I made my first trip to Jamaica this week. Not just anywhere in Jamaica, either, but right into downtown Kingston. When I heard I was being sent over there, I jumped over to Lonelyplanet's website and looked it up. I figured I would have some time to kill (no pun intended) while I was there and was looking for some direction. As I was reading the description of Kingston, the phrase that kept repeating itself in my mind was “Putting lipstick on a pig”.

Jamaica's teeming capital city suffers from a negative image that, though partly deserved, belies its charms. At first neither welcoming nor beautiful, the city is diminished by squalor, and its culture can be darned right intimidating. Seething tensions simmer below the surface and often boil over.

But although there are places visitors are advised to steer well clear of, Kingston is the vibrant heartbeat of Jamaica and its centre of commerce and culture. It hustles, it bustles, and it merits a visit, especially during one of the annual festivals.

Nice... Well I got up at 5am, and headed to the airport for 6am for the 7am flight to Kingston on Cayman Airways. I emptied out my gym bag (backpack) and put my rain jacket in there, along with the computer that I was taking with me, and looked around in there for things that wouldnt make it past security.

I went through security and remember thinking to myself “Airport Security in Cayman is a lot more thorough than it is in the US. they ALWAYS make me take my belt & shoes off, and they don't always make me do that in Miami...” After stopping at the duty free store, I went and took a seat near the gate. I thought my bag was a little heavy, as I tried to fit the bottle in there with the computer, and that was when I realized something: I had an 8” folding knife hanging from a carabiner on the side of my backpack. AN EIGHT INCH KNIFE with a fishing line hook-blade on the back of it. It's murderously sharp. (pun intended) What I was just saying about security at the Cayman Airport? Forget it.

I went up to the counter and said “I just realized that I have a tool in my bag that they didn't find at Security, but it sure as hell won't get missed again and I don't want to lose it. Can I leave it here and pick it up later?” The girl at the counter said “let me see it” so I took it out of the bag and showed it to her and her eyes popped out of her head, like she couldn't believe they missed something so obvious. She said she would leave it in the will-call box at the ticket counter and I could pick it up that night upon my return (it wasn't there when I got back that night, but it'll turn up)

So i get on the plane for the 48 min flight to Kingston, and promptly fell asleep. I woke up 30 mins later as we were beginning our descent and filled out my customs and immigration forms and noticed that my neck was getting a bit stiff. Just what I need, a headache today. I get off the plane and it's gray & raining (not hard) and make my way into the terminal. down the hallway, into immigration and get in line. I pass through there and customs and the exit spits me out into the morning rain. OK. I try to go to the ticket counter, but they won't let me into the airport without a valid ticket. OK, so they're more secure here than in Cayman. I found the taxi dispatcher and gave her the voucher with the address on it in New Kingston. I hop in a little rasta-mobile with windows tinted so dark I can hardly see out and off we go.

What I noticed about Jamaica from the drive from Norman Manley Int'l to New Kingston was that it kinda reminds me of Cuba, except that where Cuba is stuck in the 50s when their money ran out, Kingston seems to be stuck in the mid-70s, as far as architecture and just the general “age” of the place. We got in to New Kingston and found the office building where our office was and I got out. I walked up to the front door of the building and it was locked and made a lot of noise when I tried to pull it open. A man at a desk inside looked up at the noise and saw me and buzzed me in, like in small jewellery shops. I walked up to the glass wall and introduced myself through the little talky-hole in the glass, and he said “Oh, we've been expecting you! come around to the left...” and there was another steel door, which buzzed and let me into the inner office. I felt like I was visiting a prison!

I replaced the dead machine, and looked around to see if I could discern what was causing them to fry so many hard drives. They claimed it was because of power surges and sags, which could be true, as the power in Jamaica generally and in this office specifically is pretty bad. The part that didn't hold any water was the fact that we had them install UPSes to prevent power sags from turning off the computer. I crawled under the desk to look at the UPS and that's when I noticed that the big yellow sticker that says “STOP! PLease be sure to connect the battery and charge before using the UPS” was still on... covering the outlets that were connected to the battery. I pulled it off, moved the plugs over to the correct side of the UPS and fired it up. I then had to go around and shut down each machine and move the plugs from the Surge Suppressor outlets to the Surge Supressor with Battery Backup outlets. I sorted out a few other little things that needed to get fixed while I was there, but I was pretty much done by 11:45, and my flight home wasn't until 6:05pm.

With about 3.5 hours to kill, I hopped onto MSN Web Messenger and checked in with the home office. I IM'd a girl at the office back home and asked her if she knew of anything to do in Kingston (that wouldnt get me shot or busted for red eyes and the munchies when I got home) and she said “where are you?” and I said “Im in Kingston” and she said “Shit, I wouldnt even go outside around there” which wasn't exactly the vote of confidence I was looking for. I passed the next hour checking my email, and stuff like that. I was also getting hungry and my headache was getting worse. Around 1:45, one of the girls in the office took me to go get some lunch. There's a sports bar just down the street from the office called Cuddy's, and is owned by  cricketer Courtenay Walsh. Lots of TVs everywhere, lots of service staff, but really poor service (surprise! look where I was!) anyway, I had a jerk chicken sandwich and a coke, which didnt show up right away so I had half a glass of water that was on the table. It tasted like ass though, so I waited for the Coke. My headache was big now, and I was probably dehydrated as well. Lunch for the two of us came to $600. Yes, six hundred dollars. Six hundred JAMAICAN dollars though, so when I got the slip back from my credit card, it was USD$12 :)

I caught a cab back to the airport at 4:00 and he took a different route back through Kingston, giving me a different view of life. Once I recognized a couple landmarks, I fell asleep. I was starting to feel a bit ill, and was worried that it was turning into a migraine, when I still had to fly back to Cayman, and then drive home from the airport. I showed my ticket to the security guard at the door to the Air Jamaica counter, and she didn't want to let me in, because my ticket was printed on Cayman Airways stock, and she said Cayman was at the other door. “No, Im flying Air Jamaica, it's just printed on Cayman stock” she didn't understand how that could be possible, so to avoid any more aggrivation, I went to the other door, and then walked back into the Air Jamaica area from the inside. As I was standing in the check-in line, my stomach started doing backflips and I started to sweat. It wasn't air conditioned, but that had nothing to do with it. By the time I got to the front of the line 20 minutes later, I was nauseus, green-in-the-gills and I had sweated through my undershirt and had big sweat stains on my chest, back, collar and under my arms. I must have looked like a drug mule with a burst condom in my stomach or something. In hindsight, I think it was the water. Possibly the chicken, but probably the water.

I turned to the Air Jamaica “traffic control” lady at the front of the line and asked where the nearest washroom was. she looked at me and said “You're going to lose your space, and look how long the line is now” and I said “well ok, hand me that trash bin, I'll throw up in there in front of everyone” and she said “the bathroom is over there, you can come back to the front of the line.” so I said thank you and went to the head. It was pretty nasty, and after a few minutes (miraculously, I DIDN'T chuck my cookies, I guess I have enough willpower to control it) and went back and checked in and made my way through security to the departure lounge. I grabbed a bottle of water and sipped away at most of it. I found a spot near the gate and sat down and instantly passed out. I woke up about 15 minutes later, and then fell back asleep for another 10 minutes, and started feeling better after that.

My boarding time was 17:35. at 17:40 they announced the that the Havana flight was delayed, but nothing about the Cayman flight. at 17:45 they called the Ft Lauderdale flight, but still nothing about Cayman. I went up to the customer service counter and asked about the Cayman flight, and he said it was on time and would be boarding shortly. 17:50... 17:55... 18:00... OK, I went back up there and he said “we'll be boarding in just a couple minutes” and shooed me away again. At 18:05, they announced that Air Jamaica flight 0069 was delayed until 19:05. Great. ANOTHER hour. I looked in my bag for some Advil or Tylenol, but all I had was a five year old bottle of sudo-gest. Not gonna help me. We finally boarded and took off at about 19:10. They came around with a “snack” which was a little dinner roll with some meat in it. I'm not sure what it was, and I WAS hungry, so I thought I'd give it a try, without the bread. It was nasty. The other thing int he snack tray was a chocolate muffin. sigh. more carbs and sugar. to round it out was a cup of orange juice. Not on the approved foods list either, but it had no added sugar, so I drank it down anyway. After that they came around with champagne, but I didn't feel like any of that, either.

I got home around 8:45 and was asleep by 9:00. Friday when I got back to work, everyone was saying “Hey! you made it back! welcome home!” and apparently it was the big laugh at work that they sent ME to KINGSTON of all places. I'm glad that even when I'm not there, I can be a source of amusement for everyone :)