Port Antonio: A tantalizing glimpse of the `real' Jamaica

PORT ANTONIO, Jamaica When friends would return from Jamaicaspinning yarns about paradise, I'd pretend to be happy for them. ButI made a vow: If I ever set foot on this Caribbean island's sandyshores, I wouldn't bore my buddies with the details.

My recent week-long trip was spent mostly on the not-so-troddenshores of Port Antonio, a seaside town nestled in the hills of one ofJamaica's more tropical regions.

My friends had armed me with a list of things to do in thetourist havens of Ocho Rios, Montego Bay or Negril. But the JamaicanTourist Bureau told me that Port Antonio would provide a tantalizingglimpse of the Jamaica that television ads always promise.

Having landed at Kingston Airport, I was unprepared for thebumpy two-hour ride to Port Antonio in a hot minibus with nary abreeze to cool the effects of a boiling sun. Thatched-roof shackswere interspersed with stuccoed mansions. I saw the people who livedin the thatched homes heading to market with vegetables and fruits,driving herds of goats and chickens, doing the wash, or tending afterchildren. There were few signs of any remaining impact from lastSeptember's Hurricane Gilbert.

I would later learn that 60 percent of Jamaica's 2.3 millionpeople live in rural areas, and a great percentage live in poverty.

Our bus continued past sugar cane, bananas and citrus, oftenslowing to allow a stray goat to pass. In Port Antonio, our driverpulled to the side of the road near Boston Beach, where the pungentsmell of barbecue invaded my nostrils.

We entered a "jerk" hut, an open-air stall where "jerk" -peppery, hot pork and chicken - was being cooked over a fire on thewood of green saplings. The method supposedly originated amongmountain communities of runaway slaves who barbecued wild hog.

The sun was beginning its descent by the time we arrived atTrident resort along the coastline to the east of Port Antonio. Iwas shown to a spacious cottage on the rocky edge of the water, wherewaves crashed 12 feet from my veranda and an occasional mist floatedthrough French doors.

I immediately sank into the sunken bath, but was lured from thecottage by afternoon tea, served daily on the terrace of the mainhouse. Dressing later for dinner, a formal affair at Trident, Ijoined other guests in the courtyard, where two or three peacockswere dancing to the calypso rhythms of the nightly band.

My first venture was a foray into the Port Antonio marketplace,a bustling arena where a colorful array of tropical fruit,vegetables, flowers, and "bush" for teas and medicines greeted thesenses. The market vendors, or "higglers," loudly hawked theirwares.

Here I met William. If I didn't buy his flowers, William said,he would not be able to purchase food for his family. I said Ididn't want the flowers, but offered him money anyway. William wasinsulted. I apologized and was forgiven.

I was struck by the diverse physical appearance of Jamaicans,more than 90 percent of whom are of African descent. Jamaica wasonce a British colony, built on the backs of African slaves, who werefreed in 1838. After the abolition of slavery, the English recruitedIndians and Chinese to work as indentured farmers, and the diversitycomes from racial inter-marriage.

A visit to Port Antonio would be incomplete without a raft ridedown the Rio Grande, my escorts insisted. I acquiesced and gotrained upon - a fluke, said my guide. The 2 1/2-hour trip began atBerridale, where bamboo rafts lined the beach awaiting busloads oftourists who drive the two to four hours from Ocho Rios and MontegoBay for the experience.

My raft partner and I weren't sure we could believe theraftsman's boast of having made 1,000 trips down the river with nomishaps. We hopped aboard anyway, because our driver had alreadypulled off to meet us at the finishing point five miles away. Whenwe disembarked, we were soaked to the bone, but glad we hadn't missedthe trip through the light rapids past tropical rain forest.

Nor did I miss the ferry ride from Port Antonio's twin harborsto beautiful Navy Island. Once owned by Errol Flynn, the smallisland is now a marine resort drawing watersport enthusiasts from allover Jamaica.

We spent one evening at the home of Polly Perry, who hosted a"Meet the People" dinner for a small group of U.S. tourists. We werematched with several local professionals, who came to share a mealalong with warm and enlightening conversation.

I learned why Jamaicans from the poorest to the well-to-do goout of their way to help the booming tourism industry. Thegovernment once relied on bauxite for most of its foreign exchange,but after the 1980 collapse in bauxite prices, tourism became theisland's biggest single earner of hard currency needed to pay off a$3.5 billion foreign debt. Tourism also has created jobs in a nationwhere unemployment is at least 25 percent.

The greater part of our after-dinner conversation dwelt onJamaicans' hopes and apprehensions concerning the recent election ofPrime Minister Michael Manley, a former radical socialist whoalienated local businessmen and the international financial communitywith his economic experiments in the 1970s. Jamaicans, according toour hosts, generally have a "wait and see" attitude toward their newleader, now a self-described political moderate who regained thenation's top position in an upset over conservative Prime MinisterEdward Seaga.

All in all, it was a pleasant evening with new friends,including visiting Chicagoan Myrtle Johnson of the South Side, whosaid she returns to Port Antonio year after year. Specifically

For information, contact Jamaica Tourist Board, 36 S. Wabash,Suite 1210, Chicago 60603; call 346-1546.