‘Who does this guy think he is?’ – I thought of Beno after spending the first 30 minutes with him.
I arrived to PG and got off at the last bus stop before the University of Belize (UB) branch in town, as per his instructions. I put my backpack on the bench and looked around, not seeing a soul, and thinking how the hell I’d be able to tell my host I was already there. No phone, remember? I saw 2 snack shacks nearby and marched into one of them. When I asked if the woman working there knew where my host lived, by giving her his full name, she told me she did not know. Now, being older and wiser, I’m thinking one of the two things happened there: 1) she didn’t know, as she didn’t recognize the name. The guy was simply known as Beno, or 2) she knew exactly who I meant, but she didn’t want to tell me. Oh, I wouldn’t be surprised! Trust me, there’s a lot of undercurrent in that town.
It’s a small place and in a way it reminds me of Alderney. Everybody knows everybody’s business.
Not having luck in the first snack shack, I marched to the second one. This time I asked the woman working there if I could use her phone (much smarter, eh?) and called Beno. He quickly answered and told me he’d be there in 5 minutes.
And there he was. Wearing his blue overalls, covered in grass (he worked as a gardener) he approached me, grabbed my heavy backpack and led the way to his house close by.
He talked non stop for about 20 minutes.
‘I am just looking for the right girl’ – he announced at some point, having talked about nothing but girls.
‘This guy is trouble!’ – I thought to myself then.
The funny thing was that he couldn’t take his eyes off the mirror the entire time he talked.
Beno looked himself up and he looked himself down, he checked himself from the left and he checked himself from the right. That made me smile. I couldn’t remember seeing a guy do that for a very long time, if ever!
Don’t take me wrong. I couldn’t take my eyes off him either…
But hey, who was I to say anything? If he was looking for the right girl, I was hoping he’d find one soon enough. In the meantime, I had a roof over my head and a couch to sleep on. I was good.
Once his short lunch break was over, Beno went back to work at the UB steps away from his house. The town was really small and you could easily walk everywhere. So that afternoon I set off to explore it.
That first night my couch turned into bed. Beno kept the only fan in the house in his bedroom, and I was not going to sweat myself to sleep.
That same night my bed turned into the mattress on the floor. The house I stayed in was a simple wooden house. And the roof was leaking. When the rain came and the bed started feeling wetter, Beno suggested putting the mattress on the floor and I happily agreed.
That night I hardly slept. Not only because of the rain but also because of the person lying next to me. The sparks between us could have easily set the wooden house on fire. The morning came too soon and I woke up with ‘he’s my host and I’m just passing by’ thoughts in my head. Was I exhausted? For sure. Was I hooked? You bet.
