Years ago, all over Europe and the Caribbean, in almost every country and on virtually every island, there were 'Honor Bars'. Usually in an alleyway in a town or a roadside stand, the little bars were - for the most part - unattended little businesses where you helped yourself to whatever you wanted and paid based on a posted price sheet.
One of those places - one that I got to know personally - was a tiny beer-and-a-shot snack shed called The Kite, on the island of St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The Kite is gone now, but it was always on the verge of collapse, anyway. Not that the building, which was really just a shack, was decrepit, it was anything but and always clean, it's just that it was on the side of a rather sheer cliff on the weather side of the island and, thus, always in danger from tempest and hurricane.
The Kite was so named because its owner/operator had stumbled upon an innovative marketing tool. Namely, a kite was perpetually flying off the rear deck and over the face of the cliff. If returning from Coral Bay to Cruz Bay, it was easily visible. The other piece of charm was that, when you sat with a Red Stripe at a rickety table on plastic patio chairs, the local chickens would cluck around under your table.
Sadly, these have all but disappeared over the years because people can't be trusted anymore...
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