I Finally Get to Go to the Beach

On Sunday March 8, I finally got to visit the Caribbean. Yes, my apartment is three blocks from it. Yes, I go up to the port when I have a few minutes and sneak back into a patio where a Tai Kwon Do class is practicing, so I can sit on the seawall and gaze at it. Yes, it is visible from my balcony. But that's it. There does not seem to be a great attraction for the beach on the part of Haitians. When I tell my students that North Americans all wish they could come to the Caribbean, and that you are lucky because you get to live here, they really can't see what the fuss is about. Also, I understand they don't swim in it, as a rule. It has something to do with the bogeyman living there, I think.
It was a beautiful day and I got to swim and enjoy the sunshine. There was, however, one fly in my soup bowl of happiness. I took my Flip video camera, which I have been using for all the pictures that you see here, under the water, snorkeling on Sunday. I bought a box for which I paid, evidently, $50 too much, and put the camera in it without testing it camera-less in the sink. I am ashamed to admit this to you. I went into the water with it and when I pressed the "on" button, air bubbles popped up out of my camera box. When I surfaced there was an inch of water in the box. 

It did not leak at the silicon gaskets; it leaked at the buttons. I drained it and laid it in the sun to dry and now it only runs intermittently. I hope that I can get a replacement. Sunday night I looked up the camera case ratings. A perfect 3: People either gave it a 5, because they loved it, and had the videos posted to prove how wonderful it was, or people gave it a 1, because they hated it, and told the sad tale of their once-in-a-lifetime trip to swim with the dolphins and how it was ruined by this box. I was just mad, not devastated, so I felt lucky.

Do NOT BUY this camera case!