extra component is, is what I’ve used to stay safe while independent and on my own – by choice – at a very young age. This gift for studying humans has kept me safe up until now because I’ve learned to sum up situations based on human behaviors, movements, speech patterns and word context in a short amount of time, to assess if I am safe or if I need to set a boundary. Sometimes I ignore the red flags for whatever reason and this is also not a foolproof process, but I’m grateful for the knowledge and intuition that allows me to quickly sum up situations. The skill was honed more and helped immensely when I was a health care worker for 15 years.

The easiest way for observation is obviously through sight. Being in the same room with someone or on a video call where you can see facial movements can really betray someone’s intentions. A phone call is good because you can hear vocal tones and nuances. Reading a text message is the hardest but even seeing someone’s construction of words, context, sentences, proper or improper grammar, clues me in at least 80% of the time as to who I might be dealing with.

People are interesting and I feverishly study their behavior but they also irritate the shit out of me so I’m not sure how effective an anthropologist I’d be. I’ve spoken with a lot of tourists from the U.S. and elsewhere in the last few days and we exchanged our stories. They seem so interested in how I came to be here, what I’m doing here, what my plans are. So far this week they’ve all assumed I live on this island in Belize, which of course is correct, but I wonder sometimes how they know. Maybe it’s the same way I can tell someone isn’t Belizean but probably lives here too: they don’t have wide eyes or their heads on a swivel. Their camera isn’t out taking photos, though for the record I still love taking photos and am always on the lookout for impromptu wildlife videos for my sweet cousin Owen who is 13, but already seems to have a Masters degree in Saurology (Lizard-ology). 

I’m also finally tan enough to look local. I mean, comparatively speaking. I showed up to Belize looking like a white ghost and now I’m beige enough to look like one of those pop-open containers of white biscuits who’ve been in the oven for precisely seven and a half minutes: still a teeny bit white in the middle but on the outside headed toward golden. There’s probably a different look in my eyes too. I’ve seen that look in other “foreign locals.” Thanks to an extra layer of bullshit we haven’t even begun to unpack yet, I’ve had to smile less, smile only at certain people, hide my friendly side at times in order to be guarded and protected from catcalling, local men and situations I very much want to avoid. I’ve never been in danger – that I know of – and always walk around strong, back straight, as if daring someone to try to start shit with me. You know, all 115 pounds of feisty – “spice girl”, as Rasta says. I’m always grateful for the RBF – resting bitch face – I seem to have inherited from my dad. Unless we’re smiling at you, our faces with no expression are just too intense for most people. I think it’s partly due to a lot of different thoughts going through my head all at once but it’s also my “don’t mess with me face.” Not sure where I learned or perfected it but glad it’s there. Either way we will have to unpack some of the differences in culture that I’ve seen already at a later date. 

While I was sitting and speaking to maybe the fifth tourist of the day the plantain man came around again. He is a diminutive weather-worn Belizean man appearing to be of Mayan descent, who sells delicious bags of fried plantain chips, two bags for $5 BZD. He comes to the cafe I sit at regularly to sell his goods to patrons sitting outside on the picnic tables, and I frequently buy from him. His plátanos fritas are packaged nicely, mechanically sealed even. Whether or not they were placed into the bag with bare, dirty hands remains to be seen, but I’d rather not know. It’s better that way. They’re delicious, haven’t bothered my delicate stomach yet and go great with homemade guacamole. To recap: I am now sitting at the oceanside cafe five days a week or more, DahRoot the fruit vendor comes by and sells me fruits, veggies and doles out his brand of Rastafarian metaphysical life lessons trying to get me closer to enlightenment, and a nice old man sells plantain chips. What more could I want? The snacks come to me. This doesn’t quite make up for the inconvenience and somewhat substandard grocery stores we’ve got but it sure doesn’t hurt.

The wild thing I learned about speaking with the plantain man today is that he actually speaks four languages! We had to switch into two of them to figure this out. In many cultures it’s assumed if someone is fluent in multiple languages that they are affluent or highly educated, or both. That’s usually my line of thinking anyway. Here this man was, trying to survive during these extremely hot, humid days walking around the whole island trying to get tourists to buy small bags of chips for a very small price. I doubt he takes home much money and if he doesn’t live on my island and takes a water taxi back and forth to come here, a lot of his profits are eaten up by the purchase of transportation. I always wonder if they factor that in or if their math skills don’t even allow them to compute that. The truth is, I’ve seen a lot more people in Belize versus back home, who haven’t finished high school. I’m not belittling or being derogatory, I’m honestly wondering if the street vendors are in the situation they are in partly due to lack of education which cuts their opportunities down that much further in a developing country that already has few opportunities for any success or advancement. (”Developing country” is the term we are supposed to use now instead of saying the antiquated, “third world country” phrase, but the definition still pretty much fits).

Typically I speak my basic Spanish with him because he seems to understand it better than English. Today I was sitting and speaking with tourists, telling them to buy his chips because they’re delicious and trying to drum up extra business for him. He recognized me and got a big smile – he did this yesterday too when I was sitting there with my hand already in a bag of his chips I’d purchased a few days before. It was a huge joyful grin as he raised his small fist in the air signaling victory, that he had converted one more plantain chip fan. Somehow we started having a conversation in Spanish with a bit of English and he asked me in Spanish something about how I learned the language. I think. I answered him and apparently my response was sufficient for him to launch into some pretty fast dialogue in what I assumed was his native tongue, and I did a pretty good job of keeping up! By the end he had told me and the woman I was sitting with that he could speak Mayan, Spanish, Creole (Kriol, Belizean) and English. The amount of brain power those four languages must have taken to learn just floors me. While they’re all sort of Latin-based languages – I think – they run a large spectrum of rules. I mean, the Creole alone!

I don’t actually know this man’s background but I have to assume his life has been rough. In addition to selling plantain chips along with his wife who pushes the cart, he occasionally gets out a medical letter of recommendation claiming his wife needs treatment for diabetes but he has also told me on two separate occasions she needs hernia surgery. (I know what you’re thinking – if my Spanish fluency isn’t advanced how did I understand a hernia conversation? Medical Spanish, years of trying to ask patients to pee in a cup for nurses and tell them I’m going to stick them with a needle, and to “hold the fuck still”).

As usual I’ve had to make some quick snap judgments about human behavior here to try and figure out who is after what from me. In this case the plantain man is trying to survive and so am I, and each wanting to do so morally and peacefully without harm to others. I guess this statement last night from one of my best girlfriends was pretty accurate, describing me. She sent it while we were talking about everything and nothing:

“I never met a more judgy suspicious friendly person.” My first thought was, “What a bitch.” Twenty seconds later I’m like, “She’s probably not wrong.”