As like every Island, Curacao has its positives and its negatives. Most of my time I will brag about my perfect island life and rub my gorgeous and colorful pictures under your nose. Beautiful beaches, endless happy hours and unique beach weddings. All within easy reach!
Sometimes it’s like living in paradise, you appreciate every little detail, from the colorful fish to the beautiful birds, the friendly people, the ability to visit the beach whenever you want… what’s not to like?
Well, one day your bubble will pop, you are forced to get back on your feet and face reality, like yesterday. Because living on an island, at least “my” island, often comes with some defects.
One of them is the constant lack of electricity. When living on the mainland, I have never worried about an electricity outage whatsoever. I was born and raised in a country that provided me with the proper amount of electricity at any time of the day. It’s a basic need which is considered normal. You never really appreciate electricity in general, until it’s gone…
When I arrived home yesterday night it was dark. Pitch-black, darker than dark. Now I have lived on this island for years, but even for me having no electricity comes as a surprise each time again. There are people in this world that always come prepared. They know how to handle each and every situation and have a “special stock” for every unexpected event. Well, that’s not me.
When wandering around in the dark with the flashlight on my phone (of course 10% charged and ready to die), I found myself 10 candles without anything to put them in, two flashlights without batteries and two wind lights without oil. The perfect recipe for a disaster.
With only 8% of mobile flashlight, some meat and some veggies, we moved outside to the BBQ because (YAY!) it’s doesn’t use electricity! We gathered all of our plastic garden solar lights around us. They created this perfect blue-white-very-unromantic-but-you-can-see-what-you-eat-kind-of-light and we enjoyed our dinner in the dark together.
As you can see this was not at all how I planned my evening. And even though I did not learn my lesson when it comes to preparing for something like this, I did learn one thing…
When the power is off, (and believe me) it will not come back within the next two hours, the only thing you can do is to relax. Get yourself a nice, cozy sofa, beach lounger or pillow bed. Place it underneath the stars, open a nice bottle of wine and enjoy a quiet world underneath the stars.
Because then again, island life is pretty awesome 😉
Current Rock of Residence:
Curaçao
Island Girl Since:
2012
Originally Hails From:
The Netherlands, Amsterdam
After graduation, Roos followed the love of her life to Curaçao. Not to live on the island, build a life there, and live happily ever after – no, that wasn’t the plan. She came to relax, get a tan, enjoy her holiday, and bring her boy back to Amsterdam (which at that time, could be referred to as home for the both of them). That was four years ago and Roos still lives on Curaçao. It became a happily ever after story on the rock after all – or at least the start of it!
Curaçao may have seemed like a challenge at first, but Roos soon got used to living the island life and is still enjoying it each and every day. She works as a Marketing and Events Manager where beautiful weddings, fabulous parties, delicious food, drinks, and a lot of socializing are all a part of her day to day business. This didn’t come as a big surprise to her family and friends, as Roos has always believed in fairy tales, big wedding days, and all other kinds of romantic crap. As long as she can organize it (whatever it may be), she’s happy. Her birthday parties will always have themes, her food will always be homemade, and her cupcakes will always be pretty in pink.
She lives her life by her mom’s advice: “There is always a good reason to party!” and “Everything should be celebrated.”
