And in this gift shop on the Western tip of the island I made friends with the cashier, who is Jamaican. "Lots of research going on in Jamaica," she insisted after finding out I was with the Biological Station, "you should go there. Genetic experiments with cows. We have lots of cows."


"My family has a long history of marryin' Chinese fellows," she told me. "Some of my best friends when I was young were Chinese. I remember going to one of the weddin's once, where they have the rice and all the courses...you know de ones I talkin' about."

I admitted that I did.

"And I try some of the food, and one of my friends warned me, she says that you better not eat that. And I ask her why, and she bring me round the back -- I used to work in the veterinary clinic -- and hangin' there are all the heads of all these bull terriers that I been lookin' after every day. So I asked her why all these heads were hangin' here, did somethin' happen to them? and my friend said no...that's what your eatin'."

I told her that I'd never eat dog.

"Well, it was someone's wedding so it would be rude not to eat. And anyway, it was quite tasty."

And then she told me about one of the Indian women she knew (her mother was Indian), and about how when her husband died they made a big pyre for him, and she decided to commit suttee because she could not bear to be alone. Threw herself right into the fire in front of a policeman and a huge crowd and no one stopped her and she was engulfed in flames with her dead husband and both their souls went into the next world together.


Oh, and the rest of the dockyard experience was fun as well - we saw the maritime museum and a pottery place, and hideously overpriced local crafts and a cakery and dolphins and got rained on a lot.