April 2010 – Reclaiming LIFE

I just returned from our trip to Couples Negril, in Jamaica. I need to attempt to put into words what I learned (or will attempt to learn) with you.

Click HERE to check out the post from my photography blog to view pictures.

Because we traveled to our resort under the veil of humid darkness, we couldn’t see the country side of Jamaica. But when we arrived at the resort, I was hit by beauty. Gorgeous scenery, happy people, chill attitudes.

I enjoy people watching, people are fascinating aren’t they? Being that we were at a Couples resort that is devoted to all things love, I was surrounded by lovey-dovey traveling couples; HOWEVER I was most drawn to the Jamaican people…the staff, the vendors that would come with their handmade treasures to sell along the beach, and the musicians that would come and sing softly to lounging holiday-ers. “One Love! One Heart! Let’s Get Together and Feel Alright.”

I found this YouTube video of the gentleman pictured above. He has a great voice.

The people I met from Jamaica are Happy. I watched them. They are truly happy. They laughed and smiled a lot while they worked. Some even sang and whistled while they did their daily tasks, and they work their butts off let me tell you.

At one point I looked over from my beach chair perch and noticed a scene that hit me with another one of those life lessons that seem to come to me at the oddest times. There was this American man who was really really tanned. Like tanned beyond belief. I called him Cigar Pacer and I’ll tell you why. He must have woke up pretty early to get the same loungey chair by the pool every day (or he was King of the loungey chairs, and no one dared to take his). I watched his extra tanned self with unlit cigar in one hand and a cell phone in the other, pace around his loungey chair like a lion in a cage. Pacing back and forth, back and forth, around and around while he conducted his cell phone business with the pent-up energy one would hope to lose while on a holiday. While his tense pacing was going on, I looked to my right and saw one of the servers collecting empty cups that stacked to the sky and she had a huge smile on her face. She hummed a little tune under her breath and let out a little giggle when she saw a co-worker pass by that had a bigger towering stack of empty glasses. A towering stack of glasses much like this one…

Now people have energy that comes off of them. You can feel it as soon as you are around them…or at least I feel it. There I was looking at two people obviously conducting their daily business and the energy from Cigar Pacer almost gave me hives and made me contort my face in stress, and the energy from the lovely Jamaican women made me want to play a flute (not that I can) and dance around the beach grinning from ear to happy ear. lol

How is it that every Jamaican I encountered carried with them this amazing energy? I talked to several of the staff members and many of them work 6 days a week and some travel by bus over two hours to get to work…yet they carry with them this unbelievable happy, chill, calm energy. I wanted to collect their beautiful energy in a bottle and take it home with me.

As we left the resort to fly home, I was able to see the country side in the daylight, passing by villages that I recalled hearing about as places many of the staff members lived. Along the 120 km stretch of road back to the airport, I saw many homes that were shanties really. The stores in the villages donned hand-painted signs summarizing what they had to sell. Goats ran freely and grazed around abandoned buildings. Many little tarp-covered shade shelters offering fresh fruit for sale, dotted the country side.