SPICE up your LIFE
Grenada’s known for its nutmeg, cocoa beans and world-beating beaches...and now you can fly direct again
No other Caribbean country has endured such a tumultuous modern history as Grenada. the Cuban and russian-backed revolution of the early eighties ended with the American invasion (referred to in these parts, quaintly, as the ‘intervention’) then, just as the country was finding its feet, along came hurricane Ivan in 2004 to flatten the place over eight terrifying hours.
It destroyed or damaged more than 90 per cent of buildings, ripping up the countryside and wiping out industries (especially nutmeg production at a time when Grenada was the world’s second biggest exporter of it after Indonesia).
Ivan’s wrath is estimated to have cost at least $1 billion. But mother nature wasn’t quite finished. twelve months later, hurricane emily blew in and caused a further $100 million worth of misery.
And, yet, in the dimly lit National Museum in the historic part of the capital,
St George’s, there is no mention of the events leading up to President reagan’s bold decision (which displeased Buckingham Palace, given that hM was — and still is — Grenada’s head of state), and not a squeak about the aftermath that eventually restored democracy to the country.
‘that’s because we still don’t really know what to think about it or how to present it,’ says the friendly man at the entrance selling tickets for £1.50 a pop.
I can’t resist pompously pointing out the importance of owning one’s history rather than being cowed by it, after which he leans in and says: ‘Come with me.’
We walk up a rickety staircase and stop in