A Jamaican Opera Story

Public transportation in Jamaica is an interesting beast. Normally, it is hot, crowded, loud and fairly dangerous. I swear listening to Celine Dion at full blast while sitting in 100 degree heat smalled up to the point where it feels like your ribs are going to break is a form of torture. But, since we are only allowed bicycles, we have to depend on public to get any significant distance. While I have experienced much crazier happenings on busses and in taxis before, I thought this one was fairly amusing and I haven't stopped laughing about it.

Yesterday I was on a bus from Kingston coming back to Port Antonio, reading my book and minding my own business in relative comfort (as comfortable as you can be when you're sharing one seat with another man) when I finally realized what was playing on the radio. No, it wasn't the Dancehall, Reggae or Hip Hop, and it wasn't the Celine Dion or random Country song that comes on, it was OPERA! After a long day of traveling 5 1/2 hours to get to Kingston for about 2 hours worth of meetings to be told that everyone will taking off from now until after the new year (which I already knew), listening to a few minutes of opera music on a bus hurtling around corners and narrowly missing other vehicles on the Junction Road really made my day. The best part was the Jamaican guy next to me humming along to the music. After the opera song was over, it went back to dancehall (I think it was "Ride it like a 10 speed bicycle" - a pretty hilarious song), but it was a few moments of Zen.

That's about it for now. I'll try to come up with a better post before Christmas to update everyone on my recent happenings with my trip home and what's going on now.