Roatan, Honduras

Today, we went to Roatan, in Honduras. Are you a mutt? Are you an unattractive mangy mutt with low hanging balls and a softball like growth in your neck? I have found a place for you to be comfortable and make your home: Roatan! Meet mutts like you! In the street! Perhaps finally find female mutts who will appreciate you! Belonging! Acceptance! Edible Trash!

Otherwise, this was a delightful port. Very poor, but with a tourist friendly vibe, by which I mean: beer is $2. We sat in a great outside bar under a roof with a delightful breeze and a pier that went out to the ocean. Most of the furniture looked like it came from Staples: a portable, plastic card table and 6 boss-type rolly chairs—bleached damp fabric with a high back and arm rests. So we may have crabs. There was also an oriental rug under us and after a while, they got more customers, so they brought in nice, dining room table type chairs from across the street. A couple next to us was sitting in some Adirondack chairs, the arm rest of one noisily fell off about 3 times. The glassware was all juice glasses you get in an American grocery stores and plastic picnic wear wine glasses you get in dollar stores. Beers came with a paper napkin on top “to clean it off!” We regularly were greeted by vendors and learned a new strategy from a castmate, which is to mess with them. One guy came in wearing a “DAD u da man” t shirt and sold us some bootleg movies. They must do very good business in bootlegs in Honduras, because we were offered DVDs at least 8 times. One guy was also selling “Island music” that he was sure we would love. It was labeled “Islam Misic” and had suggestive women on the cover. We bought 2 for $5. Mine is Islam Misic Vol. 8, and has a non labeled CD on the inside. There is a tiny red stamp on the front that says “Good Work”—the kind of thing a teacher would put on a spelling test—over an aroused, shy woman in a blue dress with the side of her left boob showing. The music is not terrible reggae, featuring a song called “Spread Your Love All Over Me.”

Also, the Hondurans have discovered Sculpy, that play-dough plastic sculping stuff. They have made very good use out of it, particularly in covering old bottles of booze with cartoony animals with googly eyes. If they were under $10, I would own one. Instead, I own a $2 bic pen with a hilarious butterfly. I also got earrings for $2. Everything runs around $5, but you can get them to go down in price pretty easily. I got absurd 1st grade teacher frog earrings for $3. They were originally $5, and the saleslady said “the owner has lots a money, she don’t wanna bargain, but $3, okay. Just put that in your purse.” Which I did.

Other delights were a restaurant advertising “TYPICAL ISLAND FOOD” and the official harbor guards, one wearing a Batman baseball hat from the mid 80’s.

Also, we sat by a delightful couple in that bar who loved our show and we got to chatting. They are VERY disappointed that there are no more pool games. They are VERY disappointed and said “have you been on a Carnival ship? Oh--You’ll have the time of your life. You may not sleep very much but oh, that’s fun. This cruise has been boring. The worst one we’ve ever taken. Oh yeah, we’ve slept a lot but…” They also talked about going to the beach and that they only had $100 bills. A kid in Belize was eyeing them, thinking about trying to sell them a rock. They laughed that “sorry, we don’t have any money, we only have $100s, hahaha.” I watched Goodfellas for the first time, so obviously, I decided they were in the mafia.