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Vegan in Jamaica? Yah Mon!
Don’t worry, I’m not gonna pull a Tom-Hanks’-least-fave-child and say anything else patois. Recently, we escaped the dreary dullness of a London winter and went to WEPA JAMAICA (that’s how I referred to it the whole time, in the style of In the Heights when everyone shouts “Wepa! Vanessa!” but I said Jamaica instead, it does not make sense no but I heard it in my heart) for a wedding. I know the known thing is like ‘people have destination weddings if they don’t really want you to come’ but hell no were we missing our best excuse for a trip to Jamaica! We stayed at the famous Round Hill resort in Montego Bay, but we also made sure to visit the actual city and its vegan food options, which were prettayyy great, mon.
So let’s learn about Jamaica real fast! Jamaica is an island mon! You knew that! In the Caribbean! You know what’s weird, everyone says ‘Caribbean’ with the accent on ‘RIB’ BUT whenever anyone says Pirates of the Caribbean they put the accent on BE isn’t that something. Columbus happened upon in in 1494 and so he said ‘The Spanish own you now!’ and the Spanish killed a lot of native people either the old fashioned way or by bringing new diseases to them. Fun fact: Columbus is in the Bad Place because of all the raping, slave trade, and genocide!
After some more shit, the English conquered it, named it Jamaica mon, made it into a leading sugar exporter (more slave trade), yada yada yada, it became independent in 1962, though it is still a Commonwealth country (so Lizzie Dos is their queen). Jamaica is a wee small island with international fame and influence much greater than you’d expect for a wee small, considering the spread of Rastafarian culture, reggae music, and their bobsled team.
Kingston is the capital and the largest city, but tourists tend not to go there because it has some violence. Tourists, especially from the UK, will likely fly into Kingston, however, and unless you get a connection to MoBay (that’s how the cool kids say Montego Bay), it’s a 2.5 hour drive at least. Luckily for us, we were coming from Philadelphia so it’s an easy flight to MoBay. I’m gonna tell you all this up front before you get to the beautiful resort stuff and fun vegan food jawn: the Montego Bay airport is a nightmare. It’s an absolute zoo, and after you get off the plane you will wait in a sea of endless people pretending to be some semblance of a line until you get to immigration hours later. HOURS. And this entire route, snaking from the gates to immigration, have no toilets. (Obviously I weasled my way through all the halls to the front of the mess somehow to find the bathroom but then went back to Z.) Immigration has kiosks where you enter your info, it prints out a document, and then you take it to a person at a desk. It’s a MADHOUSE. The only funny thing is that tourism is such an enormous part of the economy that the short list of ‘reasons to be in Jamaica’ that you have to answer – the normal options being ‘business or travel’ – also includes ‘for a wedding’.
Also baggage took FOREVER to arrive. You might be like ‘oh that’s fine I always just use a carry-on’ but our flight was ‘overcrowded’ and made everyone check their carry-ons too…and then all the overhead bins were empty, completely empty. The people in front of us on the plane were carry-on people and they were LIVID. See sometimes it’s good to overpack!
Alright you did it you made it through the nonsense. And now:
The Round Hill is lovely, refined resort that seemed perfect for the calmer crowd that does not go clubbing every night (like us!) (although tell that to the gaggle of divorced blondes who arrived on our last day and WERE SO LOUD). It was honestly one of the most ridiculous places I’ve ever seen in real life. Not for regular tourists like us who stayed in the main hotel (it was nice but regular), but for bigwigs staying in the luxury villas on the outer grounds. If you are supes loaded and want to go to Jamaica, THIS is where you stay. One of them was a favorite vacation spot for JFK and Jackie, and one is owned by Ralph Lauren (who is on the Round Hill board). If you are really eager to waste a bunch of your time today, go to the Round Hill website and take video tours of each of the 28 luxury villas. It’s like watching the (amazing) Netflix show The World’s Most Extraordinary Homes but somehow more upsetting. The posher of the wedding guests stayed in villas, so I visited and took some sneaky photos (shared anon).
We stayed in the main hotel since we are Not Royalty, with a really nice room that we got for half price with the wedding rate. Honestly, I cannot believe that people pay twice TWICE as much as we did for the basic rooms. It was nice but man alive that’s some crazy talk. And NB this is NOT an all-inclusive resort; in fact, we felt quite nickel-and-dimed by how exorbitant the cost for food &c turned out to be. We definitely had snobbish attitudes in the past about all-inclusive resorts being like lower class or something STUPID like that, but after experiencing this ridiculously expensive place where you get like a $20 salad and you’re like ‘ugh that was mediocre but we knew it would be expensive’ but then you get the bill and there’s already 20% service included which fine that’s fine waiters deserve it but then there’s also like an extra tax fee and then a separate service charge and you’re like wait how is that different from the other service fee but you don’t want to make a fuss don’t make a fuss and then somehow there’s also a random $5 like resort fee or something that is inexplicable so if you ever order a drink it will not be $8 it will be $25 which is why I only drink water, we are so ready to board the all-inclusive train (not that we have ever done a resort vacay before or plan to in the near future, you know us and our penchant for difficult travel!).
The resort comprises endless standalone buildings spread throughout the expansive grounds (most of it unseen by the regular guests, with the grounds uphill from the beach reserved for villas), with the public areas – the restaurants, the reception, the main block of rooms, the gym, the pool – along the beach in a semi-circle. The entrance to the hotel room building was surprisingly drab compared to the rest of the place – you entered from a very industrial-looking side with all the giant tanks and AC units on your doors’ front stoops (all rooms entered from the outside). Weird but inside was a beautiful room.
I love a hotel bed and this was a pretty good one! Not in my top 5 of all-time hotel beds but probably in my top 10! I loved the little sitting area by the balcony; you can’t see in this photo but against the right-side wall is a daybed (“Janet! Fetch my dizzy couch!”). Here’s the view from our balcony:
The weird thing about that unfinished-seeming entrance to the hotel block meant that the resort staff worked like right up against our windows and we could hear everything they did and said whenever we were in the bathroom. It was awkward! There were also like bags full of linens and towels on our front stoop at all times (and not for me to use!). So that was weird.
Here are the pics I promised from inside one of the villas – not even one of the “fancy” ones.
This is their private pool – every villa has a private pool so they don’t have to hobnob with the poors. It’s about the same size as the main one!
We used the main hotel pool every day, and it was super lovely. During the weekdays, it wasn’t too crowded at any point, but on the weekend it was a bit. The infinity pool stretching over the ocean was so beautifully designed. I was just surprised that it was a little small (and that there was no other public pool on the grounds like for lap swimming (I brought my googles!)). I guess most people are using their private pools!
One day we had the pool to ourselves at sunset and it was the most magical thing ever.
Round Hill has a great gym (included in the room rate thank goodness) that I super enjoyed, although it’s about a 15 minute walk around the beach from the main hotel block (and you have to pass the restaurant, so I’d see people I knew having breakfast and I’d be all sweaty). They also have a yoga pavilion next to the gym – which sounds amazing, right? Except the yoga classes are around $25 and it’s more like hot yoga since pavilions are outdoor structures. I was okay sticking to the gym.
The whole fitness center complex also had a deluxe spa, which I did not use (cannot imagine how expensive the massages are) but I used the bathrooms during the wedding and they were super nice.
Admission: I didn’t actually go to the beach here. Eeeek. I mean I walked in it and put my foot in just to have done that, but when faced with a beach and a pool/the chance to be sandy vs not sandy, I’m always going to pick pool. I should have had at least one beach day, I know. OOPSIE.
So as you can see, the Round Hill was pretty paradisical. The only drawback was that I was SUPER excited to play tennis every day and…I just couldn’t. It was too hot. I was shocked that the courts were always empty, but then the staff and Jamaican friends were like, uh yeah? People only play before the sun is up, otherwise YOU WILL DIE. I even had a lesson booked and everything but had to cancel because it was 1000 degrees. So sad! (And they were like oh thank god.) Aside from that, we had an amazing time, even though we aren’t really sit-by-the-side-of-the-pool-for-days-and-don’t-see-anything-of-the-land-you’re-in kinds of travelers. And we weren’t! We were the only guests to venture downtown into Montego Bay, even though we were told pretty much that “tourists stay in their resorts.” I must admit, everyone downtown was staring at us, with faces like WHAT are you doing, you lost? But the people we actually spoke to/who fed us seemed happy to see us out and about. And we had to go, not only to see the real Jamaica and not just a resort, but to find the good vegan food.
Round Hill catered fine to my veganism, and I had some nice quinoa stir-fries and veggie stews. Also, if you are in the market for a destination wedding, their buffet at this wedding was incredible, and super vegan-friendly (and also really, really not) (you know what I mean, think Jason Segel in Forgetting Sarah Marshall when he cries on the beach). But as I said, the food was supes expensive, and Montego Bay had several exciting vegan joints to check out anyway.
It’s annoying to get downtown, because you probably aren’t renting a car (if you do you are nuts in that traffic and all-around lawlessness re traffic laws), and the resorts charge an arm and a leg to take you downtown, but that’s the way you have to do it. It’s such a racket. We planned on getting our own cabs once we were downtown, but we literally could not. Every single taxi we saw was a route taxi, meaning they fill up with lots of people and operate like a small bus. They weren’t taking us to our specific destinations, let alone back to the resort! So that’s just one annoyance you have to suck up.
One morning, we had to go downtown anyway for the BEST MOST RIDICULOUS experience (with dogs) of all time, which will be its own (next) post. After that morning experience, we went straight to Millennium Victory, a vegan Rastafarian restaurant. It was THE BEST.
There’s a long history of vegetarianism in Rastafari culture. It’s called Ital food in the Rastafari tradition, derived from the word ‘vital’ but with no ‘v’, emphasizing the ‘I’ as it emphasizes the unity of each individual with nature. (Thanks wikipeeds.) It means food that’s natural, pure, and from the earth. Ital food aims to increase “livity”, the life energy in all people. (That’s why that vegan raw dessert market stall in London is called Organic Livity, I am just now realizing; and yes the people who run it are Rasta.) Rastafari commonly believe that everything you put in your body should enhance livity and not reduce it. That means there’s no chemicals or additives. It also can sometimes mean no salt, which is yikes (but often especially means no salt treated with iodine, which is yay for me), but this food was seasoned well and delicious. I would LOVE to go back here.
We asked the staff to decide for us, as everything on their big board menu sounded excellent. So they brought us two big plates of their best stuff, and everything was indeed excellent. We had jerk tofu (omg), roasted plantains and veg, all in amazing sauces. There were huge chunks of homemade seitan and sauteed ackee, the famous Jamaican fruit that whips up somehow just like eggs. AMAZING. I don’t remember everything else so just ask them to decide for you if you go, which you def should if in MB.
UGH IT WAS SO GOOD. We also got a melon skin juice, which was ace. There was a really friendly man eating at the table next to us who was like ‘this melon skin juice is the best, you need to try it’ and we were like ‘we’re okay thanks though’ and he was like ‘no I insist, I’ll order it for you’ and we were like ‘ok thanks man!’ and he really did just mean order it, not pay for it, it sounded like he was going to pay for it, but then the staff was like you need to pay for your juice, it was funny and also a Larry David moment. We also got Jamaican patties (like pasties/hand pies but not flaky crusted, which is amazing for me because I don’t like buttery flaky things (I do know that this is weird)) filled with veggies to take away to have the next day.
The best part of any hotel room is a fridge that’s empty (not full of minibar crap you don’t want (or worse the kind of minibar where it charges you if you MOVE something? LET ME USE THE DAMN FRIDGE ASSHOLE)), and since we had one in our room, we went to a giant supermarket called Progressive, in a downtown mall, so we could stock up on snacks, fruit, breakfast foods, and drinks.
I forking love this supermarket. They had SO much vegan stuff, like an entire enormous aisle of non-dairy milks, a war chest of strange vegan meats that I’ve never seen before even in Chinese groceries, a juice/smoothie bar, all kinds of great stuff.
I had two ultimate favorite items from this shopping trip: one for its hilarious packaging that still makes me laugh, and one because it is g-d delicious.
The funny one:
wat
(and has protein!)
The next restaurant we tried wasn’t vegetarian or vegan, but it had tons of vegan options. It was the kind of cafe you would find on every block in Malibu or something, with an extensive trendy menu, lots of green smoothies, and a yoga-studio vibe. I obviously loved it. DLE Cafe is right around the order from the Progressive market, btw.
I could tell you how extensive DLE Cafe’s menu was but I’m just going to show you so you can appreciate how difficult my decision was.
I don’t remember which green smoothie I got but obviously I got one, and it was great! I was annoyed to get a plastic cup since I drank it there, but I did have it while I was waiting for them to make the rest of my order which was takeaway so I guess that’s a good reason and prob my fault. The straw was paper though, which is good in theory but they disintegrate super fast.
Here’s just one of the food menu pages ugh I still can’t decide and I’m not even there. There’s a feeling long-time vegans know well, when you are used to not having much decision-making power and then you’re faced with a menu with so many options and you are like NO STOP IS TOO MUCH.
I decided on the ackee wrap because you must eat as much ackee as possible when in Jamaica it is a MAGIC fruit and I don’t understand why jackfruit blew up as pork and ackee hasn’t as eggs? Someone sell it! I also got the vegan mac & cheese because I’m a mac & cheese fanatic and also look at that menu it says “hands down this is probably the best mac you will ever have” and I was like “excuse me is it ‘hands down’ or is it ‘probably’ you can’t have it both ways this is like how my brother and I for some reason say ‘poss def’ all the time and no one gets it and for good reason! Anyway the mac was just okay. No pics because it was takeaway and the pictures I took were sad.
Lastly, poss def my favorite, was the Chabad Kosher Hot Spot. You say Chabad, you say Kosher, I hear hummus and I come running.
The Hot Spot is an Israeli food joint right across the main road from Margaritaville (which apparently is the hottest place to party, even for locals, on a Tuesday night…or maybe it was Thursday…I don’t know because I didn’t go obvs but ask a local). We called in an order before our flight home so we could get it en route to the airport (smort!). The number on the website…is not the one to call. Somehow, when we called to place an order for HUMMUS, we heard “this is Rabbi x…?” THE RABBI PICKED UP. HAHAHAHHAHA. We apologized and were like sorry we were trying to reach the restaurant? and he was like ‘oh sure here’s their number!’ It’s all connected, the Chabad org and the restaurant, see all these Jews in Jamaica just want to make sure everyone who wants hummus can get the hummus, THAT’S ALL THEY WANT SO BE NICE.
We did get our hummus, which was excellent, and our amazing flatbread, and Israeli salad and a jerk falafel wrap (that’s right) so yeah DEFFO a must in MoBay. Again, I’m not going to share takeaway pictures because yeesh and oh no. But trust me that everything was great! What a great find! When we told our driver where we wanted to stop, he was like ‘oh yeah I’ve heard of that place!’ and seemed excited so I hope he went and liked it.
At the airport, leaving is much saner than arriving, and they have giant water bottles at most vendors! Huzzah! (Small water bottles are the devil’s playthings.) There’s also plenty of recognizable food outlets. I had my hummus and falafel but I did buy one non-water airport treat, a packet of moringa powder. You know I’m a sucker for all things superfood and apparently moringa is big in Jamaica. I had to buy it because a) it’s a Jamaican variety so that’s cool and b) the brand?? do you see the brand name? LOL. (Shavuot is a Jewish holiday.)
So that’s my time in Jamaica, my babies. I leave you with a Jamaican proverb, just one of the many such cards that housekeeping left on our pillows every night – literally the best part of the trip.
Yekaterinburg to Irkutsk: Three Days of Train
Dear little baby laptop diary,
I titled this post after one of the most random Broadway plays I’ve ever seen, “Three Days of Rain”, with Julia Roberts making her lackluster debut, Paul Rudd just being our universal boyfriend, and a not-very-famous Bradley Cooper, whom I knew from Alias and was super excited about. Who knew that in a few short years he would be the biggest star of the bunch! Anyway, it was a kind of boring show, and that’s all I remember, which is a shame because I am currently on a train with two days and two nights left to go, and I would like to be thinking about a play instead. How is it going so far, you ask? Let’s just say if I didn’t want to talk so much about Broadway whenever I had the chance, this post would have simply been called Three Days of Pain.
I thought the unwritten but definite rule of these cabins was that whoever is on the top gets to sit on the bottom bunk on their side during the day and use the little table for their meals. Each side keeps to themselves. I begrudgingly learned this on our first long train when Husband and I both had bottoms so the woman on top of mine sat on my bed a lot. I learned, great, that’s how it’s done, she can’t prepare her food and eat up top. OK, I got it, sorry I gave you a bad look. But this morning, after I exercised outside our door in the hallway (there’s a bar running down the hallway of our cabin, it’s tight but it’s enough space to do barre exercises like I’m a GODDAMN BALLERINA and lots and lots of squat variations and calf raises. No one was up when I was out there so I also got out my resistance bands and worked my back so darn happy about that I think I’d go insane if I was cooped up here and couldn’t at least try to work a muscle), I came back to sit on my bed and read and Shirtless Youth was sitting on my pillow by the table making his breakfast. Like. NO. You get the bottom bunk and table part from the guy BELOW YOU. That’s the rule!! Omg! I guess he literally couldn’t because the Giant Flesh Ball Man was oozing out everywhere you turned and they couldn’t both sit on that bunk, but still, that’s not my problem man! I waited outside and did more calf raises and then when he got up I claimed my spot back and haven’t left since. Except to pee in the literal pits of despair. These toilets are so grimy and sludgy and I’m spending so much time in there because I pee a lot and Husband and I brought 15 liters of water on this trip with us and I have to drink it even though I fear it’s not enough for three days. That’s for two people! (We each carried a 5L jug and had three 1.5L bottles between us and I also had about 1/2 liter left in another bottle. Hey I guess that is 16L maybe we will make it.)
OH MY GOD Giant Flesh Ball just went to the bathroom and came back shirtless and is now putting deodorant on while sitting next to me I am going to vomit. OH my god Shirtless Youth is also still shirtless and just got down from his top bunk by jumping onto my bed with his smelly feet right on my sheets, right next to my physical body. He was just ‘cleaning’ his grundle with his towel I cannot believe this. GFB Man is still humming and now is drumming his fingers in rhythm the whole time on the table omg I am going to LOSE MY MIND.
Oh wait. Oh my god they both seem to be getting dressed! And not in their smelly sleep clothes, in real clothes with buttons and things! Ahh praise Jesus are they disembarking? Did we reach their stop? Or did we reach my melting point? We don’t stop for like 30 minutes I cannot wait to see how this goes! I’m so nervous and excited and scared that I’m getting my hopes up! Are they going?? Will our new neighbors be even worse? Even smellier? Even more in my personal space? Why do men think they have the right to my personal space? I guess we will see what happens in 30 minutes when we stop at some combination of letters I already forgot. I have to go pee before they lock the bathrooms at the stop (they get locked at every stop because, well, because everything ‘flushes’ onto the track, so at least it’s a civilized reason). We will see what happens.
Oh my god she already locked the bathroom! We don’t arrive at the stop for another 30 minutes this is INHUMAN. GFB Man is brushing his crumbs from his side of the table towards me and the computer. That’s just swell of you. He’s still humming. Shirtless Maybe-Not-So-Young Man is now shirtless again, despite having dressed himself five minutes ago, so I have less hope of his departure now. He’s also sitting on his top bunk with his feet hanging off pretty much in my face (it’s tiny room) and they smell so bad my eyes are tearing. I’m also equally frightened that if they do get off, our newbies will be even worse. What if THEY reek of smoke? Ughhh that would be worse. And we have TWO FULL DAYS LEFT. Two more sleepless nights. Two more days of having to time my bathroom breaks between frequent stops. Two more days of constant Purell because there’s no soap in the bathrooms. Two more days of using precious bottled water to brush my teeth and wash my face because the train water would give me cholera. Two more days without contacts because no way I’m touching my eyes. Actually that last one is good, my eyes need a break from contacts.
While I wait on my ability to pee and breathe from the smelly guys maybe leaving and cry from possibly worse new cabinmates, I will tell of all the food we had to buy and bring onboard for 3 days. No meals are included in our ticket and the dining car is very expensive, but also I think they have zero options for me anyway. Husband will check it out later or tomorrow I’m sure (we can’t both leave, someone has to guard our stuff). So in Yekaterinburg, we found a few giant supermarkets that were very expensive (they had no cheap supermarket, so weird! No little bodegas like have been all over the rest of Russia either). We found lots of good treats and bought a lot, but considering it’s three days worth of food for two people it’s probably just right. We bought jars of white beans in tomato sauce with some veg in there, which I’m sooo pumped about. Like mamma ‘taliano looking stuff, I hope. We also found vegetarian grape leaves in a can, another tomato sauced bean thing in a can, and lots of bread. And we brought that fantastic Russian staple, instant kasha! Sooo good. I used to think kasha was just a part of that disgusting Main Line Jewish dish of kash’ n’ bowties but aside from that it’s actually really good. And good for you! Along with cucumbers, tomatoes, and pickles (probably not the best idea because they smell, but if people don’t care how their bodies smell why should I care how my food smells), and more apples and orange, we are set. Plus we found a lot of chocolate in Yekaterinburg so happy dance. And cookies! Every city we’ve been in so far, I’ve scoured ingredient labels and found one package of accidentally vegan cookies. Never the same one, so we’re on our third try. The chocolate chip ones in St. Pete’s were still the best, but the cinnamon ones in Moscow were very yummy too. I will report back on these weird blueberry puffballs I found! I hope that when we eat all this stuff I don’t have a Meg Ryan in “French Kiss” train moment (LACTOSE INTOLERAAAAANCE who knows it? best movie ever I pretend Kevin Kline won his Tony a few weeks ago as a belated gift for “French Kiss”).
Well, back to reality. The two smelly guys did indeed get off. But we immediately got two new Russian men who…I’m not yet sure, but I think they might be worse. They’re meaner, that’s for sure. When they came by, I said hello (in Russian) and smiled and they didn’t even blink or glance at me just threw their stuff on their bunks and went back out. WTF. A few minutes later, Husband did the same thing when they returned and again, no eye contact, no utterance of any kind in our direction. Stupid Russian jerks! Fine don’t talk to us, that’s good for me. But they smell a little smoky, which better not get worse. I’m promising myself two things: If they ‘magically’ get smokier (meaning they’ve smoked on the train, which is not allowed), I am going to say something (I am able to say ‘you smoked? where? not allowed!”); and if they sit on my bed at any point I am putting my foot down and getting super scary and yelling “NYET! that is your side, and this is our side.” I think I know how I say that. They know each other so that makes it easier. I hope it doesn’t come to my having to yell in very poor Russian at men I have to sleep next to for at least one night. Their phone noises are on, too, which is a big no-no, and just as the icing on the cake, their phone noises are incredibly loud bits of very bad songs.