Not So Anonymous

We are approaching three months in and this life is starting to feel less like someone else's and more like my own.

• The produce man, David, has started to know me and always offers me a free taste of some sort of fruit that I am unfamiliar with.  
• We have become casual friends with many of the business owners like the wonderful French and Italian owners of Tutti Fruitti, a serious addiction of ours, and are warmly greeted with a smile and a familiar nod or wave.  
• We know many of the children's names that run around town and several have just shown up on our porch from time to time anxious to play with the kids.  
• We have scoped out the local only spots to buy fish (still a feat though...I feel compelled to do an exposé "where did all the fishermen go?").  
• We have been invited over for dinner, taken on a lovely sailing excursion, and been given a lesson or two on how to fish without a pole.  
• We feel extremely comfortable being nearly the only white people that come to the local fútbol games in town at night.  
• It's still a joy to ride our bikes everywhere and makes me feel less like an outsider (though this is far from the real reason we would or wouldn't be considered one).
• We finally scouted out where to get $.25bz (12 cents US) "ideal" or "milky way" (frozen milk, sugar, and flavor...I think) in a little baggie that you bite off the corner of, another nice cool treat and easy on the envelope budget!!  
• I know where in town to go to borrow tweezers to pull out the barbs of a sea urchin when needed.  
• The kids have scouted out, with the help of some friends, many of the edible fruiting trees (stay tuned for a fun video tutorial from them).  
• We know which local crazy guys to keep our distance from when they haven't had their meds.  
• We have several people we would call if we are in a pinch or need a favor...and would be honored if we were on their list as well. 
• More than once people have let us come back to pay for something when we didn't end up having the cash on us...always an indication of some familiarity and trust.  
• We know not to touch the green caterpillars, that mango sap is like poison ivy, that there is a good dentist in town that can fix a chipped tooth, that banana tree sap/milk from the trunk will cleanse and heal a wound in a hurry, and that scorpions like damp dark places.  
• We have seen a form of bioilluminesence in what we think were glowing jellyfish off of our dock, a spotted eagle ray, a manatee (only Addie saw that one), a blood moon, many tropical fish and coral, lots of iguana, and we haven't even gone on any excursions yet. We are waiting for YOU to come visit for a good excuse for us to go together! 

doing school on the pier

iguanas aren't so bad

best bread in town only BZ$2

best gelato you've ever had - Tutti Fruiti

fresh ingredients - Tutti Fruiti

Lorenzo, one of the nicest people around

All this to say that it's nice to know our way around this little piece of earth.  It's nice to not be so anonymous anymore.
-Heidi