Up-date 11-5-11

Three weeks ago (10-15-11), I went on my third monthly Billfish tournament. The weather was perfect. The wind was light, the sun was out, and the ocean was almost flat with big slow rollers. We left Majuro at 0600 and headed out to the neighboring atoll of Arno. We trolled around Arno for eight hours with absolutely no fish. Then about 1400 we suddenly got hits on three of our four poles. For the next ten minutes it was total craziness on the boat. I reeled in a 18 pound wahoo with help from Hugh. In the meantime Ronnie and Cary were bringing in a fifty three pound Sailfish. Once Hugh and I got the Wahoo in we went to work on the other pole and after a ten minute battle we landed a sixty three pound Sailfish. So in ten minutes we had three fish on board and two of them qualified for the tournament. We were on the back side of Arno and Ronnie was worried about making it back in time for the weigh-in so he cranked up the boat and for the next two hours we raced back to Majuro. We made it back with time to spare. At the weigh-in our two fish won the tournament for us. Back at the dock we butchered all three fish. I got a nice roast of Wahoo to take home.

Sunday through Friday I spent on the couch with the worst case of flue I’ve had in years. I spent the next week recovering from the flu and playing my new X-box game.  But after an uneventful weekend I was back to my Cabana boy duties - but only for two days.

Wednesday, after dropping Becky off for her ride, I got home and was getting ready for my run when Becky called in need of a substitute. So for the next two days I taught social studies and Friday I was the P.E. teacher.  So now I have the weekend off but I’m back teaching P.E. Monday and Tuesday. I hope that life gets back to normal soon and I can get back to my Cabana Boy duties/life style soon, but hey, I knew the job was tough when I took it. 

Facing my Fears

We all have our fears, things we are overly sensitive about and would rather leave alone. For me, it has always been my voice. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE to sing! I sing in the shower, in the car, and in the privacy of my home. And because I believe God gave me this voice and wants to hear it, I sing in church – just not by myself. This stems from a childhood where my folks thought there was something wrong with my voice and sent me to speech therapy (to a creepy guy) at a young age. My voice was deep – I didn’t lisp, or slur, or any of the other things that usually send young ones off to therapy. But I knew I was different. So of course this was the button my siblings and peers knew they could push. Then as a young adult I had my vocal chords stripped and then got myself some more therapy. I know that if I sang Karaoke, it would sound as bad or worse than the woman in My Best Friend’s Wedding. I have come to terms with my tin ear and loud obnoxious voice and am thankful for the gifts I do have. That is, until Majuro.

I have already written about the culture here, how they love to put others on the spot. Really, it is a sport all its own. I have dodged the bullet a couple of times but this time I knew my time was up.

The church we have been attending was forced to move. They found a new place, made all of the lease negotiations and got ready to move in. Then they found the place was infested with termites, so much so it is a miracle the building was still standing. So down to the studs it went and Willard decided to lend a hand. After a long day of stringing wire he picked me up after work last Tuesday and wanted to show me the progress. It turns out there were several families at the site, still working and putting together a BBQ and we were suddenly invited. This is really the first time I have had a chance to chat with these folks and I was very happy to be a part of the group. During the conversation I asked about the upcoming potluck. “Oh yes,” they said, “it will be right after church, and by the way, every group performs.” I told them I’d probably take ill about 7:00 A.M. on Sunday Morning. They laughed and laughed, not having a bit of it.  Meanwhile, Willard volunteered me to paint their large outdoor sign.

On the following day, we repeat the whole experience after work. Willard has been there again working and now we are stopping by to look at his progress and to double check what they want for the sign. The women are all sitting together happily chatting and laughing and they invite me to join them. I don’t know all of what they are saying but they are having so much fun I find myself laughing hysterically with them. Then it becomes quiet for a minute. It is at that moment that a Marshallese lady, Rishi, asks me if I have decided what I will present on Sunday. They all start laughing because now it is a big joke; they know they have found my weak spot and they love every minute. They tell me what they don’t want to hear – something straight out of the hymnal or the Star Spangled Banner. They want a little more creativity from the Americans. Somewhere in the conversation I thought I heard something about dancing. “Oh, if I dance, do I get out of the singing,” I asked ( I don’t mind making a fool of myself in other ways). “No, the singing and the dancing go together.” Great – I was digging myself deeper by the minute. “What if I paint the sign, can I get out of the singing and the dancing,” I asked. They all stopped and looked at each other. “Maybe,” they said, but then they laughed and I knew it wasn’t going to be good enough. I prayed there would be enough other Americans to keep me covered.

This morning we arrived at our new church building. It isn’t done but they came a long way in a week’s time. They had flowers on the outdoor pillars and garlands of greenery decorated the sanctuary. It was lovely. I thought I understood the performing would be part of the potluck, but it turns out it was in the heart of worship. Not only that, but some of my high school students had come. I’d formulated a plan, but now circumstances meant I needed plan B. I suggested Swing Low, Sweet Chariot at the last minute. There were about seven of us, plus we asked the congregation to stand up and join us. We pulled it off; my new friend, Rishi, thought we were fine and was happy not to hear the Star Spangled Banner yet one more time. Not only that, but I still have Plan A in my back pocket for another time. I figure we can do Where Have All the Flowers Gone. I have the headbands and peace signs ready in the trunk of our car for everyone in the group and am hoping they will all be laughing so hard they don’t actually hear us. Little Bunny Foo Foo might come out as well.

It was a lot of fun seeing and hearing the other groups. The Filipinos were a large group who sang, the Fijians danced and a Solomon Island woman did a very pretty solo. Two Tongan women sang as well, as did a whole group of Marshallese members. And since it is an international congregation, when the potluck finally began, the food was amazing.. I tasted everything that was new to me. I’d tell you what I had but I have no clue! I can tell you though, that I have never seen so much food disappear that quickly!

I have to admit, I’ve been a little homesick lately. I think it is because I know things are going on at home and I feel bad I am not there to help or be supportive. Our hearts and prayers are with the Christian family.

We received the packages I ordered from Sue the other day and were thrilled with the surprises that were enclosed. The note, chocolate and coffee from friends are really appreciated. Thank you! I am looking forward to having Nate, Mom and Dad here for a while. It will be fun to share our adventure with them.

We lost our Internet here at home for a while and are in the process of getting it back. In the meantime we sure love hearing from you all. You are in our thoughts and prayers.

Love to you,

Becky

Stings and Things

It seems hard to believe that over three weeks have gone by since my last blog but time seems to just slip by. About three weeks ago (on a Friday) I received an ant bite on top of my left foot. No big deal, right? Wrong! Turns out I’m mildly allergic to this variety of ant and my foot began to swell and by Saturday the whole foot was puffy. Fortunately by Sunday the swelling was dissipating and by Monday morning I was pretty much back to normal. However, Monday afternoon I got another ant bite while playing with Mischief in the yard, this time on top of the little toe of my right foot. Again I had another 48 hours of swelling, this time on the right side of my right foot. But by Wednesday I was pretty much back to normal which was good because Friday I got another bite! This time on time on the top of the second toe of my left foot and endured two more days of swelling and itching. I’m not totally stupid, and after three bites I now don’t go into the grass without a little bug juice on my feet. Sorry no pictures of my feet - you just have to visualize them.

We now have gardener who comes once week to rake the yard and pick up the garbage that floats in on the tide and ends up on the beach. His name is Juji and he is a young man of about 25 years of age who lives three houses over from us. He is nearly totally deaf and we basically communicate with gestures but, we generally understand each other.  He can be seen walking up and down the road looking for work at different homes. He is a very nice young man but has very limited prospects here in the islands.

It’s time to talk about the roads again. I’ve already talked about the road. Besides there being cars on the road there are kids, adults, dogs, pigs, chickens, and the occasional coconut.  This time I want to talk about the different types of drivers. First, there is the slow driver. I mean 10MPH to 20MPH tops. The vehicles of the slow drivers tend to be in poor mechanical shape; it may well be that they are going as fast as they can. Then, there are the speed demons who are basically going as fast as they can sometimes hitting the tremendous speed of 50 MPH while weaving around slow drivers, pedestrians, animals, potholes, etc. The last group of drivers (to which I belong) is the moderates. We drive fairly fast but rarely get over 35MPH. This group slows down around other road users and tends to be very courteous.  It’s still kind of wild place to drive but I’m used to it now and it doesn’t bother me nearly as much as it does Becky. There is fourth group of drivers, the dreaded Marshallese Taxi. The taxi driver will cruise slowly along until signaled by a pedestrian at which point he will dive over to the side of the road to pick up his fare. He may, or may not, get off the road and he will pull back into the road with a minimum of warning to other drivers. If his taxi is full he will continue on down the road to his destination. If his taxi is not full, he will pull over and pick up additional fares until it is (because there is really only one road everyone is going in the same direction). Most taxis hold four adult fares but I have seen four adults and four young children plus the taxi driver going down the road in a vehicle smaller than my old department issue Ford Taurus.

Well my house is clean, the laundry is done, my blog is written, it’s time to put my feet up and read a book for a few hours until it’s time to go pick up Becky. Life’s tough when you’re a Cabana Boy.

Manit Week

This week is devoted to celebrating the Marshallese culture, or manit. We celebrate this Monday through Thursday at school and then culminate with a national holiday on Friday (this means no school)! Today the middle and high school classes hosted volunteers who taught us various aspects of manit. This involves canoes, clans, music, and dance to name a few, and of course, food. Two foods that I learned about today are the coconut and the breadfruit.

Every part of the coconut tree is useful in some way. The Marshallese use the leaves or fronds to make plates (enra) and baskets. The coconut itself is used in various stages of ripeness. We drink from the young coconuts. As they age the juice turns into a semi-solid that is used for eating and making a coconut candy. Of course there is the meat that is shredded. The coconut is inside of a thick fibrous husk. The men husk the coconuts by shoving them onto a sharp stake and tearing off the outer shell. These husks make great kindling. The hard shell is used like our charcoal because it will burn for a long time. There is also another part of the tree that holds sap. The Marshallese drain this sap from the tree and boil it into a syrup. If left more than a couple of days it ferments into an alcohol; left longer it turns into a vinegar of sorts. This was the islanders’ source of sweetener before the missionaries brought sugar to the islands. Our volunteers boiled down the sap and added shredded coconut to make a type of candy. They rolled it into balls and then wrapped it in saran wrap. They gifted me with a necklace of the candy balls and was I ever popular today!

Another pair of volunteers taught us how to preserve breadfruit. Breadfruit is a green fruit about the size of a small acorn squash. It is a starchy fruit that ripens around May. The people here bake it and deep fry it into chips. But it can also be made into a pudding/paste type dish called bwiro that will last indefinitely. This was useful in times past because food supplies were limited. Also, they needed foods that would last on long canoe journeys. The process of preparing the dish was fascinating! The first thing I learned was that women take the ripe breadfruit, pare and seed it, and put it into a bag such as a pillowcase. There it sits. Once a month the bag is put into the lagoon where the saltwater takes care of any insects and bacteria. Meanwhile, the breadfruit softens, so that by the end of the year it is ready to knead.  Coconut milk is made from water and grated coconut and added to the kneaded breadfruit. The mixture looks like cake batter. Breadfruit leaves are washed and formed into cones and secured with ties made from the branches of pandanus trees. The cones are filled with the batter. The women gather up and turn down the top of the cones and tie with more pandanus ties. These are then put onto a fire created with the coconut husks and shells, along with pieces of coral to hold the heat. After a couple of hours in the fire, the sweet paste is ready to eat. You can eat it right away or save it for a later date.

I don’t know if I have been able to convey how interesting all of this was today, but I have included several pictures that I hope you enjoy! Tomorrow we go to a canoe exhibit and on Thursday we get to see a display of finely crafted mats. What a fun week!

I hope you all are well and enjoying life! Take care, Becky

husking the coconut

kneading the breadfruit

making the "twine" from the pandanus branch and looking cute

the ribelle teacher, Adam,  sits on the bench and grates the coconut

making the breadfruit leaf cones

making the cone packages from the breadfruit leaves

straining the cococut milk from the shredded coconut and water mix

cooking the breadfruit on the fire pit with the coconut shells and coral

More Fishing Marshallese Style

First I must tell you that I have been humbled. I was so proud of the 385 pound Marlin we caught last month but last week was the all Micronesian Tournament and Becky and I went down to watch the weigh in. A husband and wife team from Palau brought in a 551 pounder. Now that fish was a monster.

551 pounds

Saturday was the local monthly Billfish Tournament and I was again lucky enough to be invited to crew on Ronnie’s boat. John and Hugh were again on board and a friend of Ronnie's named Gary who is from Renton WA but has been living here aboard his 38 foot sailboat since 1998.

John

Ronnie at the helm

We left the dock at 6:00 AM and were soon out of the lagoon and in the open ocean. This time the sea was much rougher than last month. The swells were 4 to 6 feet and the wind was blowing around 20 knots. Ronnie’s boat handles the ocean well but we were tossed around all day.

Hugh not feeling well.

The fishing was great but the catching was lousy! We had two really good strikes that took everything including the swivels. We had one marlin on but it must not have been hooked well enough and spit out the lure. We did catch one 20 pound yellow fin tuna and two small (7-8 pound) skip jacks so there was fish to take home but a big goose egg for tournament points. Fortunately for us, of the eight boats in the tournament only one had a qualifying fish and it was a small marlin weighing in at 131 pounds. So Ronnie stays well in the lead for the years total points in the annual competition.

I count the day as a success because I didn’t get seasick (Hugh did) and still went home with a nice piece of tuna. Just another tough day as a Cabana Boy.

Trolling at 9 knots

Ronnie and John looking for birds

Our fishing platform

Mandatory Improvisation and Other Cultural Norms

I attended a conference this week. It was called The Pacific Epidemiological Workforce Development Academy. Basically, people from the Pacific island nations gathered to learn how to use data better to help prevent substance abuse on their islands. I have attended a lot of conferences in the past but his one had a flavor of its own!

Every day we opened in prayer. Then there were the usual ice breakers and the serious work sessions. We worked collaboratively in groups and did a lot of brainstorming and problem solving. Lunch though was an hour and a half every day! And on the third night, there was a BBQ where everyone was invited.

I told Willard we should go and so we went, thinking we’d stand around, swap some stories, eat some food and gracefully leave. It turns out it wasn’t THAT kind of BBQ! We got to the beach and the tables were all set up with large bottom fish in the center of the tables for us to munch on. The woman who organized the party, got up and thanked the host (The Honorable Minister, Mr. Addy, the Minister of Finance), and grace was said by a Samoan in his native tongue. We all got up to help ourselves to a buffet of local foods: sashimi, yams cooked in coconut milk, breadfruit, rice, chicken, and on and on. Because the conference was about substance abuse, water was served. It was delicious and we were all happy! The real entertainment, however, was yet to come.

Each country was expected to contribute something for the evening. Because the Republic of the Marshall Islands was hosting, we went first. I was happy to have safety in numbers because I was able to just stand and clap while everyone sang the song in traditional Marshallese. We finished and the next country was called up, Palau, I think. There were only a couple of people from this country so there was no hiding behind anyone. But it turns out that all of these folks from the Pacific feel free to invite anyone or everyone to join them on stage and it also turns out it is rude to refuse. Really, you just DON’T refuse! So they had a great time taking turns getting the folks in the audience to come up and sing and dance. They make great sport of it and think it is hilariously funny when the people they have called on look silly because they don’t have a clue! This happened over and over all night long; they even called the host and his cronies up! In the meantime, we enjoyed traditional songs and dances from all over the islands. At one point I about fell off my chair when the man from Saipan got up and began by dedicating his song to Nancy Reagan! But remember, we were all together to combat drug and alcohol use in the Pacific, and if you recall, First Lady Reagan was the person who had the “Just Say No” campaign. So he calls folks up to the stage and sings a song in his language about saying no to alcohol, no to marijuana, no to all of the bad stuff. It was a riot! We did get up and dance with the rest of the group around the tables for one of the numbers, but other than that, because we are not island people, they left us alone.  At the end, the RMI group did a beautiful dance involving their fans made from dyed coconut fronds. At the end the women all gave their female guests the beautiful hand-made fans they were using. They closed in prayer and we left three hours after we arrived, wondering when we’d had that much fun!

The following day was the last day of the conference. We finished up at 3:00 and I was thinking about how nice it was to be done early so I could get back to the Coop campus. Wrong! There was a half hour of closing ceremony. The RMI sang a traditional song about waving goodbye as the guests take off in their canoes, while the guests all paraded around the room “paddling their canoes” as they went. The Marshallese hosts followed this with another two traditional songs (again, I just stood and clapped) and then bestowed the lovely handmade handicrafts for which these folks are famous, on their guests. The guests then took turns at the microphone, thanking the Marshall Islands for their wonderful hospitality. The Samoans graced us with a song of their own. Then we all stood around in a circle, holding hands, singing yet another song. Of course we closed in prayer, this time in the Marshallese language. Hugs and kisses – and some tears - and the conference finally closed. It was an amazing cultural experience, especially from a conference centered on collecting data!

(Willard did ask me when we left the BBQ, what song I was going to prepare for the next event. I told him I’d fan him like a chief with the traditional fan while he sang HIS number! Yikes!!)

I hope all is well on the other end of the world. Our church prayed for the Americans this morning as you honor the 9/11 victims. You are all in our thoughts and prayers, Becky

This week in Majuro

My time as a Cabana Boy has been curtailed this week by the absence of two teachers, a principal, and a conference on substance abuse that Becky had to attend all week. So I have been teaching the first two periods of the day (algebra and Pacific Studies) and then covering the office until 4:00 when Becky returns. I will say that the kids are polite, and if not eager to learn, at least willing to do the work assigned. The students at the high school level speak relatively good English and understand the materials and concepts even when presented by an old retired cop.

Because we are both gone all day Mischief has been brought to school each day. She spends the first two hours in her crate but then spends the rest of the day making friends with whoever comes into the office. And of course the kids love her when I take her outside at lunch and at the end of the day. It appears that there are very few dogs treated as house pets here and many of the kids are shy of Mischief at first. But with a little coaxing, even the small kids come over to pet her. Because Mischief went on the middle/high school retreat all the older kids know her and think she is great. They are amazed that we would bring her from Auburn and they are intrigued by her looks.

I had planned an X-box fest for this week but as my loving bride reminded me, as part of my Cabana Boy duties, I must help her when she asks. So this week I am a teacher/secretary. I guess being a Cabana Boy means being flexible.  As I’ve said before, life’s tough when you’re a Cabana Boy.

Willard