I'm surprised there's no thread featuring Jamaica - no recent one, anyway. It's a beautiful island, with friendly natives, and popular with US tourists. It's been twenty years or so since I was there last, and I have fond memories of that visit (as a member of an old codgers' tennis team from Cayman.) And also, since my very first visit, at the time of the last "Empire Games" in 1966. (It was called The Commonwealth Games after that.) Economically, the Island went a long way downhill in later years, though. A lot of ethnic-minority individuals fled to Cayman, Britain and the USA during the years of ethnic tensions, but the place has been peaceful for decades since then.

If there's no current interest among BE members, I'll abandon this thread. Reluctantly....

[Oh dear. I meant to put this in the Caribbean sub-section! Would one of the Monitors please re-post it for me? Thank you. Sorry!)

If we want to lighten the mood in our house, we get my son to read aloud some "Jamaican English" from the internet. It's not a patois - spelt patwa, mostly - just the accent, and he does it very well. "Ali G" (Sacha Baron Cohen) did the same sort of thing, in his time.

Real Jamaicans always knew that Ali G was an exaggeration; they have their own way of taking the mickey. I well remember a fake uproar back in my cricketing days when one of my Jamaican team-mates accused a newcomer of calling him "boy", which is a racist word in some contexts. "No, no! I didn't say boy, I said bwoia!" Which was acceptable. But the accusation was repeated and repeated, until the claimed victim decided to let the alleged insulter off the hook, and ruffled feathers were soothed. We all knew it was a cruel joke, however dangerous.