One night I was fulfilling my role as “Hostess with the Mostess” at the Pizzeria and was chatting with some visitors sitting on the extension. They were contemplating buying property on the Island and wanted to pick my brain.
I was sitting on the newly-built stone wall as I chatted, the restaurant was packed with not a chair to spare. I had dressed nicely that night, a lovely new long dress to celebrate my exit from the kitchen to the dining room. I now had a pizza chef and was enjoying my new role as hostess.
The couple, never having been to Bequia before, were curious about what it would be like to live full-time on such a tiny speck in the Caribbean. I had seen such people come and go over the years, seeing the Island through rose-colored glasses and then being dismayed by realities that could and DID exist. Life on Bequia was not for everyone, and sometimes it took a while for newcomers to realize that.
The lady asked me if there were any dangerous insects on the Island and THAT got me going! I possessed a long-time fear of centipedes, and proceeded to tell them about the times I had been bitten. I had not been bitten by a centipede at that point for a while but that wasn’t the point, they still existed and were, in my opinion, the only thing to really fear on Bequia.
As I was talking, I felt something drop through the top of my dress and land on my lap. I instinctively jumped up and swished my dress vigorously back and forth but the damned centipede bit me on the leg before it dropped onto the floor. I screamed, “centipede!” and the locals at the tables nearby leaped up, toppling chairs in their haste to stamp on the insect until it was flattened. The visitors watched this “centipede dance” with wide eyes as I clutched my poor leg and moaned.
I think that was the deciding factor for the couple, they paid their bill and I never saw them again. Life on Bequia is not for the faint of heart, if you can’t take a centipede bite or two you had best settle elsewhere!