Our Man in Belize
A Memoir
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2.0 • 1 Rating
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
A settlement established by shipwrecked English sailors in 1683, Belize is now a country of wildlife refuges and spectacular snorkeling reefs. Conroy vividly and hilariously recounts his adventures in a very different Belize.
Conroy admits in Our Man in Belize that his tales "have taken on a life of their own"--tales of disasters, for example, like the dinner party at which an Obeah witch doctor blew up the consulate oven, causing the suddenly bald cook to quit in mid-meal , and the equally unsettling occasion when huge tropical roaches, attracted by the gracious candlelight, plunged helplessly from the ceiling into the guests' bowls of gazpacho. He describes the unorthodox social mores of the town, whose bordello was a barely hidden enterprise of the town's most respectable citizen, and he brings to vivid life the charming Belize people and their ways. Conroy also recounts the tragedy of Hurricane Hattie, which killed four hundred people on Halloween Eve in 1961 and changed the Belize way of life forever.
None of the cheerful chaos and disorganization was what Conroy expected when he arrived in this small Central American country with his wife and two daughters, to face some of the most bizarre experiences of day-to-day diplomatic life.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
When Conroy was a young U.S. foreign service officer 35 years ago, a tour of duty in what was then British Honduras was regarded as an assignment from hell. The weather was so humid that envelopes were ordered without glue to avoid having to steam them open before use, and new tires for the official jeep had to be labeled "dog food" to prevent unauthorized personnel from taking them. Moreover, the island was a crumbling outpost of the British Empire, governed in comic-operetta style. The major activity of the U.S. Consulate seemed to be issuing visas and stamping passports, the consul himself preferring to spend his time "talking with...people he found amusing." His major concern was the dream boat he was building, and when a hurricane struck, neither he nor his boat was to be found. Conroy's initial SOS to the State Department violated protocol--only communiques from the consul, not his minions, were permitted. But eventually the navy came to the rescue. Now recalled in tranquillity, this book is high comedy performed in fittingly elegant high style.
