Sunday, June 19, 2011

First Impressions

We arrived to Jamaica a little under two weeks ago and are finally starting to understand Jamaican culture.  The past two weeks have been filled with many learning experiences starting as soon as we landed...

 After waking up at 330 am, almost missing our flight out of Milwaukee and spending the day traveling we were ready to get to the villas and settle in for the night.  But as we tried making our way through customs we came to find Jamaicans are quite particular about letting people into their country.  And well, in all honesty we were slightly unprepared.  Not even thinking about needing the address to where we would be staying the seven of us Americans waltzed up to the customs counter handing over our forms and passports expecting to move through as easily as everyone else.  However, we were surprised when the customs workers wouldn't let us through until we had more information on where we would be going.  For some reason they didn't like the response "I don't know where we are going.  Our bus driver Bowwow is suppose to just take us somewhere!"  Luckily I'm not one to spend to much time upset with our predicament.  I quickly remembered I had the office address for the villas somewhere in my trusty Next Step binder.  Finding this address seemed to please the customs workers and they let our team through.

We proceeded to baggage where I was just praying that at leaset 80% of our baggage made it to the airport.  We discovered that the only piece of luggage that didn't make it was a small part of sound equipments.  I felt extremely relieved and was ready to get out of the airport!

We made our way up to the second customs counter where they examine your baggage.  Because we had a large number of boxes I guess we looked slightly suspicious and were sent to a special counter where we slowly began to understand that we would not be leaving the airport with everything that day.  We come to find out that because we are not affiliated with a church yet we have to pay a tax on the items to bring them into the country.  It took us awhile to understand exactly what this meant but after we did I started to realize this was not going to be as easy as we thought it would.  

About two hours after we landed we stepped out of the airport with only our personal bags, a list of what we left behind, and a piece of paper listing all the brokers in town.  Not exactly what I had been expecting to leave the airport with.  

As I take my frist steps outside the airport I try to wash the disappointment and frustration off of my face but as soon as I look at the ground I notice it's wet.  Apparently it's been raining the last two weeks before we arrived.  Excellent.  Just wanted I wanted to do leave cold rainy Wisconsin for hot, wet, humid Jamaica.

The rest of the night was spent finding our villas, buying local cell phones, working our way through the grocery store.  By that time I was so out of it I barely remember doing those things.

The next day we contacted a broker and set off in search of how to get our belongings back.  I'm told because the detention notice of the items was put in my name I have to be the one to claim them all.  We go to the brokers office and they give us instructions on getting a Tax Registration Number otherwise known as a TRN.  However, when Jamaicans say it, it sounds like there saying a "trin" because they slur all the sounds together.  After we went and got the "trin" the brokers said we would have to get a TCC (customs certificate) and then we would return to the broker.  Easy I can do that.  David a local Jamaican that Next Step works with has volunteered to take me to all these places.  And thank God he did because I would have been so lost without him.

When we get to the tax office I apply for the TRN.  After applying for that we are instructed to go to several other government buildings to get the proper documentation to be able to apply for the TCC.  Great more places.  The first building we go to, no problem, in and out in about 30 min.  The second building we go too I walk in with David and the security guard stops us and starts talking to David.  I'm thinking in my head oh man somethings wrong.  But because Jamaicans talk so quietly and mumble so much I couldn't understand what she was saying to him.  He takes me back outside and explains that they have a dress code.  You have to be wearing either pants or a skirt and I'm wears athletic shorts.  At that point I just start laughing because it sounds so ridiculous.  David and I then run from shop to shop in downtown Montego Bay until I find myself some American Jeans in a Jamaican store and spend my first money in Jamaica buying them so we can go into this government building.  We waited at the building another hour and then waited back a the tax office another two hours until we finally had what we needed just in time.

We ended the day dropping of all of the proper forms five hours later at the broker's office.  The next day we payed the tax office and were able to go to the airport to gather our things.  To do this I was taken to receive a special access pass and got to walk through the airport as an employee going into all the secret doors.  Probably the only cool thing I got to do during this whole process.          

After 48 hours we had all of our stuff back in the house. Finally.  

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