Where 007 used to hang out

Morgan's Harbour, the hotel in Port Royal that I wrote about earlier - see my blog Where pirates of the Caribbean used to hang out, was also a place where James Bond used to hang out. There was an article today on New York Times Ian Fleming's Jamaica, which traced places in Jamaica associated with Ian Fleming, who created James Bond and who regularly spent his time in Jamaica. I never knew this, but according to the article, some of the 007 movies were filmed at and around the hotel, and the car chase scene of Dr. No was shot on the road that I drive to go there! Watch a scene of the road to Morgan's Harbour in a French trailer of Dr. No, available on YouTube.

The U.S. election night

All day long, listeners are calling in to local radio stations to talk about the victory of Barack Obama. Needless to say, nearly every resident of paradise has been for Barack Obama, and everyone is excited about the U.S. presidential election outcome, as people in other parts of the world are. For some reason, however, I don't see CNN or ABC or New York Times reporting a scene of people celebrating this moment from the Caribbean! So here we go, I am posting the article by my favourite roving reporter Robert Lalah, who reports on how two residents of paradise spent the historic U.S. presidential election night, and what they expect from "Arack".
http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20081106/news/news1.html

If you need some help in understanding Jamaican Patois, you could consult some of the websites listed here: http://www.jamaicans.com/speakja/.

U.S. General of Jamaican descent

I had no idea, but Colin Powell, former U.S. Secretary of State and former General of U.S. army, is of Jamaican descent. He was born to Jamaican parents. I learned this from an interview with him by the Jamaica Gleaner, published today: click to read
Barack Obama has commander-in-chief quality, says Powell.

By the way, I have been hearing and reading many people in Jamaica expressing their view that ironically it is Bush who paved the way for Obama to rise by appointing Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice for the high-profile position in his administration. I find it very intriguing that I hear this view quite often around here although I never hear it from the U.S. media. Is it that the perspective is totally irrelevant in U.S., or is it not expressed in U.S. for fear of invoking the "r" word, i.e. "race", or...?

Indian food with a Jamaican twist

Jewel of India, which is located next to East in the fancy food court in the Market Place, is one of the best Indian restaurants that I have been to in my life (note: I have never been to India). Their food is savory and has rich complex tastes. I especially like their mutton curry, which is always made very tender. This time, however, I was with a person who doesn't eat meat, and we ordered seafood.

I couldn't manage to fit the dishes in the camera frame very well because of darkness, but from the top, vegetable bullets (695JMD), shrimp angarry (1645JMD), Madras fish curry (1235JMD), and garlic nan (275JMD). I normally prefer grilled fish over cooked fish, but I was impressed with the fish curry. It wasn't spicy at all but very tasty, and the meat of the snapper - if you order a fish in Jamaica, it is always a snapper - was so soft and juicy at the same time. The shrimp curry was also very good. The sauce was mildly spicy and velvety, and the shimps were crisp. The appetizer vegetable bullets are supposedly their original. The separate sauce is a clear liquid type. It is vinegary and has cilantro in it.

Indian people began settling in Jamaica around the same time as Chinese people came, in the mid-19th century. As in the case of Chinese people, Indian people first came as indentured labourers. To know more about how Indian people came to Jamaica then, see Out Of Many Cultures: The People Who Came - The Arrival Of The Indians from the Pieces of the Past series of the Gleaner.