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Kingston, Jamaica during Jun 18-20. The last leg of my buisness trip where I visited the University of West Indies - MONA campus and NEPA (National Environmental Protection Agency). We stayed at the Pegasus hotel in New Kingston which is a little nicer section of our town. Our unofficial guide was a prof. from UWI who was a great fellow and arranged not only a tour of his facilities but also a small boat ride in the mangroves of Kingston Harbour. He is originally a Kiwi and found himself a position at the university in 1979 and apparently never looked back. A real stand-up fellow and has that typical Kiwi laid back attitude about everything.
My photos of this trip are nearly as lush as those of St. Lucia and I apologize for the urban shots, but they are part of the story. Also, I don't want to give the impression that Kingston is as poverty stricken as some of my pictures portray - it is just that these sections tended to draw my eye and I wasn't all that interested in taking pictures of the rich, pretty houses we encountered as well - there are some very well to do places in Kingston. However, Kingston is definately not the same as Montego Bay!
The stories of strife and anger are there. Before going onto the pictures I wanted to relay the story our taxi driver told us on the way back to the airport. As we pulled through a moderately poor area, our taxi driver pointed to a neighbhood area and indicated that he lived right over there. Asking how he liked it, he said it was well enough but sometimes during elections it became a little hectic. We asked if there was intimidation happening during elections. He retorted, 'Mon, if it were only intimidation, I'd be a happy felle'r'. He then pointed to one side of the road and explained that this side of the street was primarily was the JLP party and the other side was the PNP. He said during election times that they would actually fire rounds from assault rifles across the street into the houses of each respective side, that this would last for about 4 or 5 days and the police just stayed away. He and his family would simply move out and live as refugies, either sleeping in his cab or by the beach until things settled. Okay - I'm getting carried away here a bit - but his story affected me.
These are the hills coming in from the airport - we are facing Kingston harbour. On the opposite side is the ocean. Kingston Harbour is the 6th largest harbour in the world and was naturally formed. It has a rich history of naval activity with Fort Charles being built in 1667.
On they way in from the airport we were greeted by this nice friendly billboard.
I didn't have any shots of the campus, but after the campus tour and a few other meetings, our friendly prof. arranged for us to visit the UWI fieldstation located on Kingston Harbor near Port Royal. Port Royal is known as 'one of the safest areas of Jamaica'. Not that it has very much money, it is a little fishing village. Our guide explained - well everyone here knows everyone else, there are strong family ties. Also there is only one road in and one road out.
My photos of this trip are nearly as lush as those of St. Lucia and I apologize for the urban shots, but they are part of the story. Also, I don't want to give the impression that Kingston is as poverty stricken as some of my pictures portray - it is just that these sections tended to draw my eye and I wasn't all that interested in taking pictures of the rich, pretty houses we encountered as well - there are some very well to do places in Kingston. However, Kingston is definately not the same as Montego Bay!
The stories of strife and anger are there. Before going onto the pictures I wanted to relay the story our taxi driver told us on the way back to the airport. As we pulled through a moderately poor area, our taxi driver pointed to a neighbhood area and indicated that he lived right over there. Asking how he liked it, he said it was well enough but sometimes during elections it became a little hectic. We asked if there was intimidation happening during elections. He retorted, 'Mon, if it were only intimidation, I'd be a happy felle'r'. He then pointed to one side of the road and explained that this side of the street was primarily was the JLP party and the other side was the PNP. He said during election times that they would actually fire rounds from assault rifles across the street into the houses of each respective side, that this would last for about 4 or 5 days and the police just stayed away. He and his family would simply move out and live as refugies, either sleeping in his cab or by the beach until things settled. Okay - I'm getting carried away here a bit - but his story affected me.
These are the hills coming in from the airport - we are facing Kingston harbour. On the opposite side is the ocean. Kingston Harbour is the 6th largest harbour in the world and was naturally formed. It has a rich history of naval activity with Fort Charles being built in 1667.
On they way in from the airport we were greeted by this nice friendly billboard.
I didn't have any shots of the campus, but after the campus tour and a few other meetings, our friendly prof. arranged for us to visit the UWI fieldstation located on Kingston Harbor near Port Royal. Port Royal is known as 'one of the safest areas of Jamaica'. Not that it has very much money, it is a little fishing village. Our guide explained - well everyone here knows everyone else, there are strong family ties. Also there is only one road in and one road out.
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