Kito’s favorite days are when we take her to the beach. Generally, she’ll nip at everyone’s toes until she gets too tired to romp around, and then she’ll settle down and dig herself a shady little hole. 
Sometimes, we play with other dogs at the beach. She loves that. Her best bud is Sasha, the gentle German shepherd.
Last week, she watched Ben surf for a while from the cliffs above. I captured the many sides of her little personality.
Where do you like to take your dog?
Med school is a beast. Last semester, Ben spent ten to twelve hours daily on medical school activities: lecture, studying, practice problems, tests. He worked hard, and it paid off. He finished the semester with a 93% average, honoring all his classes.
American University of the Caribbean recognizes its honor students each semester with a ceremony and dinner reception. It was awesome to watch my smart, handsome man walk across the stage and receive his Dean’s List certificate!
A few other awards and honors were recognized during the ceremony. One of these is the community engagement award. Ben G. (not my Ben) and Kyle M. received this award for their work with the SXM Little League Player Development Program, the tutoring and baseball program I volunteer with. One of the faculty members read a speech written by each of them. Hopefully, a few other AUC students had their interest piqued at the ceremony and will start volunteering with us, now that Kyle and his wife, Andrea, are leaving the island.
After the ceremony and my enthusiastic admiration of Ben’s certificate, we headed to the student lounge for some free food and conversation. I was impressed to see prestigious faculty helping to serve the food. That shows what kind of community we enjoy here at American University of the Caribbean.
Hopefully, we’ll be here again at this time next semester! Please keep Ben in your prayers as he works hard toward his goal of becoming a medical missionary and hospital founder in East Africa.
Island jeep, surfboards, tropical French countryside. This is the Caribbean life, and we love living it.
Most days are filled with studying for my husband, Ben and his friend Matt. They work hard at medical school, and were both selected as teacher’s assistants in Anatomy for good grades. Their life mainly consists of flashcards, lectures, and tests. But there are days, the best days, when they have a free afternoon.
This is one of those days. As we usually do when Ben and Matt have a break, we wax down our surfboards and get ready to ride the waves.
We’re rolling down the road with the Caribbean trade winds tousling our hair. Matt’s new (make that old– really, really old) jeep is topless, and I’m amazed to realize how much more I notice without walls and windows to restrict my view of the sights around me. I’m feeling a little squished in the back seat with the surfboards taking up most of the space, but there’s no way to feel claustrophobic in this open jeep. I cling to the side for dear life and lean out of the car a little, enjoying the breeze and the floral scents around me. I jump back a little as a motorcyclist, breaking the world record for the longest wheelie ever held, goes zipping by us on the center line.
I look behind me, where the wall of foaming water is raging toward me. I feel a little vulnerable way out here in the middle of the water on my board, but my nervousness turns to adrenaline as I face front and paddle like a maniac. I feel the foam first, hear the roar of energized water, and then I’m shooting forward like a rocket. I gather my wits and push myself up to my feet. I balance myself and smile. The reef below me seems to rush below my board. The wave slows suddenly, and the board drops away beneath my feet. I’m plunged into the warm tropical waters below, and I come up coughing and gasping and ready for more.
I’m in the back seat of the jeep again. It’s a terrifying yet exhilarating experience, sitting in this little island car with no seat belt and barely any seat, for that matter. But I love it. Up the road we go– people, houses, and animals seem to fly by. Ben and Matt joke that driving here is like a video game; you have to dodge the pedestrians, potholes, cars and animals that jump out in front of you at every turn. I watch as the scenery around us changes. We go through the hills, where the goats and cows chew lazily, watching the flurry of human activity on the road. We go past little houses, painted powder blue and pink with neat, white trim. We zip through Grand Case, where women in bright dresses and men with dreads chat in French on the porches of stores and cafes. We crawl through the traffic of Marigot, inching past quaint 19th-century storefronts. Ahead, we’ll pass the oceanfront neighborhoods of the rich and famous.
I bite into the heavenly sweetness of a peach brioche. Stopping at Seraphina’s, our favorite French patisserie, is a surf day tradition for the three of us. Ben and Matt opted for chocolate twists, their usual favorite. We watch the boats on Marigot’s docks bob up and down in the water. In the distance, Anguilla’s long coastline hides the horizon, where the sun will soon set on our afternoon of freedom.
In Sint Maarten, there a lot of airy little restaurants on the water. Today’s destination for the American University of the Caribbean spouse’s crew was Buccaneer Beach Bar. Despite its name, this is actually a great place to take kids. It’s right on the beach, and the water is shallow. It’s also a calm area, even on days when other areas of the island have big waves.
They also have a delicious assortment of non-alcoholic drinks in addition to their bar menu, and classic beachy food.
If you make it to SXM, make sure you visit one of our on-the-beach restaurants! Who doesn’t want to lounge on a beach chair with a plate of fries and a glass of something cool and sweet?
Hi friends! Usually of Foodie Tuesdays, I tweak an international recipe and share it here on 3rd Culture Wife.
Today, I have glorious amounts of leftovers and absolutely refuse to cook.
We have ribs and pizza, so I doubt Ben will argue with that sentiment.
Instead of the usual, I decided to share with you my favorite Word Press baking post of the day. Incidentally, it fits in with my Caribbean theme. If you’ve ever visited the Caribbean, odds are you’ve enjoyed a nice, warm johnny cake. If you haven’t, now’s a great time to try it for yourself!
Click on the link below to visit Mandy G’s blog and learn how to make this classic Caribbean staple.
One thing that I love about the ocean is the line of indigo at the horizon. This is my favorite part of painting ocean scenes. I love the way that turquoise becomes aquamarine becomes indigo. On sunny days in Dutch Sint Maarten, the indigo line stands out sharply against the clear blue sky, creating the perfect picture of paradise. Indigo Bay is aptly named for its lovely view of this deep blue phenomenon.
If you look at a map of Sint Maarten, you won’t find Indigo Bay on it. If you drive the entire circumference, you’ll never catch sight of it. Indigo Bay is actually the name of a luxury housing development located on Cay Bay. To find this area and the beach that belongs to it, you have to find the billboard advertising Indigo, turn right, and follow a terrifying road down to the water. The road is actually not as terrifying as it looks, once you start driving. In fact, as you go, you’ll be amazed at the gorgeous landscaping and layout that is invisible from the road above.
This morning, some of the other med school spouses, kids, and I visited Indigo for the first time. It’s a great place for both kids and puppies. The waves are soft here, even when the rest of the island is dragging out their surfboards to ride big breakers. Here, it is calm and peaceful. Little boys splashed in the gentle surf while little girls ran through the sand to fill little buckets with perfect little shells. My puppy, Kito, contented herself with digging deep holes in the sand and biting any ankles who entered the circumference of her anchored leash.
I usually am the first to grab a board or snorkel mask and jump into the sea. Today, though, it was a morning for relaxing and chatting. There will be many more days of beachgoing for us in the next 15 months, and more than enough time to dive into the sparkling waters. Twelve beaches down, 25 to go!
