Honeymoon in a Dangerous Time

An omen; quick four or five sharp pops from the road up on the hill behind our duplex cottage. They awakened us, but we dismissed them as fireworks.

Gloria and I were thrilled to celebrate our honeymoon with two weeks in Barbados and another week on the lush, spice island of Grenada. Our cottage was on Grand Anse Beach, across the bay from St. Georges and a short distance from our friends at the Holiday Inn on their two-island vacation. They invited us to crash their hotel’s Wednesday Wardair Welcome Party: a fabulous sunset, a massive buffet, unlimited rum punch and beer, and a rigged crab race.

My friend, Marcel and I booked a deep-sea fishing trip and in between, our foursome filled the time with touring and snorkeling. Steel drum music. Carib beer. Rum punch. Super-Fly, a teen, soliciting coins to dive from a cliff into a waterfall basin. We romped round the island blissfully unaware that history was making its own plans out of sight. Our honeymoon coincided with Grenada’s Prime Minister Eric Gairy’s UN trip, begging aid for the impoverished island. The islanders we met provided no clues as to the intrigue and tension fomenting beneath the calm surface. Business as usual--four more beer, please.

Early Tuesday morning—the morning following the loud bangs—Marcel and I taxied over to the 24-foot fishing boat. Later, our wives planned a shopping jaunt into St. Georges, the capitol just across Grand Anse Bay. At the dock we were subjected to an earful of Bob Marley music. Jon, the teen boat boy, bounced around the deck and handed us two breakfast beers.

“I’d rather have the ‘happy drug’ he took,” I said. I wasn’t much of a morning person.

Captain Frank, an ex-pat from Pittsburg and invited us aboard. “Guess you boys haven’t heard. The island was overthrown last night.”

“You’re joking! A real revolution?” I asked.

“Revo-looootion!” said Jon, his brown fist pumping the sky.

The captain expanded on the event as we pulled away from the dock. He said the police and the few Grenadan soldiers were arrested during the night. “Jon is happy banned reggae is now on the radio,” he added. “The radio station is the revolution nerve center.” He switched on an AM radio and between reggae tunes, listened to the revolution evolve, while patiently trolling inshore waters. Maurice Bishop, the revolutionary leader, addressed the public in a taped message airing every half-hour all day. The New Jewel Movement was now the government.

“Looks like my future fishing trips are toast,” bemoaned Captain Frank. “No one’s gonna come fish here, now.”

The event lessened our interest in serious fishing, so Frank circled the island and we stopped at a few spots where ex-pats lived, making sure they were okay. Makeshift flags made from white bed sheets were waved from various points during our circle cruise, accompanied with cheers.

Our five-hour trip ended—sans fish—so we headed to the cottage where our wives were already into refreshments and lunch. It may have been a first for them, returning from a shopping trip empty handed. They reported chaos on the jammed streets of St. Georges: dancing and cheering, drinking and flag waving--a super happy fun place.

Rumors abounded. The biggest one being that PM Gairy was already preparing a counter strike. That would be a miracle to put that together in such a short time; however, the Big Cheese, rebel leader Mr. Bishop did encourage reporting of any suspicious activity, especially offshore. A sunset curfew was put into force.

Our housemaid was distressed to hear we were on our honeymoon and apologized profusely, as did almost every islander, for the inconvenience of the situation. We were quite enjoying the intrigue and being part of history. She loaned us a tiny radio allowing us to listen in on comms from the hijacked radio station. Apparently, the revolution was poorly funded not able to supply portable radios. From the patio, while downing numerous drinks, we chuckled at confused orders on air and directions relayed to people who had vital roles in the overthrow. Mind you, this was their first revolution.

Stomachs growled from hungry checkpoint guards. Radio waves from the hill beamed across the island, assuring them food would soon be on the way. Locations of checkpoints, times of meetings, and names of section leaders were thinly disguised during the broadcasts. A mysterious ‘Mr. X’ we thought, must be the assistant manager of the revolution. And not to forget Mrs. Latim, who absolutely demanded her binoculars be returned by Mr. Stevens who borrowed them three days ago.

The police barracks downtown lay under siege, barricaded. The few trapped police were encouraged, to surrender by eight pm--or else. Resistance was futile. We could even see the large stone building, lit up like daylight, expecting it to explode any moment.

Tension and speculation mounted, every islander glued to their radio as the high drama unfolded.

But the siege fizzled out as the police finally surrendered but one policeman was killed.

We decided it would be best to get out, go anywhere else. Our friends were due to fly out on the Wednesday 747 Wardair flight. Hope springs eternal so in the morning on the way to the airport we encountered checkpoints manned by jittery, tired teenagers with bloodshot eyes. It was unnerving, bordering on frightening, how they carelessly waved around old, bolt action carbine rifles—further evidence this ‘people’s revolution’ was poorly funded. Every checkpoint was the drill: passports, open suitcases, and eavesdrop as our cabbie—and us—gleaned the latest info. Repeat at Checkpoints #3 and #5. I noticed a guard with binoculars around his neck, and wondered when Mrs. Latim might get them back.

At Pearl’s airport, there was no sign of Wardair's presence. An extended holiday for them seemed likely. There were forty-gallon drums of aviation fuel dotting the runway. Some small charter pilots weighed a risky takeoff around the obstacles as tourists were flashing buckets of money to escape. We spent hours in the sweltering airport before finally giving up like everyone else.

My wife and I, eager for any news, hung out at the Holiday Inn, dared the curfew, walking hurriedly along the dark beach. After a few days, tourists and ex-pats became understandably edgy with some bordering on anxiety attacks, despite no present dangers.

March 1979 was the pre-cellphone and no email era. Things like pixels, Bill Gates, digital, and Silicon Valley were sci-fi pulp fiction. Island phones weren’t working, but hey, we did have stamps and postcards. No one knew what pressures were being applied elsewhere in the world as though a dark curtain surrounded the island. Confusion, rumors, and mystery flourished as to what the next step might be. Jubilations and smiles from islanders fizzled into worry; however, Bob Marley played on.

All the stranded Canadians were overjoyed and hopeful when informed a Canadian dignitary and a Wardair person were on the way. A Barbados naval frigate brought the Canadian ambassador to Barbados along with an airline fellow. They set up shop at the Holiday Inn, recorded names and gave vague reassurances. Certainly not the rescue envisioned by the hand-wringing tourists. My wife and I had flown in on a private charter but we added our names anyhow.

I stood just off the lobby as a jeep with two armed bodyguards dressed in camo fatigues pulled up under the portico. It was an impressive sight as they were the only rebels we’d seen who resembled soldiers and might be capable of firing a weapon--an automatic weapon. Oddly, we were reassured.

A neatly groomed black man with a short-trimmed beard, clad in a safari jacket, khaki pants and white shirt, stepped from the vehicle. The hotel staff quickly scrambled into the lobby for a look and applauded as he marched in.

It was el Generalissimo himself--Maurice Bishop--soon to be a folk hero.

I admit I was excited. I lifted my camera for the historic picture figuring the media back home might pay big bucks for the photo, along with an eye-witness account directly from the horse’s mouth.

But a firm hand firmly squeezed my shoulder; a warning grip, like a firefighter would, for you to step away just before a door was kicked down.

“If you want to keep the camera, mon, do not take pictures,” he said.

I turned to him. He was a groundskeeper in coveralls topped with a weaved-straw hat. Could I or should I take the pic and fight him off? A few of the hotel staff stood behind me waiting for my reaction.

History be damned; I wanted to keep my camera. I still regret not taking the picture.

Negotiations between Mr. Bishop and Wardair proved fruitful. In a few days, Wardair’s plane arrived as promised, but evacuated only Wardair passengers. Gloria and I were left to fend for ourselves. We’d would have to wait until our charter plane was allowed to fly out. Our friends and most of the tourists were gone.

Some of the restaurants we’d frequented were closed. Farm trucks that used to carry pineapples and bananas rushed by us with their new loads of armed young men, eying us with suspicion. Only days ago, they were quick to smile and wave.

Wednesday Welcome Night again. The kitchen staff weren’t informed their hotel was nearly empty. Food and drink for a plane load were served. I was glad, as the previous week we only managed to snag a few prawns from the buffet. No one challenged us. Only a few dozen or so showed to dine. Hungry German guests pretended it was Oktoberfest.

The next few days passed uneventfully. The airport finally re-opened. Curiously, the day before we left, a Russian liner the 'Ivan Franko' docked across the bay in an odd position; its stern anchored to the end of the dock, perhaps for a quick getaway. My wife and I had been to the USSR and thought the islanders might have to get used to black bread. Grand Anse Beach was now mobbed by pale skinned Communists; mainly a thousand very hairy Bulgarians--men and women alike. Being on our honeymoon kept us...quite distracted, and naïve to potential danger.

There was no denying a nervous expectancy that pervaded the island. We weren’t sure the islanders totally understood how many ‘people’s revolutions’ ended up badly for them. All were grateful the PM’s personal thugs, the Mongoose Gang, had been rounded up and thrown in jail. Grenadans told us of the bullies they had been, arm-breakers, and usually were the last people to be seen with a mysteriously missing person.

Four years later, U.S. President Ronald Reagan believed Grenada was cozying up to Castro too much. Using the arbitrary 1823 Monroe Doctrine, the U.S., Caribbean, and British forces invaded the island with up to 7,000 troops. Gloria and I followed the invasion, saddened to see shelling from naval ships tearing apart beautiful Grand Anse Beach and the Holiday Inn.

Sometime during this invasion, the folk hero and leader of the revolution Maurice Bishop, was murdered. When I saw the headline in the newspaper, his image came to me: a stoic figure with a confident stride that framed my viewfinder for just a few seconds, yet engraved in my mind forever.