Barbados is such a speck on the Caribbean map that you might be tempted to resolve to know all of it in a matter of hours. At 21 miles by 14 miles, it appears, to use a neocon-ism, doable. Such thoughts are banished upon arrival at the island’s tiny airport, the bareness of which leaves you struggling to reconcile images of the Concorde landing here with such regularity that one aircraft has been permanently stationed as a token of those journeys past. ‘‘Three days,’’ exclaims the immigration officer, threatening to deport me for such foolishness. Okay, never mind, he relents, next time plan it better. Next time? After this trip you will want to return, he smiles, won’t you? Barbadians are like that. They brew a characteristically Bajan mix of exaggerated aggression with a sudden but inevitably delivered gesture of hospitality. All they demand in return is time and good cheer, and lots of it. So here then is the first tip: Throw away that guidebook. To find your way through this most beautiful of islands, just make your way to the seashore and Barbados will reveal itself. As I work my way past the poolside chairs at the Accra Beach Resort and perch myself on its waist-high boundary wall, every anxiety of a tourist-in-a-hurry evaporates. Ever after, this will be my vision of heaven: 20 ft ahead, the Caribbean Sea rolls in at low tide, waves gently crashing on the almost white sand. And all the world, it seems, is strolling past, and wanting to stop by for a chat. They size me up in seconds—there is a book on the politics of West Indian cricket by my side, and India’s absolutely pathetic Test record at Bridg-etown’s Kensington Oval is proudly recapped. ‘‘Even Tendulkar, we talk of how he cannot cope here,’’ says a young man, on a walkabout with his lunch. Suitably angered, I join the argument, and arrive at that Barbadian comfort level of agitation and goodwill. ‘‘Maybe next time India do better,’’ chips in a woman nearby, setting the ground for a pleasant farewell. An Indian Test victory is so unimaginable in Barbados that ‘next time’ must simply be Bajan code for ‘never mind’. But then, here’s Tip Two: To really enjoy Barbados there must be a next time. A leisurely round of other aspirants to primacy in the British WI—Trinidad for its economy, Jamaica for its cultural vibrance, Antigua for its 365 beaches—yields a shared irritation with Bajan smugness. “They are so British (Barbados is actually monikered Little England, with the hills up north called Scotland),” says a Jamaican investment banker on a day of uneventful cricket at the Oval. Even the applause is muted here. “They are so snobbish,” says a Jamaican. “Just stay away.” It’s an anti-Barbados game that easily gives way to an evaluation of Banks, the island’s beer. “Conspiracy,” yells my taxi driver, on a return trip to Bridgetown. “Look around, do you see any other avenue for employment besides tourism?” We cannot, she says—suspiciously sad—afford to be snooty! And having thus established her sense of superiority, she asks how much time I have and treats me to a detour through Gary Sobers’ old neighbourhood and a rugged seafront off the tourists’ itinerary. Tip Three: Its Bajan people are such a treasure that you have to summon great will, tear yourself away from the beach and retrieve that guidebook to chart out a little recce of your own. Trinidad may claim two Caribbean Nobel laureates and the unsurpassable CLR James, but aficionados of the been-there-read-that school of travel must visit Barbados’ more rugged sealine on its Atlantic coast. Call ahead to the Atlantis Hotel, on a clifftop at Bathsheba. George Lamming, who helped West Indian writers find their voice with In The Castle of My Skin, is often in residence here, and its brunch comes heavily recommended. Don’t leave it for next time.
