Isla thoughts

Today was one of those wonderful Caribbean days we dream about: not too hot, mostly. Not too sunny, mostly, Not too humid. So what is there to think about? Good question, and one I asked myself as well. Being on vacation allws you to spend time not thinking, just being.

Last night Darlene paid the price of eating Mexican food, with a night forming a close relationship with the toilet. But a good night's sleep (and her constitution) allowed her to be fine this morning, albeit dehydrated and a bit weak. I wish I had been so lucky in Cuba a few years back. So one of the thoughts is being grateful for the public health system that we enjoy back home.

Another, and recurring, set of thoughts has to do with the ways we mistreat this planet, and the cultures that live on it. On Isla Mujeres, there was, and still is, a village of fisherfolk and their families. They are Mexican (Mayan really), and they work hard to get by. They have benefitted from the tourist trade, and continue to have good-paying jobs (I think) through that trade. And this is in no way like Cancun, with its massive and very lavish hotels which seem to serve the North American clientele by isolating them from anything truly Mexican. But even Darlene will admit that there is a growth of the expensive, gentrified, white culture coming to this little island and starting to change it. There are now expensive condos, and fancy hotels - more so than when she was last here. We ate tonight at a small, hole-in-the-wall family-owned restaurant (Abuelos) which served excellent food including fish caught today (likely by someone in the family). We ate it while some of the family watched the evening telly. These places still exist and do good business, but you are now seeing fancier places than Darlene remembers from before.

And the scenery....ah, the scenery.

















It's spectacular, to say the least. This little bit of land, 8km by less than 1km, has an eastern side which is rocky and hit by crashing waves, and a western shore which is calm and sandy and warm.

And if you look closely, there are bits of garbage everywhere: plastic bottles, beer bottles, foam from who-knows-what, old rope and buoys and construction materials. Not a lot of it, but it is there all the same. There is a recycling program for plastic bottles, and yet there are a lot of them around. The intrusion of human-made detritus into the natural environment doesn't spoil it, but it saddens me. And reinforces my cynicism.

So there are questions in paradise. More to come, probably.

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Location:Calle José María Morelos,Isla Mujeres,Mexico