Chapter 12 - By Martin Thomas

Page 4

 Lily and Indiarose looked spick and span in white linen dresses, pink cardigans and pink sandals. The boys were wearing button-down shirts we had had made for them in Italy, shiny black Italian shoes had replaced their travelling sandals, and they had cardigans draped around their shoulders in the best Italian fashion. There were practical as well as aesthetic considerations in their mode of dress. The air conditioning in the hotel was fairly severe, and the girls also needed cardigans to cover their arms, still scarred from the sandfly bites they had been scratching almost continuously for some weeks now.

Excited to be wearing some of our favourite clothes again, and to be dining in such elegant surroundings, we settled down to enjoy our meal. There was a buffet that night, which included a sushi bar, and as sushi was one of the children’s favourite things we ordered a set for each of them. There was also an impressive selection of desserts, and we allowed the children to choose their own to finish the meal. After dinner we settled them into their beds, revelling in the fact that we would not need to apply any insect repellent that night, and luxuriating in the comfortable surroundings after the very basic amenities of our island cabin.

The next morning we rose early, as always, and went downstairs for breakfast. While our rooms looked out over the hotel swimming pool and the city, the view from the dining room was of Lake Nicaragua, one of the largest lakes in the Americas. A series of volcanoes surrounds the lake, and on a fine day the view is spectacular. When we arrived we found the dining room empty, and the CNN news playing on the large-screen television set. After we explained that we did not allow the children to watch television, especially the news, the staff obligingly switched off the set and we sat down to breakfast. In that ‘corporate’ setting we felt rather like a family of aliens, and we were happy to finish our meal and call a taxi to take us on our various errands around the town.

We were used to being approached at every corner by locals selling all manner of things - designer sunglasses, cashew nuts, cold drinks, even hubcaps - and usually we just kept the car windows closed and waved them away with a shake of the head. On this trip a small cage was thrust at the window of the taxi, and I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw two baby toucans glaring at me from their
perch. We all gasped, and I asked the cab driver to pull over, wondering how cheaply we could obtain these wonderful creatures. We all agreed they were amazing, and there was no need for any discussion about whether we should buy them. We would think later about details such as what we would feed them, how we would disguise the cage to get them into the hotel (where animals were strictly forbidden), and how we would eventually transport them to Bluefields and beyond. Minutes later the cage was in the car and we had parted with US$50 for the pair.

This was not the kind of shopping we had intended, but it was very exciting, and we all had our eyes peeled for more wildlife as we moved around the town. Before the week was out we had bought a couple of little green parakeets and another pair of toucans, smuggling the latter past the hotel reception in shopping bags. At the last moment Jenifer had put one of the tiny parakeets in her handbag, where it fortunately remained quiet as she sashayed past reception. We made regular trips each day to the dining room, where there was a selection of fresh fruit, especially at breakfast. Fruit was toucan ‘gourmet fare’. We would return to our rooms with papaya, watermelon, banana and mango, all perfectly sliced and ready to be offered to our little avian friends. Their appetites were voracious, and they seemed to need feeding every hour or so. They were barely out of the nest, but full of character.

Knowing a little of the laws in Nicaragua, I was sure it must be illegal to sell these native birds on the street, but I knew that they would have a better life with us. When they were fully acclimatised I envisaged flocks of toucans flying around the island, hopping from branch to branch.

In between buying and feeding our livestock we also managed to complete our more conventional shopping, including bathroom fittings and other items for the house. Once again we prepared to return to the island. We had become almost celebrities at the hotel, as we traipsed in and out in our finery, laden down with shopping bags and strange-shaped and sounding parcels. The staff were fantastic -

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