Inter-island telegraph app for social media
Issue 89 : Mar/Apr 2013
We are a long way from home. After nearly a decade in the Caribbean, we returned to the mainland a few years ago and haven’t yet made our way back to the islands. (Grandbabies will do that to you.) But to our great surprise and pleasure, when we need them the most, our Caribbean friends are still right there.
When we lived in the islands, we were continually amazed by the efficiency and accuracy of the coconut telegraph. When we wanted to buy our son David a small boat for Christmas one year, within three days of first mentioning it to a friend, the entire island of St. Croix knew about it, except David (see “Stone Free,” January 2011). And if we ever needed to find one of the boys before their curfew, a few inquiries on the boardwalk would point us in the right direction. We’d usually find them in the park, trying to turn a game of flag football into another trip to the emergency room. But now, so far away in distance and time, we thought the powers of the coconut telegraph were lost to us. Enter social media.
Dave needed some information from a boat designer/builder who wanders around the islands on his sailboat. The last we had heard, he was in Carriacou, but how to reach him? He has no Facebook account, no website, not even an email address. But we did know someone who probably knew someone who could help.
When our oldest son went to college, I had to open a Facebook account. Not necessarily to spy . . . but he is not known for his communication skills. So once a week we would go to the Internet shop and verify that Nicholas was still alive. Now we have three grown boys, a daughter-in-law, and a grandson to keep track of long distance in addition to hundreds of friends far away in the Caribbean.
I sent the word out via Facebook on Tuesday. A friend in the Caribbean, someone we’d met 11 years ago in Virginia and since shared anchorages with, knew where the designer had been seen a few months previously. She was anchored in St. John, but had a friend in Carriacou, whom she emailed. By Friday, I had the exact location and, better yet, the phone number of a man we’ve never met, who was anchored in a bay with no access to Internet, on an island I’ve never visited. We even learned that he’s gearing up for his 74th birthday bash on the island. When we call him, I have no doubt that he will be expecting to hear from us. Someone will have told him we are looking for him.
It’s nice to know we can still use the coconut telegraph even from a distance. It still works, but its speed increases greatly when you combine it with social media. Somehow, it doesn’t feel the same as walking down the beach and asking, “Has anyone seen . . .?”
Connie McBride and her husband, Dave, currently cruising Florida’s shallow waters in their Bolger sharpie, communicate through their website www.simplysailingonline.com but maintain an account with the coconut telegraph.
Thank you to Sailrite Enterprises, Inc., for providing free access to back issues of Good Old Boat through intellectual property rights. Sailrite.com
