where things got interesting following entry (or the rest of the story)

So, things got interesting after we cleared customs and immigration, yesterday. We headed out to the curb to see if we could find whoever had been sent to get us. After looking around for 20 minutes, a very casually dressed, heavily French accented man came up to me and asked if I was…. actually, I'm not real sure what he said, but it started with an "S" so I answer back saying, "Schwinn?" he answers back this name that starts with an "S" and I repeated, "Schwinn?"…. several more times.

We found ourselves being loaded up into a taxi. An absolute example of miscommunication which led us to the wrong place with the wrong person. When we were delivered to a backpackers' rest house, the man's obvious surprise at our amount of luggage became amazingly clear! The error did have an up side. Karl pulled out his contact info for the mission and the same taxi driver talked via cell to the mission office, got directions and delivered us without further ado. There we were greeted with smiles and handshakes and, "Oh, that was today, wasn't it?" Yes, apologies were made, but hey,… welcome to the islands! If things had not worked that way, we may have been at the airport a lot longer, waiting a proper time to not be obnoxiously "ugly American" impatient, and would have had the added fun of changing currency, using pay phone, etc. to find out why no one was there to pick us up.  In the long run, we came out ahead… but what about that backpacker left waiting at the airport?…mmmmm. Hope things turned out okay for her, too.