Roatan: A Lady and Her Yurt (The CoastWatcher: Caribbean West)
News from the Honduras Bay Islands and North Coast
05 May 2001
By Pierre Renaldo, The Coastwatcher©

A few weeks ago a lady came into my office in Coxen Hole complaining that she was having a lot of problems with her yurt. She looked perfectly fine to me; in fact she was very pretty and had a most charming personality. Not knowing anything about yurts, and daring not to ask about her yurt in particular without creating some embarrassment, I held my questions in hopes that she would divulge some of the basic facts about yurts.

It seems that people were cutting holes in her yurt and stealing the things that were inside, and while pretending that I understood her problem perfectly, I tried to put on my most sympathetic face to give evidence of my empathy.

"A yurt" she explained, "is a tent". "It is the kind of tent that the nomadic tribes of Asia use to live in. They Asian variety is made from animal skins. My yurt is made of vinyl, and it is very easy to cut. They are going in through the roof of my yurt and stealing my furniture. I need to find a way to make it secure."

Never having seen a yurt, at least not consciously, I asked for and received a detailed explanation of all the facts pertaining to her particular yurt. And of course it was on Roatan. We have a yurt on Roatan! And we may well be the only Caribbean island that can brag about having a yurt.

After a long discussion it was decided that I would look at the yurt to best determine how to make it more secure than it was in its present condition. I climbed the steps to the property, a beautiful location in Sandy Bay West. The yurt was on top of a hill that will offer a great view of the Caribbean once a few trees are trimmed.

After taking measurements, I made up a material list and calculated the costs of installing wood siding and a permanent roof. It is the lady's intent to add substance to her yurt and rent it out. So if any of you out there would like the thrill of living in a real yurt just contact me for the details.

I'll bet it would be a blast to go around telling everybody at West End that you were probably the only person in the Western Caribbean, if not the entire country who was lucky enough to be renting a yurt.

I wonder who ever invented the word yurt? I can think of a lot of things and even a few people to whom I could have applied a word like "yurt". There are a few guys that have called themselves carpenters who were real yurts. They come to work without a hammer, or a tape measure or even a pencil, and call themselves carpenters. The word for them is, "you stupid yurt!"

I can imaging a guy from Outer Mongolia who decided to have a little of the local kickapoo joy juice after going through all the work of putting up his tent one day. "Ah Mook," he would have said to no one in particular, "you work hard today. Now is time for happy. Have strong drink for celebrating place to sleep." Then he swigs down a couple of shooters of the local yak milk brew and a few minutes later he tries to speak but instead he utters an unusual sound.

"Yurt!"

"Is it a word or a belch?" members of the tribe wonder. Everybody stops putting up their tents.

"Hey, Mook. Is good name for tent eh? Yurt? Mook very smart guy," says the chief, addressing the other tribesmen. " Is inventor, Mook. From now on we call tent Yurt! Okay?"

And so maybe that's how the yurt got its name.

Coxen Hole is a mess. I'm not talking about the usual traffic and congestion, but the workers have been digging up the streets all over town. They dig up a two foot wide area along the side of the pavement, then they cover it up and then a few weeks later they come back and dig it up again.

In the meantime we have lots of dust in town where the paved streets have prevented dry dirt from swirling all over everybody and the houses. I was told the digging was to install new water lines. Well that's a good sign. That's right! This is an election year, so the voters are being impressed at how diligently the party in power is pursuing higher living standards for them.

I remember the last election, when the municipality hired a bunch of guys to go along the highways to cut the high weeds, so drivers would have better visibility going around the curves. There were still just as many head on collisions with the taxis, but there was a startling find. (Not counting the wrecked taxis, trucks and other ancient artifacts that were discovered back there along the right of way.)

There was an old sign, with a squiggly arrow pointing up. It was meant to warn drivers that there were curves in the road ahead. Nobody remembered ever having seen this sign before, and when the police came they explained it to the taxi drivers who were standing around marveling at the new discovery. " It is not an old Mayan hieroglyph," said the sergeant of police. "It is a sign to tell the drivers that the road has many curves."

Then a taxi driver made a brilliant remark. "Why? Do they think I am so stupid that I don't know the road is crooked?"

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I'd be happy to answer you questions. Just drop me a line at: elouis@globalnet.hn
And for any of you contemplating moving to Roatan or building your dream home someplace, check out:
http://www.eroatan/pierre/books.html
That's all for this week.

Ciao, Pierre

By Pierre Renaldo, Mountain Coastal S.A,. General Contractors, Construction Management and Construction Consultants.