New Years

1/13/15

New Years was pretty cool this year. Maybe two weeks before I was talking to another volunteer, Ryan, about previous new years and we came up with the hypothesis that going somewhere special for New Years is preferable to staying in the same area. This year, I can’t imagine a better place than Suriname, easily in my top three New Years. Even though, for the first time in at least 5 years, I celebrated without John Kammerzelt.

I left for Suriname on the 28^th. There’s a new ferry schedule across the Essequibo, it leaves at 6am, 11am, and 4pm. My friend and Andrew was supposed to be getting to the Peace Corps office in Georgetown about 10 so I thought I’d take the 6am ferry and get to town about the same time if everything went well. I got to the office about 9:30 and Andrew informed me that his plane, the only way out of his site, was delayed by weather. Apparently the plane had made it to the airport in Mabaruma, seen the weather, and turned around so now Andrew wouldn’t make it to town until early afternoon. Secretly, I was pleased to hear the news because it meant I could hang out at the office and use the internet.

Other volunteers passed through the office also on their way to Berbice on the east coast where we would meet up and enter Suriname. A group had just finished hiking Kaiteur Falls and they congregated at the office then dispersed. I continued to wait for Andrew, soaking in all the news and content I’d missed since my last trip into the interwebs. I didn’t want to bring my computer to Suriname so I set it to download some things and found a spot for it in the office where I’d pick it up on my way home.

Finally Andrew made it to the office and we amassed a small party, myself, Andrew, Holleigh, Mollie, Ashley and Ashley’s girlfriend from Spain who spoke very little English, Miriam. The bus park was a nightmare. As soon as we got close drivers and conductors pawed and grabbed at us trying to get us to board their bus. It was not my favorite moment. They swarmed and harassed us until we got onto a bus. It was like feeding time at the zoo, and we were the food.

After we got on a bus we waited for a solid 20 minutes for it to fill then headed for the east coast. We arrived at Matt and Kathrina’s house where most of the group had congregated for the White Elephant game. White Elephant is that game where everyone brings a gift and everyone takes turns stealing and opening gifts. Long story short, I brought three tennis balls and two decks of cards in a black plastic bag and left with a bottle of neutrophil, a nerve tonic.

Most people left to continue the party at Jackie’s house. Andrew, Kelly, Jerrell, Ashley, Miriam, Eben, Naomi, and I all stayed behind. Some of us started slinging our hammocks since we planned on sleeping outside. Normally, since the average temperature at night is in the high 70s, this wouldn't be an issue. I’ll return to this in a second.

A few days before this as I was getting ready to leave I decided I needed a net for my hammock. So I went down to the pharmacy and got one. Now, nets specifically for hammocks are a little hard to come by so I bought one for a bed, brought it home, wrapped it cocoon style around my hammock, and pronounced it good enough. I was and continue to be pretty impressed by my ingenuity and it held up perfectly in its real world application, plus, sleeping in a hammock is pretty cool.

The bus came to get us the next night at midnight. The ferry didn’t leave until 10 but it had been filling more quickly and we wanted to guarantee our spot. We got there about 4am and proceeded to wait until 10AM. Then, we remembered this is Guyana and realized we’d be lucky to leave the shore before 12. 12 comes around and we finally get on the boat for a 20 minute ride to Suriname.

As we got closer, people started to bunch near the front of the boat. We were all quizzical and I was standing on the second level so I could see the horde getting more and more anxious. When the boat landed and the ramp dropped it was pure anarchy. Masses of people rushed for the immigration building. I mean just flat out running like the ferry was on fire. Needless to say, we were all confused by this. We proceeded to disembark like normal humans in an orderly manner.

It was only as we approached the terminal we realized our mistake. Before us lay a swath of humans. A line 10 people wide, and 40 people deep had manifested in front of the building. Initially our thoughts were that this was not a big deal. Suriname customs must be way better than the Guyanese we had just come through. We were wrong. 4 hours later we had all made it through the line. But finally, we were in Suriname. Right?

Wrong, were about a 4 hour drive from Paramaribo where we were all staying. At this point, I was getting tired of the uncomfortable seats and unbearable temperature. Luckily, I had a friend who could take care of that. The bottle of Neutrophil was a godsend. Looking at the ingredients, I read that it was basically a bottle of nicotine. Recalling my psychopharmacology class, I remembered that nicotine is a mild stimulant with some muscle relaxant properties. Between me and my seat mate Lauren we had about half the bottle and sat in relative comfort until Paramaribo.

The next day, we walked around town a little bit, scoping out the place for good New Year’s spots. There was lots of music and people partying. And a plethora of cute Dutch girls. The streets were filled with people drinking and dancing. We hung around for most of the afternoon then about 2pm we headed back to the hotel, napped for a little, then headed out about 9 to party a little bit. It was at this time I really started to have fun. Andrew, Mark, Jerrell, and met up with most of the other crew at Subway, one of the many American influences on Suriname. When we got there another volunteer, Ryan, suggested we go put 20 Suriname dollars on black at the nearby Princess casino. So Andrew, Ryan and I went down to the casino. For some reason, we decided to warm up with a little blackjack. A little blackjack turned into a lot of blackjack and a lot of alcohol. But the alcohol fueled my luck, I was up $300 when we decided to call it quits about 11 or so. At that point the rest of the crew had caught up with us and here’s where things got a little hazy because of how lucky I was feeling.

Ryan had acquired some free passes to the local night club, Starz. Apparently we went there, it was close to the casino, and they said they didn’t open until 1am. Whatever, if they wanted to turn away business that’s their problem. After that, I remember being on the rooftop bar of the casino counting down to midnight. And as we reached midnight fireworks went off all over the city. Jets of streaking light soared up and exploded in the sky. It was like watching 20 fireworks shows at once. It was pretty cool. We continued to hang around the rooftop bar, meet some Dutch oil prospectors and have a few more drinks.

That about sums up the night, really. The next day we went on a dolphin site seeing tour. Saw some dolphins and then we left at midnight, again.

1/23/15

On my way back from Suriname I met up with a volunteer from another organization, Project Trust. It’s an English organization and the volunteers name is Natasha, Tash for short. As we’re getting on the ferry, I look down and realize the water is really low. I figure this must be because of the new ferry schedule. Before the New Year, the ferry changed from running every 13 hours, to accommodate the tide, to running at 6am, 11am, and 4 pm. When I heard this, I even said, “that’s not going to work with the tide”. So there we are, on the ferry, she’d never been on the ferry before and she was excited about how little it cost compared to a speedboat, almost $1000. So the ferry departs, we’re sitting outside on the side deck enjoying the jungle cruise when all of a sudden, something bad happens.

The boat starts inclining. The front starts angling up and we could hear a horrific grinding noise. Then the boat shudders, which was scary for a boat that size, and slams back down into the water. The best I could figure, the boat hit bottom, rose up as it pushed through, and came back down the other side. After wiping myself I felt fairly validated in my assessment of the ferry’s capabilities.

Now, one of the ferries is broken and there is absolutely no schedule. They have literally no idea when the boat will show up. The only way to find out is to call down to the office which wouldn’t be a bad system if they actually picked up the phone. The new schedule lasted exactly 3 weeks before one of the ferries broke down. Classic Guyana.