It seems that some of my loyal readers would prefer some more pictures over just my reporting, so let's see what I can do.

I had considered posting a picture of my ankle which had turned purple for a while, but then thought that some of you might be reading this over breakfast and not even I am that mean.

I'm not very good at taking pictures I have to admit, so what you're about to see is mostly from somebody else. Let's start with a recent trip to the beach to get you all a bit jealous and then work our way through some sightseeing and my combined Housewarming/Birthday party.

Goddamn awful, isn't it? What do you think?

Here's some more directed more at your entertainment... if you lose your appetite now, I can't really help it

I could tell you a story now about jetskis, a guy called Coyote with only one arm and dreadlocks, but you would not believe it anyway, so let's move on.

Here's a bit of downtown Willemstad:

And a bit of information for you.... not sure if you'll be able to read it....

Here is where I drink away my hard earned bucks...

    located in the

And finally some pictures of the biggest cruise ship we get here. Let me tell you, it is massive!

Which finally brings us to the Housewarming party... It's nothing compared to Cafe Bendl, but we did try at least and I believe we can call it a success. Again, I will have to be a bit careful in publishing pictures here. Some people apparently do not appreciate it very much...

And this is when the dancing, singing and other madness starts...

And on an on and on... Thank you to everyone who came, for all your help and presents.

The next day I was MOD again, thank god it was quiet...

Gotta get some sleep, so we'll leave it at that for now. Take care

A little note before I start: It has been pointed out to me that some people might not really appreciate the way I portrait them or their country here so unless I'm certain I can ridicule you in public, I will be a little more careful with names etc. and what is going on at the place that I call work. I hope it does not have too much of a detrimental effect...

Well, another week has come and the Biggest Loser program is now in full swing.

Monday saw the start of the special menu in the canteen (sigh) and also the beginning of the first activity: Powerwalking.

There are actually 2 choices for taking part. One at 6am (I THINK NOT) and one at 6pm.

It was my full intention to participate and report back to you lovely people what this intriguing activity might entail, but it was not to be.

On Monday, I just missed the 6pm group and was therefore forced to rely on Miss M from P and on another friend who would normally not be my first choice as an exercise partner. You see, he just ran the Amsterdam Marathon 2 weeks ago and even finished it, so we're not exactly in the same league when it comes to exercising. He also carries a slightly worrying amount of gizmos when exercising. Believe me, man has gone to the moon and back with less computing power than he takes for a jog. However, he is younger than me, has even less hair than me (hehe) and is known to make the occasional sarcastic comment (mostly for my, ah, benefit), so I don't normally mind having him around.

Anyway, those 2 were available so off we go in a weird mixture of running and walking. Weird mixture because Miss M is walking and the rest would rather run and actually does so in what could maybe called installments, i.e. run for a little then turn back to fall back to Miss M before starting over.

Before we started I had to wait a little for the 2 of them and so I had time to stretch and warm up a little which turns out to be a good thing.

In fact, it proves absolutely vital as maybe 2 kilometers away from the hotel I trip and land awkwardly on my left foot.

Those of you who know me and my medical history for a bit longer do know that if I'm not currently fighting for my life against swollen tonsils blocking my airways, my usual area of expertise is ruining my knees. However, my body seems to go along with the whole changing-of-life-moving-to-Curacao thing and decides against the knees and goes for the ankle. Ouch!

For a minute or so I just think that this is it again: Cast, crutches, physio-therapy and the lot. Those of you who have ever broken, ruptured or sprained something will know what I mean.

Leaning against the wall and standing on my good foot, I carefully test how much strain my injured foot will take. Not a lot. I also wonder how the hell I will get back to civilization. While my friend's gadgets might be able to monitor my heart rate and other life signs and pinpoint our GPS position to about a meter for the Med-Evac, they don't fare so well when trying to replicate a wheelchair.

The situation does improve though after maybe a minute or so and I slowly start hobbling back towards the hotel. In my mind, nightmare scenarios keep unfolding about having to deal with a cast in these temperatures and being stuck at my desk the whole day. Miss M does her best to enliven my ankle fantasies by providing some horror stories of her own, mostly referring to painkillers and the fact that you can't really drink alcohol while you're taking them. This has some alarm bells ringing I can tell you...

While it's not comfortable, at this point I can still walk within reason. This will remain so for the rest of the evening when I ice the ankle and also put on some Sports Cream provided by my friend thinking positively about the future.

This has changed dramatically by the time I wake up Tuesday morning. I'm back to the point where I can't really put any weight on it and every movement hurts.

Luckily it's my left foot and I drive an automatic so at least I can drive reasonably well and get to the hotel. The way from the car park to the office is long though and I get there exhausted. At this point there is no doubt that I will have to seek medical attention if things are to improve.

I go and see a lovely doctor who confirms a sprained (and by this time quite swollen) ankle. I get some cooling gel and anti-inflammatory medication plus a bandage and am told to take it easy (poco poco). An X/ray is considered unnecessary.

I would like to point out that the medical service received is much better than the skeptical old me has expected. It's not at all complicated and very quick, both at the doctor as well as the pharmacy. It's easily ten times better than England (big deal I hear a lot of you think) but also good in comparison with Germany and I would say it can hold it's own against Norway and Switzerland.

So, instead of exercising, I just sit around a lot collecting dust. It does give me time for writing up all this though, so at least you benefit.

I will keep you informed on how I'm doing.

No, I'm not gonna whine about how old I am or how little hair I have or gonna bore you with any of the grief others or I have recently endured. Instead, I will tell you about a new initiative happening here at the hotel. Some of you might be aware that there is a program in the US called The Biggest Loser. There is a spin-off of this in the UK and also in Germany I believe whose names currently elude me.

In essence, it's a program about losing weight. We might not have cameras or drill-sergeants but still, that is what we are going to try and do here at the hotel with any associate who cares to participate. At least in principle. The program will run for 3 months and whoever loses the most weight on a percentage basis, will receive some special prize. The hotel is running the whole program and there is organized Sports activities and a special menu in the canteen. They have also given everybody a special diet plan (Ha!) and will measure progress at set intervals.

Those of you who have recently seen me back in Germany or the UK will have noticed that I had lost a bit of weight already (about 7 kgs to be precise and thank you really for all the flattering comments) but you all know also that there is still lots of room for improvement.

So, of course, I signed up. Almost my entire department actually did. About half of all the associates participate, at least for the time being. Time will tell how many of us will still be around by the time the program ends at the beginning of January.

Also, not all of us will have lost weight. You see, the entire schedule is worked out to work against you. Let me explain: You are not only fighting your body, who by the way is more than reluctant to give up any of that religiously stored fat, you are also fighting the calendar.

You don't need to be a rocket scientist (or even very smart for that matter) to work out that between now and the beginning of January lie 2 festivities which normally are not exactly associated with dieting. On the contrary, it seems that these days the sole purpose of Thanksgiving and Christmas is to submit yourself to the yearly experiment of seeing how much food (and drink) you can stuff yourself with before repairing to the couch to watch a Detroit Lions or Dallas Cowboys game or thanking good ol' Aunt Gladys (who is just a tad hard of hearing) for the lovely sweater with the Unicorn motive. In any case, the timing of the whole thing could obviously not be more unfortunate and a bigger challenge to my discipline (which most of you are perfectly aware is shaky at the best of times).

Be that all as it may, it all started for real last Monday with everybody getting weighed and photographed and then told how much weight they need to lose to achieve their ideal weight.

In my case that is a sobering 17 kilos! Yeah right! I will not share with you how much I would weigh then, but let me tell you that it must be about 15 years since I passed that weight mark. 10th grade would be my best guess. And during those days I had far more hair, good looks and brain cells!  Much as that might sound and undoubtedly is, it's nowhere near some of the kilo figures that some of my fellow associates are supposed to lose. There are individuals who need to lose more than 40 kilos, so that is the only thing that currently makes me feel slightly better. I have no intention of losing 17 kilos, if I get rid of 8 to 10 I will consider it a massive success.

Well, instead of babbling on, I must ask you to excuse me. My neighbor (the loyal Miss M from P) and I have decided that we would start all this in earnest on Monday. So until then, I'm off to enjoy life, beer, pancakes, cheesecake, full fat coke and something amazing called Cheetos, which to describe would take another whole blog entry by itself.

More next week, and ah yes, please don't tell Aunt Gladys about the Unicorn sweater...

First of all I would like to say sorry that it's been quiet for a while. I have been to Germany and the UK and seen some of you in person and I also moved house where I now have no internet. So all not so easy sometimes.

If you read my last entry (and if not, why not?), you might remember that I said that chronologically something else noteworthy happened before the hurricane. It needs a bit of an introduction, so here we go.

Like most other hotels, managers here have to occasionally perform a function that is commonly known as MOD (Manager on Duty) or Duty Manager. It usually hits you twice a month and here is more like what I was used to before I came to Grosvenor House where the whole Duty Manager thing is a real laugh. If you're unlucky you have to sort out real problems like thefts or deal with Overbooking situations or system problems. If you're lucky it's just walking around a lot talking to people who are all happy enjoying their holiday. The whole task is not be taken too easily as in case of any real emergency you're basically it and you better know what to do as to not make a complete fool out of yourself and the hotel. Now, over the years I had ample training of making a fool out of myself, but I was still reluctant to just go and start doing these shifts without pretty much knowing anything.

So, the idea is born to do one shift together with the Security Manager to get some more information on the whole "what-to-do-if"-scenarios. This guy is called Robert and he is from Florida. So, he's also not from the island and is also struggling a bit with the languages. Not as much as me of course, as he would need to lose his tongue to be in as many language problems as I'm in.

He's black and he used to play professional basketball before and therefore (maybe not surprisingly) is not exactly what you would call a small fellow. In fact, he is more of a giant.

I'll leave it to you to imagine what sort of an odd couple the 2 of us make when we go on our rounds in the hotel....

So it is that I find myself on a Sunday morning walking the hotel with Robert. Something you don't get to do a lot on these shifts in London, Germany or say Norway is to check the condition of the beach and surf. So, this is a bit of a new one for me, however the rest is pretty much the usual. You need to check a room (which I'm ashamed to say was so bad that even to our 2 untrained pairs of eyes the room was clearly not ready to be given to paying guests), walk the property, record the occupancy as well as the usage of the F&B outlets and so on. We do all that and somehow pass the rather uneventful morning, go to Lunch and do a final round of the hotel before all that is left is to write up the report.

Robert actually was to do that alone and so I return to my room (I still live in the hotel at that point) and change out of my uniform into something more casual. It's about 3pm now and the shift change to the late MOD is at 4pm. Unlike me Robert is an Operations person and likes dealing with guests and problems. I think it's fair though to say that computers are not necessarily his friends. He knows his way around them just fine, but when it comes to placing the odd comma and making the occasional sarcastic remark about Housekeeping and other departments, there is other people more at ease with the task. You guessed right, that'll be me. As he calls me for help with his report I obviously go to his office and take care of the wording and all the formatting. For all I know, he might still be there trying to get Excel to merge those 2 cells. Bless him.

I know that the more skeptically trained of you are wondering where the hell all this is going, but just bear with me, we're almost there. Anyway, the time is about 3:55pm. All of a sudden the radio (or walkie talkie to some of you) goes crazy. Most of it is unfortunately in Papiamentu so Robert and me are not really any wiser as to what is going on. It takes us maybe 30 seconds to figure out that they are actually reporting a fight between guests at the pool! Once we figure this out we are obviously off running. Now I would like you to know that when you are attending any sort of physical confrontation, it is always somewhat comforting to be in the company of an almost 7 foot, 300 pound giant, that could easily play Linebacker for the Green Bay Packers.

Anyway, when we get to the pool there is a guy in the pool. Now this might not be very unusual in a resort, however, this guy is fully clothed (okay, he has lost one shoe) and he is bleeding rather profusely. There is another guy standing just on the verge of the pool with a pretty big rock in his hand shouting at the top of his lungs.

Now, we do not have the time or the space here to report what exactly had happened the half hour before this incident or the next 3 hours afterwards so I'll give you an Executive Summary. Just so you know, it took the Police and us about 3 hours to figure about half of this out.

About an hour before the Pool episode, 2 local guys ask for a room and are checked into a first floor room. These guys have come to the hotel with the sole purpose of using the room for some sort of deal. They are expecting 2 Asian guys with a lot of cash and the plan is to whack them and take off with the money.

To achieve this plan one of the local acts as bait in the room while the other guy puts a stocking over his face and hides in the closet with a gun (no kidding!).

Whatever happens next exactly is unknown, but certainly the 2 Asian guys prove a lot tougher than the 2 local guys expected. A big fight ensues and they trash the entire room in the process! However, it does not stop there. They crash into the door opposite their own room, take out a lamp in the corridor and eventually one of the local guys crashes through the railings (or more likely is transferred through it against his own will) and takes a dive down one floor into some sort of flower/plant decoration. He loses the gun (which is some sort of antique by the way which I doubt would actually fire) and sustains some injuries which cause him to bleed but do not really slow him down. From here on he takes off through half of the resort leaving a trail of blood and eventually seeking refuge in the pool. The Asians, having tasted blood, are in hot pursuit obviously forgetting the small detail that they have just left about $25,000 and the other local guy behind upstairs.

Needless to say that both money and guy are not there any more when they realize this fact. And so it goes on...

So, we're now back at the beginning...

After we get them separated and out of the pool, I try to stop the bleeding of the one guy until the ambulance and police arrives. I then entertain myself by viewing all places of the action and by trying to get all sorts of credit card information and so on and (I kind of liked this actually) by buying all other guests at the pool a drink. I also try to figure out what the pint or so of blood will do to the water quality in our pool, but I eventually leave that to the Chief Engineer. Kind of funny how suddenly all sorts of senior management show up, but whatever.

Eventually everybody gets arrested but to say that I have even a tiny amount of confidence in the Curacao Police force is a vast exaggeration.

So, so much for doing a nice little Manager on Duty shift here at my new hotel. If you want excitement, this is the place.

I have done 2 more shifts since then. On one of them I had to move out of my own room and on the other one there was a fire across the street, so at least it keeps you occupied.

I don't really know how to get there now, but I want to dedicate this episode to my friend Robert, who helped me through my first shift and who I could count on at all other times. For some mysterious reason Robert got fired last Friday, so Robert, should you ever read this, this one's for you.

Chronologically, I actually have another story to tell you first but the developments here have their own way so let’s get the last 2 days dealt with first.

It’s Month End once again and as you might or might not know that always puts us beancounters in a strange mood. Glad that there are many beans to count on the one hand, however dreading all the work of producing some numbers that most people then won’t like on the other.

This always reminds me of my favorite definition of an accountant:

An accountant is someone who solves a problem you didn’t know you had in a way you don’t understand. Very true.

Month End always means long hours, stress, pressure and god knows what else. This is my second month end in Curacao and it is getting a little better in terms of finding my way around things. Nowhere near what I’m used to, but then it’s also a little more relaxed here. So far so good.

But then God probably thought: Hey, let’s not make it all too boring and let’s better give him something to write home about.

So he came up with this:

What you see here is the path of Hurricane Felix that developed Friday night somewhere off the coast of Grenada.

Friday night it was actually only what meteorologists call a Tropical Storm, but it was upgraded to a Category 1 Hurricane on Saturday and later to a Category 2 in the early hours of this morning.

The ABC islands (yes, Curacao is the C) are the 3 small dots in the blue Hurricane Zone above Venezuela.

Now, as I have pointed out to some of you on various occasions Curacao normally lies below the Hurricane belt and we don’t get Hurricanes here. This is the reason why suddenly the whole island turned crazy. The last hurricane they had was 2 years ago and supposedly it was quite bad and nobody wants a repeat of that.

So, while I was posting journals and doing “normal” Month End stuff on Saturday, my boss and the rest of the Leadership Team of the hotel were preparing for the hurricane. All equipment at the beach and any Food & Beverage outlets outside (which in this resort is all of them with the exception of a cocktail bar and a coffee shop) was collected and transferred inside. Fuel for generators was checked and all available staff was called in. Letters to guests were distributed, torches and radios given out and all the other stuff you can do when you something big, wet and windy is coming was done.

Initially it was supposed to hit sometime between midnight and 5am on Sunday, but that prediction became later and later.

Our Systems Manager is currently away on a conference in Chile, so guess who the back-up is. Correct, good ol’ me. Good that I know so much about UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply), Server Backups, Data Tapes etc. NOT.

So after getting a couple of hours sleep at home, I go back to the hotel at 3am to make sure $200,000 of servers are safe.

No way I wanted to be stuck at home anyway. Having only moved in on Wednesday and with all my gear still in boxes I was nowhere near prepared for something like this (that’s not quite true actually; I might not have any candles, torches, food or anything else useful, but I do have a supply of beer, rum and coke as well as a bottle opener and a glass, so really, how serious could it get?).

By the time I leave home it is already raining. And one thing is for sure, hurricanes do know their rain (it will end up dropping about 20 cm of rain).

I listen to the radio on the way and I have to say they do a good job here. All the announcements are in 4 languages and so even people like me can hear and understand whether they will survive the night or not. By this time it is now a Category 2 Hurricane and the centre is supposed to pass about 60km northwards Curacao which I hear is not all that much distance.

I spend the next half hour covering the phone switch and the 2 server racks with plastic foil (the roof in this hotel is not to be trusted) and hope that should it all go down that we can bring the systems back up. At this stage it rains, but otherwise it is spookily quiet. Apparently not a good sign either. However, we do have electricity so nothing to worry about at this point.

I then go back to Month End work. Let me tell you, you have no idea how much you can get done at 4 am.

It seems there are more people in Housekeeping and Engineering than during the day as well as the General Manager and the Hotel Manager milling around so they really don’t need me there.

The wind eventually starts at about 5:30am, but it’s far less serious than expected. Yes, it blows quite a bit, but I can easily say I have been outside back home with the fire brigade during far more intense storms clearing streets and railroad tracks.

I’ve tried to capture the scene in a few pictures, but I guess it does not really convey the wind. Trust me though, our lobby does not look like this normally.

This is the Lobby view we are normally so famous for:

The outlet you see next is actually aptly named Seabreeze…

Anyway, it all blows over and while we they do close the airport and stuff, there is no major damage or casualties. At no point did we lose power or the water or gas supply. The only thing is that half of the nice sand on our beach is gone and that’ll cost to refill.

One idiot guest obviously has to go for a swim in the ocean while “the surf’s up”, but I don’t even move when the excited chatter over the radio starts. He can drown alright for all I care.

But hey, whatever. Another day, another Month End.

On the upside, even with all the stuff going on, I have a full first draft of the P&L distributed and some of my Balance Sheet reconciliations done by the time I go home around noon on the second. I also know that people here really care about their hotel and the guests in their care, so what more can I ask for.

I’m also glad it happened the time it happened as normally stuff like this happens when I’m supposed to travel.

Now I’m looking forward to getting the rest of Month End out of the way and then getting home to Germany on Thursday. Hoping and looking forward to seeing some of you this weekend on the various weddings, the Herbstfest or back in London next week.

Have a good week.

As promised in the last entry, here are some pictures of my car. We are back to Fire Engine Red. Enjoy!

Let me tell you how not to buy a car in Curacao.

As mentioned previously I believe, you can’t do nothing without a car on this island. (Note to all Bavarians: Bayrische Doppelverneinung funktioniert auch im Englischen, wenn auch nicht ganz grammatikalisch richtig).

You will need a car whether you like it or not. The roads are in a reasonably good condition compared to what I have seen in the Dominican Republic for example. They like their speed bumps (or drempels as our Dutch friends like to call them) here and you might encounter (or more likely run over) the occasional stray dog, herds of goats or iguanas, but that’s it. Ah yes also, for some reason people can’t drive in rain, even though that clearly does not stop them. Let me tell you, if and when it rains here, it is raining hard and there is lots of water on the road. The concept of aquaplaning has not sunk in here yet and the fact that the tires on most cars are not up for it either does not help in any way. Anybody up for some real skidding?

Anyway, you should also note that cars here are not the beloved treasures or status symbols that they might be to people in Germany or England. They are real utilities and in everyday use. In fact, it’s a bit more like France here. A car without a proper dent is not really a car anyway.

We have talked about accidents in this space before (I passed a sign the other day which announced that there have been 13 traffic deaths in 2007 so far; quite respectable for an island of about 150,000 people) and there are certainly a lot of “restored” vehicles out there. Thus, you have to be careful when looking for suitable mode of transportation.

I’ve had my fair share of trouble with my last car, so I did not want a car older than say 8 years or one with a lot of mileage either.

Cars here are mostly Japanese or Korean, with a few US manufacturers thrown in. You do see the occasional BMW, Mercedes, Volkswagen and rarely an Audi, but that’s it as far as European cars are concerned. At least the islanders know to keep their fingers off any French voitures…

Most of the cars are automatic and you really need air condition. Because there actually is a lot of sun, a black car is not too clever either.

I arrived on July 11 and more or less immediately went to a car fair on July 14. Keeping the entire just mentioned in mind I actually found a car I liked on that day. The car was ANG 12,800 or about GBP 3,600 or EUR 5,300 in real money. Now I did not bring that sort of money with me to the island in cash and they wanted either cash or a check.

However, they also offered financing (at 9% interest) with the same bank that I am banking with anyway, so why not do that? Problem solved. Most local people seem to do the same thing.

Okay, so on the 14^th of July I sit in a little marquee in a big car park, fill in a ton of paperwork, provide copies of my contract, of my passport and also of my driving licence and generally sweat a lot. 

The paperwork is then supposedly passed to the bank on Monday, although I’m not entirely sure if that really happened. In any case, the bank then takes almost 2 weeks and a bit of chasing up to get to the point that they contact my employer. The employer is kind enough to confirm that I actually do exist and that yes, they pay me a somewhat large salary (as stated in my contract, which the bank already has) compared to most people on the island. Very well. I don’t know this for sure but I presume the thought process at the bank then goes something like this. Right, we have got all the paperwork, we have verified it, so let’s do nothing for another week.

Once that week is up, they come up with this: As my contract is for one year only they are willing to finance the car over one year. So far so good, but wait, there is another condition. I also need to find a local person with a salary comparable to mine that is willing to vouch for me, i.e. someone who is willing to pay for me should I default on my loan. Rrrrrrrrrright. Now, I don’t know about you, but the only people I would approach for a favor like that are my parents or maybe the 2 loan sharks that call themselves my brothers. Last time I checked they were neither in Curacao nor local people. I don’t feel I can ask anybody else, so let’s forget about it. Great! Took the bank just 3 weeks to figure that out. Now we’re back to the drawing board.

The place that is selling the car knows someone at another bank, so the suggestion is why don’t we try that one? What else can I do, so let’s fill in more paperwork and copy some more contracts, payslips, bank statements and god knows what else.

These guys actually take a week, but at least they say yes. So, I just have to go there one day and sign my life away. So, I get there and wait for the representative for half an hour. Now for my favorite part: When it’s finally my turn they have to somewhat sheepishly admit that the director is in the process of authorizing the loan on his PC but has left to go somewhere and they can’t find him. As long as the file is open on his PC, nothing can be done. Now let’s think about this for a minute. We are talking a loan for ANG 12,800 here which the director himself has to approve. ANG 12,800. The owner of the hotel that I work for is in the process of trying to find a buyer for the hotel. Here we are talking a loan of something like ANG 120,000,000. Who is approving that loan then? The Governor of the island? Good old Queen Beatrix? Maybe God himself?

Anyway, two and a half hours later I have signed everything they want me to sign, I have a new bank account (probably have bought an encyclopedia of some sort) and have missed most of the working day.

We are now on day 33 of trying to get a car. The next day the car sales people actually get the check from the bank and we are ready to tackle the next problem: Tax and Insurance. But this is too boring in detail. So, in summary, the insurance will get it wrong once (my name is actually not Marriott) and have to start over (add 2 days), but once that is sorted it takes only another day for the license plates and on Thursday 23 August I get my car. So it took only 40 days in the end….

It’s a red Chevrolet Cavalier Coupe and its all mine. Well, actually I guess it belongs to bank, but whatever.

Thank you to all the people at Economic Car Center and everybody who drove me around for 6 weeks or lent me their cars.

So, what is the lesson in all this?

You don’t need me to tell you this but some bank will screw you over, either here or anywhere.

I do have the money in the UK but did not want to take out the money via cash machines or wire it as Barclays charges you an arm and a leg for that. With the limits in place I would have needed something like 10 Cash machine transactions where you get charged by Barclays and the local ATM supplier every single time.

Obviously I should have done that anyway or brought more money to start with. The credit alone will cost me something like GBP400 over the course of the loan and I could have at least saved a bit of money towards a hair transplant (which is now more necessary than ever) paying the car up front.

Unfortunately, it’s raining today, so I won’t take pictures of the car now, but watch this space for an update on the car soon.

Take care

Before I get into my reporting today, let me try and answer a question I have been getting a lot. Where the hell is Curacao? Somewhere in the Caribbean, isn’t it? But where exactly?

Well, Google to the rescue and here we go http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Curacao&ie=UTF8&t=h&om=0&ll=12.118352,-68.966331&spn=0.002392,0.005375&z=18&iwloc=addr

What you can see is the hotel where I work, most easily identified by the pool and beach. I actually tried to find my butt parked there on the beach for all of you to see (it’s a nice butt you know), but I have zoomed in as much as it would go and it won’t do it. If you then zoom out it will give you an idea where the island lies in relation to the rest of the Caribbean, South America and the US. Pretty cool, ey?

Okay, but back to the reporting. I thought about writing about Month End, but I think it’s not applicable to most of the audience and boring anyway, so let’s forget about that.

There is also only very little I can write about the social part this week with the exception maybe that I am officially too old for listening to Techno and House (even in a rather inebriated state) amidst hundreds of sweating and jumping locals and Dutch. The beach doesn’t help there either for some reason.

I then actually wanted to write about apartment hunting with its ups and downs and the progress of getting a car with only its downs. However, when I was out apartment hunting this week something else happened. Those of you, who haven’t yet watched enough Jamba ringtones commercials on MTV to be rendered brain-dead, might remember that I wrote about not having yet seen an accident in my last entry. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that.

In the 2 hours we were out and about looking at apartments I saw a little boy getting run over and we passed another collision involving 2 cars.

In addition, last Sunday I have passed the scene of a heads-on collision.

I believe all of the involved will live to tell the tale, but the boy surely will not play Softball for Curacao this year. The ladies in the car that got hit in the side have suffered a broken collarbone, concussions, whiplash and various abrasions and I doubt it has done many good things for their blood pressure either.

Now these 2 accidents happened around lunch time so I guess we can only blame the general carelessness here when it comes to driving. The heads-on collision on Sunday (which looked by far the worst and I where don’t actually know what happened to those involved) I would bet my afore-mentioned butt on that alcohol was involved. Everybody has a drink (or 7 or 8) here, especially at the beach on a Sunday and then gets in the car to go home, so I guess it’s just something that you have to deal with.

The one thing I do like about this here is that they have not yet completely lost the plot when it comes to the laws governing this. So, if you do have an accident here while driving intoxicated, you can’t sue the guy who sold you the drinks, like the way it is now in many other parts of the world. Here it’s just: Better luck next time.

I don’t really know how this fits into this, but it’s far too cool not to tell you. The guy that drove me around to look at apartments (and who will most likely become my landlord) is some sort of local celebrity here. I haven’t quite figured out what it is he exactly does, other than driving around in one of his 8 cars and showing people apartments or houses, but he seems to own lots of houses, he owns part of the mobile phone company, is a famous DJ and among other things owns a radio station.

Needless to say that his own radio station is playing in the car.

Now get this: When we stop at the scene of the accident with the little boy, he gets out of the car, checks out what happened and then makes a phone call. We are still in the car and the radio is on. 10 seconds later the radio station plays some sort of “Breaking News” music and then you hear the words of the guy 10 feet next to you over the radio. You see him say the words but hear them over the radio. How weird is that? Traffic and news reporting on a whole new level.

He does the same thing at the other accident. Welcome to Curacao.

Anyway, it looks like I might have found an apartment which might be finished this year. The first time we looked at it, he said it would be ready on August 10. As we went back on Wednesday I could not see any considerable change over the last 2 weeks other than a few palm trees planted in the yard, but he insists it’ll now be ready on August 20. We’ll see. I think it’s impossible, even with Polish workers.

The car story is so sad I won’t even bother you with it. Still no car…

I’m also not in the mood to tell you about the rest of my week right now and in any case I stayed in Friday and Saturday, so nothing special there.

Maybe things will pick up a little today. I can’t sit around all day again.

Hopefully more soon, until then, take care