We are in America for three whole days. Where do we go while we’re here? Do we visit the sparkling beaches, hang out in the fancy malls, visit the sunshine state tourist sites? Actually. we’re currently holed up in our motel room doing school. Catching up with classes the girls missed through travelling.

What? What’s wrong with that? There’s a nice pool to swim in. Iguanas to make friends with. Not the special kind of friendship though – even if the iguanas are game. Today we’re Uber-ing to the surf shop. Uber-ing being a solid form of sightseeing. We can discover all sorts of things by talking to Uber drivers.

The lady who drove us from the airport has no family in Florida – except her husband and children. The rest of her family are in Cuba. She goes to visit them at Christmas. In the meantime, she and her husband enjoy motorcycles. Every Thursday they join a group and set off motorbiking through Florida.

‘Are they all Cubans too?’ Jack asked her. 

She paused. Glanced at him through the rear view mirror. 

I know, it was a little uncomfortable. I felt I could read her mind at that moment. Is this white guy messing with me? Is he boxing me into the Cuban corner? 

Plus, Jack has this habit when he’s talking to people whose first language is not English. He makes his English even worse than theirs. He says he does it so they don’t feel bad. He drops all his connectives and stays in the present tense even when he’s talking about the past. Super painful.

‘It sounds like you’re taking the piss out of the immigrant,’ Lulu told him.

Jack looked upset. ‘No I don’t. What do you mean?’

She sighed. ‘Ok. You know when you said that we live on a boat and she said yes?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Well, I don’t know why you said, “it’s a barco” really loudly afterwards. Since she understood you the first time.’

’I did not!’

’Yeah you did,’ we all said in unison.

‘It makes me want to curl up and die,’ Lulu added. 

Ahh, beautiful America. Always satisfying when we can make Jack squirm.