I woke up without a clear memory of how I got back to Peter’s yard and safely atop my sleeping bag. I glanced over and saw my wife had since gotten up and left the tent. I wondered just what time it was when the memories of last night came back in short, little snippets. “Six Love!” and an explosion of sorts when the table was hit so hard that the dominoes flew to all corners of the bar. Cheers resounded both inside and outside the bar. We lost. Time to get up and face my first full day in Jamaica.
I gathered my soap, towel, and toothbrush; unzipped and rezipped the tent and headed for the shower area when I heard my wife say, “Good afternoon, sleepy head” from where she sat on the stoop. She said that the water was still off but would “soon come” and patted a spot on the stoop next to her so I went over and sat down. I pointed to her watch and asked the time. It was about 8am and already getting quite warm.
I could hear Peter in the kitchen cooking something that smelled like eggs, so I said, “Good Morning, Peter” and did not get an immediate answer. I turned to my wife and asked in a near whisper, “Is he upset or something?” She just shrugged but added, “I don’t think so, why? “The game last night”, I continued when Peter stuck his head out the door and said, “Good morning, partner” with a special emphasis on the word “partner” which stung just a little.
“Want some coffee?”, he said. “One dollar a cup”. “Sounds good”, my wife added. “Want some help?”, she asked. “Okay”. She was getting up to go in the kitchen when he said, “I will show you how we make Blue Mountain Coffee”.
Peter took a cast iron frying pan off a hook on the wall and put it on a burner turned to medium where he dumped in a few handfuls of dried, green, unroasted beans and gave my wife a wooden spatula to stir them and keep them moving. The smell was incredible and getting more so as the beans darkened and, meanwhile Peter brought a small cane broom out to sweep off the top step where I was sitting. I stood and watched as he took the frying pan’s contents and dumped them on top of the now swept step. He handed my wife an empty one-liter rum bottle and told her to crush the beans using the bottle like a rolling pin. After the beans were ground down to his liking, Peter took three handkerchief-sized pieces of cloth and filled each with the ground contents and tied a knot on top of each.
Peter went back into the kitchen and then he and my wife came out with three mason jar mugs filled with hot water. He demonstrated dunking the bean-filled sachets continuously until the water turned dark black with an oil slick on the top. I could hear Gus and Inga rustling around in the kitchen and they appeared carrying enough ackee and saltfish in wooden bowls for the five of us along with a can of Betty to sweeten and color the coffee.
My first breakfast in Jamaica. Boy! This coffee is strong!
