30 Days In Reflections; Exploding Kitten Food Take 2; Everything's Bigger in Belize

On Tuesday I completed another installment of "Try It Tuesday" with Relleno. Not what we had back home, which was a hatch chile or poblano pepper stuffed with cheese, dipped in egg batter, and deep fried - this is a black-colored stew! Here is the video: Try It Tuesday - Relleno

Wednesday I journeyed to Caribbean Queen, the barge system that brings goods from the mainland to the island. I found a gentleman on Facebook Marketplace selling rich black dirt/compost for $5U.S., in old sugar sacks. This island has almost no dirt with nutrients in it, so if you want to grow anything non-native, you need to make soil, or buy it. He also had basil plants, which I desperately need! I paid $60BZ at Caribbean Queen, I couldn't figure out why it was so expensive - by contrast, I paid $90BZ for a dresser and 4 large boxes previously. My goods also weren't at the normal depot; they were at the Marina, which I had to find on my own. It was as far south as I have ever been on the leeward side (west, facing the mainland). 

When I arrived, I found out why it was more expensive - they had to palletize the bags as they were so heavy! I definitely tested the weight boundaries of our golf cart. And the barge guys left my poor basil plants in the sun all day, they were scorched. I cut them back and they should recover.

After Nathan finished work, we walked our neighborhood in search of seeds to plant. Check out how lush and tall cannas grow down here!

For reference, Nathan is 6'1". The tallest ones are easily 9'.

Check out the size of spinach leaves (NOT baby spinach, clearly!) and one of the smallest avocados I could find:

This leads me to believe that if you can get it to grow, everything grows bigger in Belize!

That night, I cooked prosciutto pasta for dinner, and as we were about to start eating, the power went out in our community. BEL, our electric company, was on it quickly, but there was rain and lightning, so it took them 30 minutes longer to restore power than they originally estimated; it was out for almost 2 hours. Check out our romantic, camping-fan/light dinner:

We have our quote back from ProSolar, and it is...painful. Almost double what the original estimate was, plus we would have to A/C and climate-control the bodega, and build a pergola to carry the panels, so likely another $12-15k U.S. We'd love to have solar, but it doesn't make financial sense at this juncture. Great timing with the power outage, BTW.

Thursday, I was about to get dressed when I heard aggressive honking out front; I peeked out to see the Caribbean Queen box truck. I scrambled to get dressed - I was planning to go down and pick up my Amazon/PetsMart order, but they threw it on a delivery truck and didn't call. The guys unloaded the boxes and I brought them in, excited to see my wares. I ordered a runner rug for our foyer to catch sand, it's great! And it was only $22U.S. I was bummed that one of my orders of "dragonflies on a stick", the seller sent me butterflies instead. Mosquitoes do not fear butterflies, and it's not like I can return them. UGH. 

I noticed a funky smell and presumed it was our garbage since I had cooked chicken a few days prior. 

It was not.

I found that out as I continued on to open my case of wet cat food. One of the cans had burst in transit. It has been on a truck, in a sea container, on a barge, and in another truck over the past 3 weeks, there is no telling when the explosion occurred...but it was long enough ago to become entirely rancid. I took the whole box to our front porch and in the light of day, I realized it also had raised a bumper crop of MAGGOTS.

Here is the video recap if you are interested: Extra protein in my cat food shipment to Belize

I spent the rest of the morning trying to remove maggots from the salvageable cans, washing everything, gagging, removing the labels from the cans to make sure additional maggots weren't hiding, then taking a "Silkwood" shower. I tossed 5-6 cans total - the ones that weren't worth fighting the maggots over. Nearly every can (I ordered 96) had at least a small ding in it, and probably 1/3 had large dents but were still airtight. 

As expected, my cats were lounging on my bed (Selene laying on Nathan's pillow!) and were indifferent to my suffering.

I next journeyed into town to run some errands, first stopping at Digi to get a local phone number! It was a very easy process, it cost $22.50BZ to get a physical SIM card and activate it, then I added $30BZE in credits for talk/text/data. It does expire in 6 months, and I can add on funds at any point. I'll mostly use this for calls for deliveries, we'll see if Caribbean Queen calls me for my dry cat food delivery next week! (Amazon delivered it to Belizean Queen a day late and it missed the cutoff to sail with my first order).

I picked up some great pots for cheap at Harmouch's Hardware, hit Western Dairies for cheese and sour cream - which is more like crema, it's slightly darker and much more liquid than we are used to. And $5U.S. direct from the source, so not inexpensive. A quick stop at Caye Mart for some groceries for dinner and they had sleeves of 6 Oreos for $1.50BZ, so I had to get some of those! A regular pack of them runs $21-25BZ, so the sleeves are probably more economical, plus they won't get stale.

Thursday also was our one-month anniversary as residents of Belize! 

So far, it has been mostly what we expected; we have had a few curveballs with the condition of the villa, the salty air degrades everything way faster than we expected. We thought we would "eat local" a lot more, we certainly spent more money eating out than we should have. We've been conservative with power so I'm curious to receive our first bill that is entirely our usage - no renters. We are way behind on starting the process for our beach home. 

My biggest frustration has been the lack of pricing in stores - from hardware to food, a good portion of items are not labeled with a price, and I would rather not buy something than have to take it to the counter and ask how much it costs, I fear it is a sliding scale based on how new to the island you appear. 

The only thing I miss from the U.S. so far is the convenience - grab-and-go meals at the grocery, same-day delivery from Amazon, the instant gratification. I thought I would miss fast food that I was so addicted to, but I really don't crave it!

Nathan's frustrations are the inconsistencies in internet and electrical services. He misses having his family right around the corner - he's never lived more than 20 minutes' drive from his immediate family, whereas I spent the majority of my life in a different time zone from my family, so I was better prepared in that aspect. We both really enjoy living on the water, and all the reasons we came to visit - the food and the friendly people!

We shall see what the next 30 days hold, and if I adjust my above feedback...enjoy your weekend!