I'm going back to find some peace of mind in San Jose [part I]
It was the unspeakably hot afternoon of June 22 when I found myself riding in an airport parking shuttle again, at a different airport, and this time a different driver was speaking a different kind of different language.
"Mon, it hot!" he complained cheerily to the booth bunny as she raised the gate for him to exit the lot. "Tomorrow I want the AC on!"
I was the only passenger on the bus. "You sound like you're from someplace where it gets hotter than this," I opened.
"Am from de Carribean."
I had guessed that. "Which island?"
"Jamaica."
I've been to a few of the islands, but not that one. "So, how hot does it get there?"
"One hunred an fortay," he said. "Dat's Fahrenheit."
"No way!"
"Yes. But there's not the humility like you have here."
"How can humans survive in that?"
"Dey wear clothes, for one. Not like here; the people wear nothing. Down there they know how to dress for the heat."
"And all that rum helps, too, I bet."
"Oh ho!" he laughed, "Dey rum we drink in the island, it's not the rum they send here. We have 200 proof, and one hundred eightay proof. We send the fortay proof to Canada."
"Isn't that always the way?"
"The government, they selling everything. No more factories; selling our water to California."
He must be talking about Canada now, not Jamaica.
"You know what ganga is?" the driver is asking me.
"Of course."
"De Americans, dey don't know dat word. You tell dem you have ganga, and they nod. You show dem, and dey tink it a spice."
I find this hard to believe, but I'm enjoying the story.
"It's go by two names here, marijuana and pot. So if you bring any across you say it's ganga, the Americans won't know."
I know: they have a different word for everything.
I like being the only passenger on the bus.
Continued in part II.
"Mon, it hot!" he complained cheerily to the booth bunny as she raised the gate for him to exit the lot. "Tomorrow I want the AC on!"
I was the only passenger on the bus. "You sound like you're from someplace where it gets hotter than this," I opened.
"Am from de Carribean."
I had guessed that. "Which island?"
"Jamaica."
I've been to a few of the islands, but not that one. "So, how hot does it get there?"
"One hunred an fortay," he said. "Dat's Fahrenheit."
"No way!"
"Yes. But there's not the humility like you have here."
"How can humans survive in that?"
"Dey wear clothes, for one. Not like here; the people wear nothing. Down there they know how to dress for the heat."
"And all that rum helps, too, I bet."
"Oh ho!" he laughed, "Dey rum we drink in the island, it's not the rum they send here. We have 200 proof, and one hundred eightay proof. We send the fortay proof to Canada."
"Isn't that always the way?"
"The government, they selling everything. No more factories; selling our water to California."
He must be talking about Canada now, not Jamaica.
"You know what ganga is?" the driver is asking me.
"Of course."
"De Americans, dey don't know dat word. You tell dem you have ganga, and they nod. You show dem, and dey tink it a spice."
I find this hard to believe, but I'm enjoying the story.
"It's go by two names here, marijuana and pot. So if you bring any across you say it's ganga, the Americans won't know."
I know: they have a different word for everything.
I like being the only passenger on the bus.
Continued in part II.
2 Comments:
I love striking up conversations with bus drivers, taxi drivers, and other people I run in to over the course of my day. You get some of the most interesting stories from them.
Unfortunately, a lot of Americans treat people who are in the service industries, like cabbies, waitstaff, salespeople, etc, like they are less than human. They tend to judge people by appearances, rather than actually trying to see what lies beneath those appearances.
I like that story... on a hot day in Toronto, it cools me down just a little.
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