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The Christmas holiday was a special time for me, as it was the very first Christmas I had ever spent with my wife. Not only that, but I was able to spend time with both my brother and sister. We enjoyed having my Uncle Don, Aunt Tammy and family over to Rockford for Christmas dinner, and my cousin Ashley was the star of the show. |
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Roxie and I traveled to Chicago for the weekend to visit the city and meet up with Brian and Amber Essenmacher. We enjoyed the Christmas spirit of the city, and I visited the Chicago regional Peace Corps office. The only thing that we didn't love about the city was the bitter cold. |
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On Thanksgiving weekend, we held a wedding reception at Paul and Diane's house in Ann Arbor for all of our wedding guests from the states who were not able to make it down to the Caribbean. It was great to see so many people who I had not seen in quite a long time and introduce them to Roxie. You can't beat two parties for the same event! |
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On September 27th, I left St. Vincent for what may have been the last time in a long time, and Roxie followed me to the U.S. a week later. I began working a contract position at Creative Solutions on October 1st, and Roxie and I moved into Paul and Diane Sonda's house until the end of the year. This move is a big transition for both of us, but we are excited to begin to settle into one place and plan for our future. |
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A few days before we left Mustique, we had a going away party on Macaroni Beach. It was a chance to enjoy the company of so many wonderful persons who we had become close to over the past two years. I was overwhelmed with the amount of gratitude shown to me for the work that I had done, and felt blessed to have had the chance to serve others in the capacity that I had. |
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Last Days in St. Vincent & the Grenadines The months of July, August and September were marked with nostalgia, as we began or plans to leave St. Vincent and the Grenadines and move to the United States. We took a trip to the falls of Baliene, I took one last trip to Union Island, and we went to the Miss SVG show during carnival season. It was our only carnival activity this year, as the cost of immigrating to the U.S. was extremely high. |
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In August, we invited our niece, five-year-old Ebony Hooper to come to stay with us for the month for her summer holidays. Ebony has always been my favorite niece or nephew and we enjoyed having her with us in Mustique. It was a month of firsts for Ebony: first time on a plane, first time riding horses, first time visiting Mustique.
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In the last week of June, Roxie and I traveled to Barbados for her visa appointment at the U.S. Embassy in Bridgetown. We had to come two days early in order for her to get all of her medical tests done, and se we made a four day vacation out of it. We had a great time, and stayed at a hotel in St. Lawrence Gap, the hotspot for tourism in Barbados. One of the highlights of our trip was a visit to Harrison's Cave.
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In June, our friends Brian and Amber Lewandowski came to visit us for a weekend in Mustique. It was a great chance to be tour guide, and to appreciate Mustique for everything that you get overly used to after awhile. We also had the chance to take them on a tour of Tommy Hilfiger's mansion, and spend an afternoon in one of the villa pools high atop a hill in Mustique.
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On May 31st, 2005, the Mustique Community Computer Education Programme, of which I am the director, celebrated its first-ever awards banquet. The banquet was an opportunity to showcase the accomplishments that we have all made in the effort of adult education. It was particularly rewarding for me to see the pride on the awardees faces when they came on stage to collect their awards. |
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Roxie and I traveled to the Dominican Republic on April 30th, 2005 for a weeklong honeymoon, a gift from my father and his wife. We stayed at the Viva Dominicus Palace Resort and had an incredible week. Click here for a detailed look at our trip. |
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Not long after the wedding, Roxie's sister Alex came to Mustique for a visit. It was the first time she had ever been to Mustique, and the first time that Roxie and I had spent much time with her since she moved with her husband Lian to Texas. Roxie and I enjoyed showing Alex around the island, the only thing to complain about was that she could only stay a couple of days! |
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On March 13th, 2005 I married Roxie Hooper. Click here for a detailed written and photographic description of this special occasion. |
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Every year, Basil's Bar in Mustique plays host to the Mustique Blues Festival. This year, Roxie and I were both actively involved, as Basil hired Roxie to sell CDs for the artists every night of the festival, which ran for 15 nights. This meant a lot of late nights for us, but also a lot of fun. We got to know every single one of the musicians, and, along with the rest of the audience, were treated to a surprise performance by Mick Jagger on the last night. |
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On the last day of January, I was invited to go on a sailing trip to Savan, one of the small islands that makes up the Grenadines. I joined neighbor Wayne Trimmingham and his family, along with a few others, on a catamaran captained by Olaf, a friend of Wayne's from Germany who spends a month in the Caribbean every year. Although I am not an avid sailor, I did enjoy visiting an island where a small community of fisherman has set up camp. None of the fisherman were there that day, so I was able to poke my camera around and take some interesting shots of how they lived. |
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Part of my job here in Mustique involves working with the children at the Mustique Primary School teaching computers, as well as running a full-time adult education program. I teach each of the grades, K-6. Earlier this year, we did a computer project where the kids created posters of themselves with digital photographs and personal information, such as what types of food they like and what is their favorite color. This page is a collection of all the pictures of all the students that I teach, as well as some pictures of the students at work and the school itself. As you will be able to tell, I have a bit of diversity in my classroom! |
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I returned to Mustique on December 30, 2004, just in time to celebrate New Years with my fiancé Roxie. From what I had heard during the years that I have been living in St. Vincent, Basil's Bar is the place to be for the new year. We had a great time. We didn't leave Basil's until six in the morning, and were among the first to leave when we did. I was glad to be back in Mustique and celebrating the beginning of the year that would mark the beginning of my own family. |
