Tuesday, 24 May 2011

Arriving at Nevis

I have made it to the island and it’s been about 25 days now but it feels as though I have been here for months. That’s probably because we have block exams once every two weeks and we are already done with our first block exams, which felt like the finals. Anyways, the name of the island is Nevis and it’s sister island is called St. Kitts. Together they make up a country called St. Kitts and Nevis. The former is a bigger island and also more touristy.  So, I landed at Basseterie International Airport at St. Kitts on 28th of April and I was travelling with Teja and Mustafa. As we approached out destination, we were greeted with some amazing views of the islands. In the beginning I couldn’t make out which island was which, but it became obvious after a while. Nevis has a volcano and the peak is called Mt. Nevis, so it was easy to spot that.  After the touch down, we had to queue up to go through the immigration and the employees at the airport were really slow and I was getting frustrated because I only slept for few hours before I started travelling and I was tired and hungry.  That was followed by me not getting one of my luggage; the one that had all my clothes and stuff like towels and all. Feeling low, I went to the luggage claim area and reported my delayed suitcase. Then, someone named Daisy was waiting for us outside and she drove us to the dock and from there we took a ferry to get to Nevis. We took the sea bridge, which is the fastest way of getting to Nevis. However, if you are taking the sea bridge you have to make sure that someone is waiting for you at the other side. Daisy had told us that Charlene would be waiting for us at the dock in Nevis. The ferry ride was about 20 mins long and the sun was just about to set. It was that time of the day when everything looks beautiful.  Like Daisy said, Charlene was waiting for us at the dock and she drove us to Rawlins, which is one of the student dorms. On the way she gave us our phones and told us about the orientation that was going to happen after few days. After we reached Rawlins, we had to go to the dorm-housing office to sign our 4 months residence lease. I was assigned a room at Potworks, which is about 10 mins drive from Rawlins or 5 mins walk from school. So, I signed the lease and was waiting for a ride to Potworks. Claxton, the guy in whose office I signed the lease came to pick us up. He was driving a truck and the funny guy told us to hop into the trunk of his pick-up truck. We did and finally reached our dorms that is going to be our home for the next four months, or may be for the next two years. Claxton handed me my keys and gave me instructions on how to use the switch when lights go off; there is a switch inside my room and if the lights go off, we just have to switch to 1 from 2 and that allows us to use the generator. We have to switch back to 1 when the lights are back. I had to call home and I tried using the phone that Charlene gave me and I was supposed to get a 5 EC top up for free with the new phone, but I didn’t. Thankfully I met a really friendly senior who lives in a building right across mine and she let me use her phone. I kept the conversation very short and she told me that if I wanted to use the Internet, I could walk to a nearby restaurant called Flavors as they have a 24hours free wifi. So, Mustafa and I went there and as the restaurant was closed, we had to sit outside on the steps. I called home again using gmail and this time I was able to talk to my mom for a longer time. It was already late and I was exhausted, so I went home and crashed. That was day one.








  Finally reached Nevis; the peak at the backdrop is Mt. Nevis which is a Volcano. No..it really is!!