When the plane took off from Managua, I was happy to have Kate’s hand to clutch. Bouncing, jittering, skittering: I imagined the pilot halfway through a bottle of Flor de Cana – famous Nicaraguan rum. Out the window it was earthskyearthsky, as the plane lolled from side to side, engines sputtering feebly.
“Kate, if we die in a horrible plane crash, I want you to
know it’s been a blast.” Kate wears a fake perma-grin when she’s nervous; her
voice emerges strained through her teeth, “Matt! Don’t say that sort of thing –
it’s bad luck!”
But when we landed on Big Corn Island, our luck had
obviously turned for the better. Lobster, shrimp, and fish swam in butter and
garlic on our plates. Palm trees bobbed their lazy heads towards the beaches:
white sand festooned with crabs and conchs. In fact, the crabs were so
plentiful they had crab-crossing signs, like you might see for moose back in
Canada. And a good thing too – Kate nearly stepped on one (crab, not moose) as
we returned from dinner our first night in the dark. All we saw at first was a
shadow-stone the size of my head. Under the flashlight, the shadow coalesced
into a surly, side-stepping crab, mid-scuttle. One eye swiveled around on its
stalk to glare.
When not admiring the island, getting tossed like a boy in
ten-foot waves, or eating the creatures of the ocean, there was the discipline
of the hammock. Dangling nets of the Caribbean, hammocks swaddle the infants
and comfort the elderly: from cradle to rocker. Sure your hands may twitch for
your cell phone – gotta see what emails I’ve received in the last four minutes
– but that’s just civilization tugging at your flesh with its hooks. Pull out a
book, Mon, or better yet just pull your cap over your eyes, like the mellow
fellow below. And for star watching with your ladylove, the hammock has no
equal.
After two days of lounging and sleeping beneath a mosquito
net, we bought tickets to Little Corn. Smaller, more touristy, less developed:
Little Corn juts from the ocean five miles to the north of Big Corn and wears a
skirt of white beach and volcanic stone. The huckster at the jetty sold us our
tickets but I declined his ganja. He was covered in knife scars and corded
muscles. The boat was about twenty feet long with ten benches; it could safely
seat forty people so we crammed forty-five onboard. Then, sweltering and
huddled, still clanging against the jetty, the sailors didn’t untie the lines
until the huckster berated, cajoled and pleaded for a tip. Ten awkward minutes.
“I work so hard, Mon! You got no idea how hard I work. All for a tip. You
there! You! You like your seat? Maybe give me little tip? No? What about you
over there?” and so forth. Even after we slipped our lines you could still hear
him calling, “Tiiiip! There’s still time!”
Sitting in the back of the boat was easier on my stomach,
but harder for the waves. Twelve feet and higher, and driving right into them,
each wave hit the bow and turned into a giant salty fist. Only a few seconds
between punches, eyes stinging, water getting forced down the lungs, I cowered
in my hat next to Kate. Our fingers found each other on the bench under the
life jacket. Within two splashes every stitch was soaked, and Kate’s purse was
a runny soup. As the fear of death gibbered in my head, my thoughts flitted to Guantanamo Bay’s waterboarding victims, half-drowned by an icy sponge. Most of all my heart went out to the Syrian
refugees, who must have huddled on similarly shady voyages on their journeys to
new homes.
“Kate, if we drown on this boat ride, I want you to know
it’s been a splash.” She yells back, “Don’t you ever stop?”
But of course we lived, otherwise there would be no story. In
retrospect linking the miserable boat ride to the hell of Guantanamo was
hyperbolic, and perhaps crossing a line or two. Avoiding exaggeration and
respecting “lines” are concerns that the higher brain usually takes care of,
and when you think you’re drowning, that part shuts down. We spend our day-to-day
lives simmering in polish and tact but die like shrieking monkeys.
On the jetty we took awkward steps on new legs. Found a bar
a hundred feet away to drink recovery Tona while my stomach settled. Then we
indulged in all the island’s little pleasures: swimming, live music, fried fish
for breakfast. We met countless Dutch people; I think they clamour to the Corn
Islands as part of a coming-of-age ritual. We even hired a local guide, Tindal,
to take us snorkeling among the shimmering reefs.
Tindal would not be satisfied until we swam with a shark. We
found one, mottled and napping, in a bed of coral while we hovered overhead on
our flippers. “You gotta touch da shark, Mon.” “No thanks.” A school of fish –
communicating via hive mind – scintillates turquoise. Holding a starfish you
can feel hundreds of tiny knobs and ridges in its flesh.
Taking her hand, I say, “Kate if we die tonight, I want you
to know it’s been a fairy tale.”
