MONDAY, THE NEW FRIDAY --

Monday night back in San Ignacio town. We were really enjoying the town at this point, grooving on the nice folks and cheap beers. After cleaning up, we met up at Hannah's for dinner. This, I believe, is where we discovered the "panty ripper," the drink that would become our best friend for the rest of the trip. We won't go into the issues involved when a drink becomes your best friend... but I think its probably not good. Anyway, a panty ripper, for non-bartender-types out there, is coconut rum and pineapple juice. Very sweet and yummy. Hannah's was listed in the guidebook (the book I was using, by the way, was the Rough Guide, after having depended on the Moon Guide for planning and realizing that it (moon) sucked) as basically the best restaurant in Belize. Well, we weren't so sure we agreed with that, but it was pretty good. Molly, Sally and I all got vegetarian Indian entrees and split them three ways. There was a coconut curry that wasn't very coconutty and something like chana masala and something vaguely paneer-like (fresh spinach, not all creamed up). So the food was more Indian-esque than actual Indian. James had something with chicken, I think.

Oh, I forgot to mention that we ran into the birdman at the border. Eric, Everild's brother, that is. Once we had passed through the border, the cute American horse guide from Barton Creek and Eric were waiting on the other side. After chatting with the American (Aaron, I think his name was), Eric approached us. Apparently he needed a ride back to town, so he squeezed in with Molly and Sally in the backseat. I asked what he was doing at the border, and he replied "There's not much to do at the border." Which we found hilarious -- he didn't exactly answer the question, now, did he? So he had been drinking at the border (with friends, I suppose) since around 2 in the afternoon. He was very boisterous on the ride back to SI, and kept us very entertained. When we got back to town, though, we wanted to clean up, so we told him we'd see him at Hannah's later. When we didn't see him around before dinner, James started to worry that he'd be mad. Eric seemed a little possessive of us, his American friends.

We did end up seeing him after dinner when we were hanging out at Chingo's or Eva's, though. Eric was drinking water and trying to sober up, I believe, and Sally made fun of him for it. We managed to hook up with a couple of other locals and a couple of Canadians sitting outside of Eva's and drinking Belikins. One of the locals was either crazy, drunk, or both, and was very funny. Sally and Molly kept taking pictures of him and the other guys -- I thought to myself that digital cameras are interesting social tools. Taking pictures with and of the Belizians and then showing them around was frequently a major part of our interactions with them. This was probably aided by the many beers that were being consumed -- things seemed much more amusing with the help of many beers.

Someone suggested moving on to the Kokopelli, a bar upstairs from the Natural Foods store. That's right, SI had a natural foods store AND a vegan restaurant. I never made it to either, unfortunately. But I'm a pretty un-militant vegetarian, so I didn't really feel the need to check them out on the trip. Anyway, the Kokopelli was the place, James said, that we had been looking for the previous couple nights. It was happening. There were tons of people playing darts, pool, and just hanging out. James played darts with a Canadian and James (Jaime?), aka "smiles for miles." He was a really sweet, nice guy. He introduced us to his friend Eduardo, who is an artist. He was also nice, and was the only local to buy us beer. He bought two rounds. Eric, meanwhile, was pouting -- he warned us about five times that he was leaving, hoping for us to convince him to stay, I suppose. When the Kokopelli started shutting down, Eduardo and James (smiles for miles) tried to convince M&S to go to the casino with them. James and I were ready to head in, but he trusted the guys to take care of the girls -- they were good guys. M&S decided to turn in as well, however.