Day 2: Seeing Sites While Hearing Site Reports (by Charlie)

Today was our first full day in Jamaica, and it was spent orienting ourselves with the town of Falmouth and Good Hope Plantation, where we are staying. Everyone's day started with breakfast, and for me it was a little too early. I meant to get up at 6:30, but due to a combination of fatigue caused by yesterday's travel and an immensely comfortable bed, I didn't wake up until 10 minutes before breakfast. Fingers crossed that it's easier to get up day three! Following breakfast, we went on a tour of Good Hope Plantation to familiarize ourselves with the place we're staying and the history of the plantation. This is where the site reports came in; as we were walking around Good Hope, students would give presentations on various locations in the plantation that they researched before the trip. We ended up learning all about the historical significance of Good Hope, and I found that it was really interesting to compare the plantation's historical uses with its use today: a tourist location visited by cruise-goers that gives them a stereotypical Caribbean experience. Sites that have a very dark past have been converted into moneymaking operations that don't remind the visiter of any historical wrongdoing. A good example of this is the slave hospital. In the early 19th century, the slave hospital housed slaves sick and injured from horrible working conditions and infinitely long days. Today, however, that has been converted into an aviary housing McCaws. Sites with dark histories converted into commercial enterprises seems to be a theme in Falmouth, and the citizens of the town seem to be a lot more comfortable with their past than citizens of America.

Following our tour of Good Hope, we stopped by our house for lunch before going into the town of Falmouth for a walking tour. There, we listened to more site reports from our peers on important locations in town, such as churches, the port, the square, and the dome (a multi-purpose furnace facility). The port really resonated with me and a lot of other students. Built in 2011, Falmouth's port houses some of the largest cruise ships in the world. These cruise ships dropped anchor with promises of economic growth for working class Jamaicans. However, they haven't delivered. The combination of Royal Caribbean using tax relief as leverage in the deal that brought the cruises to Falmouth (meaning they pay no taxes when they dock) and cruise-goers rarely exiting the ship unless its to go to resort-like getaways has led to little growth. We also saw cruise-goers on Good Hope this morning, which made the port even more interesting since we were seeing the type of businesses it was benefitting. Overall, I thought our trip into town was even more interesting than our walk around Good Hope, and I'm really excited to venture back there.

In my opinion, Day 2 was a complete success and got everyone excited for the hard work to come. I'm looking forward to meeting and talking with more of the people of Jamaica, working on the restoration sites, and leaning more about Jamaica's culture.