Well, I want to start out by saying that we had a great time in Jamaica. I am not a writer, so the things I try to explain may not be as clear as I had hoped. Feel free to leave me any questions you want in the "comments" section, not sure how that works, so you can email me and I will try to be clearer, you won't hurt my feelings. Also, if I am mistaken on any of my statements, Michelle, please set me straight. I don't want to pass any incorrect information. That being said, lets get to it.

The first thing I thought I would write about was Rastaman Troy, who we met on our first night in Montego Bay, which was actually our 6th night in Jamaica. We were walking from our hotel with Jimmy Buffets Margaritaville ( http://www.margaritavillecaribbean.com/index.php) as our dinner destination for the evening. We, or should I say "I" was stopped by a man with dreadlocks who asked where we were headed. I knew he had an idea where we should be going by his tone, so I said we were just out for a walk. He was attempting to get us into his bar/resturant/store that we were currently in front of. Since I'm not good at lying anymore, I was great as a kid but have since lost the skill, I tried to stick to my story, but I was getting the feeling that he wasn't buying what I was selling. He told us that we should spend our money with the only Jamaican owned place on the street we were on. Again, I stuck to my story and we told him that we might stop in later. He let us go, reluctantly. Michelle reminded me that I need to ignore people and just keep on walking, but it's really hard for me. I've learned that lesson in two other places, the market in Juarez Mexico and in the Bahamas. The time I was in Freeport, Bahamas, I was walking from the tourist area with some friends when a lady approached me and asked to put beads in my hair, don't laugh, I used to have enough hair to do that. Since I was raised to be polite, I looked her in the eye and said "no thank you." Well damn if that wasn't the wrong thing to do. This lady broke into a sprint to catch up with us, where she continued the question/begging. I think it had to do with the eye contact, because everyone was telling her no or ignoring her completely, but she chose to chase me. Needless to say, I didn't get the beads, but there was a lot of "no thanks" to follow the first one. Flash back to last Thursday night and we have now left the Rasta's company and continue our trip to Margaritaville. We had dinner, took some pictures, I have included one of Marcy and Michelle with their heads in a big sharks mouth, which wasn't real in case you were wondering (smartass). We have one with my head in it, but you can tell by the look on my face that I wasn't into it, so I posted this one instead. Now, we are done eating and need to head back to the hotel, right past the Rasta's bar. I figured, were on the other side of the street, so we should be able to slide right by. I'm guessing that you all are smart enough to realize, if that plan had worked, I wouldn't be writing all of this. That would be a lame ending if I just said, "so we walked by, he didn't see us and all was well." No, the truth is, not 20 feet out of the resturant, I hear "so you went and spent money with the rich people." Now, I had two thoughts, (1) run like hell, maybe even scream like a girl or (2) deny, deny deny. Here are the problems with both of those. I'm overweight and out of shape, making running a bad option. I'm guessing that when I passed out after a half a block, he could catch up with me. I'm pretty sure the screaming would draw little attention, other than a curious shop owner or street businessman (I mean the pot sellers, more on that later). Plus, Michelle did a nice number on her toe on Sunday, so I'm guessing that my sprint would be solo. I'm pretty sure that leaving 2 women on the streets at night is high on the scumbag scale, so option number one was ruled out. (2) This sounded like the easiest way to go, but there were several problems with this one. First, I mentioned that I have lost my lying ability, not totally, I can still lie to the kids about some things (Santa, Easter bunny and so on), but for the most part, not my strongest ability. Second, he just watched us walk out of the resturant. I could say that we were looking around, to see if we wanted to swim there the next day since they have a water slide from the resturant to the ocean and a few other fun things, but that again would go back to my lying. Plus, we are now in possesion of a doggy bag and two plastic cups with the name of the resturant on them, clearly visible, even to a pot smoking rastafarian. The response I decided to go with was to stare at him like I didn't speak english and hope he went the other way, no such luck. I'm not sure what the conversation was from there until we agreed to go to his bar the next night, which seemed to pacify him. He was shaking my hand, and looked me in the eye (nothing good comes of that move for me) and says, "I'll take you for your word." Now if that wasn't a challenge to a mans honor, I don't know what is. Marcy and I discussed and decided we would go on Friday night. The only problem with this was, we wouldn't have Michelle with us, which was my safety net the whole time we were in Jamaica. She always took care of us, led us to the right resturants, stores and hooked us up with the great hotel we were at. I wasn't sure we wanted to try the resturant, but I knew we could hit the bar and I could have a Red Stripe, a beer made in Jamaica which I have had in the US and have been drinking while in Jamaica, but wasn't sure they would have anything Marcy would drink. I was affraid my one beer purchase would not be enough, but I was going to give it a shot. Friday night was here and I was looking forward to the trip to Troy's Reggae bar, he told us his name after the last encounter. Marcy and I walked down the street, located the bar, walked through the alley (usually not a good sign of a bars cleanliness/safety, but hell, we're in a different country, lets not hold onto sterotypes) We go up the stairs to the rooftop bar, where Bob Marley is playing on the stero. I like Bob Marley, what of his music I have actually heard, so I felt a little at ease to here a "feel good" song playing. We didn't see Troy, but we sat down, I ordered my Red Stripe and we saw that they had a little bottle of Mudslide, which Marcy and Michelle had been drinking that week, so Marcy was able to order. I turned around and who was walking onto the roof, Troy. He looked up and saw us and I saw a person who was surprised, but actually glad to see me. I stuck out my hand to shake his and he damn near broke my hand when he grabbed it to shake it. The first thing he said was, "I took you for your word." Good memory. He gave Marcy a hug and I was glad we had decided to stop by. He sat and talked to us for awhile. He taked about his "Moms" who raised him, his father wasn't around, (more on that subject in another blog post). He turned out to be a really nice guy and his bar will be the first place I stop next time I go. If you are ever planning to go to Montego Bay, let me know. I will tell you how to get there, you won't be disappointed. I have also enclosed a picture of us with Troy and ask you to do the following. Look at the picture and think about what you see, not just a picture of the three of us, but look closer and see if you see it? Give up? This is a picture of Troy hugging Marcy like they are old friends (or more) and a big dumb white guy who squezed in the shot. Can I look anymore out of place than I appear in this picture? I submit that I cannot. We finished our drinks, told Troy goodbye and headed out for dinner. I was a little afraid of Troy when we first met, but as the old saying goes, don't judge a book by its cover.