Relocating..

The hardest part for me, coming from NYC, is feeling like there are no repercussions for bad service. We rely on so many different sectors to provide us with services and products for our daily lives. For instance, in the past 6 weeks I have been without cable TV for two+ weeks, without properly working phone lines-no fax for 4 weeks and counting and have not had DSL for the past 6 weeks-no ETA on when it will be fixed. You can beg and plead all you want, but things get fixed when they get fixed. All of my services are provided by Innovative. There isn't a lot of options where I live, so I have to suck it up.

I've also missed the variety of restaurants, shopping and museums NYC had to offer. But, when I moved down here, I knew there would be some trade offs. I accept it, but still miss these things. I would never move back. I found a new set of problems-but the good outweighs the bad.. Gas is more expensive, power goes out-although that has been improving, the produce section of my local grocery store is wiped out by Monday, I have to go to several stores to get groceries etc. All those things bug me, but I still love the life down here. I'd rather deal with these irritations than NYC irritations!

Finding my way was the biggest surprise. No street names except for the main roads and those have numbers that the locals don't know. Also - the movie theatre is closed during the day on weekdays. My husband and I were retired and looking forward to going to the movies during the day - not possible except on Saturday and Sunday.

Mosquitoes.
I thought that BIG BUGS would be the biggest problem to overcome, but it is the mosquitoes. We have a very open house, and cannot change that for a long time, so I have to learn to deal with it. I have to spray myself with bug spray all the time, light coils, spray Raid, we've used the electronic bug things, the zapper, and whatever else we find on the shelves at the various stores. It's the most frustrating thing I've had to deal with. They are worse INside the house than OUTside, so we spend most of our time on the deck (or gallery as they call it here).

Hi Robo841,

I am still thinking about what surprised me the most and will post when I have an answer -- good question!!!

Hi Suzette,

How are you doing :)?

I just wanted to let you know that I sent you a PM.

Best,
Mell 🙂

I've had the "bug" problem on each one of my visits. My doctor here in LA told me to take lots of B vitamins - that somehow repels the bugs. It worked! I left the island a week ago with only a few bites. When I was there in March I had about 80.!

Where on the island do you live, Shawn? I did wander through the grocery stores just to see what was available - definately not as much variety as here in LA!

Donna:

I understand what you mean about trying to figure out where everything is. Once I am in an area (Redhook, downtown, etc) I know where things are - but it is getting from one part of the island to another that confuses me!

Also, driving on the other side throws me a bit - especially the intersections.

Thanks to all that replied - I really appreciate the input.

Robin

Robo:

I recently relocated to STT and my GPS unit saved me as I used it for the first week until figured out the roads. If you have the resources it is nice thing to have as it shows you a number of the stores and you can save the locations you visit often to return with a push of a button.

Hope to see you on the island sometime.

Matt

Just like right now, I just lost power. There isn't the slightest breeze, I'm beaded with sweat and draining my laptop battery. Luckily for me, my DSL doesn't work so I can still get online! That's island life for you.

Doesn't work? Thank God for my generator! Cold A/C!!

RL