From paradise to pure reality

Hello dear readers. Here we are now, on the other side of the world. During our stay on Saint Vincent and the Grenadines we collected so many beautiful and lifechanging memories that there is an uncountable number of things I could tell you about. But I can’t, so I will limit it to the best ones. I’m sure you’ve already read many blog entries about our arrival in the Caribbean. That is why I will skip this part and start with an evening at a restaurant on Bequia where we had a farewell because one of our crew members, our doctor Vinc, left. Now you may think: “A farewell? How could a farewell become one of our best memories of the Caribbean islands?” Well, besides the delicious food and fruit juices there was also a steel band playing covers on their local instruments. Some music and a dance floor are everything needed for us KUSis to have an unforgettable night. There we were: 34 teenagers, some teachers and crew members dancing Cha Cha Cha, singing along in the sand under palm trees and above of us a sky full of stars. Can you imagine a better farewell? Well, I can´t.

In the end, that night was quite a cliché, wasn´t it? But we aren´t here to experience typically touristic days. We want to have the adventure of our life. Some days later, when we had already left Bequia and stayed for one day in the “Sandy Lane Marina”, we got another taste of adventure with Classroom under Sail. The day we tried to leave, it started to rain heavily. All the fresh water was directly used by my watch to clean the deck. Our rain jackets were useless – after ten minutes everyone on deck was completely wet. I can´t remember having ever experienced such a heavy rain. After the cleaning was done on every station, we actually wanted to leave, but the rain and the wind wouldn´t stop so the ships lead decided to wait one hour until it was over. As my watch was already wet, we took the first and last watch at the port. Three hours later we were still standing there with the rain going on. But we didn´t care, we had fun. Dancing in the rain, pitching out the water from the dinghies, having the first conversations with our new members, our doctor Clemens, the mate Ulli and the boatswain Ole, and just enjoying the warm rain – something I don´t believe I would have experienced as a normal tourist.

Four hours later, I felt like a tourist again when we anchored at the Tobago Cays next to big yachts. Actually, I have to admit it’s really beautiful and worth a visit. With dinghy shuttles we were brought to the beach. There you could either chill out or walk up a little hill. From the top you had a fantastic view over the Horseshoe reef and a little island where the movie “Pirates of the Caribbean” was filmed. I was sitting for a long time on this hill, talking with other KUSis about our lives after our journey and listening to Nico’s stories. The actual highlight on the Tobago Cays was the reef, though. Every one of us had the opportunity to visit the reef at least two times for 30 minutes. What we saw was both fascinating and terrifying. There was so much life, turtles and special fish species. And then there were the corals. Well, I should rather say, then there were no corals. It was like swimming through a field of coral ruins. The reef had already been badly damaged before the hurricane Baryl hit, although that certainly didn’t help. The few corals left were mostly grey. Sadly, the coral bleach didn’t miss out the Tobago Cays either. When I saw them, it was the first time I was directly confronted with the consequences of the climate change. This confrontation with pure reality shouldn’t remain the only one.

Entering the Bay of Union Island, we were standing at the bulwark looking to the island and couldn’t believe what we saw. Some buildings were destroyed, others had neither roofs nor doors or windows. On our first day on the island the ranger told us how he had experienced the hurricane. At first the sky became dark, then the wind started to increase. In the neighbouring garden he saw a whole boat rising up and flying through the air. That was the moment when he hid in the bathroom and held the doors to protect himself and his family from the dust and the stuff flying around. After around five hours everything was over and the only thing he thought was: “I am still alive”. He went outside and saw the destruction. Only one house in the middle of the village stayed untouched. In the six months before we arrived here everything had been cleaned up. However, rebuilding the houses will still take some more years. You can already see some new roofs, but there aren’t many of them. Besides the buildings the hurricane also damaged the local nature. The mangroves were already destroyed before the hurricane came because of us humans building bridges to a little island which made water circulations nearly impossible and as a consequence the mangroves died. Due to of all the debris which is now because of Baryl lying in the mangroves a project to make them grow again is nearly impossible.

On top of that, the wood of Union Island is home to some special animal and plant species which exist nowhere else in the world. Rich people want to buy this rain forest to build a tourist resort. But the island is fighting together with many organisations to keep the forest in its today’s shape. What makes the whole thing about protecting the nature of Union Island harder is a problem with the local political situation.

On our stay on Union Island, we also met the local teenagers. We visited their school, they came for a dinner to the Thor and we had the first football match Union Island against Classroom under Sail. As we had been stuck for two months on a 50-metre-long sailing ship we couldn’t run as much as they could. So, we had to exchange our players every 10 minutes which ended in a little chaos because nobody knew which position they were playing in, so suddenly there was no defence left and Union Island could easily score a goal. In the end we managed to deal with that problem too and were a fabulous team! The funniest part was when the tropical rain started again during the match and the field turned into a mut field. Sadly, we lost 6:8. But fun is the most important thing – and fun we had indeed.

Now the last evening began. We had already seen some performances of the local dancers and drummers the days before. Therefore it was time that we also show our talents. With “we” I mean the music project of KUS. On a little hill we gave a concert performing our best songs with fitting messages. For example, we sang “We are the world”. That song was written and sung in 1985 by several Pop Stars to raise awareness for a hunger crisis in Ethiopia. It’s about unity and sends the message to lend a helping hand. For most of us this song is the favourite song on the Thor Heyerdahl. After we had finished, their dancers and drummers showed a performance again. With that our visit on Union Island and in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines came to an end.

We started our journey on the Antilles as tourists in hotspots like Bequia, the “Sandy Lane Marina” on Canouan and the reef on the Tobago Cays. But on Union Island we met the local people and experienced things normal tourists would have never seen. I mean who of you has ever played football against a Caribbean school team or brought instruments with a dinghy from a sailing ship ashore?

It was depressing to see the destruction the hurricane had left. On the other hand, it was impressing to see how the people deal with it. Of course, some of them have a trauma and still suffer due to the memories. Still, they are looking forward enthusiastically – only talking about rebuilding, that it will take a while but that they will make it. They continue living their culture intensely. I personally respect the people for their attitude and confidence into the future. However, despite the fact that they won’t give up they still need help from outside. I hope that we could make some change with the donations we brought with us for the school. I will never forget Union Island or our whole stay on Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and I am glad that I got the opportunity to be here.

But this isn’t the end of our voyage. Today on December 20th we continue our journey heading to Panama – with new watches and Christmas eve coming soon. Thank you for reading! Goodbye!