The ABCs of Roatan

This is the type of categorical nonsense I come up with at 2am when I can't sleep, when I go lie out on the hammock, mess around with the thoughts in my head and get dive-bombed by bats.

The Unofficial ABC's of Roatan, by Kimie, with input from Robyn and Danielle:

A is for Alex, my codename down here. As in "Hi I'm Mario from Mexico, and who might you be?""Nice to meet you, Mario. I'm Alex from Kansas."

B is for Banana soda, like cream soda, only tasting more of bananas!

C is for Creole- my new favorite language. As far as I can tell it's a mix of spanish, english, french and sign language. Something like "what are you doing tonight" is "whatyalldoonnight?" only mumbled, and without any consonants so it sounds like "ayallooight?" and the answer is "yeh." I can understand it. There's a lot of head nodding too. I am a master of it by now and Robyn and Danielle keep telling me to quit mumbling.

D is for Dylan. As in, "Oh Mario, you haven't met my friend Dylan." aka Robyn.

E is for Enormous ex-football players that Robyn spits on like a llama when she laughs. This girl is no longer allowed coca-cola.

F is for Fish tacos. I've eaten them every night for the past 5 days for dinner.

G is for Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a Colombian writer. I just finished 'Love in the Time of Cholera' while lying on the beach. Best book I've read in a long while, and it takes place on the shores of the Caribbean.

H is for hammocks.

I is for iguanas! They're as common as squirrels down here, only three feet long. I asked the lady who owns the place where we're staying how they get down from the trees. She says they fall down.

J is for jacuzzi water. I'll never get tired of swimming in a warm ocean.
K is for lack of key lime pie. Every night after fish tacos we ask if they have key lime pie because the sign that says 'desserts' on a white board says 'key lime pie'. So K is for lack of Key lime pie.

L is for leaf cutter ants! Every night between 9 and 10pm little leaf cutter ants march in a line across our walkway up the cabin. The other night it started pouring rain, and the next morning when we went down the stairs, there was a perfect little trail of abandoned leaf pieces. It started pouring and they abandoned their leaves and ran for their poor little ant lives!!

M is for Cony, a local we met at the dive shop and who has invited us to volleyball games. I asked if it was short for anything, and he says that because his dad is half Scottish, he wanted to name one of his sons a Scottish name, so he named him McConey. When his birth certificate was being written out, they wrote 'Mercury' by mistake, which is now his legal name. So M is for Cony.

N is for Natalie (Danielle's codename). "Mario, meet Natalie." "Nice to meet you, Alex, Dylan and Natalie. Do any of you speak spanish?"Dylan: "Yeah Danielle speaks a little."Mario: "And who is Danielle?" Oops.

O is for octopi. Haven't seen any.

P is for Parrots! They're in a cage at the bottom of the stairs leading up to our cabin, and they whistle and give catcalls every time we walk by.

Q is for BBQimie, because I have been nicely seared.

R is for rumbrella! We ran down the street in a torrential downpour and used a bottle of rum as an umbrella.

S is for sand and salt. It could be for smoothies, or snorkeling, or SNUBA diving (yes, snuba) but sand and salt is in every fold of clothing and embedded in our scalps and our ears. We're marinating in it.

T is for Typical Breakfast (plato typico!) Refried beans, fried eggs, avocado and white cheese wrapped up in a corn tortilla. Mmmmmmmmmmm.

U is for Utah. The first friends we made down here were from Utah, and they get special mention in here. They also attended 'The U' which is what they call the University of Utah.

V is for vanity out the window. We get so salty why bother taking a shower? PS: Apparently my hair is curly.

W is for Wahoo! I went on a fishing expedition this morning and caught a 32 pound Wahoo (I've asked why they're called that and no one seems to know. We can only guess it's because that's what you shout when you've caught one.

X is for X-ray. Our waiter, Sean, at the fish taco place broke his hand the day before we arrived here, and his hand is in a cast. He's a skinny little guy and has glasses. He's lived all over the states and couldn't be much older than us, but he's really gotten into island life.

"How did you hurt your hand, Sean?"

"On someone's face."

He said he got an X-ray of the rest of his body and he's going to put it onto a T-shirt.

Y is for "Yaloa", how the local girls say "hello"

Z is for Zupa. (soup). As in, it's a bird! It's a plane! It's Zupaman! (Just like the more well known superhero, only more likely to be found carrying crackers and a spoon). Actually it's not even spelled with a Z. It's an S. Nothing down here starts with Z.

And there you have it.
PS: It's not a problem for anyone if I don't ever come back, is it?