Fish & Dogs

During the day I made myself busy on the rocks chasing small fish and sea urchins in the Indian Ocean. Several lovely hotels lined the coast.
Our hotel, Le Spice Garden sat on the end corner.
I played on the rocks because unlike the other hotels that moved the rocks from the beach and made little lagoons for their guests to swim freely on white sandy beaches, Le Garden didn’t even bother. The property line started where the rocks did.
I figured at least we had tide pools. At the same time I made sure to hold my footing on the algae, so I didn’t slip on the rocks.
I wasn’t alone. Closer to the hotel most of the locals fished on the rocks for a living. They would wake early in the morning and walk out from the coast, stand up and fish all day.
Kell gathered her stuff in the room for her conference. There were only two days left before she made her big speech. At this point she just wanted a good night’s rest and nice shower. She looked woolgathered. The airline still didn’t deliver her clothes.
While other conference participants walked around in fancy business clothes, she had to wear those old sweatpants she rode in on. I figured she was disgusted.
After an hour or so, Kell called for me to come off the rocks. We had to walk to Le Meriden, the conference hotel to handle business.
All the hotels sat on a little half mile strip, ours being the end and Le Meridian being the main focal point of the coast. The villages were in front of the hotels.
At night from our rooms at Le Garden the others and I could see Le Meridian’s lights, people dancing, smell the food and hear the music.
We felt like stepchildren. There was no life and laughter in our hotel lobby.
From time to time Canadian and Pete took us over for drinks.
I climbed off the rocks and met Kell in the sticker filled grasses. We picked the stickers off our pants legs and I instantly became glad I didn’t wear shorts, because they would have been in my skin.
As we made the walk along beach, several loose, mangy dogs followed us.
I hated those dogs. With their ribs showing they looked half dead. I figured they didn’t have a proper meal, causing them to lose energy but then they had the nerves to chase you. The locals were accustomed to the dogs. They were chased too. I found out that some of the dogs were just wandering pets. All of the dogs were loose, and looked uncared for mutts, unlike American dogs, which were fine breeds.
I took to walking with a stick. Because I was going to be damned if I would stay in a death trap hotel, be bitten rabies, and have to go to that makeshift hospital or go home for a tetanus shot. Then the ride home took two days, so I didn’t want to be leaking with flu like symptoms on the plane. I held on tightly to the stick.
“Bran, you look real stupid carrying that stick,” Kell said. She lugged her books in her arms. I sucked my teeth and didn’t even look up at her as I pulled my shoe out of the sand.
“But don’t get rid of it, OK?” she followed up. She was serious.
I heard how wild dogs bite tourists. The nurse issuing me my shots in America warned me. And those dogs were everywhere.
Later, I’ll tell you about my trip to the top of the mountain. So far up, your ears pop from the elevation. You could only get there by car. Yet, the dogs were there too.