29 July 2008 - Tuesday

Today I decided to get some laundry done. I have a new washer & dryer that we brought with us, but Scott needs to figure out how to get them to work on this electric here. In the meantime, the previous owner left a washing machine so Scott set it up in the carport & we’ve been using that for laundry… then hanging everything either on the porch or in the carport. We just have to keep our eyes peeled for passing showers! Actually, the wash can hang out there without getting wet from the rain… unless it’s blowing from the east (which it did today!). Then it’s a scramble to get it down before it gets soaked again. Of course, by the time we get it all down, the shower has passed & the sun is shining again!

This afternoon we took a trip to the post office to mail some letters & check our mail. We’ve had the box for a few months now, but I don’t think we’ve ever received any mail yet! (In case I haven’t told you… I can’t check the mail because our box is so high up that I can’t reach it! Scott can reach it, but he can’t see inside.) So we went inside to ask for our mail. The woman behind the counter told us that we hadn’t paid the bill for the box! (Scott paid for a year just 2 months ago!) We could see that there was mail for us, but she kept saying we had to pay for the box. Fortunately we happened to have the receipt to show them that we paid, then she gave us our mail. I think there was confusion about whoever had that box before us. I’ve heard that the mail delivery system here in Grenada is really not reliable… now I see how that can be true!

We also stopped for groceries today… with our shopping list in hand! Looking at the prices in the meat department, I think we’re going to be eating a LOT of chicken down here! Meals are going to be a bit of a challenge… at least until we figure out the best way to stretch our dollars. So guess what we had for dinner tonight? You guessed it… chicken!

We met a couple from Texas that was walking down our street this evening. They are mennonite missionaries living just up the road. Said they’ve been here for about 9 months, but are scheduled to be here for 33 months. We talked with them for about a half hour at the bottom of our driveway.

We also stopped to see our friends Mike & Jackie. They’ve been working on re-tiling the floor in their house. They have 4 apartments they rent to the college students. They’re trying to get a lot of work done before the kids come back for the school year. I think they said the first ones will arrive in early August. Before we left their place, Mike gave us a piece of fruit he called a “french kashew”. I’m not sure of the spelling, but that’s exactly how it sounded. So I’m thinking it might be called a French Cashew… but it looks like an apple! Haven’t tried it yet, but I’ll let you know how it tastes!

One thing I noticed is that there are a lot of dogs running around here! They just wander all around the neighborhood, sometimes in packs. I’m not even sure if most of them belong to anyone. A lot of them are a bit on the thin side, and I don’t think anyone gets their dogs spayed or neutered. There are at least 2 hanging around at our neighbor’s house (across from our driveway). Every morning there’s one out behind the house. We’re planning to plant a vegetable garden, but I’m told we’ll have to figure out a way to keep the dogs out of it.

Photo description: Main Post Office