Hmmm...

I am ashamed that I didn’t remember what day it was when I posted my last blog (Friday July 16th). I tend to forget what day and what date it is but that was a date I should have been aware of. I want to wish a belated Happy Birthday to my youngest daughter Carrie. I hope that she had a great one. I did call on Saturday but could only leave a voice mail. Peter has been appointed by the Hopkins town council as the guardian of the lagoon and local off-shore waters. It pays a small salary and may even provide him with a small boat. He is responsible for making sure that the drift nets being set are the right net diameter (4 inches or more), fish studies, lagoon health, etc. He recommended his friend Tonic as his deputy and the council approved him too. Peter is very excited!

Next, before I get into the news and events of the week, I want to clear something up. Based on emails I’ve received I may have given a lot of you all the wrong impression about my 1 night jail stay. I wasn’t arrested and do not have a criminal record in Belize. I was merely detained. As I’ve mentioned before this is a pretty backward country. When a foreigner does something wrong, even a non-criminal offence, they deal with it differently. They don’t tell you to come back in the morning, or call and make an appointment; they take your passport and put you where they know they can keep an eye on you. And that is in jail. It’s what happened even in a traffic accident until they investigate it and find who is at fault. So, no harm no foul. I don’t have to check the box on any forms that ask if you’ve ever been arrested. It won’t even be an issue if and when I apply for residency here. There is no record of me even being held. I hope that relieves those of you who were worried about me. Thanks for caring though!

Since my car is being held prisoner by Customs in Belize City I boarded the Hopkins bus for my 1st ever bus ride, bound for Dangriga and Belize City, at 7am on Monday morning. It took 2 buses just to get out of Hopkins! I didn’t realize how busy that bus was so early in the morning. Actually I never considered how many people took the bus to work in various parts of the country. One of the nicest things was that almost everyone who got on said; “Good morning!” out loud as they started down the aisle to find a seat. It was very refreshing. Have you ever ridden a bus in the states and heard anyone do that? Normally everyone stays quiet and ignores the other riders. I guess though that part of it is because Hopkins is a small village and if you aren’t related to almost ½ of the population you grew up with the other ½. Still it was refreshing. Anyway, once the bus passed through town from the north end to the south end people were standing in the aisles. Here in Belize it’s against the law and I’ve actually seen bus drivers being ticketed for it. So before leaving the main part of town and out to Hopkins Road the driver made a cell call and another bus appeared. Those of us that were headed west and north to either Belmopan or Belize City were transferred to the new bus. Once that was accomplished we headed out of town. Hopkins Road is, as my brother Dave can tell you, 4 miles of very bad road and stops at the Southern Highway where you either turn north to head to the Hummingbird Highway or south to Placencia and Punta Gorda (the southernmost city in Belize and a major port) where the road ends. After travelling 10 miles you hit the Hummingbird Highway and you either turn right (east) to Dangriga or left (west) to Belmopan and the Northern Highway and Belize City and Corozal and the border to Mexico. Our bus turned right and headed toward the bus depot in Dangriga where buses lead to everywhere. Before we’d gone too far the Belmopan/Belize City bus pulled into our lane and stopped. Before going on let me tell you how you know where a bus is going. You look directly in front of the driver and there is a wooden placard 3 feet by 1 foot with the destination city written on it. Pretty simple. And…all the busses are manufactured in the states by Bluebird, the same company that builds school buses. Belize buses all look like school buses but with different paint schemes. Anyway I got off and boarded the Belmopan/Belize City bus and settled in for the 2 hour ride. It seemed to stop every 100 feet or so to let new passengers on or old ones off, thus the 2 hours to drive 55 miles. There was a 10 minute stop in Belmopan and then it turned into an express bus to Belize City and the 55 miles took only an hour. Total bus fare? US$7.00.

I went to Customs to pay my fine and learn the amount of tariff I need to pay. It wasn’t pretty! The tariff on my car is 67.5% of the blue book value which is about US$20,000. That’s roughly US$13,500!!! No way can I pay that. But it never came to that anyway. (The tariff on the trailer, canoe and generator is US$332.) I was told by the valuator that, because I didn’t own the car outright and didn’t have the title I couldn’t legally import it without documentation from the owner (the loan company). That stopped everything. When I got back to the Customs office, after he took a 90 minute lunch break, I asked why I wasn’t told that when all this 1st took place. I had told him then that I didn’t have the title and that I was making payments on the car. All I got was a shrug. By now I’m pissed! What are my options I asked? Pay off the car and get the title or take the vehicle out of the country and sell it and buy one in Belize. What??? I told him if I could pay it off I would have and that the Belize government website didn’t say that you had to have the title to bring a car into the country if you plan to stay. His response? You could have asked at the border and they would tell you. Now I was ready to pull him over the desk and ??? My response was; “Drive the 3500 miles from Florida, through Mexico, and ask at the border? Obviously they don’t know because they told me I had a 6 month visa on my car and that’s how I got into this trouble in the 1st place!” So anyway, if I want to leave Belize, trailer and all, and live in Mexico I have to come back to Belize City and pick up my car, along with a Customs agent, drive back to Hopkins, hook up, and drive to the border, all with the Customs agent in the car. He’d get out on the Belize side of the border. I asked for my passport and where to pay the fine and was told that I needed to go to Immigration to pay. He did give me my 2 passports back though. I looked in my old passport and saw that I was stamped in so I don’t think I’ll have a problem leaving the country because they gave me a new 1 month visa. And, since all of the Immigration offices and border checkpoints aren’t linked in a single computer system that I’ll have a problem. So maybe they gave me a pass on the US$1000 fine. I spent the extra money and flew back to Dangriga because I didn’t want to spend the night in Belize City and I had missed the last bus back anyway. Tricia picked me up and we started talking about options. She said that one of her former husbands (she’s had several) went to Mexico without a title and sold his car without a problem. Personally, even though it sounds, and seems to me at times, that I’ve been put through the ringer, I want to stay here. So that may be the best option. I have no problem paying the US$332 for all my other stuff so I’ll do that and at least keep my place to live. The downside, and one of my chief worries, is that the electronic braking control for the trailer is in my Jeep. Ron said that he could install it in anything I bought without a problem. That eliminates that problem. So I’ll have to think long and hard about my next step…

As always, stay well, keep happy, and practice peace. I am!!!