End of the Map

No one in Barbados has a last name. I learned this very early during my stay here. Whenever you meet someone, you get their first name and then an associative physical or geographical characteristic. "Hi, I'm Peter." And Peter is tall and bald and from Denmark and so that's how Peter is known to you from then on. When you describe Peter to someone else, those characteristics become that person's last name. Person A: "Do you know Peter?" Person B: "Maybe. Peter who?" Person A: "You know. Tall. Bald. From Denmark?" Person B: "Oh right - Peter!" What's incredible is that people fully accept that this counts as "knowing someone," and I can think of no better way to encapsulate my time on the island than that: a series of very intimate and personal connections, shared experiences, and fun where no one even knows your name. It's hard to say what I'll miss about Barbados because I believe that in time, this pl