My nephew's name is Jesse Calvin and I
cannot wait to meet him!
Saturday, October 6, 2012
I'm an Aunt!
I can't resist telling everyone that I
recently became an aunt! My brother and his wife back home gave
birth to a beautiful baby boy on October 4th, 2012. My
mom was wonderful and sent me many email updates once Evan and Sasha
headed to the hospital. I have also received a few pictures via
email. It's not quite as good as being there, but I feel so lucky
that I have the internet. Without technology I might not even
know that I had become an aunt!
Ways of Life
Every now and then it dawns on me just how different my life is here. I've decided to give you a glimpse into my days. These things seem so normal to me now, but are so vastly different from life back in America.
My walk to school- My favorite part of walking to school is using the shortcut that goes by the taro patch in the middle of the island. I look out over the taro field and enjoy the view of the big leaves shining in the morning sun, surrounded by coconut trees. The short cut opens into someones yard where I see my favorite pig on the island. Why is it my favorite? It's big, spotted, and snorts its greeting to me every day. One morning a chicken was perched on the edge of the pig's bowl eating the pigs food; the pig was foraging in the trash while snorting at me, the intruder; and a cat was sitting with its back to the chicken and the pig, clearly thinking it was superior to both.
Washing dishes- The dishes are washed outside either under a tree or near the well (an open hole in the ground). We have one large bowl to wash for washing and another to rinse in. While washing the dishes, chickens come and eat any leftover rice off the plates, cats look for bones and fish, and flies buzz around and land on anything they desire.
Showering- Step one- go to the well and fill up a bucket with water. Step two- lug the bucket to the bathroom, preferably with the help of someone else. Step three- use a container to pour water over your head and body. Step four- shower as usual. Step five- rinse off using the container to dump more water over your head. Note: only Samery and I shower in the bathroom. Everyone else showers outside. Girls wear a shirt pulled up under their armpits and guys shower in shorts.
Eating- Meals take place on the floor in shifts. I'm not sure if there is an order to the shifts or not. I may have my own plate of rice or I may share with others. There are multiple plates of rice then plates or bowls of whatever else is available (fish, breadfruit, taro, ramen). All eating is done with fingers, no utensils are needed.
My walk to school- My favorite part of walking to school is using the shortcut that goes by the taro patch in the middle of the island. I look out over the taro field and enjoy the view of the big leaves shining in the morning sun, surrounded by coconut trees. The short cut opens into someones yard where I see my favorite pig on the island. Why is it my favorite? It's big, spotted, and snorts its greeting to me every day. One morning a chicken was perched on the edge of the pig's bowl eating the pigs food; the pig was foraging in the trash while snorting at me, the intruder; and a cat was sitting with its back to the chicken and the pig, clearly thinking it was superior to both.
Washing dishes- The dishes are washed outside either under a tree or near the well (an open hole in the ground). We have one large bowl to wash for washing and another to rinse in. While washing the dishes, chickens come and eat any leftover rice off the plates, cats look for bones and fish, and flies buzz around and land on anything they desire.
Showering- Step one- go to the well and fill up a bucket with water. Step two- lug the bucket to the bathroom, preferably with the help of someone else. Step three- use a container to pour water over your head and body. Step four- shower as usual. Step five- rinse off using the container to dump more water over your head. Note: only Samery and I shower in the bathroom. Everyone else showers outside. Girls wear a shirt pulled up under their armpits and guys shower in shorts.
Eating- Meals take place on the floor in shifts. I'm not sure if there is an order to the shifts or not. I may have my own plate of rice or I may share with others. There are multiple plates of rice then plates or bowls of whatever else is available (fish, breadfruit, taro, ramen). All eating is done with fingers, no utensils are needed.
Monday, September 24, 2012
My Family
My family here does not have the typical family structure. Rather than having host parents, I live with three sisters. Samery, my oldest sister and host, is 30 years old. It seems very special to have a sister here the same age as my brother back home. She is a teacher at the school. Sandra is 16 and is a junior. Samery has started to call us twins, which I find quite amusing. Sasa is 10 years old and is the youngest of all the sisters (there are more I haven't met).
When I first arrived Samery was on Weno, so another sister, Maxie, was my host for the first ten days or so. I believe she is 24. Maxie is married and she has a son, Martson, who is around quite a bit. I think Martson will be three years old in a month or so. Martson understands more Chuukese than I do and I wish I knew what he was saying when he talked to me! Maxie was a great host when I arrived. I thought she lived in the house too and it wasn't until she said goodbye, after Samery arrived, that I understood she lived in a different house.
In addition to all my sisters, there are four high school students living with us, three girls and one boy. There are only two high schools among many islands, so high school students from other islands live with sponsor families for the entire school year.
Having so many people at the house is wonderful. At first I thought it might be odd to live with one of my students, but it has not been an issue. I think everyone here are so used to having people overlap into different parts of their lives that they don't even think about it. It makes me wonder if I'll live and work in same community in the future. I enjoy it here!
Every day there are many other people that visit and sleep at our house in addition to those I previously mentioned. I think most of these people are cousins. The majority of the visitors are male, ranging in age from elementary school to about 30. At any moment they might be chatting, drinking coffee, cooking, playing ping pong, relaxing, sleeping, or singing and playing ukulele. I will never have to worry about being lonely with all the people at home.
One day I asked Samery why she was willing to host so many people. She has five extra people in her home between me and the students. Her answer was simple and warmed my heart. "I like to care for people," and she does a great job. My family includes so many more people than my sisters and I am happy to be a part of the family.
When I first arrived Samery was on Weno, so another sister, Maxie, was my host for the first ten days or so. I believe she is 24. Maxie is married and she has a son, Martson, who is around quite a bit. I think Martson will be three years old in a month or so. Martson understands more Chuukese than I do and I wish I knew what he was saying when he talked to me! Maxie was a great host when I arrived. I thought she lived in the house too and it wasn't until she said goodbye, after Samery arrived, that I understood she lived in a different house.
In addition to all my sisters, there are four high school students living with us, three girls and one boy. There are only two high schools among many islands, so high school students from other islands live with sponsor families for the entire school year.
Having so many people at the house is wonderful. At first I thought it might be odd to live with one of my students, but it has not been an issue. I think everyone here are so used to having people overlap into different parts of their lives that they don't even think about it. It makes me wonder if I'll live and work in same community in the future. I enjoy it here!
Every day there are many other people that visit and sleep at our house in addition to those I previously mentioned. I think most of these people are cousins. The majority of the visitors are male, ranging in age from elementary school to about 30. At any moment they might be chatting, drinking coffee, cooking, playing ping pong, relaxing, sleeping, or singing and playing ukulele. I will never have to worry about being lonely with all the people at home.
One day I asked Samery why she was willing to host so many people. She has five extra people in her home between me and the students. Her answer was simple and warmed my heart. "I like to care for people," and she does a great job. My family includes so many more people than my sisters and I am happy to be a part of the family.
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
My New Home
I arrived on my island three weeks ago and I love it here. I am currently sitting on the second floor balcony of my school. There are no hallways so the balcony serves as the hallway. I am overlooking the courtyard where chickens are wandering and people are sitting. The ocean is visible behind the security building. We had a little rain this morning, so it's overcast and breezy. I can hear the breadfruit leaves as they hit the ground. I still have difficulty differentiating between the sound of rain and the sound of the wind in the coconut leaves. When the leaves hit against themselves it sounds just like the pitter-patter of rain.
.jpg) |
| view from my porch |
In my yard are two local huts made from sticks and pandanus leaves. These huts let the breezes pass through and are great places to take a nap or play cards. The volleyball net is used in the evenings when it is not quite so hot. We have a cook house in the side yard where the majority of the cooking takes place. Any cooking in the cook house is done over a fire. Much of the food prep is done there as well. I have helped to grate taro and have observed someone mash breadfriut. We also have an oven made from an old barrel in which delicious bread is baked.
My house itself is made of concrete. All of the floors are tiled and are swept every day. Houses here typically don't have a lot of furniture and mine is the same. We have one table in the main room. Sitting and laying down on the cool tile floor is how we relax. In my room I have a table and a bed frame with a foam mattress. I feel very spoiled to have a bed. The first week I was here I slept on a woven mat and had adjusted to the hard floor by the time the bed arrived. Most of our time is spent outside or on the porch. People don't need furniture in the house or windows that close when it is never cold!
My house itself is made of concrete. All of the floors are tiled and are swept every day. Houses here typically don't have a lot of furniture and mine is the same. We have one table in the main room. Sitting and laying down on the cool tile floor is how we relax. In my room I have a table and a bed frame with a foam mattress. I feel very spoiled to have a bed. The first week I was here I slept on a woven mat and had adjusted to the hard floor by the time the bed arrived. Most of our time is spent outside or on the porch. People don't need furniture in the house or windows that close when it is never cold!
.jpg) |
| my house |
The island itself is quite small. The main road is a loop and I was able to jog the loop in ten minutes. This leads me to think the loop is about a mile around. I say the main road, but it is more like an extra wide path made of crushed coral and sand. Many paths criss-cross the island, going between houses and the taro field in the middle of the island.
Overall the island is very quiet. The first week here I felt like I was living in a campground. There are no cars and the sound of voices echo through the trees. If I hear a rustle in the leaves I look to see a hen with her chicks, a little lizard, or a pig. The pigs are typically tethered to a tree and snort a lot. Hearing the snorts always makes me grin. There are also a number of roosters around. I am thankful that no roosters live in my immediate vicinity, so they have yet to wake me up. It seems like roosters crow any time they are disturbed.
I am enjoying life here very much. It is certainly a different way of life and it is nice not to have the rush and clutter of America. I do have the internet here which such a luxury. I think it is one of three islands in the whole state of Chuuk with internet. I feel so lucky! Life is good!
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Picnic Island Paradise
Last weekend we went to a picnic island and spent two nights there. I'm sure it is the kind of place where everyone pictures me living when they think of me in the Pacific. It was very small, with white sand and coconut trees. Hammocks made of fishing net were strung between trees, encouraging people to relax and enjoy themselves.
The trip was organized by the current Chuuk Peace Corps volunteers and I am so thankful they wanted to do this for us (the new trainees). We arrived Friday afternoon and stayed until Sunday, giving us plenty of time to talk, swim, eat, play games, get advice, and explore the reef. I say plenty of time, but I could have stayed there for a week.
Never before have I seen water that was so many shades of blue and green. Looking out over the water I first saw a light sea-foam green with the white sand below, further out a is was blue, then changed to bright turquoise. As the ocean met the sky it was a navy blue. For the first time in my life all those paint colors made sense: aquamarine, sea-foam green, pacific blue. I was seeing them all in their true form.
Little hermit crabs were everywhere. When I stood still I watched the crabs make their way across the sand. As I walked the shells would drop down to the ground, in an attempt to convince me that they weren't crabs at all, just shells in the sand. If you picked one up, it would hide inside it's shell. To encourage it to some out, and much to my amusement, Ben demonstrated that you could stick your tongue out and say, "bladle bladle blodle." Sure enough the crab would crawl out of its shell and reach out into the air. It reminded me of humming to snails on the coast of Maine.
The first night we were there the moon was full. It shown down on the water, creating a rippling moonbeam trail reaching to the horizon. It was so beautiful and bright! I was turning in circles in delight and pure satisfaction when I noticed a moonbow over the island. The moon was shining to brightly through the sprinkling rain that a full moonbow was arching over the entire island. The sight was magical. We were shouting, laughing, hugging, and dancing in excitement over the moonbow.
Being on the island allowed us to relax and connect with everyone. The current volunteers have been so helpful and honest with us. Their stories have made me laugh and cry, filled me with anticipation and excitement as well as apprehension and nervousness, and have given me true insight into what lies ahead. Each of them has shared their stories, hoping to make our experience just a little better, giving us a heads up and tips for things we may encounter. It will be so sad to see them leave and head back to the US.
Next week all of the current trainees will become Peace Corps Volunteers and then will head off to our own islands for service. After creating all these wonderful friendships it will be so hard to say goodbye. I have become so close with everyone that being the alone on my island is a bit intimidating. I know I'll make connections, but initially I'm sure I'll feel lonely and crave the closeness of other Peace Corps Volunteers. Spending an weekend together on our little island was a gift. Thank you M77's, you are so wonderful!
The trip was organized by the current Chuuk Peace Corps volunteers and I am so thankful they wanted to do this for us (the new trainees). We arrived Friday afternoon and stayed until Sunday, giving us plenty of time to talk, swim, eat, play games, get advice, and explore the reef. I say plenty of time, but I could have stayed there for a week.
Never before have I seen water that was so many shades of blue and green. Looking out over the water I first saw a light sea-foam green with the white sand below, further out a is was blue, then changed to bright turquoise. As the ocean met the sky it was a navy blue. For the first time in my life all those paint colors made sense: aquamarine, sea-foam green, pacific blue. I was seeing them all in their true form.
Little hermit crabs were everywhere. When I stood still I watched the crabs make their way across the sand. As I walked the shells would drop down to the ground, in an attempt to convince me that they weren't crabs at all, just shells in the sand. If you picked one up, it would hide inside it's shell. To encourage it to some out, and much to my amusement, Ben demonstrated that you could stick your tongue out and say, "bladle bladle blodle." Sure enough the crab would crawl out of its shell and reach out into the air. It reminded me of humming to snails on the coast of Maine.
The first night we were there the moon was full. It shown down on the water, creating a rippling moonbeam trail reaching to the horizon. It was so beautiful and bright! I was turning in circles in delight and pure satisfaction when I noticed a moonbow over the island. The moon was shining to brightly through the sprinkling rain that a full moonbow was arching over the entire island. The sight was magical. We were shouting, laughing, hugging, and dancing in excitement over the moonbow.
Being on the island allowed us to relax and connect with everyone. The current volunteers have been so helpful and honest with us. Their stories have made me laugh and cry, filled me with anticipation and excitement as well as apprehension and nervousness, and have given me true insight into what lies ahead. Each of them has shared their stories, hoping to make our experience just a little better, giving us a heads up and tips for things we may encounter. It will be so sad to see them leave and head back to the US.
Next week all of the current trainees will become Peace Corps Volunteers and then will head off to our own islands for service. After creating all these wonderful friendships it will be so hard to say goodbye. I have become so close with everyone that being the alone on my island is a bit intimidating. I know I'll make connections, but initially I'm sure I'll feel lonely and crave the closeness of other Peace Corps Volunteers. Spending an weekend together on our little island was a gift. Thank you M77's, you are so wonderful!
No Place for Trash
In the US we take for granted that we have huge landfills and we don't really think about where our trash goes. I put it on the side of the road on trash day and somehow think that it disappears. Here there is no place to put the trash. It's on the side of the road, in yards, and in the ocean. Seeing trash around me makes me realize how much waste people create. It's really bad! In the US you see junk yards with cars, and somehow this makes you feel better because it's all in one place, like the cars belong there and it's okay. Here, cars sit in yards and on the side of the road. They are used for parts as they sit, so eventually all that is left is the skeleton, slowly taken over by nature. Vines grow in, on, and through them, but the car still exists, with no place to go.
Picture all the trash and recycling you neatly bag up in a month, put into your trash cans and recycle bins, and have taken away each week, never thinking of it again. Now picture it sitting in your from yard; maybe some of it is in bags and some is loose, some has blown away to your neighbors yard, and some is stuck in the mud. Then imagine everyone else on your street doing the same thing. Maybe some people centralize their trash in one area, maybe others spread it out so that it isn't all in one pile. Now, instead of just picturing a months worth of waste, picture it accumulating for a year or two (this includes everything you might get rid of). It's overwhelming!
Thankfully people here do not create as much trash as Americans. People don't waste things or buy frivolous things. Yes, there are plastic take out containers, but there isn't as much waste as from take out food here a from restaurants in America. Bottles are used for other things before being thrown out, as are plastic bags. Clothes are worn until they can't be anymore and then are used as rags. If Americans lived here and created all the trash they did in the US it would be totally disgusting.
It was odd the other day when I had a bottle from water and my choice was to bring it into my house, only to have someone else add it to the trash pile outside, or consciously throw it into the trash pile myself. It felt so odd to be purposely throwing a bottle on the ground. I am such a recycler in the US, it's hard to abandoned those habits completely. Maybe while I am here I can encourage people to make take out food containers out of leaves. Sometimes this is done now for breadfruit and taro, and I think it is what people did before the containers were available.
Seeing all the trash here makes me wonder about all the land fills in the US. People should not waste so much, nor should there be so much packaging!
Picture all the trash and recycling you neatly bag up in a month, put into your trash cans and recycle bins, and have taken away each week, never thinking of it again. Now picture it sitting in your from yard; maybe some of it is in bags and some is loose, some has blown away to your neighbors yard, and some is stuck in the mud. Then imagine everyone else on your street doing the same thing. Maybe some people centralize their trash in one area, maybe others spread it out so that it isn't all in one pile. Now, instead of just picturing a months worth of waste, picture it accumulating for a year or two (this includes everything you might get rid of). It's overwhelming!
Thankfully people here do not create as much trash as Americans. People don't waste things or buy frivolous things. Yes, there are plastic take out containers, but there isn't as much waste as from take out food here a from restaurants in America. Bottles are used for other things before being thrown out, as are plastic bags. Clothes are worn until they can't be anymore and then are used as rags. If Americans lived here and created all the trash they did in the US it would be totally disgusting.
It was odd the other day when I had a bottle from water and my choice was to bring it into my house, only to have someone else add it to the trash pile outside, or consciously throw it into the trash pile myself. It felt so odd to be purposely throwing a bottle on the ground. I am such a recycler in the US, it's hard to abandoned those habits completely. Maybe while I am here I can encourage people to make take out food containers out of leaves. Sometimes this is done now for breadfruit and taro, and I think it is what people did before the containers were available.
Seeing all the trash here makes me wonder about all the land fills in the US. People should not waste so much, nor should there be so much packaging!
Road Construction
For the past month I've been living and training on the main island of Chuuk in Weno. Chuuk is so different from Pohnpei. There has been a ton of construction happening on the roads. Roads that are in the process of being rebuilt are super muddy. Sometimes the mud is solid to walk on and other times you sink down, losing your flip flop in the muck. A word of advice, when walking in mud using flip flops, plant your heel first. This prevents massive amounts of suction and reduces the risk of breaking your flop or losing it in the mud. But don't worry, there are plenty of puddles available to wash the mud off your feet. Even really muddy water will do the trick.
Roads that are still waiting to be built have potholes ranging from the size of turkey platter to a crater, taking up the width of the road. These fill with water because the main road is very close to sea level. Car rides are super bumpy and progress is slow.
The road project that is being undertaken in huge. Roads are being paved and a drainage system is being installed. There are so many pumps running because as soon as holes are dug, they fill with water. When the project is finished the roads will be wonderful. I hope I get to see all the roads completed!
I didn't intend to write so much about the roads, but they are a huge part of my life and traveling. Walking anywhere is such an adventure, navigating through the mud.
Roads that are still waiting to be built have potholes ranging from the size of turkey platter to a crater, taking up the width of the road. These fill with water because the main road is very close to sea level. Car rides are super bumpy and progress is slow.
The road project that is being undertaken in huge. Roads are being paved and a drainage system is being installed. There are so many pumps running because as soon as holes are dug, they fill with water. When the project is finished the roads will be wonderful. I hope I get to see all the roads completed!
I didn't intend to write so much about the roads, but they are a huge part of my life and traveling. Walking anywhere is such an adventure, navigating through the mud.
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