A Surprise Marriage Party
And Miss Prat, The Matriarch
The following stories and associated articles were originally published in 2023-2024. I re-edited them for new subscribers. From March 31st to May 9th, I will release these stories twice a week while I’m in Malaysia and China. If you want to support my work, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your interactions with these stories and articles will help me deliver the type of writing you want when I return from China.
Art is about the process, not just the result. Can AI be part of the process, or does it kill the artistic struggle and, therefore, the human soul?
In a world where AI creates results we endlessly scroll through, we can counter the disparaging of art by showing the value of our process.
Therefore, before revealing today’s story from Forever Foreign, I want to show the process.
It started with scrawled notes, remnants of rides to school, tipsy nights, and phone calls from youth until now.
‘Schrijf verdoemme oew verhoale op!"
I’ve pleaded with my father to pen his tales throughout my life. He told his stories in various languages, adding layers as he code-switched and retold stories from the perspective of different idiomas. I’d beg him to write the stories in Flemish, English, Spanish, or a mix of the three.
He never listened
… until 2022.
Cancer has a silver lining.
Over the past year, we’ve been editing my parent’s travel stories. Since my parents wandered amid CIA shadows and sticky red tape, celebrated with the Sandanistas, dwelled on a monkey-ridden island with a beat-loving recluse, and smuggled what they needed to survive.
In other words, structuring the stories so their wants and desires are faced with obstacles didn’t need a stretch of the imagination.
Yet, the driving force of Forever Foreign is not their wants but their destiny—something I didn’t realize until reading
’s “CRAFTING CHARACTERS: HOW TO ACTIVATE YOUR CHARACTERS’ WANTS.”Whereas antagonism and obstacles can create conflict that hopefully leads to a climax where the thematic, external, and internal goals come together, every chapter in life isn’t always like that.
If I were going the traditional publishing route, I would have taken the following story out, but I designed this series for Substack. Although every story stands alone and has gone through several drafts, I also include stories that are part of the process and hold more weight for those who read from beginning to end.
A quick summary for those who missed Marrying a Stranger: Paper & Pens.
Miracles happen at 10:30 am—like getting married with ostrich feather necklaces instead of rings. Lucas and Catalina arrive at the Civil Register with their witnesses, Gary and Alex, two friends they made a few days before. The official, a proper Jamaican gentleman, scrutinizes their details, adjusting Alex’s spelled name (Alex wasn’t sure how to spell his name) and diplomatically correcting my parents’ lodging history, which happened to be a brothel.
More context from previous stories
My father, a wild-hearted seafarer, claimed he knew my mother was "the one" the second he saw her. My brother and I had heard the story before, but this time, it was with his cancer diagnosis hanging in the air.
Back in 1981, my mother stepped off a train in Antwerp, only to find my father waiting—without knowing her schedule, just a feeling. That "feeling" turned out to be hours of watching trains pass, but it worked.
So, was it love at first sight? Who knows. But when he told her he was heading to the Bahamas and Jamaica a few weeks after knowing her, my mother asked, "Can I come with you?"
A Surprise Marriage Party
2:00 pm. The Wedding Party.
You don’t always get what you want. Sometimes, you get much more.
—Lucky people.
The centre table at My Brothers—the pub where we meet Gary—is covered with the flowers I found in my dream. On the terrace, gazing upon a beach, the table houses a bouquet of birds of paradise, their vivid orange sepals and blue petals unfurling from the spathe's beak-like embrace.
"What is going on?" Catalina asks, snapping me out of the flowers’ seduction.
"We havin' a little shindig for di Jamaican friends. No, for di friends of Jamaica, I mean," replies the owner of My Brothers.
"But we requested a table for four people."
"Dat right," he says, pointing to a table with the birds of paradise.
"Dat deh yuh table deh, mon. Yu get hitched a Jamaica, mon. Yu a real friend a Jamaica," Gary says, wrapping his arms around me and Catalina, my wife.
"Our table," Catalina stutters, grateful at our wild story taking a fairy tale turn.
"Bwoy, mi a starve till mi dead," Alex exclaims, putting Gary in a headlock. "Mi a murder mi food rival, yuh see!”
Once Gary gets out of Alex’s strong arms, he takes a seat across from Catalina, and Alex sits next to her. The spirit of Bob Marley serenades us with "Could You Be Loved" as the afternoon sun waltzes upon the sea.
Shortly after the song that will forever be etched into our hearts, four Red Stripes arrive along with two large bowls of goat curry.
"Mi granny cook di wickedest curry, mon," Gary says.
Catalina has a weakness for kids—the baby goat kind. When she holds a fork and knife, she does so with eloquence and style, but not today. She picks up a bone with some meat and sucks it clean while looking me straight in the eyes.
In my mind, everyone but Catalina disappears until—
"Your wife knows how to treat a man," Gary moans.
"What?" Catalina asks, but before anyone can answer, she looks under the table and realizes her foot is stroking the wrong leg.
Catalina almost chokes. "I am so sorry."
"Not me," Gary says with a wink.
As the orders of Red Stripes increase, so does the magic. Midway into the night, a group of young men appears armed with guitars, maracas, and tambourines.
"Wi bring love an' joy to unuh heart," says the man holding the guitar.
They stand around Catalina, all four of them, singing about the wonders the big bamboo performs in the bedroom. Their muscular bodies glisten in the late afternoon sun as they jam a style that reminds me of Harry Belafonte's infectious rhythms and smooth vocals but with spicier lyrics.
In the doorway, the owner stands, surveying everything with a smile. When he notices me looking his way, he winks.
What a wedding gift from a man we don't even know.
Catalina
April 29, 1981
The next day, we said goodbye to My Brothers to spend our honeymoon at Negril Beach, a seven-mile-long white-sand beach with crystal-clear, turquoise waters.
At the village entrance, a colossal tree loomed, and beneath its branches reclined an equally large woman, encircled by a cadre of robust and, I must admit, rather handsome Rastafarians.
"Hey, darlin', you got any smokes?"
Your father and I could immediately tell she wasn't from here or didn't grow up here. When she waved me over, I gave her one of my Camel cigarettes, which she gratefully accepted.
"What’s your name, sweetie?"
"Catalina."
"Hey, Caty, pleased to meet you," she said, startling me with the use of Caty— the name only my family and Lucas use. "Ah'm Miss Rose, and dem good-lookin' fellas ova there are mi boyfriends," She said, laughing and revealing her white teeth as she playfully squeezed one of the Rastafarian's legs.
"Where ya'll headin' to? The village?"
"Yes, indeed, we are looking for Miss Pat."
"My dear Caty, then we a go be neighbours. Just follow dis road for half a mile, and when you see a house with chillun playin' in da street, that's when you arrive at Miss Pat's. By the way, do you got rolling papers? This whole island is on strike. There are hardly any rolling papers or cigarettes about. I wish I neva lef Florida," She said, shifting her body to slump back against the tree.
"Okay, thank you, but I don't have any rolling paper. I'll see you around, Miss Rose."
"Bye, darlin'"
Following Miss Rose's directions, we strolled along tiny, simple wooden houses adorned with bougainvillea and young girls with beaded hair and the friendliest eyes.
"Do you know where Miss Pat lives?"
One of the girls pointed to a woman in loose, colourful attire and giggled before running away.
"Hi, are you Miss Pat?"
We approached the woman sitting on a step leading up to a wide veranda that wrapped around the entire light blue house. It seemed large enough to house several people comfortably.
"Yeah, dat’s me, beautiful."
"Do you happen to have a room, Miss Pat?"
"Yeah, I do. How long yuh a go stay?"
"Five nights."
"Aight, dat be twenty dolla a night. Wha part yuh a come from?”
"We're from Belgium and just got married in Montego Bay. This is our honeymoon."
"Yuh get married a Jamaica? Well den, yuh can stay for twelve dolla a night, and I will go cook you up some dinners. Dinner tonight at six o'clock."
The price was indeed a gift for the room. The wood on the walls and floors was old and scratched but added a rustic charm. And at least we didn’t end up in another brothel.
After a refreshing shower, we walked out onto the patio and found a fit Jamaican man with an American baseball cap in the hammock right outside our room.
"Aftanoon, yuh mind if mi tek a smoke on di patio?"
It was a large marijuana joint wrapped in brown wrapping paper.
"For you," he said.
Rejecting it seemed unnatural. I took a small inhale from the cigar-looking thing, Lucas took a few more, and soon after, the world turned into a comedy show.
Suddenly we heard a familiar voice.
"Hey, yuh have any ciggies?"
It was Miss Rose, walking towards towards Miss Pat and I.
A dozen or so children ran back and forth from the yard towards the three of us on the patio, urging Miss Pat to give them a piece of pineapple or banana.
"Are those your children, Miss Pat?"
"All di children of the street a mi children, Catalina," Miss Pat laughed. "Dis ya place a one big community. Wi love an' feed each odder pickney. Di young maddas in di resorts, so dem pickney come to me. Woman dem cook, woman dem clean, woman dem do everything while man dem smoke funny cigarettes," She said with an accusing look at your father and the Jamaican in the hammock.
Later that night, Miss Pat invited us to eat Escovitch fish, a typical Jamaican dish with grilled red snapper topped with a savoury and tangy mixture of scotch bonnets, bell peppers, onions, and red wine vinegar. To be honest, I wouldn't have known any of that at the time. It just tasted like good, home-cooked food.
When we finished the meal, your father went to the hammock, and I ordered two more Red Stripes for Miss Pat and me.
"The fish was really delicious, Miss Pat."
"Red snapper a one good fish. An' as a married woman, yuh haffi learn to cook. Yuh cook, Catalina?"
"Well, I like to eat. Lucas is the cook."
"So yuh man can cook, dat already someting. But a di woman haffi bring love inna di kitchen. Yuh haffi bring love inna di bedroom an' love inna di kitchen."
Well, one of those I was confident in.
"Do you love your husband, Catalina?"
"To be honest, we just met. But I've had nights and feelings with him I've never experienced with anyone before. He's full of life and loves the small details of everything, just like I do. There's nobody I'd rather travel with," I said, feeling how proud and happy I was to have him as my husband. "He likes so many things. He likes butterflies, flowers, food, and everyone seems friendlier when he's around…But he can't dance. At least, not like the men in Jamaica."
"Oh honey, but can him perform?"
I blushed at the question, but I guess my eyes said it all.
"Dat good, baby. A woman need weh she need. But mek him know fi no smoke dat funny stuff. Tell him all di things him like fi hear, but just do yuh own ting. Yuh a di boss. Mek dem think dem a di boss, but don't fuhget dat. An' bein' wid a good man, Catalina, is like a journey. A journey weh neva end."
She was the first woman I really spoke to since getting married. As you know, I usually don't like women. I find them boring and hung up on things that don't matter. Maybe it was the milieu of women I came in contact with in Belgium, and Miss Prat was the opposite. She had no time for… bullshit. You know, I don't curse often, but that's the word. There was something maternal and wise about her. Maybe it was the stern and loving way she played with those children. Maybe it was her tired, knowing eyes that sprang to life when she laughed. Whatever it was, she was the person I was meant to speak with at that moment.
"I will never forget you."
Her smile was a silent affirmation of the truth in my words. The unspoken understanding lingered between us—our paths would never cross again. There was no need to write down names or addresses for letters. To me, people had always been chapters, transient narratives intersecting with mine. They'd come into my life, and then one of us would leave. That's what I learned as a little girl.
Then she winked at me, left the small dining room, and sang the song playing in our hearts.
We're jammin'
I wanna jam it wid yuh
We're jammin' jammin'
And I hope yuh like jammin' too.
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