Submitted by Penguin Blog (USA) Visitor (not verified) on Mon, 02/18/2008 - 7:08pm.
I was in San Pedro Sula in '93, on our way to Ruinas de Copan and the Guatemalan border, it was the return portion of a 10,000 mile road trip through Central America by pick-up truck. What I knew about banana men came from stories told me by Ben Griese who taught me Spanish. He died 35 years ago. But in 1950 he was vagabonding around Central America and was looking for a job in San Pedro Sula, when a local told him that he should go see the other Gringos at the Tela Railroad Company (United Fruit's rail company), and they would surely give him a job. He went to see the Railroad manager and when Ben was ushered into his office the first thing he noticed was large framed photo of a USS Navy cruiser on the wall behind the desk. So, Ben rolled up his sleeve to make sure his US Navy tatoo was showing (Ben had been a 17 old sailor in the Phillipines near the end of WWII.) When Ben told the old Navy guy that he was looking for a job, the guy asked him if he knew anything about electric motors: "Sure, I do, " Ben lied through his teeth. "OK. You got the job, here's a pass to take the railroad to Tela, and here's a few bucks to carry you over." The railroad man, passed Ben a handful of US fifty cent pieces, which was Honduras official currency at the time. Ben refused the money, telling the guy that he wasn't looking for a handout. "That's not a handout. Get a shave and a haircut, and buy some new clothes. I'm not going to have an American going around Honduras looking as ragged as you do--it'll make the rest of look bad." Ben took the railroad to Tela, which was the United Fruit Company's banana shipping port on the Carribbean. He was given a job in the electric shop rewinding electric motors and got living quarters in the Gringo bachelor domitory. The first motor he tried to rewind blew up, but instead of getting fired the shop manager gave him a book on how to repair electric motors and told him to take his time fixing the next one. Ben only lasted a couple of months and then quit to live with a Black Carib woman in a fishing village South of Tela. Every couple of weeks he would walk down the beach to the docks where United Fruit Company would give away the extra stalks of bananas to the locals after the last ship had been loaded. His girl-friend would roast the bananas on the coals and with some fish that her brothers had caught, Ben lived without working for several months before moving on south to Nicaragua.
In '93 we spent a couple of weeks on the Carribbean coast south of Limon in Costa Rica (at Cahuita village), and I wasn't happy with Chiquita Bananas, because they grew their bananas inside blue plastic bags to protect the fruit from bugs and leaf damage. Those bags littered the roadsides and clogged the streams, and when we dove the reefs off Cahuita, you could see the blue bags wrapped around the coral. I haven't eaten a Chiquita banana since then.
(October 12, 2009) Dr. Cara Natterson, Dangerous or Safe: Which Foods, Medicines, and Chemicals Really Put Your Kids at Risk Zora O'Neill, Forking Fantastic!
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Banana men & Honduras.
I was in San Pedro Sula in '93, on our way to Ruinas de Copan and the Guatemalan border, it was the return portion of a 10,000 mile road trip through Central America by pick-up truck. What I knew about banana men came from stories told me by Ben Griese who taught me Spanish. He died 35 years ago. But in 1950 he was vagabonding around Central America and was looking for a job in San Pedro Sula, when a local told him that he should go see the other Gringos at the Tela Railroad Company (United Fruit's rail company), and they would surely give him a job. He went to see the Railroad manager and when Ben was ushered into his office the first thing he noticed was large framed photo of a USS Navy cruiser on the wall behind the desk. So, Ben rolled up his sleeve to make sure his US Navy tatoo was showing (Ben had been a 17 old sailor in the Phillipines near the end of WWII.) When Ben told the old Navy guy that he was looking for a job, the guy asked him if he knew anything about electric motors: "Sure, I do, " Ben lied through his teeth. "OK. You got the job, here's a pass to take the railroad to Tela, and here's a few bucks to carry you over." The railroad man, passed Ben a handful of US fifty cent pieces, which was Honduras official currency at the time. Ben refused the money, telling the guy that he wasn't looking for a handout. "That's not a handout. Get a shave and a haircut, and buy some new clothes. I'm not going to have an American going around Honduras looking as ragged as you do--it'll make the rest of look bad." Ben took the railroad to Tela, which was the United Fruit Company's banana shipping port on the Carribbean. He was given a job in the electric shop rewinding electric motors and got living quarters in the Gringo bachelor domitory. The first motor he tried to rewind blew up, but instead of getting fired the shop manager gave him a book on how to repair electric motors and told him to take his time fixing the next one. Ben only lasted a couple of months and then quit to live with a Black Carib woman in a fishing village South of Tela. Every couple of weeks he would walk down the beach to the docks where United Fruit Company would give away the extra stalks of bananas to the locals after the last ship had been loaded. His girl-friend would roast the bananas on the coals and with some fish that her brothers had caught, Ben lived without working for several months before moving on south to Nicaragua.
In '93 we spent a couple of weeks on the Carribbean coast south of Limon in Costa Rica (at Cahuita village), and I wasn't happy with Chiquita Bananas, because they grew their bananas inside blue plastic bags to protect the fruit from bugs and leaf damage. Those bags littered the roadsides and clogged the streams, and when we dove the reefs off Cahuita, you could see the blue bags wrapped around the coral. I haven't eaten a Chiquita banana since then.