An island is not a rock
by Chris Morvan
There’s a blog that I follow, called Women Who Live On Rocks. It’s a jovial, whimsical thing, started by a yoga instructor, a good-looking, bikini-wearing type who looks great in photographs.
I don’t know how she came to be living on a small island in the Caribbean, but she clearly likes it, as do the many contributors whose playful efforts add to the tales of sophistication-gone-native. She talks of “the patience required for an island lifestyle that has the tendency to move at the speed of a hermit crab.”
The blog is apparently just for fun, a way for someone who can string a few words together to pass the time and stay sane. Reality does not intrude here.
All in all it’s the sort of thing that must get right up your nose if you’re a Caribbean islander born and bred. During my time in these parts and on various other islands it has become apparent that the locals tolerate the expats and find them useful financially, if not actually welcome. The everyday life of the newcomer is very different from the daily grind of the indigenous, and the two worlds run in parallel, with little social contact.
The name of the blog tells us much of what we need to know. The use of the word “rock” is probably meant to be wryly affectionate but comes across as rather insulting. It bothered me when I was in Guernsey and it bothers me now. The “rock” that these people referred to back then was the place where I grew up, and I don’t consider myself a country bumpkin, redneck or whatever the insular equivalent might be. It’s not like London or New York, but that’s not to say it is inferior to those places.
Back on my “rock” in the English Channel I found it offensive to hear criticism of the lack of facilities and so on – and mine wasn’t the first generation to feel that. There’s an old saying there: if you don’t like it, there’s a boat in the morning.
My island was invaded in the 1970s by the finance industry, which resulted in a huge influx of money but also pushed up property prices out of the reach of people who didn’t happen to be high-earning bankers, accountants and lawyers. Meanwhile, these people who were helping themselves to the beaches and modernising big old farmhouses in quiet country lanes would laughingly tell their friends that it was all tolerable as long as they could “get off the rock” now and then.
There was a London-born TV presenter, brought up in the island, whom I interviewed once, and I asked her what she did at weekends. She said she went straight to the airport after work on Fridays and got the hell out. And now that she’s a well known BBC radio journalist with a reputation as a hard-nosed interviewer, I doubt that she can be found on her holidays adorning the coves and strands where she once risked her youthful intellect so her parents could save tax.
In the world of the disinterested realtor, rocketing property prices are a good thing. The less scrupulous estate agents don’t want to see your family in a nice home you can comfortably afford; they want to see houses changing hands at exorbitant rates that are reflected in the size of their commission.
Most locals in the Caribbean don’t want their island chewed up and spat out, but in the case of this one, it’s probably too late. Take away the foreign investment and the tourist trade and what would be left?
Presumably the women who live on rocks don’t see themselves as a threat to the lifestyle of their adopted home – and why should they? They’re minding their own business, keeping the local wine shop going and conducting field trials on the effectiveness of supermarket shampoos and conditioners in tropical environments. And yes, I feel entitled to poke fun because I too am guilty of coming over here and soaking up the free vitamin D while cluttering up the beaches (where you don’t see that many locals anyway).
As a long-time expat I have learned a few tricks designed to prevent the conspicuous from sticking out like a sore thumb. You don’t wear shorts, for instance, because only people for whom the heat is a novelty do that. It attracts mosquitoes.
And I am gradually becoming accustomed to waiting to be summoned when I eventually find myself at the front of a queue. However, it is still tempting to walk straight up to the window to claim my little bit of attention from someone who, in the absence of the license to tell me to get lost, will resort to making me wait.
