Saturday, May 27, 1995 - Aruba

Bought a textbook for Papiamento (also spelled Papiamentu). This is certainly an easy language. It's the first language I've ever come across that didn't decline the verbs. For instance, "ta" is to be, and it's the same for every person: mi ta - I am bo ta - you are (singular) e ta - he is nos ta - we are boso ta - you are (plural) nan ta - they are For most other verbs, you simply use the infinitive after ta: mi ta bai - I go bo ta bai - you go (singular) e ta bai - he goes nos ta bai - we go boso ta bai - you go (plural) nan ta bai - they go For the past tense, you change ta to a: mi a bai - I went bo a bai - you went etc. The future, which is seldom used, is formed by putting lo before the pronoun and eliminating ta: lo mi bai - I shall go lo bo bai - you will go etc. How simple can you get! And most of the vocabulary is very similar to Spanish. I bet a person who's fluent in Spanish could understand 90% of what's said in Papiamento without a single lesson. For instance, here are the numbers from 1 to 10: Papiamento Spanish un uno dos dos tres tres cuater cuatro cincu cinco seis seis siete siete ocho ocho nuebe nueve dies diez Even though Arubans insist Papiamento is a "real" language, in my opinion it is just pidgin Spanish, similar to all the other mishmashes of languages that developed during colonial days to facilitate communication between the dominant and the dominated. This is probably of no interest to anyone but me. I've always been fascinated by languages. When I was a little kid, my ambition was to travel all over the world and be able to speak the language of every country I came to. Today, Roy and I rode the bus to the area where the other marina was supposed to be, a couple of miles past the desalinization plant. We wandered around until we found it. It was quite small and a private club. The manager was very nice. He talked to us for about half an hour. He's 51 and was born on Aruba. He said there has never been a severe storm here. That was reassuring. He also told us that when there is a hurricane farther north, it sort of draws the wind away from here, so it's calm and hot in Aruba. They had no openings at all at their marina; in fact, they have a waiting list of members who want slips. Nearby was the ferry dock to De Palm Island. The round-trip costs $5. We discussed going over there, but decided not to today. There didn't seem to be much there. We really lucked out catching a bus back to Oranjestad. When we reached the highway, there was a bus stop right across the road and we could see a bus coming! We crossed the highway, got out our fares, and waved at the bus. In a few minutes, we were back in Oranjestad. We ate lunch at Kentucky Fried Chicken. Then Roy returned to the boat to do some work, and I walked to the Pueblo Supermarket. On the way, I passed a very nice hardware and housewares store. I went in and was delighted to find a good, stainless steel, made-in-U.S. vegetable peeler. Our old one disappeared several days ago, and the only replacements I'd been able to find had been totally miserable. They tore the vegetables to pieces, so I was really happy to find a good one at last. I dropped the groceries off at the boat and then went to the pool area at Sonesta Suites to stay out of Roy's hair. I got so relaxed in a lounge chair by the salt-water pool that I dozed off and had a hard time getting awake enough to return to the boat. While I was gone, a Naval officer stopped by the boat and informed Roy that the courtesy flag we were flying was not a proper Aruban flag. We had bought it in Fort Lauderdale, and it was supposed to be an Aruban flag, but the blue is too dark, the star is too big, and the stripes are too far from the bottom. After supper, we watched an Alfred Hitchcock movie, "North by Northwest", on channel 13.