Bonjour de Martinique!

It is absolutely beautiful here in Martinique! There are so many colors and smells and gorgeous sights here on the island everywhere one looks there is something amazing to experience. Sometimes it feels like a dream, and at others like I am sitting in a movie, but most of the time it feels just like I am living in a paradise.

I think the best cultural experience I have had so far was the first day we were here. It was Sunday, and the holiday epiphany. So my family and I had great big feast that afternoon with many siblings and cousins and other seemingly random people. The meal consisted of lamb qnd four different types of fish with a salad and rice and some strange new vegetable similar to a potato but purple and gray and much more mushy. It was almost like Thanksgiving but rather less formal with many strange smells. After our meal thqt night we went to another cousins house and met even more family. Nowit was time for le Galette des Rois, a flat cake filled with either almond paste or coconut (the islands specialty) or sec (dry). The cake is cut like a pie, and everyone eats a piece, and whoever finds the little king piece in their cake is king or queen for the night! I was not so lucky as to find the piece, but I did eat a lot of cake. It was hard not to, I hadn't learned how to say I am full in french yet, my belly was very full that night.

Another part of that night was meeting a lot of people who speak very fast to you and expect you to respond. Eventually they would see from my very confused expression I had no idea what they had asked me and would try again a little bit slower. It was quite overwhelming that night. On top of all the french chatter that blew my mind, when you meet all these people, it is custolmary to kiss them on the cheek and they kiss you back. I can tell you I kissed many people in greeting that night and as an American who hasn't done much of that it was rather intimidating and a little scary. But all is well, I feel much more comfortable kissing people in greeting now, with all the practice.

Well we are off to Morne Rouge today and eventually a beach later this afternoon. We are off to new adventures!

à bientôt

Mary S.