Cramer and Lisa play on a volleyball team that competes in a semester long tournament. They play every Friday and everyone wears tye-dye shirts that they made together at the beginning of the season. Even I got a tye-dye shirt even though I never touch the ball (a very dangerous idea) because I always tag along to lend moral support from the sidelines and hold all the girl's purses. Last Friday our game was scheduled at the Marriott resort beach right after class, so four of us piled into Casper (our wonderful island car) and headed to the biggest resort on St. Kitts. We parked and made our way to play for an impressive WIN! All in all the game took about an hour and then we went to pile in Casper again to head home.
Now, let me tell you a bit about Casper. I christened him Casper because he is white and on his last leg. The car has no rear bumper, several rust holes, no power steering, very little to no brakes, and a tendency to fill with water when it rains very hard (until Cramer punched holes in the floorboards to drain it). The ignition tumblers are also worn out so that you could probably start the car with a stick at this point and once the car is running the key can be removed without turning the car off. Such is Casper.
Now back to the story; out from the Marriott we came rejoicing the win when Cramer notices that Casper's windows are up. We never roll them up unless we are parking for the night because it becomes unbearably hot inside cars here. That was strange but what was stranger was the fact that the doors were locked. We never lock the doors and were thankful that the key opened them at all. As Cramer unlocked the car doors, he looked up suddenly scratching his head and said, "Guys, there is a Tv in the back."
Sure enough, there was a very large Tv (with remote) in the backseat of our locked car which had the windows up and upon further inspection had been moved one parking spot over! Cramer votes to either take it or leave it on the sidewalk, Lisa votes to leave it on the sidewalk, but I decide to "do the right thing" and let somebody know; so we flagged down a golf cart with Marriott personal. Two members of the Marriott security team arrive, declare the Tv stolen property of the Marriott, take our statements, and in general seemed to be laughing at our predicament. They took pictures and then Cramer helped them load the Tv into their golf cart. Before they left we were all standing around puzzling over the fact that someone would steal a Marriott Tv, put it in Casper, obviously drive the car, but then bring it back and leave it when Cramer says, "so since we returned the Tv do we get a free night at the Marriott," and the security guard replies, "no, but you might get a free night at the Queen's finest prison, the St. Kitts jail." Dead silence....then we informed them that they would get no more information from us and they were not leaving until Ross security could arrive. We called Ross and they sent the mobile unit to us within 15 minutes. Let me tell you those 15 minutes were not fun as the security guards glared at us from across the parking lot and we realized they had all our information, Cramer's fingerprints on the Tv, and pictures of the Tv in the car with any or all of us in the background!
As soon as Ross got there, the security guards tone changed. They claimed it was all a joke and that we just took their joke the wrong way. Cramer informed them that when we joke in the U.S.A. we tend to smile. They said that they used to be in the St. Kitts military and so are trained never to smile; such nice men.
For the time being, Cramer and I are boycotting the Marriott and giving other beaches and businesses our E.C. (eastern caribbean currency). Uncle Millie (our favorite taxi driver) is also very relieved every thing worked out as only a local of St. Kitts could have bailed us out of jail and he is our on call local :-)
Good luck to all the deer hunters back home and everyone be sure to eat some turkey and pumpkin pie for me!
No comments:
Post a Comment