notes from the inexplicable

Tempted as I am, explaining the trip to Belize is impossible. It cannot be done.

As someone who loves language, it is frustrating to encounter its limitations. Unfortunately, that is my burden. Every novel combination of words I could use to dazzle and impress and possibly convey a tiny splinter of the psychological gestalt that rearranged my soul has long been claimed by New Age hucksters and verbose mental health professionals.

So, instead of all that, here are just a few of the things I learned:

• Budget travel = plenty of beer money.
  
  
• I don't hate kids after all. And, hell no, I still don't want any.
  
  
• Joe Bageant is a walking, playing, singing compendium of early-to-mid 20th Century American music.
  
  
• Regardless of whatever open mind accompanies you, and no matter how great things work out, eating chicken in the Third World is just as motherfuckin' scary as it sounds.
  
  
• Contribo bitters, baby. For all you ethnobotanists and shaman-types [secret handshake here]: Soak a mature stick of the tropical vine aristolochia trilobata in rum for, well, come to think of it, I'm not sure for how long, but a couple of weeks with regular agitation would work fine. The result is a tonic with a tinggggg. Like ginseng, it has a "healthy taste" - earthy, medicinal and strangely comforting. And like all good medicine in the Caribbean, contribo is said to be great for a boner (fortunately, the odds of getting an erection in a bar in Dangriga are even more remote than you think). It's also water soluble for those who eschew alcohol, but a taste for astringents will come in handy with either version.
  
  
• Avoid hitch-hiking from Hopkins Village to Dangriga under the blazing equatorial sun, especially on Sunday. Eighty percent of the traffic on that particular stretch of highway is comprised of vans from the Hamanasi Resort ferrying rich-ass tourists to and from the airport and exotic coastal excursions. It just isn't reasonable to expect them to give a good goddamn if some diminishing stain of a dust-covered human being is withering and dying on the roadside.
  
  
• The monstrous face of Empire is infinitely more horrific when reflected in the eyes and stories of the world's poorest citizens.