Tonight is the big night – this morning I am working on the fine task of filling in raffle tickets for people. Thanks to everyone who has been buying tickets online we are now at $880 bzd surpassing my original goal of $500 and setting the bar for $1000. Online ticket sales keep rolling in as I am working away. I will be collecting right up till 4pm for raffle tickets. Straight donations are welcome anytime.

When I am done that job I have to get the 50/50 draw in order. We were not going to do one because Nancy could not find any double rows of numbered tickets here or in Belize city (useful donation item to bring to Nancy for those of you who are interested) I told her we can just number our own paper and make it work. As I was pulling out sheets of hot pink paper from the shelf at San Pedrano shop and trying to work out how many I needed and how many numbers I would get to a sheet it hit me – Popsicle sticks. I got 3 packs of 200 and will number each pack with a different color marker so we can have 3 draws. Hopefully we will be able to recycle the sticks too for future use.

I was talking to Drummer Dan at Crazy Canucks last night and he was telling me how it is really starting to hit Derrick that he is actually going to Berklee and that this dream is now a a concrete thing. He has started asking Dan what Boston is like. For those of you who do not know – Derrick has grown up here on the island and has only ever taken the water taxi to the mainland once a year or so to visit relatives. He has never been on a plane or out of the country so this is a big deal in so many ways.

Imagine your first visit to this lovely tropical Island of Ambergris Caye Belize that so many of you have come to love and call home. How excited you were what it felt like as got up early stood inline at the big airports for connecting flights landing at Philip Goldson international airport. The smell of the tropical air that hit you as you got off the plane. The size of the airport here compared to Miami – Charlotte – Dallas or where ever you came from. Boarding a Tropic Air puddle jumper and making that fabulous flight across the gorgeous Caribbean Sea to land at an even smaller airport. How did you feel when you got off that plane and saw that none of the buildings were over 3 stories tall and you were welcomed with smiling faces and golf carts everywhere. Now imagine the reverse if you had lived your whole life here and were getting ready to take your first trip on a plane to a different country. Imagine how the size of the airports would feel and the vastness of Boston filled with people – cars and skyscrapers.

I remember what it was like after living here a while and going back for a visit to Canada. I still remember the feeling as the plane descended in Miami and everything felt so big and crazy – shopping malls – parking lots full of cars and giant letters painted on the roofs of buildings advertising food products. The airport was huge and cold and sensory overload.

More to come

By the time we left to go set up we had reached $965 in online raffle ticket sales – we are all quite pleased with that. Ambergris Vacations and the San Pedro events Calendar is very much in support of local musicians and are doing our best to make sure that all you live music fans know whats on where in San Pedro.

Our fundraiser at Pedro’s Pizza was a huge success – we raised $1497 bzd last night grand total coming soon. A few of you who bough raffle tickets online won prizes and will be notified by Monday if you won and what your prize is. All Cayed up and the other musicians that came to jam with them rocked the house.

Big thank you from ambergrisvacations.com /  San Pedro events Calendar and All Cayed up to all those who donated all the wonderful raffle prizes – everyone who who bought tickets and Pedro’s Pizza for providing us with tents – an outside bar and a great space to hold our event.

For more pictures check out Pedro’s Hotel blog.