Letter to the Editor

Observations of a visitor who fled the Canadian winter

Tuesday, January 6, 2004

Dear Sir,

Doesn't Christmas Eve seem to come straight at you from nowhere and kick you? Like many of you I found myself at 1pm on the day before Christmas in my car listening to the radio play bad new versions of standard Christmas songs. 

You'd think after two hours of sitting behind the wheel that I would be able to remember the words to all those old songs I've been hearing for years. However, I find that I was still mumbling on through them. I started to feel sorry for the car I was driving. I wondered if I would get to my destination before she'd boiled over, or would I be the first to boil over. 

Why was I enduring this torture when the car had no air-conditioning? That final present can be a real nightmare in the middle of the afternoon. It made me wonder why I didn't do this 214 days ago. I guess that would be called planning ahead. I wonder if old St Nick was hurrying around trying to remember what he has forgotten too. He only works one night a year, so at least he doesn't have to compete with this traffic, that is if his reindeer are on their best behavior.

I moved here eight weeks ago from Nova Scotia, Canada. I came to escape the cold Canadian winter and to enjoy some sun, sand and did I say sun? So far I have been very busy strolling along Seven Mile Beach talking to anyone who will talk to me. I'm easy to spot, I'm the Canadian guy who talks too fast and no-one can understand me.

As I recall, I was quite a "chalky fellow," when I first arrived, but I worked hard each day on my tan. I have come up with a game to pass the time while I'm outdoors. I can now identify the folk on the beach who live here; they wear their sweaters and long pants. 

The tourists who have stepped off of the boat in Georgetown for the day are covered in sunscreen or badly burned from their last tropical stop. I think I should write to Milton Bradley and see if they would like me to turn this into a board game or perhaps Fox will air it as a new reality TV show. 

Anyway it's a full-time job that requires me to be on beach patrol each and every blessed day. My biggest dilemma is worrying what I'll wear to the beach. The folk in Nova Scotia are proud of me soaking up the hot Caribbean sun while they're shoveling snow when its 20 below.

Chad Tetford

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