Filling a rusty, metal, 20 foot box

The next question was, who do we get to help us to move all of our things down to the container, which was now perched at the other side of the complex, out of sight and not entirely out of mind...

It didn't seem that "Raggedy Rich" and "Dutty Dawg Dacres" were likely to be able to take the day off on short notice, round of 20 of their friends, and come over to help the following day (Friday), no matter how much beer and pizza we plied them with, and how much begging we did.

This seemed like a job for the pros, which gave both of us the willies, having had terrible experiences with movers in the past... well... who hasn't?

After getting a quick referral, we called a company who said that we neeeded to let them know in the next 10 minutes so they could set it up for the following day.

We made a well-thought out, balanced, executive decision ... in the throes of our desperation. "How soon can you get here?" I coughed out, feeling the pressure of an apartment manager n the war-path someplace, and a container and carrier pick-up time of 6pm sharp.

At $44 dollars per person per hour, it was a better deal than had ever been presented bya moving company, who follow the time honored tradition of the industry of negotiating the price of the delivery while you are waiting for them to unload your previous earthly possessions (with the wife nervously wondering if the china from the wedding was all broken, and the husband hoping that the old TV did break, thus requiring a new flat-screen model from Circuit City... for the sake of the children, of course.)

They said they'd be there the following day at 8:30 am or so.

If any sleep came that night it came from exhaustion, as once we found the movers, we realised that we were in no shape for them to come tomorrow to help move all our stuff. We had been planning for another day of leisurely packing, followed by some leisurely shopping, to be rounded off by filling the container over a leisurely weekend, eating pizza and drinking beer at a leisurely pace.

Now we were busy throwing stuff into boxes and taping them up, calling my two aunts for help -- frantically getting everything together in the few hours we had left.

The following morning we awoke to sore backs and aching muscles, but we just about almost ready.

The movers came, with an extra person, and after we engaged in the time-honored moving tradition of haggling over how long the job would take (they had not been told about the 200-300 yard distance to the container) they got to work. We got busy telling them where things were, what to do,and got VERY busy making sure that they were happy, and well-watered and well-plied with patties (no beer for them.) They were being paid by the hour, after all, and we needed them to keep working hard, which to their credit they did no some horrendous heat.

They took our stuff downstairs, packed it into the truck for the short trip across the complex, and emptied the truck directly into the container.

They came back for a load, and somewhere in all this they asked "Where do you have your plywood and "lock and load?"" (I may be wrong about the name of this device.)

One of the movers, a tall guy with a tattoo on his neck who looked like the most resistant of all (until he shared that he had spent 6 weeks in Jamaica, taking comfort in some of the best ganja in the world) told us that we needed to secure the load with __something__. This would prevent the stuff in the container from moving around. According to him, you didn't want to have all your stuff bouncing around inside the container, and unless it was completely full (which was unlikely) it could happen.

Thanks to my aunt we were able to get all that we needed in about 2 hours -- going from not understanding a word of what he was talking about, to being able to get the items in hand so they could pack the truck.

Long story short, by 3 pm they were done. The container was tightly packed with two 8x4 pieces of plywood, secured by very tight rope. For a decent picture of what I'm talking about, see: http://www.jaminco.com/personal/cont.htm which is the best (and only) site on how to do the physical packing.

Whether the job they did was adequate to prevent a problem remains to be seen...

At around 7pm or so, another driver came with a truck to pick up our now filled container, just about every earthly possession... to take it to Jamaica for us. We breathed a deep, deep sigh of relief, because we had made the deadlines, in spite of the many surprises.

In retrospect, it would have been much easier and much more expensive to have a company come in and do everything while we spent a day at the beach... but, no regrets so far.

The only remaining job that we had to do before I could leave Florida for good was to dispose of my sofa and love-seat set, and find someplace to which that I could donate my car on short order. Neither of these turned out to be straightforward propositions, of course.

(to be continued)

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Oh what a difference a month makes.

The move is not quite completed, but I look back to what I wrote back then can only marvel at my naivete, and lack of knowledge.

The one thing that I most regret is that there is no source on the internet that right now has any practical help on how to arrange a move back to Jamaica (or any third world country I imagine.) Hopefully this can help anyone how is looking for advice, and hopefully they will actually be able to find it!

There have been constant surprises all along the way, and I've learned a lot about a process I hope never to repeat -- but not because the process is difficult, but because I don't want to ever leave Jamaica to live anywhere else ever again!

The first major surprise came when the twenty foot container arrived.

I had thought that the container was something like the PODS (Portable On Demand Storage Units) I'd seen in people's driveways -- a clean, white metal box that would occupy a single parking space. In fact, on Thursday morning I went cycling in the morning and saw a couple of PODS in the neighborhood... "No problem, I thought."

That was until I saw the huge, metal rusty box arrive at my Emerald Place apartment in Fort Lauderdale ar atound 1 pm or so. It was bigger than I thought, and nowhere near as photogenic as the PODS I'd seen. In fact, it kinda looked like a dumpster on a flat bed carrier, raised about 5 feet off the ground being pulled by a driver (who spoke a little English, thankfully) and his son who was no more than 10 years old.

He quite innocently asked me where I wanted to place the container, and I thought to myself - oh, that's easy -- near to the front of the building, near the elevators. So he pulled it in, sideways, backing it in with his semi, and walked to the back and released the container.

Except, it seemed that he had forgotten to take the carrier with him...

So as he prepares to pull away, my wife and I look at each other in a panic and say "Hold on, is he leaving it like that???"

Well, apparently he was.

There was the container, on a carrier, sitting 5 feet above the ground, in the parking lot of my apartment complex... looking as if it had no business being there parked between apartment 304's Camry and apartment 106's scooter.

Also, we looked at each other and asked "How the heck to we get up that high?" At five feet off the ground, there was no way to get ourselves up that high... not without major gymnastics, a ramp or a lot more help than "Raggedy Rich" and "Dutty Dawg Dacres", my two friends who were coming to help us move. How in the world were we going to get our belongings from my apartment and up and into that thing?

While the driver waited for our next move (he clearly had some a lunch of hot empanadas waiting somewhere for him and his son) a man walks up and asked accusingly "What the heck is that and how long is it going to be there?" I've never seen him before...

I try to explain the situation, throwing in the fact that I was moving back home to Jamaica, and needed to do this to export my belongings. Maybe, I thought, he'd take some pity on poor us and what we were trying to do.

"Four days???!!!! Hell no. This is private property! You can't leave that there! I'm calling the apartment complex, and the fire marshall ,and the police and the coast guard, and...." I don't know what he said next, because I had stopped listening by then as he ranted on, giving me an instant reminder of some of the things I dislike about America.

We ignored him, but realized that we'd better get some permission from the apartment complex before the driver left. With our best hand signals, my wife ran and stopped him, and tried to explain to him using both of the words that she knew in Spanish, that we needed to get permission from the apartment complex to leave the (possibly) offending object in place, which was now taking up 6 parking spaces in the front of building 3, Emerald Place.

He seemed to understand, and she begged him for 15 minutes (his son did some fast interpreting.)

We quickly went over to the office in the hope of warding off a barrage of phone calls from what I thought could quickly turn into a lynch mob, and (too quickly, and out of breath) explained the situation to one of the employees in the apartment office.

She assured us that the office manager would NEVER allow us to leave it where we had.

We gulped.

But, credit to her clear thinking, she called her boss and asked if we could leave it at the back of the complex (about 300 yards away), and if we could get 24 hours to get it off the property. She was very persuasive, which might have had something to do with our panicked looks and generally desperate demeanor.

Her boss relented, and after a quick call to the container company to see if they could pick the container up the following day (Friday) instead of Monday, we at least were now allowed to theoretically pack this 20 foot metal box with all our earthly possessions.

Now... how the heck would we get all those earthly possessions from my second floor apartment, and nice two bedroom with a view of the pool, incidentally, down to the rusty container sitting atop a carried over five feet high, 300 yards away?

Somehow, "Raggedy Rich" and "Dutty Dawg Dacres" didn't seem like the right help for us at 2 pm on Thursday and the clock ticking.

(to be continued)

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The Cost to Move Back to Jamaica

This is one topic that I have been asked about a few times. I admit... I have just been lazy about looking up the past info needed to answer the question.

One patient reader asked:

My question to you is, and yes, this is all relative. How much do you believe is a reasonable sum of money (liquid US$) to make a 'comfortable' move. Okay, let me be reasonable give me a scale, a range. Thanks.

Here are some basic costs I incurred in my move from Hollywood, Florida to Kingston Jamaica:

1. Packing
This involves moving all your stuff into a 40 foot container, (or two or three.) The packing that must be done is more involved than it sounds, as I detailed in these post to my blog.

Professional help is a must to prevent breakage. I paid around US$550 to pack my container.

2. Moving the Container to Jamaica
I have no idea what the going rate is, but I paid about $2000 for a 40 foot container without a car inside.

3. Moving and Unpacking the Container
I recommend using a customs broker to do everything from clearing the container and its contents, to putting it all away in your new residence. I paid about $1350

4. Airfares
Depends on where you are coming from, and the size of the family.

As a returning resident who kept to the guidelines of they allow in a single move, I did not pay any customs duties.

This was all 2 years ago, so things may very well have changed since then.

With respect to the amount needed to feel comfortable, I would say that a budget in South Florida works out to about the same lifestyle in Jamaica, more or less. I have kept a monthly budget for a few years, and can see where the transition to Jamaica resulted in some one-time costs, but the overall number stayed about the same.

In other words, a US$50k salary in the Miami/Broward area gives just about the same lifestyle in both places, by me estimates. I left South Florida before housing prices went on a rampage, (and before some major hurricanes) so this should be adjusted somewhat to reflect these events.

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The Skin-Bag as Container

In an earlier post, I shared how I have come to understand that my body is just a "skin-bag" that my spirit is identifying with for a short time.

Today, in one of my infrequent meditations, I had an insight.

As long as I choose to be alive in this world, there are certain realities that come with that choice.

The first is that I must give up control over breathing, and allow the skin-bag to be breathed by some life force I don't really understand.  In other words, in every moment that I choose to live, I give up trying to breathe, and allow this life force to breathe air into and out of the skin-bag.  Luckily for me, I rarely interfere, and as a result I get to stay alive.

I don't smoke, so I am at least giving the life-force a chance to continue doing what it's doing for some time, without getting in the way. I notice that it pulls air in, and pushes air out, and I never have to think about it.

What is less obvious is that the life-force also pushes thoughts into my mind.  Again, I have no control over this, as they come and go whether I am awake or sleeping.  It looks as if this will keep going as long as I am alive.  It also seems to me that I should not try to interfere with it either, and to do so is to cause stress to myself.

In other words, the life-force is using my thoughts to think me.  Thoughts come in, and then disappear if I allow them to.

Now and then I forget all this, of course, and in moments of tension, I hold my breath, and sometimes try to hold my thoughts.  The result in both cases is dis-tress and I imagine that if I kept this going  I would end up in dis-ease.

Perhaps the same applies to eating, perhaps?

But anyway, in my medidation this morning I came to see that while I was meditating, and allowing thoughts to flow freely, it was as if  I was sitting here as a container of thoughts, witnessing them coming and going, as if on a light breeze.

What makes meditation special, is that it's an opportunity to identify with the container, rather than with the thoughts.  Everyday life is where I easily get lost in the thoughts, forgetting who I am (spirit) and instead becoming the thoughts themselves.

It felt good this morning to return to being the container, (or, more correctly, having the experience of being the container) and hopefully more of this experience will carry over into my daily living.

Now, what does this all have to do with Moving Back to Jamaica?  Perhaps nothing, except that the violence and murders that are part of life here (151 as of yesterday in 2008) pushes me to think seriously about who I am, as I think it would for many people.  Of course, I could take my skin-bag and park it safely back in Pembroke Pines (FL), and take it out of harm's way.

But then what would I have to write about?  LOL

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OK, I found a real contact that gave me a special price at one of the most reputable shippers.

Once again, the network clicked in and I was able to find someone who is close friend of acouple of friends of mine, and a cousin. That worked well!

Now, for the logistics of filling a 20ft container, the thought of which leaves me with the question of how big a container of 20ft size really is? Is that big? Is that small? How many boxes of medium size does that hold? Will it hold everything I have, or not?

It's kind of a scary thing to realize that until the container shows up at my doorstep, I will have no idea what it will hold. At that point, it will be too late to get rid of some stuff, or to acquire more stuff.

I'd better have plenty of manpower on hand to assist in that move, that's for sure!

In the meantime I'e been searching the web to find out exactly what a "Returning Resident" is allowed to bring back to Jamaica. The list allows exemptions for certain items without duty, such as one bicycle per family.

One bicycle per family? That seems to be unrealistic to me, as if I had children what in the world would I do with only a single bicycle? As it is, I have 2 bicycles and my wife has one, so I'm sending one ahead with my father who is coming to visit next week. He's been asking me over and over when I'm bringing my bike down, as he's become an avid cyclist -- which has done wonders for his weight and health. 2 years ago he almost passed out from riding up to the top of his street (about 125 yards,) and now he's contemplating a 142 mile ride in October from Kingston to Negril.

When I get back to Jamaica and I have my roadbike I'll be able to go on some long, albeit slow, rides with him I hope. My wife seems to be getting interested in the idea of the ride fron Kingston to Negril, so we'll see what happens there.

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The Final Steps

While there were still some snags to overcome, I left the Customs office feeling that the process was coming to an end, and that there was light at the end of the tunnel. In a way, I had to feel that way as I was leaving for a business trip the next day (from Tuesday through Friday) and was leaving the entire process in the hands of two people -- my customs broker and a friend of mine who promised to be there to allow my stuff to be loaded into our apartment, if needed.

Well, she was needed -- the customs broker did his part, and by Wednesday the contents of the container were cleared by customs and the entire shipment was sent by truck to my new apartment where my friend reported that the broker's company was moving all the contents "gingerly" from the back of my truck into the apartment. I was nervously calling by cell phone from Barbados.

After hanging up with her, I stayed on the phone and called my wife in Washington, DC to let her know that we were at the end of the physical process, to our mutual relief. Now it was just a matter of unpacking boxes and settling into our new apartment.

Epilogue

While the process was at times jarring and surprising one, in retrospect I think that there was much that could have been avoided if I had more knowledge about the entire process from the very beginning. While there are people who ship goods back home frequently, there are relatively few who do so as returning residents, which is a one-time privilege. When I searched the internet for any kind of assistance, I could only find a single shipper that was helpful -- www.jaminco.com -- they had pictures and gave tips on how best to pack a container. This turned out to be useful when we were trying to understand what the helpful mover was telling us about "securing the load."

The only other things I could find on the internet were companies trying to sell, sell, sell without offering any actual help whatsoever (unless that help was to buy.) Mostly these companies were ones that were offering to do everything from end-to-end, by packing the items in the home and unpacking them at the destination.

Of course, the fee for that kind of end-to-end care and responsibility is not a small one.

Most people of modest means who are not having their move to Jamaica being paid for by their large company employer would not select this option, but instead would try to do some of it themselves.

I think that with better planning and more information, there could have been no surprises at all, and the move would have been easier. Hopefully, this series of blogs will help a little in smoothing out the bumps on the trip home -- after all, it's almost every Jamaican's dream to move back and this should not be as much of an impediment as it is.

Incidentally, moving back the physical items is the easiest part of all, I think. Mentally moving back is another thing altogether, and one that I'll be focusing on in blogs to come.

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Shock and Awe

From an email from a friend of mine:

"I met some ladies in Miami last weekend who say they read your blog religiously and want to meet you and hug you for the great job you are doing.

They are huge fans of yours."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The other night a friend of mine "confessed" that she had been reading my blog, as some are tempted to do from time to time.

As usual, my first feeling was one of amazement -- she knows that it exists?

Then I wondered if I had mentioned her by name... and cautiously asked if I had said anything bad...

She said no, and I asked "what did I say again?" -- my mind was truly blank as I thought about what nonsense I had stayed up late to (as my wife generously puts it) "pull out of my a** to put in that blog."

She told me that she had read my business blog (written by my tamer, saner self) and listed a couple of things that would not get me in so much trouble. I relaxed a bit.

Then came the email my friend sent above, and all the mad thoughts came back.

After all, I started writing this blog to entertain myself... thinking that someone else might want to move back to Jamaica and needed to figure out how to order, pack and ship their container.

Now it has a life of its own. And women who I don't know want to hug me.

Not that I have a problem with that.

I mean, they really don't know how many whiskers I leave on the bathroom sink when I have "cleaned up" after shaving my beard and head. They don't know what I smell like after a 3 hour ride -- all they know are the words I write in my blog. Heavily edited. Spell-checked. Screened by my wife.

But do they know me?

Sometime back when I wrote about match.com, I shared that long emails were the best way to "date" someone _before_ meeting them in person. In effect, they give the brain and spirit a head-start in getting to know someone... long before the physical bells and whistles start going off in that first face to face meeting.

I think I mentioned that it was much, much better than meeting someone in person first... feeling the physical attraction... falling under its sway... only for the brain and spirit to ask, belatedly, months later "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"

So, I do appreciate the fact that words can help you to know someone.. in part anyway.

All that to say... thanks to any and everyone who reads this blog.

I accept the hugs warmly and send them back.

But I warn all readers... at least until I get the whisker and smell thing handled, I show up much better online than in person, so I recommend virtual contact for your safety.

P.S.
Thanks to those readers who actually know me for being able to read the blog without tying it too much to the guy whose picture appears on the site.

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Tyrannical Shoulds

In recent blogs I have been hinting that a successful Move back to Jamaica is more than just a physical move, it is also a spiritual one.

Not religious necessarily, but spiritual. Moving Back successfully often entails a remarkable inner journey, in which one is confronted with personal barriers, obstacles and prejudices. The real story about Moving Back is not ultimately about how to pack a container, but how to thrive in an environment that is at times dangerous, depressing and dogmatic.

Given that most of the moves back home are from "better places," when the move is a voluntary one it marks a decision to take an action that goes against the prevailing wisdom.

"Yuh mad or what?" is expressed far more often than "Welcome home."

The reason to move home, and the choice to take the road less travelled are just the beginning of a long inner journey that starts with a personal decision, which reminds me of the U.S. Marines motto - ''The brave, the proud, the few."
While everyone should visit an army base at some point, not everyone should join the Marines. Everyone should visit Jamaica, but not everyone should come back to live.

For those who make the decision, however the instant it is made marks the beginning of an intense personal struggle involving one's own doubts, commitments, plus finding a way to navigate the ''helpful" comments of others. Of course, there are also the scary circumstances to deal with - the rampant breakdowns and the mind-numbing bureaucracies.

Obviously, the Jamaica that the returnee is coming home to is going to be a lot different than the country being left (otherwise, why return?) That goes without saying. For the vast majority of Jamaicans abroad, the difference is a negative one that prevents them from ever coming back.

The important question is: How does the returnee stay true to whatever original vision created the desire to return, as opposed to getting caught in the numerous mental potholes that exist?

In other words, are there ways for returnees to better equip themselves to take on the challenge of returning?

I have participated in a couple of courses that have nothing to do with emigrating, but everything to do with creating an inspiring vision and keeping it alive. I recommend them both as possible venues to start to be trained in dealing with the mental or personal challenges that seem to come alive whenever we humans try to take a quantum leap to better ourselves.

The first is a series of programs offered by Landmark Education. The second is based on a book called Loving What Is.

In a former life, I led public seminars as a volunteer for Landmark. The courses I lead followed their basic program called The Landmark Forum. Fortunately, The Forum is offered in Kingston twice a year, and in most major cities in the US, Europe and Asia.

Moore recently, I took a weekend course with Byron Katie, the author of Loving What Is.

Katie (as she is called) focuses her work on dealing with reality, and the thoughts we have about what is happening around us in our lives. Suffering, she says, comes from getting stuck in thoughts that weigh us down, preventing us from fully embracing what is happening at any moment.

When we are able to effectively question our thoughts is when (and only when) we can be free. From my experience, the most pernicious thoughts are those that have a heavy "should" component.

For example, here are the few that run through my head:
- Jamaica should not have so many murders
- The politicians should be serving the needs of the people
- The police should be less corrupt
- There needs to be less bureaucracy
- This could only happen in Jamaica
- De people dem too dyam tief
- Things are too expensive here
- It is way too hot / rainy / humid / dry
- De mosquito / madman / pothole / noise (dem) is unbearable
- Life here is too hard
- The US/UK/Canada is so much better because...
- De people too gravilishus / licky-licky/ wanga-gut/ nayga-like/ lazy / violent / aggressive / ungrateful / greedy etc.

At the heart of each of these thoughts is an unwillingness to accept reality, and a wanting life to be different. Nothing wrong with that... except when we refuse to fully accept life the way it is right now.

That sounds quite simple, and based in common sense, yet there is a powerful human mechanism at work here that takes serious practice to overcome. The vox populi in Jamaica is dominated by strident calls against "what should not be happening."

It is quite easy as a returnee to fall (or relax) into this general, disempowering tone.

Over the past 2 or so years of using Katie's materials (available free from her website) I can safely report that it has helped me tremendously. How? I have found that the moment any kind of anguish or suffering starts, I am now much better at nipping it in the bud using her simple formula - 4 questions and a turnaround statement.

I know expats, returnees and even Jamaicans who have never left who indulge themselves in endless rounds of "what is wrong with Jamaica." This perpetual game is one that prolongs their personal suffering, as new items are sought out daily to be added to a growing list.

Using Katie's tools, I find that I have been able to increase my capacity to remind myself (when I find myself indulging also) that ... Jamaica(ns) should not be any other way that is. Why? Because it is exactly the way that is, and no other.

It has taken me many hours, tens of pages and lots of study to begin to see some consistency of application - my own inner journey has been slow, and I am far from mastery. But this growth is important for us returnees, even critical, if we are to succeed in fulfilling our dreams of returning "in style."

We Jamaicans abroad talk a lot about "setting ourselves up" before returning - preferably with a fat bank account, a 2-story house, a source of foreign exchange and at least a 1-year old SUV.

We might be right about the preparation needed to thrive in Jamaica, but dead wrong in thinking that the things that need to be prepared are tangible. After all, a well-timed hurricane, theft and recession can undo all those kinds of safety nets.

Instead, the best kind of preparation might be the kind that quickens the inner journey, and shows up as a willingness to learn, an openness to new ideas in any area, a love of adventure, an ability to self-reflect and a courage to tell the truth. If our being away in "farrin" has been about getting "set up" with these things, then it would have been time well spent.
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Some quotes from Byron Katie

When you argue with reality, you lose -- but only always.

I am the perpetrator of my suffering -- but only all of it.

What is is. You don't get a vote. Haven't you noticed?

Reality is God, because it rules.

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America the Surplus

The dust has finally settled enough for me to even think about adding to this blog. After several days of heavy lifting and heavier spending, I woke up early this morning determined to give a perspective (and maybe even some useful tips) to someone less fortunate than I who wants to move back to their home country.

It's Sunday, and just about every piece of paper, cloth, leather, rubber, metal and wood that I own is packed safely into a huge metal box, which as we speak is a port waiting to be lifted into a ship, which will then be transported to Kingston, Jamaica. It's a sobering feeling that 39 years of hard work has produced only enough stuff to fill about 75% of a 20 foot box.

Should I have more stuff? More paper perhaps? Twice as much cloth, or better quality leather? Is life really about accumulating a lot of this stuff, only to have to reduce it radically before moving it in a metal box to someplace else?

Funnily enough, as I was radically reducing the amount of stuff I had in preparation for the move, I realized how wrong I was about so many of the things I had bought. Gadgets that I thought I absolutely neded, and worked hard to acquire, only to never use. Technologies that became outdated and useless. Books that never were read. Objects that are worthless today, that took me several days or weeks of hard labour to obtain.

Let's see... life is about working 2.5 weeks to obtain an object that is worth half that much in 12 month's time, and absolutely nothing in another 12 month's time, which then gets thrown away in a dumpster and put in some landfill or garbage mountain somewhere. Someone tell me if that's worth it....

But of course, hindsight is 20-20, and when I bought these objects I really did believe that I was acting in my own, best self-interest.

Death, of course, puts to bed all these questions. At the end of the day, there is absolutely no way to take any of that stuff, and from what I hear about people who are dying (having never seen one myself,) people don't talk wistfully about the "34 inch LCD television they wish they could have gotten their hands on." Instead they talk about people, I hear, and relationships and love, either enjoyed or lost. It seems that people on their deathbeds become wise all of a sudden...

Maybe for us, there is lesson here to be learned from the dying, and also from stuffing our worldly contents into a 20 foot container. The lesson has to do with how life is lived going forward.

I for one, have become more determined to care less about my physical possessions, and am learning to see them as temporary, useful aids that help life move along a little more easily while I have them. While I was in Jamaica early this year, we had some teenage thieves jump our 15 foot wall to steal some birds and lawn chairs. We are supposing that they are teenaged because they made a return visit, supposedly to check on our ability to replace stolen objects for their shopping pleasure.

By contrast, yesterday, here in Florida, we had the hardest time imaginable getting rid of a 13 or so year-old sofa and loveseat set. In the past year, I had a portend of things to come when I noticed several sofas, recliners and kitchen chairs near the dumpsters in the front of my apartment complex, left there by former residents who had no way to get rid of them... I vowed that I would not create the eyesore that they had by following in their footsteps.

Yet, there I was yesterday, contemplating doing just that.

At the last minute, a friend of a relative who said they wanted both items went AWOL (and still has not been found.) That was on Friday. We had until Sunday night (the last day on my lease) to rid outselves of both items.

Much earlier, my wife made me promise in blood not to bring them with us to Jamaica (too strong a reminder of my previous marriage.) Yesterday morning,we were faced with the ultimate last resorts -- paying someone US$62 to come and take it away to the dump (and paying the "dump fees") or doing what so many other fine residents of Embasy Place Apartments have done.. and leave them at the dumpster.

We did everything we could think of, including calling several charitable organizations who take used furniture for a living to give to those in need, but they were either closed or had a backlog and could not accommodate our urgent need. We placed ads in our apartment building, called friends, used the yellow-pages to call different companies.... probably doing all the things that my fellow ex-tenants had tried to do to get rid of useful, but unwanted furniture.

Luckily, we did not have to join them in breaking the rules of the complex, and were able to find recipients for both items. The only price we had to pay was for our own labor -- lugging the sofa to its new home on the third floor of another building in our complex, and the loveseat to someone's truck in the parking lot.

Whereas in the US, we can barely give used stuff away, in Jamaica which is just 90 minutes flying time away, we have to work VERY hard to keep something as simple as a lawn chair in our possession.

These episodes made me think of a mind-shift I've decided to make in going back to Jamaica, where theft is such a daily fact of life. That is, I've chosen to start seeing my physical objects as just a bunch of stuff that is temporarily in my possession, before it's either thrown into a dumpster, or given away, or exchanged for money, or stolen by someone else for their use.

And maybe, I can be free of all of these objects of wood, leather, paper etc. and realize the fact that I am not the objects in my possession, much in the same way that I am not the loose change in my pocket.

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Now the Excitement Begins

Putting everything that one owns into a rusty metal box does bring some sober thinking.

A childhood friend of mine died last Sunday when he took his boat to Lime Cay, jumped off, and hit his head. A close death makes you ponder certain things... like the fact that when you die, you can't take the boat with you, or even your closest friends and family. It's a really sad time for his family, as you could imagine and if the funeral is on Saturday, I'll probably be going.

It also brings into clear relief the reasons why I am moving back to Jamaica, which run counter to the accepted wisdom that one should be looking to leave Jamaica for the US, not move back to it. Moving back to Jamaica represents a commitment to a vision I currently have for my life -- one in which I make a difference to that which matters to me. My friend's death is a timely reminder, that not even tomorrow is assured, and that I'd rather spend today moving in the direction of my commitments and visions, than running away from what scares me in life (and there are some really scary things happening in Jamaica at the moment.)
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Well, anyways at this point I still wanted my stuff (even though it will all be inherited by someone else when I die) out of customs and back into my hands. My wife was just beginning to start to worry about "people walking around Kingston in her shoes" and "the TV and the rug -- make sure that those are there because those are the things that they are most likely to steal."

Luckily, for me, I could afford to use a custom broker, a reputable firm that was referred to me by a friend, who immediately put me in touch with the owner by phone from where I was working in Barbados. He promised to take care of everything, and I had to trust him on this one because I only had a day and a half in Jamaica, before leaving to return to Bim (i.e. Barbados.)

On Monday morning, I was at my customs broker offices, and they took us through the paperwork quickly, and assigned someone (a junior clerk) to go with us to the interview at Customs. This was a critical juncture -- the point at which I would be given the status of Returning Resident, and therefore bring in everything tax free, or be left in the pool of "the usual traveller" with a hefty bill to pay running into the US$thousands.

(Incidentally, it would have helped mildly if I had made a list of the contents of each box, and then kept a numbered list of the boxes. I use the word "mildly" because I had over a hundred boxes, and finding "box number 74" would have taken at least a half hour...)

My trusted broker, who pays the role of consultant, trainer, advisor, middleman, confidante, clairvoyant and others, helped me to prepare for the interview by giving me something of a pep talk, and an idea of some of the things that would be BAD to say, like "Oh, NO, I will never, ever again ever travel from Jamaica for the rest of my life." Of course, the customs officer would need to be placated and pampered, and treated as if they had the power to make a big decision... which they certainly did.

In the back of my mind, of course, were all the stories that every Jamaican knows -- how dem customs officer "tief" and "all dem want is a smalls" (bribe.) A friend told me her first hand account of spending 5 hours in customs trying to clear one box, and when the customs officer came she started by opening the box, and upon finding a box of chocolates, ate in right there in front of her... slowly, and deliberately, making her know "who was in charge yahso!"

So, I had my own share of trepidation as I drove down to the customs house on the wharf with my mother and the junior clerk , not knowing what to expect, but expecting at least a long line, a very long wait and hoping that my customs broker had brought the necessary "smalls" they would need to grease the wheels of customs.

Well, it turns out I was way off the mark.

The line was short. The office was professionally run. The officer was polite and friendly.

I was second in line, and was seen in less than half an hour, and would have been seen sooner were it not for the man in front of me who had messed up his shipment, and could not hear that the customs agents were trying to help him... trying their best to help him, in spite of his rudeness.

The only hitch came when I had to redo a form that the customs brokers used, because they had the "old form" and had not updated their supply of forms. Luckily, the our trusted junior clerk seemed to be a friend of everyone in the office, and the relationship, for which I was paying good money, was giving me the advantage I needed.

There was also a minor hitch in the spelling of my name on the bill of lading, and when I began to worry about my flight the following day, they all assured me that no, I didn't even need to come back myself, the broker would take care of all of it for me. My goods would be inspected the following day and then be released by Wednesday or Thursday.

It was such a non-event that my mother fell asleep in the office while waiting for me.

While I understand that it is entirely possible to get the entire process done without the assistance of customs brokers, it would have been much harder to do, much more stressful, take much more time, and also require several payments to different bodies and agencies. In fact, I had a good friend who also cleared a container, and the entire process took 3 solid days of her time, most of which were spent down on the wharves waiting.

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