'Rotten person' from Mundelein dishes on his island vacations in new book

Even though he's an esteemed professor, a literary expert and a prolific writer, it's possible that Gary Buslik might become best known for being a rotten person.

His new book, "A Rotten Person Travels the Caribbean," ($14.95, Travelers Tales) - a funny, based-in-truth compilation of stories from his travels - is becoming his most popular work to date. It's already sold out three times on Amazon.com and is now in its second printing. There even have been talks about a "rotten person" series.

So is this 62-year-old Mundelein man really rotten?

"My wife says I don't have any wrinkles, because I'm Satan. I don't age because I'm Satan. I must be rotting on the inside, like Dorian Gray ... so that's where I got rotten from," he said. "Although, when my friends need to be mean to someone, they say, 'Will you call them for me?'"

Admittedly cranky, Type A, and set in his own ways, Buslik finds himself traveling to the Caribbean several times a year. While he does enjoy the trips, they're mostly to indulge his wife of 28 years, Annie, because she loves the islands so much.

Their personalities are opposite, Buslik says. Annie likes to sample the local cuisine, he prefers PB&J sandwiches. Annie can spend several weeks in the Caribbean, he can stay "10 days, max." He can't even relax in a hammock.

"I've tried to read in a hammock, but I get all tangled up," he said. "I'm not happy unless I'm writing. What can I say? I'm an American and I love to work. But I can't work in the Caribbean. I've tried bringing my laptop down there, but I end up sweating all over it. I'm not comfortable. I need to be in my office."

Caribbean veteran

Buslik, a Skokie native, earned a Ph.D. in English and is one of the world's few experts in West Indian literature. He teaches the subject, as well as creative writing and travel writing classes, at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Buslik first visited the Caribbean in the early 1970s, encountering an anti-tourist attitude in the Bahamas (he blames the timing of his trip, which was right after the island became independent). He returned regularly for the next 30 years, visiting almost every Caribbean island. The one he hasn't been to? Haiti.

"It's very dangerous (in Haiti) now," he said, "and I'm weak-willed."

When he's island-bound, Buslik's favorite thing to do is shop at local bookstores. His Mundelein home, which fronts Countryside Lake, has a library containing a steel drum and shelves his collection of books by West Indian writers. Some, he says, are truly outstanding pieces of literature. Buslik even tracked down some of the writers and helped them get their work published in the United States.

People who live in the Caribbean are interesting, Buslik says, and he's always chatting up people when he's there, looking for interesting characters to serve as foundations for his stories.

While he describes his book as "creative nonfiction," Buslik says the anecdotes are all based on something that actually happened or a person he actually met. For example, he writes about accidentally peeing on Idi Amin's shoes at a restaurant in Mustique, but in truth, Buslik just peed next to him at the urinals.

"I could have very well peed on his shoes, but I didn't," he said.

Buslik is fond of his life in the suburbs, and designates an entire chapter for his neighbors, the time he wastes in Mundelein Commons shopping center, and his brush with police at the local Petco.

He likens the development in the Caribbean to that which has taken place in Mundelein in recent years. While the new isn't always as good as the old, he says there's no sense in bemoaning economic progress.

"May as well wax wistful about manual steering, room radiators and slide projectors," he writes. "Move on, sweep up, adios. Get yourself a frappuccino and chill, dude. Watch out for the seagull poop."

Word association

We named a few islands, and asked veteran Caribbean traveler and wordsmith Gary Buslik to tell us the first thing that came into his head.

Jamaica

Nevis: Impossibly green

Aruba: Desert geology, unusual in the Caribbean

St. Thomas: Liquor stores

Puerto Rico: Cockfighting

Statia: Historical

Tortola: Yachting

Bahamas: They're not technically part of the Caribbean

St. Maarten: Frenetic