A three-week Tobago vacation left a Kazakhstan-born woman so captivated by the island that she returned to Germany, packed her bags and came back on a one-way ticket.<\/p>\n
But when she returned to Tobago intending to make the island part of her life, paradise suddenly looked very different.<\/p>\n
The woman, who would eventually spend 17 years in Trinidad and Tobago, has revealed how the Tobago she fell in love with as a visitor collided with a much harsher reality when she returned intending to stay.<\/p>\n
Her first trip came in November 2008, when she checked into a small guest house in Lowlands following a difficult breakup.<\/p>\n
She had travelled to Tobago wanting to get away from her old life and spend time alone.<\/p>\n
Instead, she became captivated by the island.<\/p>\n
She recalled friendly people, beautiful beaches, warm weather, fresh fruit and nights where the sky appeared filled with stars.<\/p>\n
More importantly, she said Tobago gave her an overwhelming feeling of calm and belonging.<\/p>\n
She described feeling as though her nervous system, which had previously been constantly unsettled, finally relaxed.<\/p>\n
By the end of the three weeks, she didn’t want to leave.<\/p>\n
But she returned to Germany, moved back in with her mother and found work at a Latino bar.<\/p>\n
About two months later, Tobago was still on her mind.<\/p>\n
One freezing night, while driving home from work around 3 a.m. through snow and rain, she heard Bob Marley’s Three Little Birds playing on the radio.<\/p>\n
The song immediately brought her Caribbean experience flooding back.<\/p>\n
She went home, started searching for flights and contacted a man she had met while staying at the Lowlands guest house.<\/p>\n
He had previously told her that if she ever returned, he would help arrange somewhere for her to stay.<\/p>\n
She asked whether the offer still stood.<\/p>\n
He told her to come.<\/p>\n
This time, she wasn’t booking another three-week vacation.<\/p>\n
She bought a one-way ticket to Tobago.<\/p>\n
She estimates she arrived with only around \u20ac200 in her pocket, driven largely by a desire to experience again the sense of belonging she had discovered during her first visit.<\/p>\n
Then came the rude awakening.<\/p>\n
By the time she returned, the guest house she had fallen in love with had closed and the man she knew from there was no longer working.<\/p>\n
He arrived to collect her in an ageing purple Nissan B13 with shiny rims.<\/p>\n
Her description of the vehicle painted an immediate picture of just how different this Tobago experience was going to be.<\/p>\n
She recalled the car door not closing properly and said a screwdriver was being used to hold up one of the windows.<\/p>\n
Then they headed towards the accommodation he had arranged for her.<\/p>\n
Having grown up in Germany, she admitted she expected at least something resembling the standard of the guest house where she had stayed during her vacation.<\/p>\n
What she encountered was far from what she had imagined.<\/p>\n
Looking back, she said that was probably the moment she should have turned around, returned to the airport and waited for the next flight back to Germany.<\/p>\n
But she didn’t.<\/p>\n
The contrast marked an important turning point in her story.<\/p>\n
Tobago as a tourist had been beaches, stars, warm weather and an almost immediate feeling of peace.<\/p>\n
Tobago as someone arriving with a one-way ticket was about to become something very different.<\/p>\n
There was no longer a comfortable guest house waiting for her, no return ticket in her pocket and very little money to fall back on.<\/p>\n
The paradise she had experienced for three weeks was now becoming real life.<\/p>\n
Despite that rude awakening, she stayed.<\/p>\n
And the decision not to turn around would ultimately become far more significant than she could have known at the time.<\/p>\n
The woman who first arrived in Tobago for a three-week escape would go on to spend 17 years building a life in Trinidad and Tobago.<\/p>\n
Her experience also carried a lesson she could only recognise in hindsight: falling in love with Tobago while on vacation was one thing.<\/p>\n
Trying to build a life there was going to be another story entirely.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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