Farewell Jamaica

Well, I'm still trying to get my head around Jamaica. The picture of Jamaica I grew up with was of Harry Belafonte sitting under a palm tree strumming a guitar and singing calypso. More recently, the Jamaica I've seen in the media has been the Jamaica of Usain Bolt, of a champion netball team, of Courtney Walsh and a champion cricket team. I pictured it as a clean, prosperous and laid back country. Turns out that my expectations weren't always matched by what I found.

Not sure that I actually heard any calypso, and Harry was only present in one black and white photograph that I came across. Reggae has replaced calypso, at least in the minds of the tourists. Bob Marley is everywhere, but when the music cranks up late at night, and you lie there in your hotel trying to get to sleep, it's rap that you hear. Usain Bolt is the poster boy of the country, and when he's in town, half the country seems to flock to watch him train, and live vicariously through his success, instead of pursuing their own.

There are certainly successful and prosperous elements to Jamaican life, and if you stay at an all-inclusive resort behind the big gates and only venture out occasionally, maybe that's what you'll notice the most, but I was surprised at the number of everyday Jamaicans that were just sitting about on rocks, on seats, under trees, in gutters doing nothing much, while their shops were falling down, their houses were a mess, and their streets stayed unswept.

In Africa and Cuba, there was still poverty, and not everybody had money to build or improve, but the real difference there was that people were always striving to improve. They cleaned and swept continuously. They were always fixing their houses, sweeping their porches, mending what was broken. It just seems that in Jamaica, most people (but of course not all) were happy just to sit around and watch the paint peel.

There are three standard sayings in Jamaica. The first is 'out of many, one people'. It's the country's motto. A government slogan perhaps, but by and large everybody does seen to get on well. Whilst I'm sure that there is some racism and intolerance in every country, I didn't notice it in Jamaica, and that's to their credit, though maybe some of the minorities may have differing thoughts.

The second is 'One Love'. After hearing it every day for a week, I've still got to admit that I really don't know what it means. The best I can come up with is that it's the Jamaican equivalent of 'have a good day'. It's a generic response to almost any comment, and a typical way of parting company. It probably has it's origin in the dope smoking Rasta culture, but I'm not sure it really conveys any message other than civility.

The third is 'Respect'. If you give a beggar something, they will probably respond "Hey man. Respect", meaning I respect you. If you don't give a beggar something, they will often respond "Why you show me no respect man?" If you end up being curt with an insistent tout, they will complain that you have no respect. It's really used as an excuse by anybody who wants to do their own thing, even if it impacts others, and even if it means that they aren't showing respect to you. It's used, really, by anybody who wants to do their own thing.

And it's that overwhelming preference for everybody to just do their own thing (or perhaps to do nothing) that doesn't sit easily with me. As Mandy said, it's not about ability, it's about attitude. Even staff in customer service roles like airline staff, supermarket attendants, and waitresses have a pretty much 'whatever' attitude. When we pressed a waitress about our drink order that still hadn't come after 45 minutes, she rolled her eyes and to our face said 'whatever'. It's past being laidback, and almost to the 'I don't care' stage, and when most of the country is like that, it's future isn't too rosy.

As we drove around the island, we didn't come across one set of roadworks, and the roads were in bad condition. Apart from some new tourist hotels, we didn't see any construction happening. In short, there didn't seem to be much expenditure on infrastructure, though I'm told they are making great strides in the IT arena.

Jamaica's economic growth has been one of the consistently slowest rate of developing countries for the last 30 years, and unemployment is high, especially amongst youth. But it's the tendency to just sit and watch life go by, to live vicariously through other people's success, combined with the 'whatever' attitude that makes me think that nothing much will change in the foreseeable future.

On the plus side, Jamaica is blessed with a great climate, lots of rain, and a good agricultural sector, so it's not all bad news, and if people put in a bit of effort, it could really be a different place. Would I suggest you go? Well, the tour was great. The tour staff were terrific and very patient. We enjoyed it, and were glad we came. However, if you are from the US, there are far nicer countries to visit in the region with all the same facilities - Costa Rica and Belize spring to mind - and I can't think of anything we did that you couldn't do better in Australia if you are on that side of the pond, so I'm not sure I'd recommend you go all that way at the expense of a different country. However, if it's on your way, it's fun.

After a last walk along the beach, we all piled into the bus and headed back towards Montego Bay, with 'The Everly Brothers Sing Reggae' to cheer us along. Made a stop at the airport where most people in the group said their farewells, and went to face their personal battle with the disinterested airline staff. Despite arriving early enough at the airport, staff were so slow that they kept pulling people behind us who had arrived late out of the line to get them onto their flight on time. The consequence was that we were boarding by the time we got to the gate.

Our flight to Houston arrived early, but we had to go through immigration, then baggage collection, then customs, then re-lodge our luggage, then go through security screening, and finally take a train to our next terminal, so we only had a few minutes to grab a bite to eat before we were boarding again - this time for L.A.

Apart from the usual United Airlines circus where they had overbooked, and started offering people incentives to change flights at the gate, it was all pretty smooth. Gotta say that I've been very impressed with the customs, immigration and security at L.A., Miami and Houston airports. Amazingly better than a few years ago. At each of the airports we have literally kept walking all the way through immigration, and never encountered a queue.