Every Man is an Island

Some pictures

2008-06-22T20:20:00.001-07:00

Uploaded four albums (speed!). In order, it's the Upward Bound banquet, the MIHS senior class banquet, graduation, and Arno.

Emoj

2008-06-20T13:47:00.001-07:00

It's finished.

My plane leaves in three hours and I will leave the Marshall Islands after 3 years. Everything I want to say I've hopefully already said at this point, so I'll leave it at that. I'll update this blog a few times when I get back home, mainly with some pictures. Thanks to everyone who's kept up with me these past 3 years.

Faculty address

2008-06-05T16:00:00.000-07:00

Good morning and welcome to our distinguished guests, coworkers, friends, and family. Thank you for attending Marshall Islands High School’s 44th Commencement services.

To deliver a speech in this position is never easy. Therefore, in honor of being asked to deliver the faculty address, I have decided to teach one last lesson to our graduating seniors before I no longer have the privilege of teaching them any more. And in the spirit of the Marshall Islands, I will begin by telling a story.

Twenty-one years ago, a woman named Li Xiaowei made an impossible decision; she chose to leave the comforts of her native homeland so that her child could have opportunities in his life that she never had in hers. She left China and went to America. In her right pocket she had a slip of paper with a phone number written on it. In her left pocket she had her entire life savings, a twenty dollar bill. When she arrived in America, she called the phone number in her right pocket and was given directions to an apartment. With the twenty dollars in her left pocket, she transported herself to the apartment where she found a sleeping mat, and nothing else. At the age of 32, Li Xiaowei’s life had begun for a second time.

One year later, Li Xiaowei was joined by her five year old son, Li Ruochen. Li Ruochen began first grade in America armed with the only English word he knew, “bathroom.” He came home crying the first day because his classmates made fun of his name. That night, Li Xiaowei gave her son an American sounding name, Richard. And, because family names in America come after given names, she switched the order of her son’s name. Li Ruochen became Richard Li.

Because I didn’t speak English I was very quiet and shy in class. I never asked questions or answered when called upon. My teachers quickly concluded that there must be something wrong with me and placed me in special ed. As I grew older, and graduated from special ed., I became more aware that I was different from everyone else. I looked different. My hair was different. My skin color was different. My customs were different. The food I ate was different. My mom was different. She spoke a different language. She wore different clothes. When I watched TV, no one looked like me or my mom. No one spoke our language. No one had our customs. It did not take long for me to believe that my first grade teachers were correct; there must be something wrong with me because no one else was like me.

Afterwards, I tried as hard as I could to be like everyone else. I wore their clothes. I ate their food. I even colored my hair. And I never ever let anyone meet my mom. I never told her when PTA meetings were. I never invited my friends to my house. I was ashamed of her, of her customs, of her clothes, of the way she spoke English. I was so ashamed of her that I even made fun of her. This was how I felt, and I felt this way every single day, until the day I graduated from college.

That night, Li Xiaowei and Richard Li were eating dinner celebrating his graduation. I felt the same way I always did when I was around my mom, embarrassed and ashamed. I wanted that dinner to end so badly because I didn’t want to be seen with my mom, and her clothes, and her customs, and her language. However, this night would end differently, because my mom told me a story, a story that she had never told me before. She told me about twenty-one years ago. She told me about the phone number in her right pocket. She told me about the twenty dollars in her left pocket. She told me about the sleeping mat and nothing else. And then she told me 3,000 stories just like those. And she told me that all those stories existed, that she put her entire life savings in her left pocket, just so I could have dinner with her that night, with my American college diploma in my left pocket.

At that moment, I again felt embarrassed and ashamed, but not of my mom; I felt ashamed of myself. I felt ashamed that I ever thought there was something wrong with this woman in front of me, this wonderful, remarkable, miraculous woman. I felt ashamed that I ever thought there was something wrong with anything connected with this woman, especially myself. This woman gave me life, so how could there be anything wrong with me? There was nothing wrong with my hair, my skin color, my customs, my language, for they all came from her. For the first time in my life, I no longer wanted to be anything else, because I understood that nothing else could be as good as what my mom gave to me.

Three years ago, I began teaching at Marshall Islands High School. I taught English to sophomores, now the 161 students you see in front of you. One of my best students was a girl named Amy. One day she wrote a story about the first time she met a ripelle. Amy elegantly described the ripelle woman’s beautiful hair, her light skin, and the language she spoke. It was a brilliantly composed story, clear and clever. Then I reached the end, and Amy’s last sentence took my breath away. There, she had written, “I wish I were a ripelle.”

What Amy had written about the ripelle woman was not simply what she observed, it was what she wanted to be. I was stunned, motionless, thoughtless. I wanted to scream, but no voice came. I wanted to cry, but no tears came. I wanted to forget, but no strength came. Instead, all of my energy was dedicated to the realization that I knew exactly how Amy felt, and why she felt that way. I knew why Amy wanted to be something else. And I knew that if Amy felt this way, many of her classmates probably did as well, and still do. My students are hurting. I see the hurt as I read their essays about themselves and where they come from. I hear the hurt as they talk about themselves and the people around them. They are hurting in the same way that I had hurt, the kind of hurt you only feel when you’re convinced that who you are, is not good enough.

Therefore, I need to say something right now. I need to tell you, Amy’s classmates, one last thing before you stop being my students. It is something I wish someone would have told me a long time ago. This is my last lesson to you, and don’t you dare forget it:

Class of 2008, YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL!

Everything about you is beautiful. Your hair is beautiful. Your skin color is beautiful. Your culture is beautiful. Your customs are beautiful. Your language is beautiful. There is nothing wrong with you. In fact, everything about you is just right. If you don’t believe me just look at the people who have come here today. They are your parents, grandparents, aunties, and uncles. Do you even know how beautiful they are? What are their stories? What is in their pockets? Ask them. Discover their beauty. Their beauty is your beauty. And once you know how beautiful they are, how beautiful you are, you’ll understand that no one on Earth is as beautiful as you.

Students, you don’t have to change yourself for anybody. You don’t have to compare yourself to anybody. And you certainly don’t have to be like anybody else. In fact, everybody else should have to be a little more like you.

God made you look the way you do. God gave you the language you speak. God made you act the way you do, think the way you do, and be the way you are. You are not the same as everyone else, and what’s wrong with that? There is no shame in that, there is only pride in being God’s unique creation. Be proud that no one looks like you or speaks your language. I know that it can be difficult, because you see things on TV and hear things from people that make you believe there’s something wrong with being the way you are. Don’t believe them. Don’t ever believe them. They’re just first grade teachers who don’t know anything. They don’t know your stories. They don’t know what’s in your pockets. They don’t know that the shy kid with the funny name who they placed in special ed will graduate from college and spend three years teaching the most beautiful people in the world.

Soon, you will march out. You will march out of the gym, into the field, into the workforce, into college, and into the world. And when you do, I want you to march in the only way that befits people of your grace, strength, and promise -- with your chest towards the horizon, your chin towards the sky, and your eyes towards the future.

So explore. Discover. Go. Find all that there is to find. But wherever you are, always remember who you are and where you came from, for these are the sources of your power. So explore with courage, but return with pride. Discover with ambition, but come back with humility. Go to learn, but do not learn to forget just how beautiful you really are.

As for me, I will be leaving as well, as others have done before me. However, I always found it strange that, when a lot of those people left I heard them say that they committed themselves, dedicated themselves, or even sacrificed themselves to be here with you. Please excuse my language, but that’s the biggest load of crap I have ever heard. Committed, dedicated, sacrificed – these words suggest that there’s something else, something better, that these people could have done with their time, that somehow, you were lucky to have them. Nothing could be further from the truth. You were not lucky to have them. They were lucky to have you. You do not have to be thankful because they entered your lives. They should be thankful because you let them enter your lives. And anyone who comes here, and thinks differently, does not deserve you.

Class of 2008, these past three years, there is nowhere better I could have been, than right here. And there is no one better I could have been with, than you. I am so lucky to have had you. And I am so thankful that you let me into your lives. You are beautiful. I love you. I congratulate you. And God bless you.

Class dismissed

2008-05-23T17:28:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday I taught my last class ever in the Marshall Islands. It was actually severely anti-climactic because at the time I didn’t even know it would be my last class. The last day of finals were supposed to be on Friday, but since we switched to half-day schedules for finals my last day was supposed to be on Thursday, for I did not teach during the periods that took their finals on Friday. I didn’t have anything special planned, but for sentimentality purposes I had planned to “soak in” that final class a little bit more than the others, maybe remember some faces and the little things that I’ve really enjoyed about being in a Marshallese classroom for three years.
However, it was not meant to be because I was put on emergency assembly duty on Thursday due to the absence of a two teachers, forcing me to take my classes to the assembly as opposed to teaching them. I was a little bummed that I didn’t get to relish my last teaching responsibilities here, almost like watching a good movie with a sudden and abbreviated ending. Nevertheless, the rest of the movie was pretty good, so in the end I guess I didn’t lose much.

Upward Bound also ended this week. I taught there for two years, but the commitment was obviously nothing like the commitment to Marshall Islands High School. Still, working at Upward Bound gave me the opportunity to teach students not at Marshall Islands High School, primarily private high school students. In addition, because it’s an after school program, the students who put forth the effort every day to attend and work hard really inspired me. In any situation, regardless of how bleak it may seem, there are always dedicated individuals who want to make things better. Upward Bound’s graduation is tonight, and one of the private schools that my Upward Bound students attend has its graduation tomorrow. I’ll be attending both.

I’m starting to believe that the Taiwan Embassy simply hasn’t selected all of its scholarship recipients yet. Why it’s deciding to select at different times is unknown to me, but it seems like the only two people who have been selected period are the two I mentioned previously. I guess this means that nobody has officially been rejected yet. In fact, I’m hearing rumors that Henry is actually on the cusp of being accepted. If he is, that would create an infusion of mixed emotions for me the likes of which I cannot even fathom right now.

Oh, I turned 25 recently, a full quarter century of living. It was my third and last birthday celebrated in the Marshall Islands. Some friends and I went to my favorite Chinese restaurant and ate the place clean while singing some karaoke. I kicked it off with “Ice Ice Baby” which was, unfortunately, a few steps slower on the karaoke machine than it’s supposed to be. However, utilizing my formidable rap skills and knowledge of lame early 90s music, I managed to sing it blind and then waited for the machine to catch up. That’s just how I roll.

I’m out in 28 days. Know what I’m looking forward to most? Late night fast food and, for the first time in four years, following my fantasy football team on Sundays instead of Mondays.

I also hear there’s some crazy thing called TIVO that I’m really going to like.

Marshallese debate

2008-05-10T18:00:00.000-07:00

I’ve done a hell of a lot of debating in my life – three years of policy debate in high school and four years of parliamentary debating in college. Throw in a smattering of competitive speaking and Model UN, and you have the makings of a supreme dork. Luckily, my dorkiness has come in handy on a few occasions. Most recently, this year I was asked to teach “listening and speaking” to Upward Bound seniors. I wasn’t exactly sure what “listening and speaking” meant so I just changed it into a speech and debate course because that’s what I know.

Teaching the course has been difficult, as expected. Marshallese hate drawing attention to themselves, which of course is exactly what speech and debate is. My students started out with thirty second speeches and slowly made their way to four minutes. Now they’re starting to compete in abbreviated parliamentary debate rounds and their improvement has been noticeable.

Nevertheless, what’s also been noticeable is how differently they approach debate compared to what I’m used to. Marshallese culture is very communal. What is mine is also everyone’s. It’s simply unfair for me to have something and not share it. Thus, when my students began debating and would sometimes miss what their opponents said, they did what they were used to. During the middle of the round they asked their opponents what they said. And their opponents graciously repeated their arguments. After a speech ends, they again speak to each other to clarify what was said during the speech. I was at once flabbergasted and touched. The competitive juices that drove me to debate just does not exist in the same context.

My student was not selected to be a Gates Millennium Scholar. It’s disappointing but I keep telling myself that neither she nor I have anything to be ashamed of. She was part of the first group of applicants form the Marshall Islands, and was selected as one of 1,800 finalists from an applicant pool of 14,000. It’s not a baby step, it’s a big boy step, and maybe next year someone will be selected.

Helping to alleviate the disappointment is the fact that the same student was selected to be a Taiwan Scholar. There were two from Marshall Islands High School, both girls, again. Henry was not chosen for the second straight year. Neither was Jean.

I’ll be back in the United States in forty-two days. Hope to see a lot of you then.

Save the date

2008-04-24T20:49:00.000-07:00

June 21, 2008 - Richard Li makes his triumphant return to the United States after three years in the Pacific. Earlier this month I requested a change in my termination date from August 14th and June 21st and it was approved this week. I'll fly into Honolulu and spend a couple of days there with friends before flying to Los Angeles and spending time with more friends and attending my first wedding. I'll be back home in Idaho on the 28th of June.

At first it was simply a relief to get all of this stuff mostly out of the way. However, the more I ruminate about it, the more exciting it gets. Needless to say the amount of change in my life has been pretty minimal over the past three years. Of course I don’t regret any decision I’ve made in the past three years, but just the fact that I have something different on the horizon is a pretty exciting turn of events.

On Friday I also received a bit of unexpected yet very welcome news. I’ve been elected by the senior class to be the faculty speaker at graduation. Not only is it neat in and of itself, but it’s particularly significant because of this year’s class. When I first arrived in the Marshall Islands, I taught sophomores. Partially as a result of wanting to see those students graduate, I decided to stay for two more years. Now those students are graduating seniors and I get to address them before we part ways. In seven years of competitive speech and debate I must have given over 1000 speeches. All of them combined don’t equal half the significance of this one. I’m really looking forward to it, and will be even more so once I figure out what to say.

Jane has had her Taiwan Scholarship revoked. She became very ill and then became very scared. Her friends say she had a “large and hard bump” on the side of her stomach that was very painful. She begged her parents to come back and receive traditional Marshallese medicine for it. Her parents were hesitant because the plane ticket is very expensive and they didn’t want to risk the chance of not being able to treat her, or worse, that she would simply never go back. They urged her to stay in Taiwan. She did and failed her classes. Her scholarship was revoked and she returned last week. She’s putting on a good face but I can tell she feels like she disappointed everybody.

Her sister, Jean, interviewed for the Taiwan Scholarship four days before Jane returned.

Henry has once again applied for the Taiwan Scholarship. He interviewed the same day as Jean.

If I were Lost, I'd be just fine

2008-04-09T18:04:00.001-07:00

It was only a matter of time before I discovered the magic of TV shows on DVD while in the Marshall Islands. With a fair amount of free time, I could be doing something constructive like reading or even writing, but of course I'm doing what anyone else would do, watching endless amounts of television.

After I graduated but before I left for Majuro, a friend and I managed to polish off the first two seasons of The West Wing. When I came back after my first year here, I went on a mad TV show burning spree. I got a hold of five seasons of The West Wing and The Sopranos. Upon returning to Majuro, I managed to finish most of The West Wing before my DVD book was stolen. I, of course, was totally sad. I asked my landlord/neighbor if he could keep an eye out for anyone who all of a sudden has a new collection of DVDs to watch. A few days later he came by really excited because he had found my DVDs. I was like, "Whoa, really?" He said, "Yeah! You have a lot of good porn!" Sadly, I informed him that my DVDs were not porn. He seemed disappointed but then tried to liven my spirits by inviting me to go watch porn with him. I declined.

This year I broke down and bought the complete series of The West Wing, all seven seasons. I finished it a few months ago and am now rewatching it. My friend recently got her hands on Lost and asked if I wanted to blitz through it with her. While we were watching I suddenly ran through a couple of thoughts. My first thought was, "Wow it would really suck to be stuck on a deserted island." Then I thought, "Wow, how much more would it suck if this happened to me on my flight back to the States? I would be so excited only to be so stuck."

I think my friend sensed what I was thinking because she then asked aloud, "Dude, can you imagine if our flights out of here got stranded?"

I answered, "Yeah, that would really blow."

She looked at me quizzically and said, "What? Are you kidding?" Seeing the perplexed look on my face she proceeded to explain. "We would crash land with a bunch of Pacific Islanders! We'd be totally OK!"

"Wow, you're right," I responded. "I never thought about that. I guess there's no better people to crash land with is there?" We continued to watch.

"Ha!" I exclaimed, after watching the fat white guy try to catch a fish. "We wouldn't have that problem."

"Yeah we'd have so much fish to eat," she said. "Why aren't they eating any coconuts?"

"Because they don't know how to get them," I answered. "We would totally be able to rock that."

"Yeah, we'd probably even gain weight on that island since we're so badass," she said.

After awhile I chimed in again. "Hey, what about the monster?"

"OK, maybe not crash landing in the first place is a better idea."

Woo hoo!

2008-03-15T23:29:00.000-07:00

The Marshall Islands has its first ever Gates Millennium Scholarship finalist, and she goes to Marshall Islands High School. It’s pretty exciting. Two months ago five students of mine completed Gates Millennium Scholarship applications. They were the first ever to apply from within the Marshall Islands. Four of them were rejected, but one made the cut. It was sad to break the news to the four who were turned down, but it pretty sweet to tell the one who made it.

She now has one month to produce the remaining paperwork, namely pell grant eligibility, an updated transcript, and a letter of acceptance from a college. Final notifications will be produced on a rolling basis as soon as finalists produce the remaining paperwork. Spirits are pretty high right now as the final documentation is crunched out.

My only other bit of significant news is that I’ve requested to move up the termination date of my contract. Currently it’s August 14th, but graduation is June 5th. While I’m generally OK with receiving a few extra paychecks, I expect I’d get bored with pretty much nothing to do for over two months. Moreover, it would prevent my replacement from being hired in a timely manner because I would still be under contract. That means my replacement probably wouldn’t begin work until after school begins, a prospect I don’t like.

Taiwan Scholarship applications are in full force. As expected I have more applicants this year, including my host sister who graduated two years ago. We’re looking at up to fifteen applicants in all, about twice the number compared to last year. Six will be accepted this year, the same as last. Applications are due at the end of March. I think we’ll hear by the end of April.

One of the girls who went to Taiwan last year was actually back for a few weeks. She took advantage of her Chinese New Year vacation and returned to visit her family and friends. She stopped by the school and spoke to me and this year’s seniors. It seems like she’s doing well and her Chinese is definitely passable. The seniors seemed pretty struck and I’m sure her presence had a lot to do with the increased number of applicants.

Something relatively cool happened this month. The Chinese Association of the Marshall Islands was created, intending to organize and protect the estimated 300 Chinese in this country. The first meeting was held the weekend before Chinese New Year and over 150 people were in attendance. I attended and was asked to become the secretary for the purposes of communicating with the community at large. I accepted. I like it. It feels like a portion of my life here has come to a very constructive conclusion.

Model Nitijela

2008-02-27T02:10:00.000-08:00

It's not exactly an update, but if you've ever wanted something more visual about my job or the Marshall Islands this might please you.

When the time came for me to teach government in the Marshall Islands, I was kind of at a loss regarding what to do in class. All I could remember was that when I took government in high school my teacher conducted a rather weak Mock Congress with my class. I wanted to do something like it, only better, but I sure as heck don't know the rules and procedures under which the Marshall Islands legislature operates. However, having participated in Model United Nations in college, I figured I could adapt some of its rules and procedures to suit my purposes.

Thus was born "Model Nitijela." I've been doing it for three years now and the below link shows the latest manifestation.

Model Nitijela

A little football amongst friends

2008-02-04T17:03:00.000-08:00

I like sports. I always have. I like to play them. I like to watch them. I like to read about them. I like to gamble on them. I like to engage in seemingly frivolous activities related to them. But most of all, I like what sports are able to do. They make us remember. They make us forget. And without a doubt, they bring us together.

A few years ago, I was able to experience the unification power of sports in a way that everyone should at least once in their lives. It was 2004, and I was studying abroad in Rome during autumn quarter. I was having a great time looking at old stuff and eating new stuff. One day I received some news that snapped me out of my ethnocentric Italian mood -- the Red Sox had come back from down 3-0 against the Yankees in the ALCS. Game 7 was to be played that night, at 3:00 AM Rome time. "Wow, I need to see that," I thought. But where was I going to watch an American baseball game in the middle of the night in Rome? After some poking around, I discovered that an Irish pub called "The Abbey" would be open late in order to broadcast the game. That night, a few friends and I woke up [really] early and took a tram over to to the pub, expecting to find a very disgruntled bartender looking after a few American miscreants. Much to our surprise, we couldn't even get into the bar because a tangled mass of bodies blocked the door.

When we finally wedged our way in, we found ourselves in the middle of what must have been at least 500 people all craning their necks to watch the two TVs which were broadcasting the game. Fortunately one of the girls I was with was quite attractive and thus was able to communicate, in universal body language, "I'm good looking, please let me sit." I took advantage of the situation by sitting on the wood paneling on the wall (yeah, the 6" or so that acts as decorative trim) directly above her. When Johnny Damon hit the grand slam I was tossed to the floor rather unceremoniously as the entire place erupted and started shaking harder than Mt. Vesuvius. When the game ended, euphoria broke out. Hugs and kisses were exchanged. Everyone started buying everyone else drinks. The man standing next to me announced that he had traveled 22 hours in a skiff from Sardinia just to watch the game, though that was nothing compared to the man who claimed he arranged for the Mafia to get him out of Sicily posthaste so he could catch the broadcast.

It was about 6:00 AM. My friends and I had a difficult decision to make. Classes started at 8:00 AM. It clearly wasn't worth traveling back to our dorm/hotel and then coming right back to where we were standing for our classroom was less than a five minute walk away form the pub. However, we were also really tired. What exactly were we supposed to do for the next two hours? We tried our classroom. It was locked. We tried churches. God was still on break. Finally, we decided to fall asleep underneath a fountain in front of the Pantheon. It was absurdly uncomfortable and we were absurdly happy. Sports had brought us together.

I thought I would never be lucky enough to find myself in another similar situation. However, I underestimated the power of tape-delayed football in the Marshall Islands. Because FOX was carrying the Super Bowl, it was not broadcasted in the Marshall Islands because of licensing conflicts between FOX and Disney/ESPN, which is the only carrier in the Marshall Islands. This, of course, was very distressing to the fifty or so football fans in the Marshall Islands. In response, the Majuro Fantasy Football Association managed to arrange, through rather unorthodox methods, for the video taping of the Super Bowl. The plan was for someone to pick up the invaluable cassette and deliver it to the local [only] television company who would then televise it locally.

On Monday, thirty men and a few women of varying ages and persuasions made a pact to avoid all forms of telecommunications for twelve hours. It was like we were on an island in the middle of the ocean or something. We worked during the day, and avoided the internet. We rode cars home, and either turned off the radio if we owned our own cars, or hummed loudly to ourselves if we rode in taxis, much to the very confused chagrin of the driver and other passengers. After work we sat in front of turned off televisions. We gave the tape an hour margin for error – what if the game went into overtime? Finally, 6:00 PM hit. The diehards headed to a Chinese restaurant to watch.

As I approached the restaurant, a sudden fear coursed through me. What if I was the first one, and the TV was currently set to ESPN? I walked up the stairs and loudly as possible, drowning out any background noise that might be emanating from the TV. When I got to the top and peaked through the door, I see about a dozen or so people already there, waiting. It was safe. They were all watching the Bollywood channel all in Hindi.

“What the hell are you watching?”

“We figured this was the safest channel to watch. Why the hell did you walk up the stairs so loudly?”

The people quickly stream in, every one more anxious than the previous after having avoided everything with an antenna for a day. A particularly gruff man walks in and makes a declaration.

“If anyone says anything about the score he will absolutely die.” Everyone murmurs in agreement.

We decide it was time to switch channels. Carefully, the remote control is pressed to navigate to the proper channel in order to avoid accidentally channel surfing through something dangerous. We sit and watch for ten minutes.

“Where the hell is the game?”

“Is it on channel 18?” someone asks, since channel 18 is the other locally broadcasted channel. Someone steps forward to change the channel but makes a mistake. He doesn’t press the one hard enough and we end up on BBC.

“Fuck! That’s a news channel! Change it! Change it!” The man fumbles with the remote frantically.

“I can’t! The batteries are dead!”

“Shit! Shit! Shit!”

In desperation, the man unplugs the TV from the wall. A pause.

“It’s still going to be on that channel when you plug it back in.”

Through a coordinated effort, the man plugged the TV back in while someone else simultaneously began surfing towards the safe foreign language channels. We reached channel 18, nothing. We surfed back to channel 29 and soon after the channel becomes fuzzy and the tape begins to play. Cheers.

An hour later we were still watching the pre-game show.

“When did they start taping?”

“I told them to start at 11:00 AM.”

“When does the game start?”

“11:17 AM.”

“OK, someone’s wrong.”

The game finally started at around 7:15 PM. The crowd became considerably drunker. Packed inside the one room restaurant were about forty people. Half of them were Americans, and the rest were an assorted smattering of Marshallese and Australians. There were volunteer teachers who have been here for six months, and former Peace Corps volunteers who have been here for more than thirty-five years. In addition, there were the people I have come to dub, “the old salts,” the men who look like they had just stepped off a ship lost at sea. They’re old. They’re hard. They drink like fish. They smell like fish. And they wanted to watch football.

“Hey, it’s still 7-3 at the half.”

“How the hell is this happening?”

“I think this could be bigger than Namath in Super Bowl III.”

“Dude, you remember that one?”

“Yeah, it was the last one I saw in the States.”

“Hey haven’t we been having a lot of power outages lately?”

A worried pause.

“Shut the fuck up and keep drinking.”

The power stayed on, and Giants stayed in it. By the fourth quarter the crowd had dwindled a bit, but the ones who needed to be there still were. When the Giants first took the lead in the fourth, the place exploded. Some of the crowd sounded like college frat boys. Some sounded like professionals. Some sounded like pirates with grog.

When the Patriots retook the lead, a few groans were heard. Even pirates hate the Patriots.

Finally, it was Eli’s time to shine. He made the escape. He threw the pass. Tyree made the jump. Harrison made the belly-to-back suplex. Tyree applied the super glue to his helmet. High fives are exchanged. Chest bumps are awkwardly made. The old salt next to me jumped up and started cheering as if he had just spotted land.

“Hey do you realize that happened like eight hours ago?” said the amused person next to him.

The old salt looked a little self-conscious and sat down nervously to sip his beer.

When the game ended it was about 11:00 PM on a Monday night. A volunteer teacher from New York bought a round of shots for everyone still remaining. Most people downed it. An old salt looked at it curiously, poured it into his empty beer bottle, and began sipping it. We filed out of the restaurant, to go home to our various dorms, apartments, houses, and buccaneer cabins.

It was eight hours after the game had ended. It was on a VCR. It was with kung pao chicken and New Zealand beer. It was in the middle of the Pacific. It was a little football amongst friends, and it brought us together.

Next?

2008-01-19T13:35:00.000-08:00

TOEFL’s done, or at least close enough. Due to some weird logistical mishaps (likely sloppy paperwork), only sixteen students were allowed to take the TOEFL at once, as opposed to nearly 30 last year. As a result, I had to register my students for three different test dates, with only the first one (January 12) guaranteed to return the results on time. The second date (March 7), will probably be on time, while the third date (May 10), certainly will be too late to be of any use this year. Unfortunately I have no way of knowing what the maximum limit is until I see how many people show up on test day. I simply know that the site is full for any given date. Originally I thought that the test just became insanely popular this year. Much to my dismay I showed up Saturday morning to discover only 16 people waiting for a room with 30 desks in it to open. I was pissed.

The students seemed to agree that the test was easier than our practice ones, which is good of course. 15 of the test takers were my students. Next time I think 8 will be, and then 2 in May. Regardless, I’m done preparing students for the TOEFL, meaning I have a lot more time on my hand. I like that.

Also, earlier this week I submitted all 5 Gates Millennium Scholarship applications. I think about 30 students were eligible to apply based on GPA. All of them showed up to the first informational meeting. As we met more often, the number dwindled until only 5 remained. I met with those guys once a week for about two months, including three times during Christmas break. Each time they had to submit 2 essays and revise the ones I returned to them. There were 8 essays total. It was a very intensive process, certainly more intensive than anything else they’ve done before. What was incredibly fun was submitting all those applications online. The only connection I have is dial-up. There must have been at least 150 questions for each application. A lot of them were the “choose a response and then wait for something else to load based upon that response” variety. I spent a lot of time in my office waiting for pages to load.

And of course the application webpage decided to break while I was in the middle of submitting my applications. The webpage said to contact them via phone if something happens to the webpage. That’s easier said than done here. I resorted to asking friends via gmail chat to call for me. You know the saying that it takes a village to raise a child? I think it also takes a village to submit scholarship applications in the Marshall Islands.

I’ll be interested to see what happens to those applications. They’re not exactly conventional. In fact, so much of what my students wrote in their essays is impossible to understand for lay audiences that I even submitted a small description of the Marshall Islands to the Gates foundation. In the end the foundation received applications that were polished but clearly reflected candidates from severely disadvantaged backgrounds. Those guys have a tough decision to make.

National elections are finally over. There was an incredible debacle with the vote counting. Two separate recounts were ordered. During the first, new votes miraculously started to appear. During the second, votes that weren’t counted the first time were counted the second time. Someone in this country said that had this occurred in other countries, riots would have ensued. I think there’s some truth to that. However, the most that occurred here were a few grumblings over morning cups of coffee. There’s something to be said for the laid back Pacific attitude.

Another New Year

2007-12-31T21:24:00.000-08:00

My e-bike charger arrived and it’s fabulous. I max out at about 22 mph and get about 25 miles per full battery charge. It may not sound like much but considering it’s about 3.5 miles from my house to work, and that the highest elevation in the entire country is like five feet, it’s pretty ideal. If I were to take a taxi I would inevitably be stuck in stop and go traffic (yeah, there actually is traffic here) anyways. With my e-bike, I can just whiz by on the side of the road and arrive at work at the same time, if not a little bit sooner.

In a somewhat related bit of news, my mom sent me an “action sports video camera” for Christmas. Apparently she saw some Japanese tourists with this thing. Basically it’s a mini digital camera that’s waterproof up to a pretty shallow depth. Her thought was that I could use it to record my snorkeling trips. However, what its true advertised purpose is to capture “action sports” moments, i.e. mountain biking, skiing, etc. Now I don’t mountain bike or ski, much less here, but I do e-bike. Some time in the near future I’m going to strap that thing to my helmet and ride to and from work. I’ll upload the video (hopefully it won’t be too large) to YouTube and you guys can see what Majuro looks like. I’ll also be the oddest looking thing to ever move through Majuro, on an e-bike with a helmet cam. And yeah, next time I do go snorkeling I’ll record that as well.

School is cruising along. The Gates Millenium Scholarship applications are due soon. Each applicant is required to write eight essays, which is a pain because that means I have to edit eight essays for each applicant I have. I have five. Also, the most effective method of applying is to do it online. Of course, none of the five students who are applying have internet access. That means I’m going to input all of their applications myself, including letters of recommendation.

The TOEFL is fast approaching. We’ll have one last full length practice test on January 5th before the real thing on January 12th.

Oh yeah, it’s the New Year. I went to the block party, as I did two years ago (last year it was canceled because New Year’s Eve fell on a Sunday). It was pretty much the same as it was two years ago. Afterwards my neighbor and I sat on my deck and watched the sun rise.

Happy holidays to everyone.

The shark fin soup

2007-12-12T01:24:00.000-08:00

So remember how I became the proud consumer of Guitar Hero? I guess I should have mentioned more specifically that I was the proud consumer of Guitar Hero II. However, I can now say that I am the proud consumer of Guitar Hero I, Guitar Hero II, Guitar Hero: Rocks the 80s, and Guitar Hero III. Obviously I was unsatisfied by simply having one Guitar Hero game to play, so I tracked down a friend from college and asked if he would download/burn/send the remaining games in the Guitar Hero series for my enjoyment. He obliged and now I can rock out to my heart’s content.

The other bit of boring geeky news I have that only interests me is that I won $150 this week. Remember how I spent $340 in order to join the local fantasy football league? Yeah, I got $150 of it back this week. I know that the majority of the people who read this actually don’t give a shit about fantasy football, but damnit I do so I’m going to explain more. The local league pays out the majority of its money in weekly installments to the top three point scorers that week. I’ve made a habit of consistently coming in fourth. My team had a nasty tendency of being consistently above-average, which is pretty much the worst kind of team to have in a league that essentially rewards for unusually large blow up weeks. Thus, after 14 weeks I had won precisely $12.50 (a third place tie) and had come in fourth like 8 times. However, this week my team unleashed 14 weeks of pent up fury and I decimated the entire league by setting some sort of scoring record. It was entirely too sweet.

In a moment of pure unadulterated Chineseness, I bought an electric bike. If you’re like me, you probably have little to no idea what exactly an electric bike is. After conducing some research, apparently these things have become all the rage in China (due to the already extant popularity of bikes) and are essentially bikes with battery-operated motors that either assist you while you pedal or transport you without requiring you to pedal. It seemed to make a lot of sense given that the highest elevation in this country is two feet and that gas costs $5 a gallon. Of course, nothing in the Marshall Islands is that easy. Apparently the auto-dealer somehow ordered or received the incorrect charger for the bikes, meaning everyone who purchased the bikes could not charge the bikes. As a result, I found myself ignominiously pedaling my electric bike home from work. It’s now sitting in the shop waiting for a correct charger.

Alright, time to get to the topic of this post. On Saturday, I was at a Chinese restaurant eating a bowl of noodles when the owner, whom I’ve gotten to know reasonably well over the past 2.5 years, tells me that I should drop by Sunday because she had some new stuff she wanted me to taste. Not one to pass up free Chinese food, I do. She and I sat down with some friends and restaurant staff (Sundays are slow) and eat some sashimi and assorted Chinese goodies, though nothing necessarily new. Finally, our friend comes up the stairs with a big pot of soup. Monica greets him and soon we all have huge bowls of soup in front of us. I don’t notice anything particularly unusual about the soup, except that it definitely tastes like there’s something from the sea in it and I don’t see anything it that looks like its from the sea.

After awhile, Monica begins to talk about a rival restaurant and how its “inner circle” of customers try to make themselves look like big shots by ordering $280 bowls of soup for four people. I was like, “WTF! $70 a bowl for soup?” Monica responds, “Yeah, and there aren’t even that many fish bones in it.” Now, I’ve had fish bone soup, Essentially you boil the fish bones for so long that they become soft and edible. And yeah, it’s good, but nowhere close to $70 a bowl. Then it came to me in like 3 separate connections. The Chinese word for “fish bone” is different than the word for “bone.” Moreover, it doesn’t necessarily have to refer to a fish’s bones, but can also refer to something with a similar size, texture, etc. (a sliver, for example). I noticed that my soup contained items which sort of resembled fish bones, but obviously were not. Moreover, I immediately thought about the only type of soup I knew of that could cost $70 a bowl. Finally, I thought of the various Chinese cooking shows and movies I’ve seen in which chefs prepare shark fins. I distinctly remembered that cooked shark fins do not retain their “fin” form. Rather, they sort of separate and splay out into extremely thin threads, similar to crystal/pancit/vermicelli noodles. I asked the dude who walked in with the pot what he put in the soup. Yup, I was eating shark fin soup.

I thought it was pretty cool. To Chinese (I think), shark fin soup is kind of like a holy grail food. It’s impossible (sometimes illegal) to obtain the ingredients, ridiculously difficult to prepare, and horrendously expensive. You only consume it at extra special high-class events… or if you live in the middle of the Pacific and are surrounded by sharks. Is it possible it was caught illegally? Yeah, sure. But whatever. The guy, who works on a fishing boat, said the shark was legally caught according to the “bycatch” regulations, meaning the boat was not specifically fishing for sharks but rather the shark was caught along with the other fish. Plus, he’s based here. He’s not constantly running back and forth between here and China, and it’s not like there’s a huge shark fin market in the Marshall Islands itself. Most importantly, the damn thing was already cooked into soup form and sitting in front of me. Of course I was going to eat it.

I excitedly told an American friend of mine and she criticized me for going to “environmental hell.” Pfpfpfpfpt. I have an electric bike. That gives me enough environmental credits to eat a shark.

Oh yeah, it was really good.

Right, pictures

2007-11-24T17:55:00.000-08:00

Yeah, next time I say I'll upload pictures I probably should do it. Anyways, they're there now.

I'm moved

2007-11-21T16:36:00.000-08:00

I moved last Saturday. Overall I’d say it was a pretty painless move. A couple of friends and I moved everything out of my old house and into my new apartment in about 45 minutes. It only took one trip and we managed to finish right before the rain started. There were a few straggling items that I had to take care of, but they were pretty minor.

My new place is actually a lot nicer than I expected. My only purpose for moving was to save a few bucks every month on my power bill. However, my new place could safely be called a step up. It’s newly renovated, and much more spacious. The bathroom itself is probably larger than my dorm room my first year here, an observation which was made by a friend who currently lives in the dorm. I’ve uploaded some pics (yeah it’s been awhile since I’ve done this) of the apartment to my photo album.

My friend Sara left tonight. She was a part of my volunteer group and, after spending an extended summer back home after our first year, also came back to work for another year. That means everyone who originally came with me is now gone. There is one more volunteer who’s still here, but she was on an outer island the first year – not quite the same. It’s an eerie feeling being a combination of the Last of the Mohicans and the elder statesman.

Yesterday, something happened to me that had yet to happen in the previous 2.5 years. I felt a little burned out. It’s a little difficult to explain. I had just finished teaching my TOEFL prep course and the office was pretty empty given that it was a lunch time. All of a sudden this feeling of fatigue without the accompanying satisfaction just swept over me and I felt extremely unmotivated to do what I knew I had to do next.

I’ve always considered myself as someone who’s able to push himself further and harder than the average bear, but I guess even I have my limits. Either in this blog or in an e-mail I once wrote that I often feel like I’m running on a treadmill here for I’m expending a lot of effort but don’t seem to be getting very far. I think the more accurate metaphor now is being a cog in a machine that spins about 3x as fast as all the other cogs. I’m expending a lot more effort but the final output of the machine as a whole is only minimally changed by my extra effort. I’ve pushed my cog pretty hard for pretty long, but I guess even I can only maintain my pace for so long before slowing down.

Two years ago, I wrote this on this same blog:

“Thus, in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’d like to give thanks to all of my 107 students. Thank you for making me appreciate what I have and inspiring me to work like hell.”

Tomorrow will be the 3rd Thanksgiving I will have spent here. 19 of those original 107 have graduated (they were seniors when I taught them). I’m not sure how many of the remaining 88 are still in school. If they are, they’re seniors, and I’m helping them go to college. I’m more thankful for them now than I was two years ago.

I actually have news

2007-11-02T22:47:00.000-07:00

I’m moving. In what might be the first real bit of news I have about myself, I’m... well, moving. Currently I live in a little quaint single unit house with a fenced in yard. It’s completely adequate. I definitely enjoy living here and can’t complain a single bit about it. Nevertheless, I am paying my own power bills here, and that became the trump card. My new place is a second floor apartment which pays for my power. I can’t exactly pass that up. An average power bill is about $75 a month and can easily be more if I use it as much as I want to. It’s also new and bigger so that’s nice. Moreover, it’s owned by my host family and I get a nice view of the sunset over the lagoon from my second floor deck. Decision made. I’ll move next week.

The school held its Halloween Party this past Friday. I was at school from about 7 AM to 2 AM organizing the damn thing. It was fun except, like everything here, became invaded by denizens of little children. That’s a rather interesting little tidbit I’ve never blogged about before. I have no idea what it’s like in other developing countries, but in the Marshall Islands, and I’d imagine other parts of the Pacific, the definition of supervision is simply different than what you and I are accustomed to. If you’ve read Coming of Age in Samoa, you’ll know that children here “learn” and “develop” due to much different forces than what “taught” and “developed” us as children (just ignore the part of the book that tries to paint a picture of complete utopia). Traditionally children were not hawked over by their parents because the appropriate development necessitated a certain amount of freedom and peer (other children) supervision. This worked well until globalization changed the circumstances under which everyone, including children, live. Now, a western definition of supervision is more required if a parent wants his/her child to succeed according to increasingly western definitions of success. A child must stay in school for a long time, avoid western temptations, etc. This requires a lot more “active oversight” from parents than they were certainly used to growing up as children. Thus, the result is that a lot of children are still raised according to traditional definitions of supervision and encounter problems due to the existence of non-traditional forces and circumstances, i.e. drugs, alcohol, lack of participation in school, etc. The hundreds of unsupervised elementary-aged children at the Halloween Party will become victims of teenage alcohol abuse, teen pregnancy, and general juvenile delinquency in 5-8 years.

I’ve decided that my goal this year is 20 students attending college off-island. The fist year I was here, as a volunteer teacher, there were two. Last year, my first as a college counselor, there were nine. I think twenty is possible with enough work and luck. A sub-goal is a Gates Millenium Scholar. We received these applications earlier this week and I’ve been pondering how likely it would be to get one of them. The stars would have to align in a certain way, but I think it’s within reach. It’d be nice to have it as an “alternative” to going to Taiwan since the current next best option isn’t even close. This is also an open invitation to anyone who might be able to help me. The Gates Millenium Scholarship application is somewhat inapplicable to students here. I’d like to get the ear of someone within the organization who can help me, i.e. I want to write some sort of primer explaining living and educational circumstances here so the appropriate people can read it before reading my students’ applications. For example, it asks for volunteer and community service experience, both of which simply don’t exist in the same sense that they do in the United States. I need to let them know about this. If you can help, let me know.

I attended the kemem (first birthday) of my host nephew this Wednesday. A kemem is a really big deal here and this one didn’t disappoint. There were a ton of people and my host family stayed up all night accommodating guests. My oldest host sister leaves on Monday for Hawaii where she will deliver her baby. She’ll be there for a month before returning with the baby. Her plan is to stay here until next summer when she will return to school.

1st quarter ends this Tuesday. I have three quarters left in the Marshall Islands.

Wow, it's been awhile

2007-10-05T18:54:00.000-07:00

October 6, 2007 – 1:17 PM – Wow, it’s been awhile

I have my second Guitar Hero controller. More excitingly, I’ve figured out how to customize my guitar hero games. That means I can load songs from my computer into my Guitar Hero game and play them on Guitar Hero. It’s pretty much the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me. Basically my life has condensed itself into school, fantasy football, and Guitar Hero. And you know what, I can’t complain.

In mid-November I will take the TOEFL. Having taught it for two years, I figured it was about time I actually see a real one to gauge whether or not what I’ve been teaching is similar to what is being tested. There will be two months in between when I take the TOEFL and my students do. That should be enough time for me to readjust my teaching plans as necessary based upon what I see on my test day.

Oh, for one of the few times in my life, college admissions probably being the only other instance, being from Idaho came in handy. Allow me to explain.

Over the past two years, I’ve noticed that students from the Marshall Islands (and all other Freely Associated States by corollary) have a hard time negotiating the financial aid process, largely due to their unique immigration status vis-à-vis the United States. They don’t have US passports or SSNs, but are eligible for Federal Pell Grants. Unfortunately, given the extreme international security extant today, when a US college receives a financial aid application from a student without a SSN or immigration documentation, their natural reaction is that a mistake was probably made but to err on the side of caution. Thus, they request from the applicant the information that they assume is simply missing. However, due to the fact that the missing information really isn’t missing, and due to the extreme difficulty in communicating anything from here, students are left in a position in which they can’t explain why their financial aid application looks the way it does. The result is that they don’t receive any financial aid, which means they aren’t able to go to college. Needless to say, that’s bad.

I’ve been trying to correct this but haven’t had much success. The US Embassy misunderstood the problem and thus gave me an irrelevant solution. Given the nature of the problem, I wasn’t really sure who else could help me if not the US Embassy. Then, in May, fortune smiled upon me in the form of former Idaho governor and senator, Dirk Kempthorne, now Secretary of the Interior. He visited the Marshall Islands on a tour of the Pacific and briefly stopped by a Chamber of Commerce meeting at which I was present. I dropped the state name and got his ear for enough time to explain the situation I was facing. He put me in touch with some people at the Department of the Interior and, after a few months of persistent e-mail correspondence, I got a call earlier this week from someone at the DOI asking me for details regarding the problem so she would be well informed before meeting with the Department of Education about it next week. With any luck this will all be resolved before my students start applying for college this year.

My oldest host sister, whom I taught the first year I was here and who went to college in Washington, is now pregnant. She follows my middle host sister who had her baby last August. I have one more host sister left. She’s 16 and a junior. My instincts tell me that my host dad is going to lock her in the deepest darkest dungeon in Majuro and throw away the key.

I own Peyton Manning

2007-09-07T18:54:00.000-07:00

School has started.

More importantly, football season has started. This year I threw away the majority of the common sense and joined the local fantasy football league for $340. Basically it’s a question of how much faith do I have in my geek mettle. Unfortunately, that’s something I refuse to have questioned. It’s kind of like Michael J. Fox in the Back to the Future movies. Whenever someone calls him a chicken he freaks out and does something irrational. Whenever my geek mettle gets questioned I freak out and do something irrational, like spend $340 on what amounts to little more than a game of chance. Whatever. Game on!

There’s nothing too much to report from school. I teach two classes again. Government, again. I do the college counseling, again. On a bright note some students have already started talking to me about going to college and what it takes to go to Taiwan. Last year’s successes have apparently generated more interest from this year’s class.

Hmm, I just realized I have very little to say this week. How about this. I am now the happy consumer of Guitar Hero. A returned teacher brought it for me a few weeks ago and I’ve been rocking out ever since. I’ve even managed to accomplish my lifelong goal of playing Sweet Child of Mine. Yeah, simple pleasures. We’ve had a few Guitar Hero parties and I’m getting a second guitar whenever the mail arrives. Alright, I think that’s it. More to come when something exciting happens.

I see the bad moon rising

2007-08-28T04:04:00.000-07:00

It’s not just a CCR song, it’s also what I’m looking at right now. As far as I know, this is the first time in my life that I’ve seen a red moon. I’m sure it has something to do with the sun and I’m sure it can be seen in other parts of the world as well, but I’m going to pretend that it’s something that can only be viewed in the Marshall Islands. It is, however, appearing on a perfectly cloudless night which, if you’ve been reading this blog since its inception, also means that I can see the Milky Way. Thus, even if you can see the red moon, just know that I can see it with the Milky Way and like a bajillion other stars.

The Taiwan girls left last Thursday. It’s a terrible understatement, but I was really happy to see them go. It was just genuine, unadulterated delight. They’ve worked very hard and overcome more than anyone should ever have to, and I was just pleased to have been a small part of their stories. Truthfully, I don’t think I’ve felt a purer joy in my life. It was just a very special moment. The pictures above are of them at the airport right before they left. There were two more, but unfortunately my camera literally broke at the airport. At least I got those four.

I was witness to a mini-miracle this past week. One of my students received a travel grant to attend Palau Community College, like the other two I’ve mentioned before. He was supposed to leave on the same flight as the others but was unable to because he was stuck on an outer island. He was visiting relatives and was unable to return to Majuro because Air Marshall Islands, the domestic carrier, had both of its planes grounded due to mechanical failures. Five canceled flights later, my student was still on his outer island while the other three were flying to Palau. It was a terrible shame, given what he’s had to do to even reach this point and finally to be deterred by the domestic airline of all things. I asked Palau Community College and they said that my student could still attend next semester, but that they could not pay for his ticket. Frustrated and disappointed by the way things turned out, I wrote a letter to the editor of the local newspaper requesting that steps be taken to ensure that a similar predicament not arise in the future.

The next day, I returned to my office after lunch and found a note attached to my door. A random stranger was leaving for Honolulu that night but offered to pay for my student’s plane ticket from Majuro to Palau if he decided to attend next semester. I was flabbergasted. I called around town and tracked him down to his hotel (yeah, this actually works pretty well in Majuro). I arranged to accost him before he got on his shuttle to the airport. I bought him a drink and we chatted for a bit. He was a diver who came to dive Bikini. Unfortunately for him, the only carrier from Majuro to Bikini is also Air Marshall Islands. He couldn’t reach Bikini and had to leave, but before he did he read my article and decided to help out someone who was in a similar situation. Random acts of kindness, gotta love them.

School still hasn’t started yet. However, I’ll be teaching an out-of-school TOEFL class this year and that will begin tomorrow. My students can take the same class during school, but I’ve received a few requests from members of the community who are unable to attend a TOEFL class during school hours, since those are also work hours. The vast majority of these came from Chinese who either wanted to take a TOEFL themselves, or who had kids who needed to take TOEFLs (Chinese students all attend private schools so they can’t make it to my TOEFL classes offered during school). I gladly offered to teach a course during evening hours. If you can’t tell, I’ve become decidedly more Chinese since I’ve been here and thought this would be a good way to get myself more involved in the Chinese community.

It floors me sometimes to see the similarities between the Chinese families here and the one in which I grew up. The obvious parallels are that they and my family both immigrated from China to a foreign country in order to pursue better opportunities and give better opportunities to their children. The foreign country in question is different, but the culture so to speak is exactly the same. I was eating dinner with a Chinese family one night – they have a 16 year old son who will be attending my TOEFL class – and thought I was looking ten years back in time. Everything down to the food we were eating (they’re from the same part of China as my family), to our topics of discussion, to how they talked about their son was a mirror image of what I remember growing up. Conversation was laden with school and future academic plans. Their son was never good enough and needed to study harder.

When I spoke with their son alone, he conveyed how frustrated he was at always being inadequate in his parents’ eyes. My head was just throbbing at that point because I felt like I almost knew too much about what he was talking about. I wasn’t even sure where to start because everything just wanted to spill out like a bursting dam. In the end, I just told him that all Chinese parents are like that and it’s just their way of encouraging us to work harder. In addition, I told him that it’s unfair for them to criticize him like that, particularly publicly in a foreign country that doesn’t obey the same conventions, and to not be discouraged by what the say. I like to think that I would’ve appreciated such a comment from a slightly older Chinese male when I was 16. But oh wait, I was in Idaho and that wasn’t going to happen.

Alright, I’m going to go look at this moon one last time. Have a good night.

Faking athleticism and the third eye

2007-08-18T14:59:00.000-07:00

School’s been delayed by about three weeks due to construction. That means that the previous week and the upcoming two have been and will be the most boring three weeks of my life. There’s literally nothing for me to do anywhere. I realized this week that the reason I’ve been having trouble sleeping is that I simply don’t do enough during a day to make myself tired. I sleep for like three hours and that’s all the rest my body needs. Usually I fill up the remaining five hours by eating. I bought a big pack of artificially flavored peanut butter cookies and baked myself a cake in preparation for more early mornings. Yes I know, my life is awesome.

In order to combat my impending bulimia, I’ve decided to take up soccer. Twice a week a bunch of guys play soccer on this little patch of grass with a telephone pole in the middle of it. Out of all the things I’ve quit in my life, I think soccer is the one I regret most. It’s basically a way to make friends no matter where you are in the world, kind of like drinking. Unfortunately I only played like one year of “little league” soccer plus a few IM games when someone who actually knew how to play was too hung over.

I’ve always found interesting the dynamic that is created when someone who is incompetent at a certain activity joins a bunch of people who are more or less competent at said activity. I guess there’s two schools of thought. The incompetent guy can disengage himself and learn passively so he doesn’t screw up the people who are competent, or he can engage himself and learn actively and try to compensate for a lack of skills with extreme effort in order to mitigate the anger of everyone else. I usually fall into the latter camp. However, in this case, not only did I lack skills but I also lacked fitness. Thus, when I kicked into “OK I suck but at least I can earn points by trying really hard” mode, I couldn’t go for very long and soon became an enormous waste of space on the pitch.

Whatever. I’ve gone about four or five times. It’s pretty much the only thing that makes me tired enough to fall asleep for eight hours.

On Friday I was out with some new teachers at a private elementary school here. Apparently someone had asked one of them if he believes in the “third eye,” meaning telekinesis or some shit. Moreover, this guy had also asked pretty much everyone else at the table the same thing, a revelation which naturally resulted in much raucous conversation about third eyes, third nipples, third testicles, etc. – basically anything that naturally exists in pairs and would be really fucked up if they existed in threes.

A few minutes later, a friend who had been here for a year walked by and told us that she had just been at her host aunt’s elomej. If you’re a long time reader of this blog, you might remember that an elomej is a wake before a funeral and a very large and important part of Marshallese culture (see my host grandmother’s elomej post two years ago). Anyways, the new teacher, the one who had recently been asked about the third eye and hadn’t been here long enough to recognize what an elomej is, responded with, “Oh really? DID SHE HAVE A THIRD EYE?”

He kind of smiled faintly at her, wondering why she wasn’t laughing. The other new teachers kind of gave each other probing looks, like they knew something wasn’t right but couldn’t quite figure out what. My friend Jay, who’s been here off and on for a long time, gave the new dude the “you should shut up now” elbow. And you know how, in every group, there’s that one jackass who derives so much pleasure out of other people’s really uncomfortable and awkward moments? Yeah, that guy’s me. I started laughing uproariously. First, I tried to keep it in, which resulted in hacking sounds emanating from me and a general shaking of my torso. However, it soon escaped but luckily, by then, the teacher who’s host aunt had died explained what an elomej was and everyone else had started chuckling too.

Two weeks to go before school starts. I’ll take suggestions about what the hell to do.

I got puked on

2007-08-11T19:50:00.000-07:00

I officially have 365 days left in the Marshall Islands. My contract with the Ministry of Education expires on August 13, 2008. A friend recently asked me if, whenever I write down the date on a check, blackboard, etc., I immediately think about where I will be and what I will be doing one year from that date. By virtue of having just determined that I will be leaving the Marshall Islands exactly one year from now, the answer is yes. One significant stage of my life will have ended and a yet to be determined one will begin.

Last week I created the “07-08” folder on my hard drive. Ever since “98-99” I’ve been organizing everything I create or write according to academic years, a fact which reveals that I’m ridiculously geeky because I’ve been archiving shit on a computer since I was 14. Nevertheless, “07-08” will be the last folder that will be populated from documents regarding the Marshall Islands, a very momentous revelation in my compact little nerd world. What “08-09” will hold remains to be seen, though I’m already deliberating on how I’m going to neatly transition from organizing according to academic years to organizing according to calendar years, since “08-09” will be the first folder that will not correspond to some sort of educational institution. I guess dates on computer folders are my equivalent of dates on checks or blackboards.

Next week a new school year will begin, my last at Marshall Islands High School. I’m definitely less excited about this upcoming year, probably because I’ve already done what I’ll be doing. I assume it’s a natural reaction, but I think it’s a good indication that one more year is probably a good limit. I don’t want to be here if I’m no longer excited to be here.

One of the six girls who was selected to be Taiwan Scholars, one not from my school, recently declined the offer due to personal reasons. In response, the Taiwan Embassy chose another one of my students as the alternate. She accepted and is now on board. That means five out of the six scholars are from Marshall Islands High School. I’m quite proud of that. We’re having dinner at a Chinese restaurant tomorrow, the same one I went to earlier with the same group of girls. However, the newly selected scholar wasn’t a part of our group at that time, so now we need to include her. The same rule applies – no forks allowed.

Last week three students left to attend school in Palau. It was a very touching scene at the airport. Their relatives and even random strangers approached them to shake their hands as they departed. I think everyone recognized the importance of what those three students were about to do. I imagine the reception will be much larger when the Taiwan girls leave.

The total number going to Palau should have been four. One student was unable to go because he’s been stranded on an outer island for over three weeks now. It’s extremely frustrating and unfortunate. Palau Community College even paid for his plane ticket to go to Palau because his grades were very good. I informed his parents and they made arrangements for him to fly back to Majuro on Air Marshall Islands. Four canceled flights later, he’s still out there. Palau has already changed his ticket once to accommodate him. Every time they do it they lose $75, and he’s still not here. I’ve e-mailed Palau again to ask them to change it again but haven’t heard back. It’s ludicrous from every perspective. What this kid has had to overcome to even get to this point is monumental. And now that he’s successfully reached the end, he’s being obstructed by the government airline. Placement tests at Palau Community College are already over, and classes start tomorrow. I’m not sure what’s going to happen to this student but I don’t think it will be anything good. What a shame.

I realized this week that I’m exactly half-way to my savings goal that will allow me to travel around the world for a year. That makes sense since I’m half-way done with working in the Marshall Islands. If all goes according to plan, I’ll be going home with a comfortable amount of money and can begin shopping and planning for what I’m tentatively calling one big fucking trip. It’s a really satisfying feeling knowing that I’m slowly achieving a very large long-term goal.

Hmm, I should probably share some sort of story to properly end this very stream of consciousness post. Let’s see, oh! I got puked on two nights ago. Vomit stories are always fun because the people reading them aren’t covered in vomit and get to read about someone who is. For some reason throwing up has become a very common incident in my life recently, though it’s never myself who’s doing the upchucking.

I was out Friday night with some friends and was walking through a bar when I hear the familiar sound of dense oatmeal hitting the floor. Unfortunately, it was also accompanied by the feeling of something warm with the consistency of a milkshake hitting my calf and oozing down my leg. The dude who puked on me sort of stumbled away without even saying anything and I was stuck standing there with his gift dribbling down my leg.

Have you ever really thought how ridiculous it is to get hit by vomit? I mean, at any given moment, how many people are vomiting? Even in a bar, it’s not that many. Not to mention that there’s a lot of space and the trajectory of the vomit really doesn’t cover very much. And I just happened to be walking through the 1.5 square feet that was being vomited on at that split second? Like seriously, what the hell. If I had began walking a half second later, or earlier, or had taken a different path, or had stopped to talk to someone, or if I was walking at a different pace, or if someone was behind me or in front of me to force me to walk at a different pace, my leg would have never encountered puke. But no, the stars aligned and I got hit by projectile puke.

After I got puked on, I had another problem. What the hell do I do? I can’t just stand there, yet I don’t want to move with vomit on my foot. I want to wash it off, but there isn’t exactly a shower in the bar. I could try washing it off with sink water, but then I would just cover the floor with diluted puke. For a brief moment I thought about dunking my foot in the toilet, but decided against it. Plus, that would mean that I have to look at it, which I hadn’t done yet and really didn’t want to do. Finally, I decided that standing in the pool of puke probably wasn’t the best idea and slowly made my way outside in the hopes that it would magically rain on my leg or something. So I slowly sauntered out of the bar, the vomit squishing nicely in between the sole of my foot and my flip-flop, including in between my toes. Once I made it out I was once again stuck. There isn’t exactly a hose or a pump located on every street corner of Majuro. I thought about going home, but didn’t want to drag a puked on leg into some poor guy’s taxi. There really needs to be some in-bar pamphlet about what to do if you get puked on, kind of like those in-flight pamphlets that direct you to the nearest exit in case of emergency. At the very least there can be a hose that drops down from the ceiling like an oxygen mask. There’s a surprisingly lack of options once you’re covered in puke.

In the end, I squished my way towards a mud puddle and washed myself off with… mud. It was awesome. I made these nice mudpuke pies and my leg was now puked on, smelly, and muddy. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so awesome in my entire life. I mean, I was definitely ready to go hit on some hot chick.

“Hey baby, can I buy you a drink?”

“Sure super handsome guy… wait, what’s that smell?”

“Oh, that’s just my leg.”

“Why does your leg smell oh so handsome guy who I’m totally attracted to?”

“It’s covered in vomit.”

“What?”

“Yeah, but don’t worry, I slapped some mud over it so it’s all good.”

“Wow, that’s the hottest thing I’ve ever heard, let’s go back to my place right now!”

Yeah, probably not.

In the end I went back in and made my friends tolerate me for a little bit while I danced and they maintained a respectful vomit radius around me.

You know, that reminds me. In college I puked out of a car window and it flew back in and hit five of my friends right in the face in addition to permanently violating my friend’s car. The next day, one of them told me, “You know you’ve got good friends when you can puke in their face and don’t kick you in the face the next day.”

I think dancing with you while you have mudpuke on your leg should also be added to that. Somewhere, Brian, Paul, Tristan, Gerbil, and Ann are smiling.

Shortest trip ever

2007-07-29T20:52:00.000-07:00

I was so incredibly excited about the thought of going to Ebon for a week. First, it would be my first real break since the time I first arrived. Second, I would be visiting an outer island. Third, I would be visiting during the Jubilee, a once-in-50 years celebration. Finally, I would be getting there via a very comfortable tourist ship. I thought, “If anything deserves to be blogged about daily, surely this is it!” Therefore, I even packed a notebook to write some daily musings along the way. Unfortunately, the entire trip lasted about 18 hours and 6 miles, as long as you don’t count the miles we spent going in circles.

We boarded at around 5:00 PM on Saturday. Our vessel was equipped with seven cabins and an air-conditioned bar/lounge area. It even had a TV/DVD and a karaoke machine. By most standards, we would be traveling quite luxuriously. I picked out a nice bench for myself in the lounge to sleep on and prepared for what I hoped would be a leisurely, relaxing journey to Ebon.

We departed at around 6:30 PM, only 30 minutes after the scheduled time, which is a miracle by island standards. I noticed that the ship was going unusually slowly, but didn’t think too much of it because the allotted traveling time was rather along (around 36 hours). After 3-4 hours, we finally made it out of the lagoon, as evinced by the considerably rougher waters the ship encountered. I remembered the seasickness pills that I packed and commended myself for being the smartest man in the world. I fell asleep at around 9:00 PM or so.

I was awakened soon after by the most violent, earth-shattering, sonic boom-like vomiting you have ever heard. This girl on the other side of the lounge must have been going into convulsions she was heaving so badly. First came the BLEGHARGHACKRACCOONCOMINGOUTOFTHROAT noise, then the sound of a running faucet, then the sound of dense oatmeal hitting the floor. To top it off, she had spent the whole night eating papaya pickled in Kool-Aid, which made her vomit a most awesome shade of scarlet. Then she did it again. And again. And again.

After that the floodgates opened. Student after student began puking, some on the floor, some on the floor while running out – leaving a nice trail, some into the door while running out, and some actually over the edge and into the ocean. Once again, I thought of my seasickness pills, and took pride in my coolness.

While awakened by the religious upchucking, I discovered that we were headed in the wrong direction. Majuro was definitely looming closer out the window. I asked what was going on and was told that one of the engines was having problems and that we were going back to Majuro. I wasn’t exactly sure what to think at that point, because I really did want to go to Ebon but the contagious puking was getting to me, and I really didn’t want to put up with it for another 36 hours.

We were met by mechanics in the middle of the lagoon, mainly an attempt from the charter company to get us on our way so it wouldn’t have to refund the money we were paying them for the ship. With calm waters again, I fell asleep at around 1:00 AM. I woke up at 8:00 AM. I rubbed my eyes, stretched, and walked towards the window to admire the open ocean view. However, I didn’t see the open ocean. Instead, I saw Majuro.

“What the fuck? Why are we still in the lagoon?” I asked. The man next to me shrugged. Somehow we had managed to sit in the same place for like 13 or 14 hours without ever deciding what to do next. “Well, are we going to Ebon or are we going back to Majuro?” I asked. The man next to me shrugged again. I sought out the director of Upward Bound, who informed me that while I was asleep, the engine had been fixed something like five times and had broken something like five times. Each time it was fixed we turned around to head to Ebon, and it would break about ten minutes later, forcing us to turn around again and head towards Majuro. Surprisingly, after half a day of this, the charter company still felt that the ship could be repaired to such a condition that would allow us to travel to Ebon and back. After the engine was fixed for the sixth time and broke for the sixth time, the director just put her foot down and said we were going back to Majuro.

Of course, going back to Majuro wasn’t easy either. And why should it have been? The story would suck more. Apparently docking a large ship with a broken engine isn’t easy. The captain tried steering the boat into harbor but couldn’t get the angle right and had to try FOUR SEPARATE TIMES. Imagine floating on a boat aimlessly for 18 hours, seeing the dock, and then being pulled away from it FOUR SEPARATE TIMES. It was awesome.

So here I am, with a week’s worth of dried and canned food and a week of vacation off work. And the only thing I could think of doing was writing a blog post. Whatever, the seasickness pills in my cabinet still say I’m the smartest man in the world.

I have a story to tell!

2007-07-14T15:53:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I went to Three Bag Island, a small island in the Majuro lagoon, with Upward Bound. I had a good time, and I have an adventurous story to share. On Friday night I went fishing with three Marshallese and two Fijians. We got into this small skiff (no bigger than a standard-sized sedan) and headed for deep water. Unbeknownst to me, the plan was to tie our skiff to this open-water platform thingy that marks the location of the channel. And who was in charge of standing on the bow of the boat and tying the rope to the end of the rusted ladder on the platform? Yeah, that would be me. So I put on my sea legs and wobble over to the edge of the boat that’s bobbing up and down in the water because it’s the channel and there’s about a 3-4’ difference from trough to crest in the channel waves. I grab a hold of the ladder to tie the rope and of course the wave breaks and the boat goes down into the trough. That means I was hanging on to the ladder without anything to stand on cause the boat was now 2’ away from my feet. Then it came back up so I could stand on it, and then it went back down again, leaving me hanging there. After three attempts I finally managed to tie the boat onto the ladder and we started fishing. Every five minutes the ladder made this “I’m going to break now” noise to which my Fijian teacher friend responded by giving a nervous chuckle.

At around nine we decide to go back. I untie us from the creaking rusted ladder and immediately after the sky opens and we get absolutely dumped on. We start to take in water and begin to bail while heading back. Then we realize that we can’t see any lights because of the rain. We had no idea where our island was. To top it off, our island’s light was the equivalent of a mosquito zapper because the solar panels weren’t working and the only light we had was, well, a large mosquito zapper. So there we were, stuck in the rain, being pummeled by waves, in a skiff no larger than a sedan, and we had no idea where to go because we couldn’t see anything. We go in the general direction of our island, hoping that we’re going to see something. The rain stopped briefly and I noticed that we were surrounded by that phosfluorescent algae stuff in the water. The lagoon, was literally sparkling, which was kind of cool. But then the rain started again and I realized again that we were stuck in the lagoon in pitch darkness, taking in water, had no idea where we were going, and the glowing algae ceased to be cool. After about twenty minutes of going who knows where and being soaked to the bone, the Marshallese started speaking to each other in Marshallese, and the Fijians to each other in Fijian. I was like, “Where’s someone to speak Chinese with me?” But then I thought, “Hey, maybe they’re discussing traditional navigational methods so we can get back and stuff. No worries I’m with seasoned Pacific Islanders!” But then I started listening to one the Marshallese and realized that she was fucking praying! I was like, “What the fuck?! You can’t be scared! That’s my job as the landlubber. You have to get us out of here!”

Finally, we saw a light and made for it. Of course, when we got there, we realized it was the wrong island. We turned around and went back THE OTHER WAY in hopes of finding our island. Then we heard this crunch and the boat stopped moving. We were stuck on the reef. More Fijian. More Marshallese. Still no Chinese. This guy and I, as the only two grown men in the boat, jumped out and pushed us off the reef. We have the coral cuts to prove it. As we started heading in some other unknown direction, suddenly someone asks, “Hey how much gas do we have left?” The other man checks and says, “Um, let’s go back to that island.” We get back to the island and realize that we were on Eneko, only two islands down from ours. A man agrees to tow our boat back to our island. While disembarking, the Marshallese woman fell into the water. She says I rocked the boat when I stood up to get out. But I maintain it was the other Fijian lady because I never got out of the boat and she did. Anyways, we fished her out of the water and the other boat finally towed us back to our island. Yeah, it was awesome. That night two of my students put toothpaste on my face while I was asleep.

My second batch of homebrewed beer is almost ready. The previous batch I made had a slightly sour aftertaste, almost like I put a few skittles in each bottle. I’ve been told that this is either due to my using table sugar to prime my beer instead of a more appropriate priming sugar or the weather simply being too hot while the beer is fermenting. The weather I can’t change, but the sugar I can. This time I used corn syrup. Hopefully it’ll turn out better.

Upward Bound ends in two weeks. Afterwards my summer break finally begins. Faculty have to report back to work at the high school staring August 13^th, meaning I get about three weeks between the end of Upward Bound and the quasi-beginning of school. However, there’s no telling when school will actually start because, much like last year, we’re waiting for a few new buildings to be finished. The buildings themselves are done, I think, but they don’t have any power. We could probably begin school with no power in the buildings, which is what we did last year, but I’m not exactly sure what the plan is this year.

Done again

2007-06-30T18:42:00.000-07:00

Wow. Long time no written update. I guess pictures can only count for so much.

Graduation occurred about two weeks ago. I was actually in charge of coordinating it this year since the people who had previously no longer work with us and the principal was off-island. There were some ups and downs but, all in all, I think it was a success. We received a lot of praise for “modernizing” graduation. We added a few special marching maneuvers and the students chose their own recessional song, some hip-hop diddy called “Walk It Out.” I spliced it together with the first 15 seconds or so of pomp and circumstances and segued between the two with a record scratch sound effect. The result was the students marched with the hesitation step for the first fifteen seconds before freezing and then strutting out the rest of the way. It worked surprisingly well, and the audience really seemed to enjoy something different.

Hmm, has anyone even seen Friday Night Lights? It’s a movie about a town obsessed with high school football. The opening scene is the head coach looking at his “big board” of players and moving little name placards around to create his depth chart. The ending scene is the head coach taking the name placards of the graduated seniors off the wall and throwing them in the trash can. Every time I go in the office, that’s how I feel. I took down my calendar and printed out a new one. I created the “2007-2008” folder in my computer. I’ve even started throwing away the college/scholarship/financial aid information of those who aren’t going or didn’t finish applying on time. I mean, this is what’s supposed to happen. I’m sure more experienced educators take this in stride, and I would too if I had been doing this for a decade or so. But right now, it still feels a little more significant. Each year is still a big deal and throwing away those names and that information is still a big deal.

Now that school’s out, I’m teaching summer school at Upward Bound. It’s not bad, though I would have appreciated a little break between the end of school and the beginning of Upward Bound. Because we started late and ended late, the first week of Upward Bound actually coincided with graduation week, the combination of which had me running around very frantically. However, it’s calmed down a bit now. At the end of July I’m going on the annual Upward Bound outer island trip. This year we’re going to Ebon, which also coincides with the 150 year Jubilee, marking the 150^th anniversary of when the missionaries first came to the Marshall Islands… yeah, I know.

My oldest host sister is back from college in Seattle (I applied her last year). I asked her how it was. The first two things she said is that it’s really cold and that she’s tried of white people asking her to hula.

Yesterday my friend Dave and I tried to make it out to the airport to see off our friend, Natalie. We were told the flight was at 3:00 PM. We made plans to catch the 10:30 AM shuttle to the airport. For the first time in, well, forever, something in the Marshall Islands happened early and the shuttle left before we got there at 10:30 AM. We decided to catch the other shuttle leaving at 11:00 AM from the other hotel. For the second time in, well, forever something in the Marshall islands happened early and that shuttle left before we even got there at 10:45 AM. Just before we were about to shell out some money for a taxi ride, the shuttle came back from the airport. We asked if it would be leaving again and the driver said he would be getting some lunch and then leaving again at noon. Dave and I decided to spend the taxi money that we had just “saved” on some milkshakes and then hop on the shuttle at noon. Come noon, the driver remembered that he was in the Marshall Islands and didn’t show up on time. Dejected, Dave and I reluctantly hailed a taxi and rode to the airport. When we got there, we discovered that Natalie had given us incorrect information and that the plane actually departs at 1:00 PM and that she herself had literally just boarded the plane. Dave and I gave each other the, “Wow, the past 2 hours have been really shitty” look and spent the rest of the day watching Die Harder 2 because we had just seen Die Hard 4 and thought it was entirely too awesome.

More pics? Ahh!

2007-06-22T21:15:00.000-07:00

There's about 12 pics from graduation in the photo album.

Pics? No way!

2007-06-16T23:23:00.000-07:00

Uploaded some pics from this year's senior banquet.

Coming soon to Taiwan

2007-05-30T23:39:00.000-07:00

Bam! Last year one MIHS student received a Taiwan Scholarship. This year it’s four. That’s a success. On a more sour note, the circumstances under which some of the scholarship recipients were accepted have come under heavy criticism. Instead of trying to spell it out for you, I’ll just provide some links.

ROC awards six scholarships

Scholarship corruption?

More criticism

It is rather disappointing that this had to happen, though it wasn’t totally unexpected. Small island politics can manifest themselves in very obvious ways. There were other very deserving students, some from MIHS and some from others, who may or may not have been passed up by this internal politicking. It’s difficult to guess what could have/should have happened, so I’m not going to try. I just have to accept what happened and move on. After all, some of what happened is very promising. I’ll probably take the students who applied through me out for Chinese food. No forks will be allowed.

Henry was not accepted. He's currently serving his sentence.

Judgment Day

2007-05-12T20:37:00.000-07:00

If it wasn’t obvious, I decided to help Henry. The decision making process was long and arduous, so I’ll spare you the details. Just rest assured that a lot of thought went into it.

Soon after I decided to help Henry, I recognized that a very daunting task loomed over the horizon. I would have to tell the Taiwan Embassy about what Henry did. While the scholarship application never asked for an applicant’s legal history, it was clearly my ethical responsibility to provide this information. At stake were the reputations of the Taiwan Embassy officials, my school, me, the safety of other candidates, the safety of people in Taiwan, and the chances of future applicants from my school. While I am willing to put myself on the line for Henry, I can’t put other students on the line for him. He made a choice. It will affect him. I will allow it to affect me. I cannot allow it to affect others.

However, I also faced the dilemma of when exactly to tell the Taiwan Embassy. After all, Henry’s trial had not even occurred yet. Until it had, any information I had was completely alleged. As uncomfortable as I would be not sharing the information at all, I would be equally uncomfortable sharing only speculative information. What if I spilled the beans but Henry wound up being acquitted? I decided I had to wait until the trial had concluded before I told the Taiwan Embassy. In this respect, the longer than expected wait for the final results is a blessing. I did not relish the thought of withholding this information until after the results were announced.

Henry’s trial occurred this week. He, and two other defendants, both students at my school, entered into a plea bargain. They pled guilty to assault and battery as well as drunk and disorderly conduct. Their sentence is 44 days in prison. He began serving it today.

I made the call on Thursday. It was unquestionably one of the most difficult phone calls I’ve ever had to make. It’s my job to give opportunities to students. Yet there I was, about to take an opportunity away. The call lasted no longer than three minutes. The embassy official thanked me for sharing the information. I told him that I still supported Henry. I don’t think it will matter.

Almost There

2007-05-04T18:25:00.000-07:00

I still haven’t heard anything about the Taiwan Scholarships yet. However, I’ve been told that, during the interviews, my students were far better prepared than other students from other schools. I noticed this myself when I showed up with my students and saw other candidates waiting in jeans, t-shirts, and, in one case, a football jersey. My students said they felt nervous but ready. The questions they had to answer were the same ones I asked them during our practice interviews. Public schools 1, private schools 0. Rock!

My TOEFL scores finally arrived. There were nine students who scored above a 500, which qualifies them for admittance to American schools and makes them eligible to receive an RMI Scholarship. Nine isn’t horrible, but I’m disappointed because most of the students who were “on the edge” ended up on the wrong side of the edge. There were about 5 in the 473-497 range. Some of them I sympathize for because they showed up to all the preparation sessions and worked hard. Some I don’t because they didn’t show up or showed up very sporadically. The student who scored a 497, which is exactly one question away from 500, showed up to about half the preparatory classes.

In about five weeks the school year will end. That means I will have been a full-time teacher/counselor for two years with one more to go. I’m not exactly sure what to make of that. What I catch myself thinking about most is that the vast majority of people who know me simply can’t relate to my experience here. In college I felt similarly because I spent over three years teaching at the same elementary/middle school. That school, the students, and the teacher became very large parts of my life but, of course, I couldn’t exactly share it with anyone at college because they just simply couldn’t relate. It made me frustrated sometimes because there was a significant part of me that I couldn’t express. Being here is similar, only much more so in scale. When I leave, no matter where I go, there won’t be anyone with whom I can properly share my experiences here. It will always be a big part of my life that won’t be able to be properly expressed. That’s disappointing.

Hmm, why don’t I discuss something different for a change. In college I stumbled upon a little paper called “Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” by Peggy McIntosh. It’s about invisible white privilege and should probably be mandatory college orientation reading (google it if you haven’t read it yet). Anyways, it’s basically a list of the advantages and mobility that certain members of American society have and, for the most part, don’t even recognize they have. As someone who wasn’t always (though sometimes I was) part of that membership, I always reconciled my underprivileged position by telling myself that I was only underprivileged in that particular context, namely America. If I went elsewhere, the tables would be turned. After almost two years here, I can safely and sadly say that, even if the tables are turned, they’re usually not turned fairly.

Even way out here (relative to the geography of where I’ve spent most my life) the invisible knapsack unquestionably exists and is still on the backs of people who are phenotypically white. They’re regarded as more capable and more physically impressive. White opinions and ideas are automatically given more credence during meetings. Marshallese girls dye their hair blonde and use skin whitening agents to crawl closer to what they (and most of the world) perceive to be the “standard” for physical attractiveness (if you don’t believe me, google what the most popular cosmetic surgeries are in East Asia… how high on the list is eye-widening?). Last year, one of my students even wrote, “I wish I were a ripelle (white person).”

This angers me for three reasons. First, it’s simply not right. Second, it’s the same crap that I had to put up with when I was growing up and I hate that my students have to put up with it too. Third, and most importantly, I thought this wouldn’t exist if I went somewhere else. But here I am, really far away, and in some ways it feels like I haven’t even taken a step out of America. Worse, after extrapolating, I had to wonder, is most of the world this way too? If I traveled to many places with a friend who was white, 99% of the time would he be treated with higher regard than I would be?

Nevertheless, I can’t just rant and claim that I have never been a beneficiary of coming from America either. It’s amazing the things people will do for me over the phone because I speak American English. I’ve been given sensitive information that I’m absolutely positive would not have been given to someone speaking Marshallese or English with a different accent. It’s also really funny when I meet the people with whom I speak over the phone. Their faces express absolute shock and horror. It’s a cross between, “That was you?? This screws up my whole understanding of the world!” and “I gave a Chinese person that information? Oh my God what have I done!”

Spring break!

2007-04-08T00:41:00.000-07:00

So, for spring break this year , I went to a Pacific island. I watched sunsets over a pristine lagoon. I hung out and drank at tropical bars. I read on the beach. I went diving. What about you?

Apparently the Taiwan Scholarship is being fast forwarded this year. Last year Jane didn’t receive notice of acceptance until July. This year the Taiwan Embassy will be sending out notices in less than two weeks.

In total, the Taiwan Embassy received over 30 scholarship applications from students across the country. My school sent seven. Last week they short-listed their applicants to 10-15, whom they will interview tomorrow. Six of my students made the short list, including Henry.

I received notice of this on Wednesday. Of course we’re currently on spring break, meaning I don’t see my students every day. I had to notify them about their interviews, and get them prepared for it, and two of the six don’t have phones. Therefore, I resorted to island style communications. I simply walked up and down the street asking passersby if they knew my students until I found them. It took about an hour to find both of them.

We did practice interviews on Thursday night and Saturday night. The disparity between their interview abilities are pretty extreme. Last year the embassy did not interview applicants. I wonder if they noticed something last year that inspired them to conduct interviews this year. Anyways, probably two of my students did well in their first practice interview – meaning they were able to speak articulately and at length. The remainder didn’t fare so well, with two being unable to effectively express themselves in sentences over five words in length. Shyness is a pretty common characteristic amongst Marshallese, particularly children.

Nevertheless, by the end of their practice interviews on Saturday, all of them seemed to be more or less ready to tackle the real thing. One is still a bit more anxious than is healthy, but when push comes to shove she’ll pull through. I’m lending Henry a shirt, tie, shoes, and socks for his interview. It’s kind of funny because in college I was definitely the one always borrowing formal attire.

Yes, I’m nervous. An awful lot is riding on these interviews tomorrow. Their next best option isn’t even close to being as good. In fact, one of the six students actually graduated last year near the top of her class. She was accepted to Hawaii Community College but was unable to enroll because of about 7,000 different problems with her financial aid and not being able to communicate quickly with the financial aid office. As a result, she wasn’t able to receive an RMI scholarship, and sat around aimlessly for about 7 months. Unfortunately, this is often what happens to students who attempt to pursue the second best option. She’s resilient, though. She’s trying again to go to college off island. I don’t want to think about what will happen to her if this option doesn’t work out.

Overall, despite being nervous, I’m very happy with the way the scholarship applications have worked out. I feel like the six students who will interview tomorrow are six I can hang my hat on. They’re motivated and capable. I don’t have to worry about whether or not we might be sending someone who will give up or flunk out. Moreover, I feel that I’ve worked hard and exhausted my resources and means to help these six be in the position they are now. I’ve done what I can. No matter what happens, I won’t have to ask myself if I could have tried harder.

Interviews are in 16 hours. Wish them luck.

I just don't know

2007-03-14T05:23:00.000-07:00

A single student has kept me preoccupied for the majority of the last three weeks. I want to tell his story, and how it intersects with my own, but am afraid that it requires so much background information that the average reader would simply become fatigued before he or she even read half of it. This is background information that I wanted to share many times throughout the past year and a half but was afraid to because I simply did not want my family and close friends to know about it. However, since my mom visited and witnessed what I dared not tell, I feel that I can divulge this information with a little more impunity, though I am still subject to the ire of locals who do not wish me to share such information. Whatever.

Racism is everywhere. It’s in every state in which I have lived, every neighborhood in which I have resided, even every school which I have attended. And yes, after living in the Marshall Islands for over a year and a half, I can safely, and sadly, thought not unexpectedly, say that racism exists in the Pacific. While in America there are many targets of various types of discrimination and xenophobia, in the Pacific the primary targets are Asians, due to simple geographic proximity and subsequent influence.

The stories in various Pacific countries are quite similar. An indigenous population begins to encounter increasing amounts of immigration from Asian peoples seeking more and better opportunities elsewhere. The Asians, both due to culturally esteeming hard work and education and due to being self-selected hearty immigrants, tend to over-achieve in their new countries compared to the indigenous populations, most of whom are relatively unfamiliar with the principles of a market based economy and how to successfully negotiate it. Asian businesses succeed while indigenous businesses struggle in markets that boasted only indigenous businesses less than a decade ago. Resentment begins to build, stereotypes emerge, and voila, racism jumps out of Pandora’s Box and begins to cultivate on the beaches of Pacific islands. This is an overly simplified explanation, butI think it suits the purposes of preparing the reader for the story I am about to share.

In Fiji, the targeted population has historically been Indians. In other parts of the Pacific, east Asians are targeted. Voracious international news junkies might remember the Chinese being more or less forced to flee the Solomon Islands due to violence directed towards them (imagine a smaller and more tropical Night of Broken Glass). In the Marshall Islands, the population in question is Chinese, specifically mainland Chinese since the Taiwanese government offer copious amounts of foreign aid in exchange for political support.

On the ground, the racism is more overt than it is in the United States, though that does not necessarily mean it is any stronger. Racial slurs are more common, particularly from drunks. Taxis sometimes refuse to stop for me. Parents have questioned my professional integrity and loyalty as a Chinese person teaching Marshallese youth. Even my mom, while she was visiting for a mere nine days, had a cigarette butt thrown at her and was told to “get out of this country.” Cases of physical violence do exist, though I have yet to encounter any personally.

Last year, shortly before I left for the summer, I wrote a series of five lengthy articles for the local newspaper detailing some of my experiences here as a Chinese person. I recently wrote a sixth after my mom visited and then left. They have been greeted mainly with praise, though admittedly the population that reads the newspaper (particularly the English articles) is not the same population which yells racial slurs at me or throws cigarette butts at my mom. I have taught entire units about xenophobia and racism, both theoretical and practical, in three different academic contexts. Has it helped? Probably not, except maybe with respect to a few personal relationships. But being from the United States has taught me that this kind of change never happens quickly, if at all. Moreover, I am under no kind of fantastical impression that racism is any worse here than it is in the United States, just a little more explicit.

Enough with the preamble, it’s time for chapter 1.

Every year Taiwan offers five Taiwan Scholarships to Marshallese seniors. These scholarships are without question the best “deal” for senior students. They include a round trip ticket from Majuro to Taipei, and a $1000 stipend every single month that the student is in Taiwan. Students typically spend five years in Taiwan, the first only studying Chinese, and the remaining four earning their degrees. The $1000 stipend more than covers tuition, room, and board. For students who don’t have very much money, don’t have a four-year degree granting institution within the country, and don’t have the means our resources to research and obtain other options, the fully funded and hassle free Taiwan Scholarships are a Holy Grail.

During the Taiwan Scholarship informational session, I was very pleased to see Henry in attendance and consequently take an application form. Henry is one of the most gifted students that we have. Compared with Jean last year, Henry might be more naturally gifted, though Jean was better educated. Henry comes from a 16 person household. That’s right, you read it correctly. I said 16 person household. His mom did not graduate from high school. His dad died when he was extremely young. In fact he doesn’t even know what happened to his dad. His neighborhood can politely be described as a slum. Most males are in their young 20s and dropped out of high school. I could go on and on about Henry’s background, but you get the point.

Despite his personal and family circumstances, Henry has proven himself to be an exceptional student. His grades have improved every single semester he has been in high school. Last semester he achieved a 4.0 GPA, bringing his overall GPA to roughly 3.5. He is a student body government officer, and the president of his class section. He writes for the local newspaper through the internship I created earlier this year. He sings in his own band. He helps a lawyer work on his ethnomusicology research. He was the lead in the school play this year. Moreover, he’s simply really smart. His writing and the questions he asks clearly indicate that there’s more going on in his head than in the heads of his peers, even his very intelligent peers. This list, like the previous list, also goes on and on, but you get the point.

Because of the second list, I was very disappointed when I held the first meeting regarding the Taiwan Scholarship after the informational session and noticed that he was not in attendance. I asked other teachers why Henry might not have attended. Finally one teacher gave me the answer. Henry has a legal history.

I called Henry into my office in order to ask him what happened. He was very honest and mature and explained that, last year, he and his friends robbed a store while intoxicated and assaulted the store owner. The store owner was Chinese. Henry’s preliminary sentence was a year in jail and three years of probation. He was not allowed to leave the country. He could not apply for the Taiwan Scholarship.

After Henry left my office, I closed the door and did some thinking in silence. I concluded that chaining Henry to this country would not benefit any one. He would never go to college after spending a year in jail. He was more likely to get himself into more trouble if he remained here for an extra three years after serving his jail time. In the end, he would be another young male hoodlum in his neighborhood, and tremendous amount of wasted potential to boot. I was his counselor. I was his student body government advisor. It was my responsibility not to let this happen to him. I decided to take action.

The national public defender is the uncle of a friend of mine. I asked her to arrange a meeting between him and me so I could explain Henry’s predicament and ask that he ask for some sort of plea bargain that would allow Henry to go to Taiwan should he receive a scholarship and serve his sentence in some other capacity, such as community service upon returning. The public defender listened to what I had to say and agreed to try. After all, he’s the public defender.

Part of the Taiwan Scholarship application asks for a letter of recommendation from a senator (yes, it specified senator). Henry and his family do not know any senators. I contacted the senator with whose help I created the Nitijela Internship last year and asked if she could perform a favor for me. She agreed. I invited her to the school play so she could see Henry on stage. They then met in my office after the play (11 PM on a Saturday night) so the senator could speak with him before writing him a letter of recommendation.

I then asked a friend of mine if he could speak to his father for me on Henry’s behalf. My friend’s father is a judge. He said he would. His father’s recommendation was that I speak to the store owner whom Henry assaulted and arrange a meeting between him and Henry so that Henry can demonstrate remorse by apologizing. It sounded sensible.

If you know me well enough to read this blog, you probably know that I am a very win-oriented person. Some would say I’m competitive, though I prefer win-oriented because I believe that one can win without beating someone else. Nevertheless, I was determined to win with respect to Henry. I had worked too hard and pulled too many strings for Henry not to go to Taiwan. This was something I was not going to lose. I hate losing. I hate failing. I don’t like the taste of it.

I marched into the store with this attitude, determined to leave with a victory. The odds were favorable. The public defender, senator, and judge had all been helpful. More importantly, I had a natural advantage entering this next task. I’m Chinese. I could speak Chinese with the store owner. If you’ve ever seen the difference between how a Chinese restaurant treats Chinese clientele and non-Chinese clientele, you know how significant this can be.

Small space. Chain link fence. A cage. I was in a cage. I was standing in a two feet by two feet area, surrounded on two sides by walls and the other two by the most intimidating chain link fence I had ever seen. The first thought that occurred to me was, “Who the hell would want to shop from such an unfriendly looking storefront?” The second thought that occurred to me was, “Is this in response to what Henry did?”

The store owner saw me, smiled, and waved me in. He said he recognized me from my pictures in the newspaper. He unlocked the locks on the chain link fence door, all three of them, and let me into the back of the store where we sat down. He offered me cigarettes and a drink from his store shelf. I refused, can’t go back to school smelling like smoke. We chit-chatted briefly, shared stories about China, where we were from, what it was like to leave. He asked me about living in America. I asked him about living in the Marshall Islands. I asked him if it was this store that was robbed by high school students last year. It was. I asked him if it was he that was assaulted by high school students last year. It was. I asked him about Henry. He looked me in the eyes and spoke plainly.

Rock. Broken bottles. Knife. On December 10^th, 2005, Henry opened the store door with a large rock in his hand. He hurdled over the store counter – the chain link fence was not there yet – and smashed the rock against the store owner’s head. The store owner was watching TV. While the store owner was on the ground, Henry called in his friends. Henry then picked up four bottles of vodka. He broke each of the bottles over the store owner’s head, one at a time. Next, Henry grasped a knife and slashed at the store owner. The store owner put his arms up to defend himself and caught the knife on his left arm. Henry removed his knife from the store owner’s arm and stabbed him in the chest. Twice. He and his friends took some vodka and left.

The store owner showed me the scar on his arm. His arm is yellow. It looks like mine. His scar is large and crooked. It looks like the scare on my arm. My scar was caused by a surgeon with a scalpel. His scar was caused by my student with a knife. He showed me the scars on his chest. His chest is yellow. It looks like my chest. It looks like my dad’s chest.

I asked what now seemed like a less than inconsequential question. Would he let Henry come in and apologize to him? The store owner looked at me. He didn’t want to see Henry.

We talked more about his family. He has a daughter. He left China for the Marshall Islands so his daughter could be educated in English and maybe go to school in America. My mom left China so her son could be educated in English and go to school in America. His daughter graduated and is attending college in Hawaii. He speaks of her with pride. He speaks of her straight A’s with pride. My mom speaks of me with pride. She spoke of my straight A’s with pride.

I thanked the store owner for his time and apologized for having to leave early. I was late for class. He thanked me for stopping by and encouraged me to stop by again. I told him if I could ever be of any assistance to please stop by the high school and ask for me.

I sleepwalked through my next class. I ate. I sat in my yard. I didn’t sleep much. He’s so talented. He’s so dangerous. He’s so smart. He’s so calculated. He leads the school. He leads vicious attacks. He beat the shit out of a Chinese person. I’m a Chinese person. My mom’s a Chinese person. My dad’s a Chinese person. I was trying to get him off the hook for maliciously attacking a Chinese person. I was trying to get him off the hook for maliciously attacking a Chinese person so he can go to Taiwan.

What must the store owner’s daughter think of me? Her dad sacrificed so much just so she could go to college in Hawaii. While in college her dad was battered and slashed. And now an uppity counselor is calling in favors and pulling strings to get the assailant off the hook so he can do what she’s doing right now. What must she think of me? How would I feel if I were her? What if this happened to my mom? How would I feel?

What must the store owner think of me? He came to a foreign country where he doesn’t speak the language and where people don’t particularly like him just so his daughter could be educated. My mom sacrificed her energy, her time, and her comfort so I could do the same. This man sacrificed the same, and threw in his left arm and his chest. This man did not have opportunities. Does his assailant deserve the opportunities he never had?

I’ve been so preoccupied with whether or not I could get Henry to Taiwan, I never stopped to think if I should.

Six articles. I wrote six articles about racism against Chinese. Three classes. I taught three classes about racism against Chinese. Even as recently as the school play last week, a man screamed, “Chinese! Get the fuck out of here!” while I was on stage. And here I am, trying to coerce a pardon for one such individual who did something much worse than anything that had ever inspired me to write and teach about tolerance.

Henry’s life is effectively over if I decide not to support him. He does not have the resources to do anything else. He does not have the legal permission to go anywhere else. After jail he will not have the motivation to try anything else. I can help him get out. I can help him escape his environment and put his past behind him. I can help him become educated. I can help him take advantage of his potential and his talent and use it to do great things.

I can also help him squirm out of legal retribution. I can help him avoid justice. I can passively consent to Henry’s actions and mitigate the consequences. I can patronize the store owner’s incident. I can belittle his daughter’s grief. I can demean my mom’s experiences here as well as my own. I can contradict everything I’ve said and stood for regarding the need for multicultural respect and esteem.

What should I do? I just don’t know.

Some pictures

2007-02-22T02:29:00.000-08:00

A few pictures of Christmas on Wotje are posted.

I'm back! I'm back!

2007-02-09T14:59:00.000-08:00

Around mid-January my keyboard broke. I woke up one morning and realized that my g, h, and apostrophe keys were broken. For about a minute or two I thought I would be OK. After all, there’s 26 letters and like 12 punctuation marks in the English language, surely I would be able to exist without two letters and a single punctuation mark. Man, never underestimate the value of a single key. I think g is worth two in scrabble and h is worth four, but anything I wrote was practically unreadable. Once I tried typing the word “lagging” and got “lain.” Then I tried to quote someone and recognized the futility in that. It’s amazing how different something looks between quotation marks and not. And to top it off I couldn’t even explain to anyone what was going on because I couldn’t tell them my g and h keys were broken because I couldn’t type g or h. Whatever, I got a new keyboard and I’m ready to rock.

My students took the TOEFL on January 13th. Once again, I think I was more nervous than they were, particularly because this year I was completely on my own as far as TOEFL preparation was concerned. The results of my students’ TOEFLs would reflect directly on my ability as an educator. That made me kind of jittery. Of course what made me more jittery was when three of my students showed up without photo IDs… after I had been telling them for six weeks to bring photo IDs. The nice man at the door let them in anyways, even though it was against procedure. His explanation was, “Oh Marshallese are just this way.” They better not be that way when they go to college in the States or else they’re going to have some real problems.

Currently it’s FAFSA season. Marshallese students are very dependent upon the US Federal Pell Grant in order to fund their college educations. However, due to simply being way the heck out here and not being familiar with filling out forms, many students never receive a Pell Grant even though the only requirement is to complete the form. I made 150 copies of the FAFSA and accompanied them with two pages of detailed directions in order to help them fill out the application. In the end I received about 70 (out of a graduating class of 167) and maybe five of them were completed correctly on the first attempt. It never occurred to me growing up in America, but filling out forms and applications is a learned skill. I learned to look for certain fields, to understand that a four blank space with MMDD means month and date, and that I should add a zero if the month is single digits. It’s becoming increasingly clear to me that these “little” skills, or lack there of, might be just as obstructive to my students’ chances to succeed in college overseas as any lack of academic skills might be. I mean if they can’t even bring a photo ID after 6 weeks of reminders or fill out a form, how are they going to register for classes, choose a major, or file their taxes? Deep breath.

In more uplifting news, I brewed my first batch of beer. Since beer is incredibly expensive here, I finally sucked it up and tried my hand at it. The good news is that it cost me about $10 to brew 60 bottles of beer. The bad news is that it didn’t taste particularly good at the start. It had a sour after taste, which according to online beer research is the result of “wild yeast,” basically randomly occurring bacteria in the air which found its way into my beer. However, I noticed that the more I let my beer sit, the less sour after taste it had. I’ve concluded that the sour taste was the result of sugar that had not finished fermenting. Either way, I’ve got cheap beer that does the trick. I win.

The 11 hour church service

2006-12-30T18:20:00.000-08:00

I spent a week on an outer island called Wotje. It was remarkably different from the outer island I went to this previous spring, Jaluit. Somehow I had this idea that all small Pacific islands were more or less the same. Well, I was wrong, but I won’t bore you with the details of how small island A differs from small island B. What I will do is tell you about how much time I spent in church on Christmas.

Marshallese have developed a Christmas tradition called jepta. Jepta is a general name given to any type of large group dance. At Christmas, numerous groups – which can be organized by age, gender, professional or academic affiliation, etc. – prepare a jepta. Each group dances into the church, sings a few songs, dances some more, throws out some candy, and gives some money to the church.

The idea is good. However, what I was unprepared for was that each group on Wotje had prepared jeptas that averaged about one hour in length. There were 11 groups. I sat in church from 10:00 AM to 9:00 PM, with a lunch break in between. OK, I lied. We didn’t get there until about 11:30 AM, but the actual church service did last 11 hours, even if I wasn’t present for all of it.

It’s New Year’s Eve today. Unlike last year, there will be no large public block party because this year New Year’s Eve falls on a Sunday (the theme of this post is religion). Instead, there was a much smaller block party last night and there will be two smaller inside parties held tonight at two different locations. It looks like I’ll attend both before the night is over.

School is going well. The TOEFL is less than two weeks away so preparation has reached crunch time. I feel more confident this year than last, mainly because I’ve been able to build on last year’s experience and because I have more control over the preparation process this year than last. There’s also more students who will take the TOEFL this year, which I consider to be a very positive development.

I never mentioned that I am now a host uncle. My host sister had a baby about two months ago. My host mom flew to America to be with her. She’s been there ever since but she, my host sister, and my host nephew will all be coming to Majuro immediately after the new year. I’m actually kind of excited since Chinese population control policy has determined I will never have any nieces and nephews. This is about as much of an extended family as I’ll ever have.

Alright, I’m off to grade a few papers. Hope everyone’s holidays were happy.

The gallon of tahini

2006-12-08T19:16:00.000-08:00

I went diving again last week. It was the first time I’ve gone since I’ve been back. We did the aquarium dive among others, the same one I did before I left. Once again, the animals were abundant. I don’t think it was quite as good as last time but still enough critters to satisfy me. I had a few complications because somehow I didn’t realize that my mask was not fitted properly on my face and it kept letting in water. Due to continuously trying to clear my mask, I used up my air faster than usual and had to borrow air from others. It wasn’t dangerous, just a bit embarrassing. The rate at which a diver goes through air is used as a rough benchmark of his skill. More skillful divers can control themselves and sustain air longer. I definitely lacked skills that day.

If it isn’t abundantly clear from my posts, the variety of foodstuffs available in the Marshall Islands isn’t particularly great. What this does is create a packrat mentality. Any new item of food is immediately gobbled up, even if it’s rather superfluous, simply because it’s new and will soon run out. This phenomenon is best illustrated by the gallon of tahini now sitting in my fridge.

Middle Eastern cuisine isn’t particularly popular in the Marshall Islands. In fact, it’s non-existent. However, one of the local store owners woke up one day and decided she wanted some tahini. Thus, she ordered a crate of tahini for her store. After keeping a few jugs for herself, she put the rest of the tahini on sale. I saw the jugs sitting there about two weeks ago and thought, “Hmm, tahini, that’d be nice to have.” Then I thought, “Wait, I’ve never even used tahini before, and there’s a fucking gallon of it! What am I going to do with all of that tahini?” I mustered up enough will power not to buy the tahini that first day, but alas, my will power would not last. After convincing myself that tahini could substitute for Asian sesame paste, and that I could easily cook enough sesame paste based dishes to justify the purchase of a fucking gallon of tahini, I broke down and bought it for 16 bucks.

The good news is that tahini actually does act as a fair substitute for Asian sesame paste. The bad news is that there’s still a gallon of it to use. After making my first bowl of cold sesame noodles, I realized that it would take roughly 600 bowls to use up that gallon of tahini. Oh well, at least I have tahini!

Christmas is approaching, and once again I’m sweating despite it being December. I’m going to an outer island before coming back to Majuro for New Year’s. It should be a nice get away.

New pics in the photo album.

Yup

2006-11-17T22:16:00.000-08:00

November 18, 2006 – 9:50 AM – I don’t get to watch college football

The biggest college football game in a decade is on tomorrow and I don’t get to watch it. For the most part American sports are well represented on the Pacific Rim ESPN feed, but college football unfortunately is a significant casualty. The only games I get are the ones during the week (which happened to include the unlikely important Big East games this year). During the weekend I get to watch the exciting action of drag racing, fishing, and cricket.

I’ve been sitting around trying to identify what exciting happenings have occurred over the past month that I can write about, and the only thing I can think of is growing a few plants. I have two tomato plants and four eggplant plants sunning themselves. None of them are large enough to be transported out of their Styrofoam cups, but I did successfully transplant multiple seedlings in one cup to individual cups of their own. I attribute this success to my immense gardening skill. By the way, you can tell life in the Pacific is slow because the most exciting thing that happened to me in a month was plants growing.

I think I’m going to go diving next week, first time in half a year. It’s nice having some money this year. I can buy food that I want to eat and do things that I want to do. It dawned on me earlier this week that, despite having a worthless liberal arts major, I find myself having a “real life” earlier than most of my collegiate counterparts. I have a house. I have a yard. I weed my yard. I have a garden. I pay bills. I have to budget my necessities against my wants. I don’t borrow. I save. Who would have thought that this would describe me at age 23.

School is going very smoothly. I’ve established another internship, this time in conjunction with the national (read, only) newspaper. They’ve employed a senior and his responsibilities will be taking pictures, writing articles, and translating between English and Marshallese. He’s very excited, though I think the newspaper is even more excited to have cheap labor that’s fluent in both English and Marshallese. That’s difficult to come by around here.

My TOEFL kids are doing extremely well, even compared to the previous group last year. Their improvement at this point has outpaced the previous group’s improvement at the same juncture. At least three of them have a better than average shot of receiving the Taiwan Scholarship that Jane did last year. Speaking of Jane, I received an e-mail from her last weekend. She wrote it in Chinese.

PS: I might have told you that I plan on saving a lot of money and traveling around the world in about two years or so. I’m still very much serious. If anyone is even remotely interested in joining me, lemme know.

Yo

2006-10-16T23:26:00.000-07:00

October 17, 2006 – 5:13 PM – There’s always a bigger fish

Next week my host mom is going to the States to visit my host sisters, both of whom are going to school near Seattle. Samantha, whom I taught last year, is in her first year at a local community school while Denise transferred to a nearby high school to finish up high school. Like everyone who goes somewhere far from home, Samantha and Denise are craving their comfort food. For people from the Marshall Islands, comfort food means fresh fish from warm Pacific waters. Thus, my host dad and I had the responsibility to catch enough fish to fill two coolers which my host mom would bring with her to Seattle.

On Sunday morning, I woke up at about 6:00 AM and my host dad and I set out at 8:00 AM for an intense day of fishing in the lagoon. We went bottom fishing, i.e. we fished for fish that live at the bottom of the lagoon as opposed to fish that swim near the surface of the water (like tuna).

The morning proved to be an excellent day. The fish were really biting and we caught near 40 lbs before lunchtime. Most of it was grouper and snapper. However, the afternoon proved to be considerably less fruitful. Since my host dad’s fish finder was broken, we were forced to simply cruise around and drop our lines, hoping that wherever we stopped just happened to be over a school a fish. In the morning we guessed well, in the afternoon we did not. However, there was one moment when we managed to stop over a school of frenetic snapper. We lowered three liens and before the lines even hit the bottom we had 7 fish on the lines (more than one hook per line). Unfortunately we didn’t drop our anchor in time and drifted past the hot spot and only caught sporadically afterwards.

I’ll tell you right now, the most frustrating part of fishing in the ocean isn’t not catching any fish, it’s having the fish you catch be eaten by a bigger fish before you can haul them up to the surface. The whole sequence goes like this. You feel a bite, yank to set a hook, feel a big fish on the end and get excited and start reeling it in. Then, as you’re reeling, you feel this huge jerk on the rod and the rod bends all the way down as you wonder “what the hell is happening?” Then everything goes slack and you end up reeling in a large fish head. Sucks. I got a few big ones away from the bigger ones (read, sharks) though. Sometimes I even saw the sharks chasing my fish as I reeled them up. One even made a final stab at it near the surface of the water and flopped itself out, which was pretty cool to see.

Anyways, I took home a few and of course they were delicious. I sashmi’d one last night and used the carcass to make Chinese fish soup. I quickly whipped up some fried rice and called it a hell of a meal. There’s four more in my freezer and I’m still deciding how I want to prepare them.

Work is work, nothing of note to report. Upward Bound started this week so that’s going to keep me busy in the afternoons, along with supplying me with a little extra income. I considered getting a dog to scare away the people who seem to be hellbent on throwing trash on my lawn while I’m not home. However, I thought it over and decided that a dog would be way too difficult to maintain, especially in this country, plus it’s possible that the trash simply blows onto my lawn (there’s a considerable amount of it lying around the country) and isn’t thrown there deliberately. Maybe I’ll get a cat instead simply because the thought of having my first pet is kinda cool.

Totally here

2006-10-05T03:20:00.000-07:00

October 5, 2006 – 9:43 PM – Pictures count as posts

For the sake of keeping up with my promise to update bi-weekly, I’m going to say that those pictures I uploaded count as posts.

So let’s see, what’s going on in Majuro. I cooked my first coconut crab a few weeks back. I wanted to take pictures of it but my camera was out of batteries and there was no way I was going to wait three hours for them to charge before I ate that thing. Thus, I ate it and didn’t take any pictures. Sorry. But let it be known, it was damn good. Coconut crabs differ from your typical American (read, not Alaskan) crab in two distinct ways. First, they’re enormous. Coconut crabs eat, wait for it... coconuts. This might not seem like a big deal until you factor in the size of a full, unhusked coconut. Remember, the coconuts that fall from trees don’t come in ready to eat form, i.e. just the brown shell with three dark spots on it. They fall with husks, think Tom Hanks in Cast Away. These crabs are large enough to chomp through the coconut husks in order to get to the coconut inside. Moreover, if you’ve ever seen video clips of non-island people trying to husk coconuts, you know that actually husking a coconut is quite simply the most difficult thing in the world to do. Coconut crabs have claws that are big enough to cut through coconut husks. In short, they’re very big crustaceans. If a fully grown one jumped on my face Alien style, its claws could touch on the back of my head, and remember I have a huge head.

The other primary difference between a coconut crab and an American crab is that a coconut crab has, for lack of a better term, an ass. All the crabs I’ve ever seen before I arrived here had a roundish body with six legs and two claws sticking out of it. Coconut crabs have the roundish body with six legs and two claws sticking out of it, but they also have this ass part dangling from the roundish body. Marshallese crush the ass part and squeeze the juice out of it to eat as gravy. I tried doing that but all I got was a crushed crab ass.

Nevertheless, even without the ass gravy, it was a mighty tasty crab. Cooking it was lesson in resourcefulness. I didn’t have a steamer, and even if I did it wouldn’t be big enough to steam the damn thing. The only pot or pan that I had which could fit the crab was my wok. Thus, I folded the claws and legs underneath the crab and dropped it into my wok and filled it with a few inches of water, thinking that once I covered it most of the crab would steam while a little bit of it would boil. Unfortunately, the crab was way too large to cover with any conventional lid. My solution was to use the deep plastic tub that I use to wash clothes as a lid. I flipped it over on top of my wok and voila, I had a crab steamer.

School’s going well. Teaching is much easier this year and I am much better at it given the experience I had last year. Undoubtedly what helps the most is that I’m doing this year what I already did last year which saves me countless hours trying to create lessons, and I already know what’s going to work and what won’t. TOEFL prep class is in full swing. More students will probably take the test this year than last year, and early practice scores indicate that they will probably do better than last year’s group too. The government interns hit a bit of a rut due to the extremely busy schedules of their supervisors, but we’ve recovered and they’re on the rebound right now. They had a photo shoot today and tomorrow are being treated to dinner by a senator and a UNDP volunteer. Furthermore, the national newspaper (also the only newspaper) contacted me and we’re working on getting an intern in that office as well.

I’ll end with another Jane and Jean update. Jane is doing very well in Taiwan. She’s sharing an apartment with the three other Taiwan Scholars from the Marshall Islands and, judging from her pictures, is really opening up (note to everyone, living in a developed country apparently means being able to wear tank tops). She also sent me an e-mail over the weekend. It was in Chinese.

Jean was selected to join Upward Bound, the same after-school program I will soon be working for. In the Marshall Islands Upward Bound is seen as a golden ticket to bigger and better things. Jean was selected to join based upon her test scores and grades. Unfortunately Jean’s parents would not let her join Upbward Bound because she is the oldest child in the household and is expected to shoulder a good deal of the household responsibilities after school. She cried for hours when her parents told her.

Also, when she was in my office at 6 PM typing her Upbward Bound application essay, I noticed that she had a hard time seeing the monitor. She couldn’t even open Microsoft Word because she couldn’t read the names of the start menu icons. Then, when she tried typing her essay, she struggled because she couldn’t see what she was typing. She was forced to write out her essay long hand and ask her friend to type it for her. When I suggested to her that she get glasses, she said she didn’t want to look like a nerd. I told the girl’s guidance counselor this and she called Jean’s mom to inform her. Jean’s mom said that they went to the eye doctor last week and he said she didn’t need glasses. Soon after I talked with another teacher at my school who is related to Jean’s mom. That teacher informed me that the doctor actually did tell Jean and her mom and Jean needed glasses. However, both Jean and her mom were too embarrassed to admit it. They were embarrassed because Jean’s family doesn’t make very much money and Jean is consequently malnourished, which is what the doctor said was causing Jean’s vision to deteriorate.

More pics

2006-09-22T19:27:00.000-07:00

Added pictures of my house. Go look.

Food!

2006-09-20T21:30:00.000-07:00

I uploaded some pictures of some food I've made here. Go look and be envious.

Yes!

2006-09-04T23:46:00.000-07:00

September 5, 2006 – 2:21 PM – All set

I promised myself that I wouldn’t post anything else until I was completely set. Well, it took awhile, but that’s finally happened. I have my contract and my house and I’m ready to roll.

My house (yes house, not apartment) is a quaint little one story cottage-like structure. I have a living room, kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom. Some of the house is renovated, i.e. new furniture and fridge and tile, but even the parts that are not are in pretty good condition. I’ve already moved in my TV and hooked up my PS2 to it. My nights in the house, both of them, have been spent curling up to some quality West Wing, of which I brought five seasons. I also have a nice little fenced-in yard with some coconut and banana trees.

Work is going very well. I only have two classes this year, both senior government, due to the counseling load. However, I’m now in charge of advising the student body government since the previous advisor has gone MIA. After school I’ll be teaching two English classes at Upward Bound to give myself a little extra income.

I spent this past weekend on Eneko, an outer island in the Majuro atoll. It was calming and pleasant, except that there was a bit more rain than I would’ve liked. Nevertheless, it felt good to get in the ocean again, snorkel, etc.

This year will be very different from last. I’m living by myself so I don’t have the social safety net of six roommates. Two of my host sisters are also gone, both to the States. Moreover, I’m no longer a volunteer teacher so I’m no longer included in that network. The independence and the flexibility is definitely nice, but I’m going to have to work a little harder if I want to see people on a regular basis.

The cable company wired my house last week, but I’m still waiting on the phone company to do the same. After that happens posts should be more frequent (I’m aiming for twice a month, really I am). Until then, I’m stuck commuting to and from the internet café to do this kind of thing. When I get a chance I’ll upload some pictures of my house and what not.

That’s it for now, hope everyone’s doing well.

Rocking out in Majuro

2006-08-08T11:50:00.000-07:00

August 8, 2006 – 7:08 AM – A couch, an office, but no bag

Just to let everyone know, regardless of what airline representatives tell you, luggage cannot be checked through an international layover. You must retrieve your bags if you have an international layover and recheck them if you wish them to reach your final destination with you. I flew from Idaho Falls -> Salt Lake City -> Vancouver -> Honolulu -> Majuro. The dude at the Idaho Falls airport assured me that my bag would be checked to Honolulu where I would have to recheck them due to having an overnight layover there. Once I arrived in Vancouver, I confidently sauntered through customs and up to the Air Canada gate. The nice Canadian lady asked me where my bags were. I told her they were checked through to Honolulu. She said they were not. I became sad.

Thus, I had to backtrack across the entire airport and through customs (the other way) before I reached the baggage carousel where my bags were spinning. Unfortunately only one arrived. The other one never made it out of Salt Lake City. I was told that it would be sent on the next flight from Salt Lake City to Honolulu and that I could claim it in Honolulu. However, the next flight to Honolulu would not be until next morning and would arrive precisely one hour after I would have departed for Majuro. Therefore, it will (hopefully) be sent on the next flight to Majuro which arrives in about three hours.

On a bright note, I had my first celebrity sighting. Showing up when and where a celebrity is scheduled to make an appearance does not count as a celebrity sighting. Rather, a celebrity sighting must be an accidental meeting. For some reason I have managed never to have a celebrity sighting… until the Vancouver airport. As I was waiting in the security line, I noticed that the man waiting in the line beside me looked very much like Charlie from The West Wing. Ironically, I encountered a similar situation four years ago at Princeton. I was debating and saw a dude who looked like Charlie (maybe it was because he was wearing a suit). Anyways, I approached him and asked if he was Dule Hill. He answered rather curtly that he was not and scoffed at me. I became sad. So this time, in the security line, I was a bit scared to ask the man if he was Dule Hill. Hell, what if it was the same guy from Princeton? Instead, I kept craning my neck to try to sneak a glance at the name on his boarding pass. Finally, when he showed it to the security check attendant, I saw it. YES! It was him!

Satisfied, I went on my merry way down the moving walkway while he stopped off to look at some magazines. But half way down the moving walkway I decided that I had to at least talk to him. I mean comeon, this was my first celebrity sighting! And it was Charlie! I got off the moving walkway and walked back to the magazine stand and asked if he was Dule Hill. He said that he was and I told him that I was a big fan of The West Wing and introduced myself. He said thanks and shook my hand. That was it. I left him alone afterwards. Later I saw some dude accost him for a picture and he agreed. Damn, I wish I would’ve thought of that.

So here I am in Majuro. I have no place of my own yet so I’m staying on an old lady’s couch. I moved into my office yesterday and rearranged it a bit to my liking. I made sure that the desk faced outside so I would seem more accessible. I organized the bookshelf and moved it to the side. I even set up a few chairs and a table inside the office so students can come in and work on their FAFSAs/applications with me in my office. I’ll take a picture of it once I’m more settled.

I stopped by the Ministry of Education to inquire about the status of my application for employment. Apparently the hold-up occurred because the position was originally advertised in the same announcement as classroom teachers. Thus, they were afraid that they may have confused potential applicants and decided that they would have to readvertise the counselor position separately from the classroom teacher positions. They did, and the deadline is this Friday. I’m still the only one who’s applied. With any luck, by mid-next week I’ll have something concrete regarding my employment.

Alright, now it’s time to go to work and then go claim my luggage.

Leaving on a jet plane... again

2006-08-03T19:54:00.000-07:00

I must become really boring when I'm in Idaho because I really have had nothing of substance to blog about since I've been here. Regardless, tomorrow I'm returning to the Marshall Islands to become a full-time counselor and part-time techer at Marshall Islands High School. Unfortunately I am not returning under ideal conditions. The necessary paperwork has not yet been processed. Thus, my travel expenses are not being subsidized. However, I decided that the school year was much too close for me to remain idle any longer. Hence, I applied for a credit card with 0% apr for the first 12 months and have charged all my travel expenses on that card. Hopefully I will be paid/reimbursed soon enough to pay that debt before it becomes too ominous. Moreover, i sincerely hope that my contract will be prepared before my savings runs out and I'm left floundering with no money and no income.

All in all it's a bit risky but a risk I'm willing to take. I'm very excited to be going back and looking forward to really being on my own for the first time (i.e. no school, no programs, no parents).

On a more somber note, I received some very sad news from Majuro. One of my students lost her brother recently in a plane crash. He was a pilot in training and was flying with his instructor when their plane went missing last Thursday. No trace of the plane or their bodies has been found. He received a scholarship from the Marshall Islands to attend flight school and was only a few weeks away from graduation. In the mean time, he had worked in various restaurants to support himself and his family.

To make matters worse, this is not the first time my student's family has been struck by tragedy. Two years ago, when my student was a junior, her father passed away, leaving behind two daughters, two sons, and a wife. This past year my student's grandmother became very sick and she (my student) was forced to look after her at the hospital everyday and still take care of her nieces and nephews at home, causing her to be consistently late for class due to her early morning responsibilities for her young relatives. Nevertheless, I talked to her about her tardiness and she was on time to class the very next day. Despite everything, she is an excellent student and person and graduated near the top of her class with a 3.96 GPA and as a student body officer. I even asked her to become a language teacher for WorldTeach, an offer which she gladly accepted. By all accounts she was an excellent instructor and the new WorldTeach volunteers really liked her. For the first time in her life it seemed like life's vicissitudes would finally let her explore her talent and potential.

But now this. Imagine being a part of that family, losing the man of the house and the oldest child within two years. Imagine being that mom. What a shame.

Went camping

2006-07-16T16:37:00.000-07:00

I spent the weekend camping and hiking in Yellowstone/Grand Teton National Parks with two high school buddies. We went fishing afterwards but didn't catch anything. Pictures have been uploaded to the photo album.

A Jane and Jean update

2006-07-11T23:36:00.000-07:00

Last year I blogged about two students of mine named Jane and Jean. I thought it would be appropriate to give a little update about their happenings.

Jane received a Taiwan Scholarship from the Taiwan Embassy in the Marshall Islands. The scholarship finances all of her expenses, including travel and a living stipend, for four years of study at a Taiwanese University of her choice. She also has the option of deferring university study for one year in order to study Chinese, bringing her total time in Taiwan to five years. Jane is the first public high school student to receive the Taiwan Scholarship.

Jean became pregnant at the age of 15. She did not tell any of her family members, only her friends. Her friends told me. I talked with Jean and begged her not to attempt a homebrew abortion, which are sadly very common in the Marshall Islands. These abortions typically consist of drinking copious amounts of soy sauce, using a coat hanger, engaging in strenuous physical activity, etc. Instead, I urged her to have the baby and let her family raise it, also a very common practice in the Marshall Islands. Jean agreed but did not adhere to the agreement. She aborted the baby by having her friends jump on her back. According to one of her friends, "We jumped on her and it fell out." Jean had straight A's last semester.

Did you know that there's a World Cup occurring?

2006-07-03T23:50:00.000-07:00

While I'm waiting to return to the Marshall Islands, I thought I'd write a few words about this World Cup thing that just happens to be occurring right now. Instead of trying to explain how big of a deal it is and why you in particular should care about it, I thought I'd instead illustrate those two premises with links and random bits of information I remember from game broadcasts.

1) The Saudi prince promised to award money and property to Saudi players for each goal they scored.

2) The Ghanian government promised to award money to the Ghanian team for each victory they earn. However, Ghana is a poor country yet had a rather successful run through the World Cup so the Ghanian government ended up borrowing money from the African Soccer League (I don't remember the official name of their league off hand) in order to pay its players.

3) The Ecuadorian government paid a Shaman to fly to Germany and chase away the evil spirits from all 12 World Cup sites.

4) National flag sales have increased so much that one professor has calculated the increased expenditure on fuel as a result of "flag drag."

5) On the day Ghana was scheduled to play the US to decide who would advance to the knockout round, the Ghanian government declared a half day so everyone could watch the game. During the broadcast, ABC/ESPN cut to a scene of scores of Ghanians watching the game... underneath a tree in the middle of a field on a black and white TV powered by diesel generator because no one in the vicinity had electricity. One wonders how the ABC/ESPN cameraman felt filming that scene on his $10,000 camera.

6) Prior to the beginning of the World Cup, English fans taught each other how to taunt in German.

7) FOX, in all its journalistic glory, has apparently given a photographer the all-important responsibility of traveling to the World Cup in order to take pictures of hot female soccer fans.

8) Numerous Chinese, whose nation isn't even in the World Cup, have taken drastic measures to watch the matches despite their early-morning televised times. They include one man who quit his job, telling his boss, "The World Cup is more important than my job." Another man's wife nagged him because the television kept her awake at night. In response the man locked his wife in a room and kept watching. But perhaps the most ardent Chinese soccer fan is a man who was watching Spain vs France when his house caught on fire. He grabbed his TV and ran outside... leaving his wife and child inside. When people arrived to help, they found the man frantically searching for an electrical socket into which he could plug in his TV and resume watching.

These people care about the World Cup. Why don't you?

I fixed the photo album

2006-06-14T23:44:00.000-07:00

Since I now have high speed internet, I decided to see what was wrong with my photo album. Apparently some feature that I had turned on became members only and that screwed up my pictures. It's fixed now. I also uploaded a bunch of pictures that I took and couldn't upload before. Both they and the ones uploaded previously should be accessible now.

Done... for now

2006-06-11T22:37:00.000-07:00

June 10, 2006 – 9:08 PM – Back in… Utah?

One year in the Marshall Islands has officially come to an end. The seniors held their prom, which I chaperoned, and then graduated five days later. The following week was finals week and the academic year concluded on May 26^th. May in general was kind of a blur, to say nothing of the final week or two. I was simultaneously trying to wrap everything up for this year while planting seeds for next year. In general I think I left fairly elegantly. Most loose ends were tied up and I tentatively anticipate an established infrastructure upon my return.

In the middle of all that hubbub I took a few moments to evaluate whether or not my students had indeed improved over the course of the year. The answer is probably what I should have expected all along; some did, some did not, and all to varying degrees. This is the life of a teacher, a never-ending up-hill battle without a pinnacle. Kudos to those who dedicate their lives to this profession, for they have much more fortitude than I.

Leaving the Marshall Islands was a trying ordeal. My flight was initially delayed 24 hours just flying out of Majuro. Since the dorm where I lived was already inhabited by volunteers returning from the outer islands, Continental was forced to provide a hotel room for me along with three accompanying meals. Truthfully I rather enjoyed that extra 24 hours. Since I worked up to May 26^th (heck, I even had a staff meeting on May 29^th) and was scheduled to leave on May 29^th, I had absolutely no time to catch my breath between the end of school and my departure. That extra day gave me a much needed opportunity to simply stop and look at my surroundings, especially since all my work was completed due to anticipating a May 29^th departure.

From Majuro I flew to Honolulu and arrived 16 hours before I departed. After negotiating for an earlier flight to Chicago to no avail, Continental again provided me with a hotel room and three accompanying meals while I was in Honolulu. Unfortunately I was so exhausted and wasn’t able to take advantage of being in Hawaii for 16 hours, but I did capitalize on my first hot shower in 10 months and, of course, the high-speed internet. Man, I cannot even imagine how much more productive the Marshall Islands would be if it had high-speed internet. Just the thought of having a broadband connection aid me in my college counseling efforts freaks me out. But alas, it will never happen.

After my brief stint in Honolulu I flew to Los Angeles and rode stand-by to Denver and once again to Chicago. Being back in Chicago was eerie. I spent most of the time trying to determine whether or not it felt as if I had been gone for a long time or not at all. On one hand most of the people I saw were unrecognizable and a surprisingly large number of new buildings and establishments had popped up in my absence. On the other hand, from the minute I stepped foot onto campus I felt old but inveterate routines resurfacing and guiding my actions and thoughts. I walked into the Reynolds Club and looked to see if the new issue of the Maroon had been released. When entering the Reg I instantly braced myself for the gush of air that’s created by the outside and inside doors interacting with each other. Even walking down stairs I instinctively stuck out my hand to reach for railings I knew would be there. What I rather enjoyed was the sense that, despite not being a student any more, there was still something about the U of C that I felt invested in. Something about it was distinctively mine, or even me. I felt that I had ownership and agency, and I liked that.

Seeing old friends was wonderful. I think it was my first reunionesque experience, which is surprising given how many times I’ve moved. However, I can’t say I’ve been very good at keeping in touch with old friends and it was great finally to be able to do so. It’s terrific being able to come from the middle of the Pacific Ocean and instantaneously reintegrate yourself into a group of friends. It’s simply comforting to know that no matter where I am there will always be people somewhere out there who know me and support me with their friendship. That, more so than anything else, convinces me that I can keep doing what I am doing.

Now I’m in Idaho, ready to do some serious R & R in front of the TV and stocking up for next year.

Rock you like a hurricane

2006-04-30T13:50:00.000-07:00

April 30, 2006 – 8:12 PM – And down the stretch I come

I forgot to write about something fairly significant in my last post so I’ll do that now. The Marshall Islands is one of two nations (I think) that celebrate a very somber and chilling holiday, Nuclear Victims Remembrance Day. In Japan it is celebrated on August 6^th, the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima. In the Marshall Islands it is celebrated on March 1^st, the anniversary of the Bravo Shot, the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated. It was tested in Bikini Atoll but was so enormous, and the United States was so indifferent about ensuring optimum testing conditions, that the fallout from the test covered all of the Marshall Islands. To this day Rongelap Atoll is still uninhabitable and Utrik Atoll is “liveonable” but not “eatoffable.” I could go on for a long time about how much radiation the Marshall Islands has been exposed to, but I won’t.

During the commemoration activities for Nuclear Victims Remembrance Day, I found myself sitting and talking with two 60+ year old women from Rongelap Atoll. They were children when the Bravo Shot was detonated and forced them to evacuate to other atolls. Talking to them was both exciting and frightening. You have not lived until you’ve shaken the hand of a person who has been nuked.

I finally visited an outer island. Over Easter vacation I spent three days in Jaluit. Jaluit is the “most developed” of outer atolls, meaning it has power. Nevertheless it does not have phones, running water, any type of outdoor lighting, etc. About 1,000 people live on Jabor, the main island of Jaluit, and obviously fewer on the outer islands of Jaluit. Most of my time was spent on Jabor, though I did get a chance to visit two “true” outer islands. It’s a completely different world out there. The peace and quiet that exists on outer islands is inexplicable, as is the darkness that sets in after sunset. I also visit Imej, an outer island in Jaluit that was the base for Japanese military operations during WWII. Now it is home to a bunch of slowly decaying war relics, including abandoned concrete buildings and huge anti-aircraft guns. There’s also an enormous war ship that’s marooned on an island near Imej. And when I say enormous, I mean it. Looking at it from a plane, it’s clear that the ship is actually wider than the island. It’s quite a sight.

So one month of school remains. Teaching has proven to be a learning experience like none other. I highly encourage everyone to try teaching for a year. You will learn more about yourself and discover personal qualities that you never dreamed you had. That this year is concluding is both relieving and exciting. It is relieving because all the mistakes I have made will be swept under the carpet. It is exciting because that means I can learn from those mistakes in preparation for next year. Speaking of next year… (drum roll) … I’m coming back to the Marshall Islands. I will return as the academic and career counselor along with teaching a few classes on the side. Ironically this is what I have ideally envisioned since January, to be able to continue the programs I’ve created here and help students take the next step, all while still keeping a foot in the classroom. I’m very happy and totally looking forward to next year.

I’ll be in Chicago from 5/30 to 6/12. Plans include Field Museum, Cubs game, Sox game, Art Institute, and so much food at odd hours. Depot… (drool)

Yup, still here

2006-03-28T01:27:00.000-08:00

March 28, 2006 – 8:58 PM – Roar!

That was my costume for the school play, a Marshall Islands version of Romeo and Juliet. I was the chorus, all of the chorus. It seemed simple enough to deliver two prologues, until I realized that I had to give them twice – once in English, and once in Marshallese. I made a valiant effort and I think most of the audience understood what I said. That’s about all I can ask for. The play itself was terrific. All the students were marvelous and worked extraordinarily hard. You’ve never seen resourcefulness until you see an abandoned outhouse converted into Juliet’s balcony.

In other work related news, some of my students received their TOEFL scores. The early returns are very promising. It looks like their scores all improved 30-40 points compared to their first practice tests. Especially encouraging was one student who attended every single TOEFL prep session and raised her score from 470 to 500. A 500 TOEFL score is required to qualify for the RMI scholarship which more or less pays for a Marshallese student’s complete higher education in the United States.

I went diving again a few weeks back. The first time I went diving I dove the reef shelf at Arno, an outer island/atoll. The reef was magnificent, completely pristine and colorful. This time I wanted to see what I didn’t see at Arno, lots of big fish. Thus, my dive master recommended that we dive this place he had nicknamed “The Aquarium.” Basically, we enter the water right outside of one of the deep water passes in Majuro atoll during high tide and literally hold onto the walls of the pass as the current drags all manner of sea critters through the pass. Sounded like fun to me. And it was! The thought of holding onto the coral to prevent myself from being swept away was a little intimidating but turned out to be perfectly harmless, and the abundance of ocean life that I saw quickly made me forget about any concerns I had. There were sharks everywhere, 150 lbs dogtooth tunas, and even a gigantic eagle ray. It sounds stupid but I never realized that the ocean had so much stuff living in it. I will definitely have to go diving again.

On a more somber note, my host grandmother passed away last week. I never actually met her but am close enough with my host family that many of their funeral obligations are also mine. Marshallese have a very intimate and special relationship with death. The day my grandmother died her relatives (practically all her relatives) were notified immediately and flocked to her house to begin the mourning period. Most of the immediate family (including my sisters and my mother) stayed up all night mourning and receiving guests who came to pay their respects. They stayed at the house as my grandmother’s body was embalmed at the morgue. After her body was returned, services were held at a church for roughly two days. For these purposes, services constitute the deceased’s children genuflecting and ostentatiously mourning in front of the casket while the deceased’s grandchildren sit to the side and receive guests while watching their parents mourn. Next the body will be brought to what I assume is a funeral parlor type establishment where it will once again be on display and the family will once again receive guests who wish to pay their respects. This will occur for three days. Finally the deceased will be buried and the final rituals at the burial effectively end the mourning period. It’s much more intricate and complex than anything in the United States, probably because family is much more important here than in the United States. I haven’t been present for all of the services like my sisters and mother have, but I’ve been present enough to recognize how significant the process is.

Finally, my flight back home has been booked. Around 10:30 PM on May 30^th, I’ll arrive at Midway. Hope to see many of you then.

The interns

2006-02-25T23:47:00.000-08:00

My internship program received some online publicity. Yokwe.net, the online one stop shop for all news Marshallese, has written an article about me and the program. The article is on the front page right now, but the direct link to it (in case you check this blog later), is here.

The above is a picture of myself along with four of the interns (the fifth had a scheduling conflict) in the Nitijela chamber room.

I'm back!

2006-02-17T22:57:00.000-08:00

February 18, 2006 – 6:22 PM – Ho!

Not bad, it took me more than 7 months before I really lapsed in updating this blog. Let’s see… what’s been happening here. My latest endeavor has been to create an internship for high school seniors at the Nitijela, i.e. Marshallese Congress. I talked with a senator who is also interested in the idea and she agreed to employ two outstanding seniors as interns in her office. We talked about the details and then launched the program. I wrote an application and distributed it to the seniors. About 10% of them applied, not a bad result considering we gave them exactly three days to complete the rather lengthy application.

The applications were very very impressive. Both the senator and myself, along with my field director who also read the applications, were extremely pleased with what we read. We invited five of the applicants back to interview with the senator, myself, my field director, the Nitijela clerk, and a UN consultant who also works here. The interviews were even more impressive than the applications. We asked some hard questions, all in English, and the applicants all responded with a lot of composure and maturity. In fact, the applicants were so outstanding that we decided choosing two would simply be criminal. Therefore, while the students were anxiously waiting outside the conference room for the pizza dinner we promised them, we decided behind closed doors to hire all five applicants and split them between the senator and the UN consultant. We announced this to the applicants over dinner and they were flabbergasted. They were extremely grateful and enormously excited. I don’t think I’ve ever felt more content in my life than when I was watching those students celebrate.

I guess the moral of the story is that education in the Marshall Islands just scored a victory. Students now (and in the future, hopefully) have something to work towards which gives them incentive to attend class and complete homework. Moreover, the experience itself is very valuable and will improve their skills and make them more employable in the future. And of course, they experience what it means to apply for a job and be interviewed.

What else… I’m in the school play. I am the one man chorus of Romeo and Juliet. My lines are in both English and Marshallese, a fact which my students really enjoy, especially when I practice in front of them. It’s actually my first ever attempt at anything dramatic. In all of my prior geekiness, I’ve never tapped into that realm of geekdom.

Man, I must be one of those job-oriented people because all I ever write about is work. You’d think that I don’t do anything else here. Heck, maybe it’s true. Either way, I like what I’m doing so I won’t be too concerned about it. I only have 11 weeks of school left. That almost seems like a lot except it means that 25 weeks are already behind me. Wow.

Word update

2006-01-16T18:08:00.000-08:00

January 16, 2006 – 10:07 PM – Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Werd. When was the last time it was so hot on Christmas that you went snorkeling to cool off? Well, for me it was this Christmas. We had some Christmasy food at our field director’s house, sang some Christmas carols, then decided it was too hot to be enclosed indoors anymore so we went snorkeling. FYI, you honestly forget that Christmas is approaching when the upcoming weeks are sunny, humid, and you’re working. My last day of school was December 23^rd and when I woke up on Christmas Eve I was like, “Whoa, tomorrow is Christmas.”

Christmas is a rather hectic time in the Marshall Islands because this country has become so religious. All the businesses hung up Christmas lights and the local ACE Hardware (yup, we have one of these) even boasted a gigantic snow globe in its front entrance. But by far the most out of place Christmas item was the largeish Christmas tree located in the middle of a hotel parking lot. It was kind of like Rockefeller Plaza except it was so hot that even the pine tree was sweating.

As rowdy as Christmas is, by far the most celebrated holiday in the Marshall Islands is the New Year. An entire section of the road (i.e. the one major road) is cordoned off and that area is deemed the “block party.” Local establishments setup tents and booths along the length of the block party and sell various consumable goods. There are two stages which each boast a few unique musical acts including the Marshallese drag troupe, “Gurl Powah.” How many paradoxes does a drag troupe in a heavily religious Pacific Island nation embody? Four? Five? Whatever, I lost count.

For about four days after the New Year I boasted in various correspondences that I was among the first people on Earth to encounter the New Year. However, I was mistaken. Those damn kiwis in New Zealand actually find themselves celebrating first because, unlike us, they do observe daylight savings time and thus are one hour ahead of us during their spring season, i.e. now. Still, I hit 2006 seventeen hours ahead of any of you. Eat it.

The last bit of significant news that I have is that my college prep students took the TOEFL this past Saturday. There is a fair amount of coming full circle/ironic completeness in this. Roughly twenty years ago my mom studied for and took the TOEFL in China so that I could subsequently be educated in the United States. With that education I then went abroad and have now taught nineteen students how to perform well on that very same test. I even went so far to meet them at the test site at 7:45 AM with a bread and hard boiled egg breakfast. And for those of you from Idaho, yeah, I also gave them pencils with all the answers in them.

Oh! I have one more heartwarming story. A few months back I mentioned that my school’s newspaper was given a biweekly spot in the national newspaper, the Marshall Islands Journal. I consequently introduced the Journal’s editor-in-chief to the school newspaper’s editor-in-chief and for the past couple of months the school newspaper’s editor-in-chief has been going to the Journal’s office every two weeks to deliver our articles. Last Friday, she was offered a job as a reporter by the Marshall Islands Journal.

Pictures update (wow!)

2006-01-09T23:48:00.000-08:00

New pictures uploaded. New post coming soon.

Merry Christmas yo

2005-12-21T18:37:00.000-08:00

December 20, 2005 – 2:37 PM – I’m making a list and checking it twice

Every Christmas season Majuro hosts a parade during which a Marshallese Santa (Hawaiian shirt and red shorts because any other Santa suit would be too hot) and his helpers toss trash bins of candy to the droves of children waiting along the sides of the road. Last Saturday I was one of Santa’s helpers.

So. Many. Kids. I felt like Gandhi or something. There were literally hundreds of kids running along side the truck waiting for more candy. We must have unloaded a few hundreds pounds of candy that day into the general community. And since there’s only one main road, all traffic was stopped in order for us to complete our candy runs. In other words, there I was, riding on the back of a truck while everything was stopped behind me and in front of me, with hundreds of kids running and screaming behind me. Quite the experience.

Also, as promised I had my first yachting experience this weekend. I manned a winch (I think that’s how it’s spelled) on Blue Moon. Surprisingly I only endangered our lives (or more specifically the intactness of the sails) once when I released the line too quickly. Luckily one of the yacht owners grabbed the line from me and quickly rectified my error. Other than that small snafu, yachting was great fun. I learned a thing or two about sailing, had a nice relaxing day on the water, and was able to talk to the two yachties about their travels.

They’ve logged a few miles (or knots) to say the least. They started in New Zealand ten years ago and have sailed to the Marshall Islands twice while hitting every single spot in between. Look at map, there’s a lot of stuff in between New Zealand and the Marshall Islands. They’ve been to all of them. Imagine living that kind of life. Your home floats and you can go anywhere you want with it. It’s almost enough to make me drop everything and become a yachtie.

Christmas break starts in two days. Once it does, I will officially be half way done.

Um, aloha?

2005-12-03T00:48:00.000-08:00

November 28, 2005 – 9:52 PM – Psst, how was daylight savings time?

I keep forgetting to mention this, but this year was the first in my life during which I did not fall back. The entire concept of daylight savings time is inconsequential for a country that lies 7 degrees above the equator and the length of whose days changes by a maximum of probably like 25 minutes throughout the year. Thus, I did not have daylight savings time, which seriously screwed with my time calculations. As if being on the other side of the Earth and across the international date line weren’t enough, I now have to calculate an extra hour’s worth of difference. Try this thought experiment on for size. Have you ever noticed that we (as in people in the States) consider EST to be “ahead” but PST to be “earlier?” Isn’t that kind of weird? Well once you’re across the dateline EST is both considered “ahead” and “earlier,” which totally screws with my head.

I finally went on a real dive. I dropped $95 and chartered a boat to take me an hour and a half away from Majuro to Arno, an unspoiled outer island. The two dives I made were pretty damn spectacular. It’s a pity I don’t have an underwater camera. The fish was an afterthought compared to the coral. We’re talking like, elephant-sized coral composed of every color of the spectrum. And the coolest part is actually looking up. While snorkeling you get the impression that coral is just what’s on top. However, coral actually lines the entire continental shelf all the way down to who knows where. Thus, when you look up from 70 feet below, all you see is coral coral coral to the surface. It’s quite a sight, especially with the sun rays filtering through the water.

The yachties have also arrived in the Marshall Islands. I never knew this but many people who own yachts actually live on their yachts. It’s not just a little vacationmobile. It’s their home. Anyways, supposedly it’s hurricane season further south so the yachties have been pushed further north to avoid sinking their homes. While in the Marshall Islands, they recruit volunteers to be crewmembers and help them race their yachts against one another. The rest of the WorldTeach volunteers have already participated in races and have nothing but rave reviews. I myself have been unable to participate thus far because the races have always coincided with work, but I’m hoping to make it next time. Imagine me as a member of a yacht club. Har!

December 3, 2005 – 7:38 PM – Thanksgiving

Yes, we managed to celebrate it. Yes, we had Thanksgiving outside. Yes, it was 83 degrees outside when we celebrated Thanksgiving. Yes, our Thanksgiving meal included coconut, breadfruit, and pandanus. But damnit, it was still Thanksgiving.

One of the volunteer’s host family decided to host a big Thanksgiving celebration in order to make all of us American volunteers feel more at home. Roughly 40 people showed up and we collectively devoured two turkeys with assorted traditional and tropical fixings.

Moreover, my school also hosted a Thanksgiving party for the faculty members. That party was actually really cool because the faculty of my school is actually incredibly diverse (I may have posted about this earlier but I’m too lazy to go back and check). Marshall Islands High School could very well be the only public school in this country in which the faculty is not majority Marshallese. Integrated with the Marshallese faculty is a healthy smattering of Japanese, Filipino, Fijian, and American teachers, along with singular representation from other countries such as Nauru.

Therefore, our Thanksgiving party, which was a potluck, featured food from every imaginable corner of the globe. I consider myself a pretty well traveled eater and even I failed to identify about ¾ of the stuff I consumed that day. Truly awesome.

In teaching news, the TOEFL looms over my head like a large albatross. I have a little over a month left to prepare my little army of students for battle. The results thus far have been promising. I have two students who, when initially diagnosed, scored in the low 500s and have since improved their score by roughly 80 points and are now threatening to crack 600. Best of all, everyone seems to be improving to some degree.

My greater concern is walking them through college applications themselves. Most of my students intend to enroll in the College of the Marshall Islands first before heading off to a 4-year school elsewhere. They’re easy. The difficult task is helping the students who wish to go to school in another country next year. There aren’t too many of them but almost all of them have never seen a webpage before and simply don’t have the “college radar” that most students in the United States are forced to have. They’re unaware of exactly how many criteria exist with respect to selecting a suitable college and it can be difficult explaining why College A is different from College B and why they would offer different experiences.

All of this means that my schedule has been stretched tighter than a fat man’s shirt. My work day lasts from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM. Monday afternoons I have a faculty which lasts until ~5:00 PM. I have an hour and a half to relax and eat before I have College Prep from 6:30-8:30 PM. Tuesday afternoons are reserved for newspaper club meetings which last until roughly 5:00 PM which are followed by weekly WorldTeach check-ins with our field director. Thursday afternoons are College Prep again followed by producing WorldTeach’s weekly radio show in the evening. Friday afternoons are debate. Every other Saturday morning is dedicated to giving practice TOEFL tests. Somewhere in all of this I have to grade papers and plan lessons. Yeah, I’m pretty busy. But hey, I graduated from the U of C. I can do busy.

Nevertheless, despite the time crunch, this endeavor of mine has already proven to be one of the most worthwhile experiences in which I’ve ever participated. Working with the College Prep students alone has been awe-inspiring. The stories they have to tell are down right astonishing. Remember Jane from a few months ago? Yeah, the upcoming adopted valedictorian? That one. Well, I’ve talked to her a bit and learned a little bit more about her. She has precisely eight brothers and sisters. Her older sister, whom I introduced previously as another very talented student, suffered a rather tragic fate. She also graduated as the valedictorian and received an RMI scholarship (awarded to RMI citizens to attend college abroad, worth roughly $25k a year). She was accepted to and attended a school in Seattle. However, she had to leave before her RMI scholarship arrived because school was starting. She never received her money. Instead, she was forced to drop out and now, three years later, she is a mother in Hawaii. She is 20 years old.

No doubt aware of her sister’s fate, Jane has adopted an unwavering focus and is the most voracious worker I have ever seen, including all U of C students. You can guess what kind of student she is, attentive, participatory, responsible, disciplined, never misses an assignment, etc. However, I also learned that she has to wake up at 5:00 AM in the morning every day because, in addition to living very far from school, her mom works the opening shift at her job and must open for business at 7:00 AM. Thus, she drops off Jane at the school at 6:45 AM and then heads off to work herself. Jane then waits over an hour for school to begin. After school Jane goes to where her mom works and waits for her until 5:00 PM at which time they go home. Despite all this, Jane has yet to miss a day of school, an extracurricular activity, a weekend College Prep meeting, etc. Think you could do that? I couldn’t.

And there’s hundreds like Jane. She’s just one. Almost all of my students could tell a similar story, and yet there they are in front of me wearing their uniforms, sitting in rusted desks inside a classroom with two working lights out of sixteen, wielding borrowed school supplies and ready to take notes. It’s enough to make me feel as if I really squandered a lot of my opportunities.

Thus, in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’d like to give thanks to all of my 107 students. Thank you for making me appreciate what I have and inspiring me to work like hell.

Yokwe and stuff

2005-11-16T03:26:00.000-08:00

November 8, 2005 – 9:59 PM – Some more academic babble

Personal stuff first. There really isn’t much. The diving never materialized because two of the divers canceled so we didn’t have enough people to make the trip. For better or for worse, that is the only development in my life over the past two weeks. It’s not even a significant development. It’s just the only development, period.

Now that I think about it, there are two stuffy dorky topics I’d like to discuss. I think I’ll start with the racial one, because, as interested in race as I might have been before, I have become even more interested in it after spending some time here. Some of you, at least those of you who have heard me ramble at length, might be familiar with the idea that certain races have been socially constructed to be more attractive than others. And yes, those of you rolling your eyes now are correct, the race typically agreed upon to have become socially constructed as the most attractive is whites. In short, white is beautiful. Is this actually true? In my opinion, yes. But since I’ve been here, a hearty and definite yes.

In the U.S., there are subtle indications that this phenomenon exists, such as young black girls buying white Barbies more often than black Barbies, or the curious tendency for individuals of other races who are considered physically attractive to embody so-called white features -- fairer skin in the case of blacks, large eyes in the case of Asians. Of course, in America there are millions of people who oppose this development on a daily basis (“Black is Beautiful”) and the result is that few people feel comfortable talking about their preferences in terms of race or at the very most write them off as matters of personal taste (I just don’t find attractive, that’s all). This hypersensitivity has rendered discussion of this topic rather difficult.

Of course, I don’t live in the United States any more. There are no political or ethnic interest groups in the Marshall Islands which have conditioned the people to respond to questions with specific neutral answers. The result was pretty astounding.

Example 1: One of my students wrote in his journal, “There are three types of girls, smart ones, girls who can do stuff, pretty girls . . . Smart ones are smart and cool, girls who can do stuff are smart and can make money, pretty girls are white. If I marry a smart one, she will be cool, but she might not have the pretty white skin.”

Example 2: I asked my students to write one sentence about each person in the class. One girl who, due to a noticeable amount of Japanese descent, is slightly fairer than the rest, received these comments: “You have such pretty white skin . . . Your white skin is so pretty . . . I wish my skin is as white as yours . . . Your skin is so smooth and white.”

Example 3: I asked my students to write paragraphs about the first time they met a non-Marshallese person. Roughly ten or so described the person they met as “beautiful” (usually referring to a woman), maybe 8 “sexy”s (men or women), and a smattering of “pretty”s, “handsome”s, and “good looking”s. One even said, “I cannot explain how beautiful she was.”

The effects of imperialism and globalization, do they ever end?

November 16, 2005 – 11:11 PM – Hah!

I lied, no more babble. Instead, I’d like to share some rather humorous writing assignments I received. From the same “Describe the first time you met a non-Marshallese person” prompt introduced above, about 5-6 of my students wrote about something similar to the following.

“The first non-Marshallese person I met was a man who came to my house. He spoke Marshallese. He said hello. I said hello. He asked if I wanted to be Mormon.”

That’s it. Hopefully some people from Idaho will enjoy this one.

Oops

2005-10-28T15:52:00.000-07:00

I just realized that a post I thought I had posted roughly 3-4 weeks ago never made it because I posted it to the wrong blog (sorry APO's blog). Anyways, here it is ex post facto:

October 5, 2005 – 9:21 AM – A Story about Jane and Jean

Jane is a senior. She’s the best student I have, and probably the best student in the entire school. She’s smart, responsible, hard working, humble, friendly, social, etc. She will likely be the valedictorian and will likely attend college in the United States. Jean is a sophomore. She is Jane’s sister. She’s the best sophomore student I have, and probably the best sophomore student in the entire school. She’s smart, responsible, hard working, humble, friendly, social, etc. She could very well be the valedictorian for her class and will likely attend college in the United States.

Jane and Jean have an older sister named Joan. Joan was the best student in her class and graduated as the valedictorian for her class. I have never met Joan but I imagine that she is smart, responsible, hard working, humble, friendly, social, etc. She is currently attending college in the United States.

Jane, Jean, and Joan are not island royalty, i.e. their last name does not denote that they come from traditionally powerful (read, currently wealthy) families, or that they hail from families with foreign roots (read, their last name is not Japanese or German, and thus they do not have foreign wealth). My initial conclusion was that the parents of Jane, Jean, and Joan must be absolute superstars. With modest resources they have produced three children of outstanding caliber who are outpacing students with much more resources and who previously have had private education. I was on the verge of visiting this household and asking the parents exactly what they do with their children so other parents could possibly learn from it at the next PTA meeting.

Last week in my senior government class I passed out everyone’s grade on a small slip of paper (yeah, I get to do this now) which showed what assignments the students were missing. Jane of course had turned in every assignment and had a cumulative grade of over 100%. However, she was not enrolled in my class until the third day and thus I did not have her personal information card, i.e. her address, phone number, parents’ names, etc. (yeah, I get to do this now too). She asked me if she should make this up and I told her it wasn’t necessary because I had Jean’s information because Jean was enrolled in my sophomore English class from day one.
Jane responded indifferently that she should probably fill one out because she was adopted and doesn’t live with Jean. I was taken aback. Jane, who is the best student in the school, whose sister was the valedictorian of her class, whose other sister is also phenomenal, doesn’t live with those two? Jane saw my expression and explained that she and Jean were both adopted but adopted separately into different families… and presumably Joan too. This happens more frequently than one would expect here because families often become so large (fertility rate is a little above 6.0) that families simply have to give up some of their children in order to be able to sustain the other ones.

In other words, it’s not Jane, Jean, and Joan’s household that has made them spectacular, because they live in different households. They just want it that badly and are willing to work hard for it. Kudos.

October 9, 2005 – 9:19 PM – Manit Day

Recently the Marshall Islands celebrated Manit Day. Manit means tradition, culture, customs, etc. Manit Day is self-explanatory, a celebration of traditional culture. All the schools setup booths at the Alele Museum (culture museum) and sell handicrafts, food, etc. My school’s booth was pretty cool. It was very rushed because somehow the largest school in the country (us) were informed rather late about Manit Day. On a slightly humorous note, one of the neat little traits about living in a very small country is the complete flexibility with which institutions operate. Manit Day was actually changed a week before the originally scheduled date. Yes, a holiday was moved. The Ministry of Education sent a memo to all the schools notifying them to move the holiday to the following week. What’s really funny? Not all of the schools on the outer islands received the memo, and thus many of them had two Manit Days. Some of the really remote ones only had one, the originally scheduled one because the memo arrived after the newly scheduled date.

The first issue of the high school paper was published this past Monday. Did I mention that I’m the faculty advisor for the school paper? Well, I am. And our first issue was published this past Monday. It was a smashing success, complete with front page news, bios of the new teachers, and an advice column titled, “Ask Baby and Kim.” I’m going to try and save the paper to PDF format and upload it somewhere.

I also found out who my host family is, well sort of. Remember how I wrote previously that the PTA assigned a host family for me but my principal wasn’t sure who it was? Well, I asked her again because it had been awhile since I’ve heard anything about it and she responded that I didn’t have one. Puzzled, I told her what she had told me previously and she said, “Oh yeah, you have one, it’s Neritha’s family.” Hmm. Oh, and the host family? It’s one of my students. In fact, it’s Baby.

Today’s highlight story isn’t of the heartwarming variety. It’s simply funny. In English class we were working on the progressive tenses and my kids were having trouble envisioning how many things could happen at once, i.e. Mrs. Wilson is sitting a table; she reads the newspaper (instead of is reading). So we acted it out in class. I asked for a volunteer to be Mrs. Wilson and a girl named Roseann raised her hand. I had her sit and read at the same time and emphasized that she was doing many things at the same time and consequently we would use the progressive tense to describe both events. On the worksheet, Mr. Wilson was supposed to be pouring coffee (they all said pours). Now I needed a volunteer to be Mr. Wilson while Roseann sat and read. I asked the class who wanted to be married to Roseann. Simultaneously, 25 students pointed to this one guy and yelled his name. Yeah.

And get ready for hell to break loose in 3 weeks. Why? That’s when Richard Li distributes the Communist Manifesto to his senior government class in a 3rd world developing nation.

The national communcations authority's internet cafe is broken right now so I don't have the capacity to upload pictures. I'll do so when they're back up.

Yeah, I'm here

2005-10-26T04:13:00.000-07:00

October 26, 2005 –- 10:23 PM – I failed my first student

Yeah, I know, it’s been awhile. I apologize. I’ve been dreadfully busy as of late, but busy is good. I like being busy. It keeps me from being bored.

First quarter just ended. This means a few things – one, I’m ¼ of the way done with my teaching stint here. Whoa. Two – I’ve been working like crazy trying to finalize grades. Three – I GET TO GIVE GRADES TO STUDENTS. Have you ever been on this side of the equation? It’s nuts. The number one myth that I have personally debunked as a teacher is that teachers don’t want to see some of their kids succeed. That is absolutely false. Nothing would make a teacher happier than to watch their students succeed. Not only is it heart-warming on a general level, but it vindicates who knows how many hours of toil and effort. And a successful student indicates that I have been successful in teaching him, and of course I like that.

Unfortunately, neither the world nor I am perfect and not all my kids are achieving equally. Some are flying off the charts, and it gives me great pride to give them a high grade on their report cards. But alas, some are not flying as high, and it pains, PAINS me to give them low grades. It’s almost criminal how many times teachers fudge grades just so they don’t have to fail a student. I will even admit that I am still holding one student’s final exam because I can’t bring myself to show him how he did (not well).

Forget patience. Forget diligence. Forget sincerity. If anyone ever asks me what it takes to be a teacher, my immediate response will be ice in one’s veins. The hardest part of my teaching experience thus far has been coming to grips with the fact that some of my students whom I see on a daily basis and of whose education I am personally in charge will not graduate from high school, will not attend college, and will not become socially mobile. Regardless of what I do, even though it’s my responsibility, I am not going to be able to change all my students’ lives for the better. That is a very daunting reality to accept, and it’s very easy to doubt yourself as a result. This job requires ice in one’s veins. You have to accept it, be unfazed by it, and move past it. I’m not sure I’ve been able to do that yet.

In other news, I’ve managed to land a permanent spot for my high school’s newspaper in the local/regional/national/only newspaper of the Marshall Islands, the Marshall Islands Journal. Every other week a few submissions from my newspaper club will appear in the weekly issue of the Journal. My kids were pretty excited. The article that drew the editor’s attention? The advice column, a.k.a. Ask Baby and Kim. Go figure.

Also, I’ve latched onto the college preparatory activity at the high school. It was started last year by a volunteer teacher and this year a full-time school counselor is leading it. By pestering him enough I’ve managed to firmly insert my foot in the door and have already interviewed a few students, administered a practice TOEFL exam, tabulated the results into Excel and analyzed it, and am about to begin teaching TOEFL prep. Full teaching load, debate, newspaper, college prep, TOEFL prep, weekly radio show, hmm… I should probably slow down. I’m not at the U of C anymore.

This weekend I’m going on my first SCUBA dive that’s worth writing about. It’s another volunteer’s birthday and we’re going diving on an outer island. That means pristine conditions and in upwards of 200 feet of underwater visibility. The divemaster’s specialty is shark calling (meaning he crinkles a plastic bottle underwater and sharks are attracted to the noise) and we expect to see some big ones. Definitely excited about it.

Alright I should write a lot more given how long it’s been but I have to end it here and go back to agonizing over grades. I’ll leave with an excerpt from a piece of writing by one of my 10^th graders. Phonics is often difficult for the kids here because many English sounds just don’t exist in Marshallese, so they are unable to correctly pronounce some letters/sounds which leads to synonymous usage of those same letters/sounds when they write (think “r” and “l” from east Asians who speak English). Anyways, “g” and “c” are often confused here along with “b” and “p.” This resulted in the following masterful prose:

“Yesterday my friends and I were walking. I snapped my friend on the forehead so he crapped my skirt. It fell down so I quickly crapped it.”

Pictures uploaded

2005-09-27T23:05:00.000-07:00

They're there. Go look.

Yo

2005-09-24T20:36:00.000-07:00

September 18, 2005 – 9:34 PM – Imperialism and Pandora’s Box

At times, the effects of imperialism and social incursion can be quite humorous. For example, since I’ve been here I’ve met/played ukulele with/and went spear fishing with a young boy named Richard, but who prefers to be called “MC Bling-Bling.” Bling-Bling (for short) claims that he is the youngest Marshallese rapper, has a collection of over a dozen do-rags, and recently traded a marmar (think shell necklace) for a volunteer’s And 1 headband. Also, at my school’s welcome back party which was held this past Friday, the entertainment was this student who transformed himself into a one man Micronesian hip-hop machine with the help of a microphone and one of five amplifiers in the country. Between him and his friends who jumped in, I counted three pairs of shirts worn over one shoulder, five backwards baseball caps, two sideways ones, and four pairs of boxers that I could see because the accompanying pairs of pants were worn too low. When the hip-hop machine and crew were taking a break, the students were entertained and danced to a collection of songs which included “Holla Back Girl” and “Get Your Freak On.”

And at other times, the effects of imperialism and social incursion can simply be frightening. As far as nutrition and diet goes, almost everything that Marshallese people consume, practically regardless of where they are, is not native. That is, nothing they eat can be grown or produced in the country. Everything has to be shipped from abroad which, of course, increases prices dramatically. For example, the staple of the Marshall Islands diet is rice. That’s right, rice. Now regardless of what you know about agriculture, it doesn’t take too much imagination to recognize that a hot, humid, tropical climate and land masses that are usually no wider than 300 yds are not ideally suited to support rice paddies. But, thanks to mid 20^th century Japanese colonialism, rice is now what the Marshallese eat, regardless of how taxing it may be to actually acquire it.

To better illustrate this perplexing situation, allow me to share a story an outer island volunteer told me about his host family. This volunteer’s host father produces and sells copra (dried coconut meat). Every week or two he picks, husks, cracks, grates, and dries about 150 lbs of copra. He brings this copra to the local merchant and receives $13 for his 150 lbs of copra. He then visits the merchant’s on-island store and spends $8 of his newly earned $13 on a 20 lbs bag of rice. Lather, rinse, and repeat.

And it’s not just rice that the Marshall Islands have embraced. Thanks to the United States, numerous canned foods, boxed foods (both of these are now wreaking havoc on the Marshallese environment), dairy, etc., have all become somewhat pricey but regular additions to the Marshallese diet. You name it. If the Marshallese eat it, chances are it’s not local (there are, of course, some exceptions such as fish and chicken which are both locally produced and eaten very frequently).

In addition to being expensive (a box of cereal costs $7), these foods are not particularly nutritious. It’s bad enough that the Marshallese are essentially converting to the American diet, but they tend to consume the worst parts of the American diet (stuff that comes in cans and boxes usually isn’t very healthy – think spam, packaged candies, basically anything with enough sugar or salt to preserve it). Subsequently, the Marshallese are now suffering from high blood pressure and a rapidly growing percentage of the population is contracting diabetes (something like 3x as high as the U.S. rate). When the Navy ship came here last week its doctors proclaimed that the Marshallese need to seriously consider changing what they eat. Well gee, thanks doc. I bet you think the Marshallese should seriously consider the adverse health effects of nuclear weapons testing too.

Now on to me. Nothing too exciting happening here. I’m sort of picking up the ukulele and have joined the school band which consists of about 15 ukuleles and a guitar. I’ve also started a debate program at the high school. About 20 people signed up but only 5 showed up. Here’s to hoping that I see more faces this week or there’s going to be some pretty lonely debates. Ahh! But here’s something I do want to share. Every once in awhile the layers of western clothing, music, and food vanish and I see get a glimpse of just how “untainted” this place has been for most of its history. During government class on Friday, we took a break and I played some “politically inspired” music for my students. One of my seniors asked, “Mr. Li, what does racist mean?”

I told her.

Looking back, I feel as if I gave her small pox.

September 25, 2005 – 2:49 PM – Island Life, Life as a Teacher on an Island

I’ll start with work this time. We were doing Athenian democracy in class and I gave the kids a copy of Pericles’s funeral oration to read in order to help them understand how proud Athens was of its democracy. It was tough reading, really really tough reading, like American college level reading. They were frustrated at first but once I told them that this was college level stuff they dug in their heels and hacked their way through it in groups and with dictionaries. Who says people don’t like being challenged any more. Also, as part of our study of Athenian democracy, I pulled an old and venerated trick out of my bag and dressed up as Pericles. I delivered a speech to my students, touting the virtues of Athenian democracy and afterwards they interrogated me, accusing me of lying because I espouse the principles of equality while simultaneously prohibiting women from voting and owning slaves. It went over superbly. Thank you, Mr. Francis.

In English, I gave my students an extra credit assignment to complete after they finished their quiz, mainly to keep the ones who finish quickly busy while others were still working. I showed them a cover of the U.S. News and World Report issue with me on the cover and asked them to write a story about why I am on the cover. It was narcissistic yes, but also fun. I received some really amusing responses about bribing photographers and robbing banks. But one paper from a 14 year old girl really warmed my heart. Here’s an excerpt of what she said:

“Mr. Li has his picture on the magazine to tell us that he cares for school and he wants to have a good future. I wish that was me. I am going to continue going to school and won’t give up. I will try to reach my goal no matter what will come into my mind and bother. A kind of student like this is a real student. They go to school every time and they don’t cut or do something bad. Mr. Li tried his best and now his teaching at the Marshall Islands. He is teaching the students there to reach their goal just like he did.”

Sometimes I have no choice but to love my job.

I’m starting to settle into a routine. Efficiency can be hard to achieve here so I’ve been desperately trying to devise some sort of schedule that allows me to do what needs to be done and still gives me time to have some fun. Some of my highlights include most Monday and Tuesday evenings during which I pack a bunch of papers to grade and take a 50 cent cab ride (all cab rides are 50 cents) to the Flame Tree where I watch Sunday and Monday night football while eating a $3 burger amidst a pile of essays about democracy and the present progressive tense. Also of note is Thursday night when, along with some other volunteers, I record a radio show which is aired Friday night on the government’s radio station (one of three in the country).

Saturdays are usually reserved for some sort of leisure activity provided that I was efficient enough during the week to complete all my errands. This Saturday was my first SCUBA dive as a certified diver. Three other volunteers and I struck a deal with the dive master such that, for only $5, we would rent enough equipment for a full hour long dive provided that we fill two bags with cans from the bottom of the lagoon. Not a bad deal at all. We went by ourselves, no dive master this time. It was pretty rocking, just us and a few cans at the bottom of the ocean. We saw the usual assortment of fish along with a couple of eels that popped their heads out of the reef.

And one final story to share. The head of the science department at my school is a woman named Asena from Fiji. We have the same planning period and were both in the lounge. She started telling me about her first and so far only visit to the United States. She was in Seattle. A few of the highlights include:

“Oh but when I first went through a tunnel, oh boy. I thought I was going to die. It was so dark and there was SO MUCH NOISE. I thought, ‘Asena, what are you doing here? Why did you leave your island and your taro?’”

“I went into the mountains and if you go high enough you start seeing some snow on the ground. Richard, it was the first time in my life I had seen snow. I was so excited. But then I touched the snow and said, ‘OK, that’s enough snow for me.’”

I have new pictures to upload but myphotoalbum.com just happens to be underdoing maintenance right now. I'll upload them when I'm next at the internet cafe. I just realized that I will soon come to another first. If my calculations are correct, the U of C begins school in three days… and for the first time in four years, I’m not going to be a part of it. For those of you that still are, enjoy your, for most of you, last year there. Regardless of how you feel about that place or just college in general, you’ll never have this year again, and it has the potential to be really good. Take care.

Lost post found

2005-09-10T18:12:00.000-07:00

It's from August 31, 2005 and has been interpolated into its correct position (i.e. one post below).

Yo

2005-09-09T01:35:00.000-07:00

August 31, 2005 – Ahoy!

The US Navy paid the Marshall Islands a rather extended visit. The USS Boxer, a quasi-aircraft carrier with a 1500+ crew, came to Majuro and stayed for slightly less than a week. The sailors’ mission was two fold; one, to service the Marshall Islands because many of them are trained physicians, mechanics, electricians, etc., and two, to enjoy their “liberty leave.” Yes, liberty leave, quite possibly one of the top five all-time greatest euphemisms. Basically, the crewmen – not all of them at once of course but a fair amount at one time – are allowed 24 hours of absolute free time. They stay in hotel rooms, eat where they want, and do what they want. I’ll leave it up to your imaginations to envisage what 1500 sailors whoa re subjected to a male/female ratio of roughly 8 to 1 for years at a time, who normally receive two beers every 45 days, and who spend all of their time on a boat do when they are given “liberty leave” on a tropical island. Actually, I’ll give you a hint. For 72 hours, the entire atoll of Majuro literally ran out of alcohol. Every drop of it had been purchased from every establishment that sells it.

As for me, all the Majuro volunteers (most of the outer island volunteers are on the outer islands now, with the exception of two whose travel plans have been altered) were offered free CPR training aboard the USS Boxer. I wasn’t necessarily looking forward to CPR training, but it was pretty difficult to reject the opportunity to be on a boat big enough for planes to land on. The Boxer did not disappoint. I saw hovercrafts, ATVs, and the world’s fastest machine gun – a mounted six-barreled weapon that fired two-feet long rounds at a rate of 4000 per second. My only regret was that I didn’t bring a frisbee because then I could have played frisbee on the deck of an aircraft carrier. That would rock.

School is going well. The shyness of the students can be frustrating sometimes (the worst question to ask is, “What do you think?”). Trying to base a lesson upon discussion is simply a lost cause at this point. It merely constitutes 90 minutes of my life which I will never have again. Instead, class is a delicate balance between lecture and group work. Once in awhile a question I ask will be answered very quietly. But when I ask that person to repeat it, he or she rarely does. This is discouraging because my teaching philosophy, and probably the teaching philosophy of many educators from the United States, is to promote discussion. This is how I was taught in high school (Mr. Francis for those of you from Idaho) and in college (everyone else who reads this). Hopefully my students will gradually become more comfortable in class and start speaking up, or else I’ll be forced to scrap a lot of my lessons. But there are always those rare moments of “Booya! Way to be!” Here’s one from my senior government class.

Me: Here’s the most important thing you will learn for the next three months, and maybe for the rest of your lives. Government provides; it provides protection and services. But government also takes. In order for a government to operate, it needs some of your freedom. Is anyone uncomfortable with this?

(Pause)

Student: …You are.

September 9, 2005 – Konichiwa?

If I only had a nickel for every time someone greeted me with “konichiwa.” No matter where I am, physical appearances always seem to matter more than anything else.

But anyways, school is going pretty well. My classes seem to hit every single morsel of the ease of teaching spectrum. Some of my students, particularly the older ones, are more engaged in class and not only answer the questions I ask them, but also ask some of their own. Other students are more shy and reserved and are characterized by passive learning. They are very obedient and studious but rarely if ever at all raise their hand to ask a question or simply request clarification.

Consequently, it is very difficult for me to “get a feel” for many of my students. Whatever I say is often greeted by… well, nothing. I’m not sure if they understand, don’t understand, or simply can’t understand what I am saying. I also cannot interpret if they are bored, confused, or clueless. It’s a big game, but one which I am determined to win, because it is one I cannot afford to lose.

There have been many moments of frustration. Students often misunderstand an assignment or in-class task and are too shy to ask for clarification. Hence, their work is often irrelevant for developing their skills and for assessment. Lesson planning can be arduous simply because I am so used to being educated by discussion that I am usually at a loss for what to do when my students’ behavior renders discussion based classes impossible. And in the Marshall Islands, probably even more so than the United States, the variation in student backgrounds is even more polarized because, in addition to some students being more advanced in subject material due to myriad reasons, some students are also more capable in the language of instruction, often because one of their parents may be a native speaker or they have had more exposure to native speakers. Imagine if you will that American public schools are taught in French. In that case, as it is here, you no longer have two “types” of students – those who already know more and those who already know less. You now have four “types” – those who know more and can communicate better, those who know more but communicate worse, those who know less but can communicate better, and those who knows less and communicate less. Juggling these four “types” of students can be exhausting as well as overwhelmingly difficult.

Nevertheless, their have been moments of victory that justify all the hardship. In my government class, there is a student who is not necessarily the most advanced in his class, but he has a very positive attitude and works hard. His homework lacks extremely polished English skills but exhibits great effort. In class his classmates speak and participate more but he is always very attentive and observant. On more than one occasion he has stayed after class to ask me questions or discuss ideas and topics which were introduced in class. Last week, as he was leaving, he turned to me and said, “Mr. Li, I really like this class.” And he left.

My life outside of school is good. I just watched the NFL season opener re-broadcasted at a local bar (because live telecast is at an unreasonable hour). If I close my eyes it almost feels like home. I also have a host family now. I’m not living with them and they are under no obligations to physically support me, but I am welcome to visit them and talk with them in order to become more acclimated to the Marshallese culture and more adept at the Marshallese language. I haven’t actually met them and don’t even know their name, but they’re there… somewhere.

No picture updates this post, haven’t had enough time to go on any exciting excursions. Next time I’ll try to post more “real” pictures of my life here, including pictures of my room and the local life and activities. Hope everyone is doing well.

Hahahahahaha!

2005-08-26T22:26:00.000-07:00

LAPTOP POWER!

2005-08-23T19:26:00.000-07:00

Adapter is here. Posts up as promised. There’s quite a few because it’s been some time. New pictures are also posted. Again, more than usual because it’s been awhile.

August 4, 2005 – 7:18 PM – Why did the chicken cross the road?

To get run over by me. First driving experience in the Marshall Islands. I went into town to grab some checks in order to pay for my scuba certification. I was driving back to Laura when this large, speckled chicken crossed the road. It never made it to the other side. There was a thud and a poof of flying feathers. We pulled over and got out of the car to assess the damage. The bumper was cracked cleanly through and one of the wheel wells was flapping around. Pretty boss damage for a chicken. I looked back at the road to examine the remnants of a chicken. To my shock, there were none. In fact, as I looked back, I saw the chicken walking back towards the side from which it came and pecking at the ground like nothing had happened. Note to self and others, chickens in the Marshall Islands are sturdy.

Aside from the steel chicken nothing too eventful has occurred in the past week and a half. The six high school teachers from WorldTeach, myself included, are attending a week-long curriculum development conference while the elementary school teachers are practicing their teaching skills on local school kids. Being in a very small country offers some very unique opportunities. Each person “matters” more. For example, the 60 or so people in that conference room are determining the high school curriculum for an entire country. The social security board is something like four people large. The chairman of that board is also leading the Bikini Atoll reparations movement along with heading about a half dozen other organizations. Being in a place like this is an ideal way to quickly get one’s feet deep into a few issues.

Since there isn’t too much to write about, I’d like to add a small academic interlude to remind myself that I did in fact graduate from college with a degree in anthropology. This country’s language, or at least the evolution of its usage, is fascinating. Like most languages, Marshallese has historically been entirely oral. It was never written. Of course, the 19^th century missionaries found that unacceptable because they could not translate the Bible into a language that wasn’t written. Thus, the missionaries actually developed an alphabet for Marshallese. In other words, some 150 years ago a couple of white people sat in a circle with some Marshallese people and tried matching the sounds that emanated from their mouths to Roman alphabet letters. You can see why this method might create some inconsistencies in the future.

I have to give the missionaries credit. The alphabet they created for Marshallese is mostly consistent with the language spoken by the Marshallese people, at least as far as my extremely limited Marshallese ability can discern. Nevertheless, there are numerous instances in which the sounds my Marshallese teacher makes do not match the spelling of the word she is reading. And perhaps most importantly, the Marshallese are not that accustomed to writing their own language because it has never been written before. Consequently, there tend to be multiple spellings for the same word because the Marshallese had to essentially learn the alphabet for their language from foreigners and that type of pedagogy is bound to create some variation. Imagine asking people learning English to spell a complex sounding word. How many different spellings would they produce?

School starts in two and a half weeks. Orientation ends in one and a half. Tomorrow we are staying overnight on an outer island to help prepare the outer island volunteers for their upcoming style of living.

August 8, 2005 – 3:05 PM – I am more tan than you are

Being on a deserted tropical island rocks. After I had been in the lagoon for two hours, I looked around and caught myself thinking, “Man, I wish my friends from home could just see what we’re doing here.” I’ll try to describe the scene. I had just surfaced from the water while snorkeling. Nearby there were a few volunteers splashing each other and generally frolicking in the 83 degree water. There were also two kayaks in the water. One was filled by two people merrily rowing around the water. The other was occupied by a single person who was lying down drifting between sleep and awake. On shore some Marshallese people were ukuleleing while others were roasting some chicken. Throw in coconut trees and water that represented every imaginable shade of blue and green, and you can get some semblance of an idea of what was occurring around the world.

While on the island I tried my hand at spearfishing. It’s not necessarily what you envisage it to be. There is no gun. There isn’t even a spear. The projectile is a rusted dowel and the launching mechanism isn’t even fancy enough to be called a slingshot. It’s simply a bungee with a little bit of string on it where one notches the rusted dowel. Anyways, I carried my spearing implements into the water with a snorkel and proceeded to fish. Fish swim faster than I do. I am a poor shot. I was fishing with a bungee and a rusted dowel. The fish won. Actually, I managed to spear two. Unfortunately, the first I speared right into a cave and when I pulled my dowel out of the cave I also pulled it out of the fish. The second one I speared through the mouth but it managed to tear itself loose before I could secure it.

By the way, night time here is out of control. I’ve been meaning to post about this but I always seem to forget. The second night I was in the Marshall Islands was a cloudless, full moon night. The beach was lit up like it was day but had this eerie greyscale aura about it. Incredibly cool. But perhaps even cooler is that the extreme lack of light pollution (remember when the sky wasn’t purple at night Chicago people?) renders ever single star visible. Moreover, not only are the stars visible, but the Milky Way is visible. That’s right, I can look up and SEE the Milky Way. Every night there’s a large, misty ribbon that meanders across the pitch black sky. Zing! That’s the Milky Way. When was the last time you saw the Milky Way?

But as rocking as it is to be on a deserted tropical island, sleeping on a deserted tropical island sucks. I slept in a ten person tent. Actually, the word “tent” is too generous. It was a raised tarp under which ten people slept. And since we did not have enough sleeping bags for all of us, a few people, most notably me, slept on top of coconut leaves. This actually was not that bad. What was bad were the denizens of mosquitoes that completely violated any of my unsuspecting exposed skin. Completely merciless I tell you. My deep woods formula OFF repellant was absolutely no match. And the humidity is at drowning level. It rained the night I was there (do not mess with tropical rain storms) and though our tarp protected us and our stuff from direct wetness, the indirectness wetness we were exposed to from the humidity made me more moist than any rain shower in the States. I might as well have slept in a puddle.

Deserted islands. Good places to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there.

August 16, 2005 – 4:31 PM – Like sardines in a can

WorldTeach moved out of Laura this weekend. My permanent and other volunteers’ temporary place of residence is the WorldTeach dorm in the D-U-D. It has nine air conditioned bedrooms and a common living space and kitchen. Unfortunately it also has 30 people in it until the outer island volunteers fly away. They’ll be going to teach on islands on which fewer than 100 people reside and which have no power, running water, telephones, etc. Absolutely crazy. Half the time I wish I were one of them.

As for me, I will be teaching in Marshall Islands High School which, at around 900 students, is the largest school in the country. As it stands I will teach two classes on the A block schedule and three classes on the B block schedule. Four of my classes will be sophomore English while the last will be senior Marshallese government. Read that sentence again. This is Tuesday. School starts on Friday. Yeah, I know.

My classroom is pretty bare bones. All the desks are rusted, some to the point that the legs have snapped off. There are no bookshelves (or books for that matter), or trash cans, or erasers, or chalk. I cleaned it and recognized that for the first time in my life I would be able to determine the seating arrangement of a classroom. We never think about this as students. We just enter the classroom and sit down in a desk. But the task suddenly seemed very daunting. Where should my students sit in there rusted desks? Traditional rows? UChicago style circle? Hmm…

I also get to decorate my classroom. This is much easier since I don’t have anything to decorate it with. Know those periodic tables, and world maps, and timelines that we all had in high school? Yeah, I don’t have any of those. Right now my grand vision is lots of words cut out from construction paper. Awesome.

August 23, 2005 – 10:01 PM – School canceled due to typhoon

The first day of school was last Friday. This year Marshall Islands High School is implementing a new block schedule. Students have a set of classes which they attend on “Block A” days and another which they attend on “Block B” days. The blocks rotate every day. Friday was to be an orientation of sorts, particularly for the incoming 9^th graders. It was only a half day but would send all the students to every single one of their classes in Block A and Block B. Therefore, each class would be roughly twenty minutes long.

The day was hectic to say the least. Students were wandering the campus trying to find their classes which often rendered them late to their already shortened classes. In addition, many students were unable to attend school at all because their travel arrangements would not allow them to do so. Transportation to and from outer islands (which many students visit during the summer because they have family there) is very dependent upon the weather and the condition of planes, both of which can be unreliable.

Given the circumstances, I decided not to count Friday as the first day of school. Instead, Monday would be the first day of school. Unfortunately, on Monday we had a typhoon. OK, it wasn’t really a typhoon. Another quick geography lesson. Typhoons are generally created in the middle of the pacific and gather both speed and strength as they move outwards. Thus, what canceled school here on Monday can be more accurately described as a tropical storm. It rained for about three hours straight (sounded like bombs were hitting the roof) and flooded the campus. Many classrooms became wet due to leaks in the roof or the water level rising high enough that water began to seep in underneath the doors. A learning environment was not to be had that day and thus school was canceled. But if in two weeks or so you hear/read about India being pelted by a typhoon/monsoon, you’ll know that it was the same one that canceled my first day of school.

This all means that the first day of school was today. It went pretty well. The students are very well behaved but also very shy. It’s very different from the American education system which generally promotes active discussion and participation. The rule of thumb is that as students here become older they become more participatory in class, but teachers, administrators, and parents are trying to encourage the students to become active learners sooner to better take advantage of their education. I guess that’s my job.

My living situation has become more stable. The WorldTeach dorm, which is supposed to house nine people, is currently housing fourteen, a drastic improvement from the thirty or so people who were staying here last week. All the outer island volunteers were schedule to be on their islands now but some have fallen victim to the caprices of island-to-island transportation (see above). But nevertheless, I have my own room now with my own bathroom which is only occasionally shared by the volunteers whose bathrooms don’t work. I have my own workspace on which I can lesson plan, grade papers, etc.

The only concern I have is that my living situation detracts considerably from my “experience.” Stepping foot into the dorm is like stepping foot into a mini-America. The people here are great but I can’t help but feel that I’m missing something by being in here and not out there. And since a large part of my deciding to come here was to escape American culture and pursue a “crazy liberal dream” as one friend so aptly put it, I am a little worried about this predicament. However, I will be assigned a host family at the first PTA meeting. Hopefully I can become more immersed in the culture here once that occurs.

I lied

2005-08-16T21:53:00.000-07:00

Yeah, it's been three days and no post. My laptop adapter has yet to arrive and until then I can't post. I should have known better than to trust around the world mail. Post to immediately come after I can power my laptop.

Comments fixed

2005-08-07T20:01:00.000-07:00

Oops, must have inadvertently ticked a few boxes. Anyone should be able to comment now. New posts and pictures within the next three days.

Here we go now

2005-07-27T16:14:00.000-07:00

Booya, I’m online. Here’s the deal. Since internet access costs so much and is pretty slow, I’m blogging into Microsoft Word and copying/pasting into this blog. It will look a little bit different but hey, you should feel lucky to hear from me. A few pictures have been uploaded to my photo album.

July 19th – 9:29 PM -- Arrival

Chicago to Denver to Los Angeles to Honolulu to Majuro. It was roughly 60 hours of travel and July 18th only lasted about three hours but I arrived in the Marshall Islands today at around 10:00 AM. We, the WorldTeach volunteers, were greeted by about 20-25 Marshallese and the Worldteach staff already on site. In addition, we were welcomed to the Marshall Islands by a wall of humidity so thick and formidable that it made Chicago’s humidity look like a little bitch in comparison. A layer of condensation instantly formed on every inch of my body. My clothes clung to my skin. My hair clung to my scalp. My backpack clung to my clothes which clung to my skin. I felt like flypaper.

In fact, the comparison to flypaper is more accurate than it originally seems because right as my epidermis gained the texture of a post-it note, the denizens of mosquitoes which inhabit the Marshall Islands were instantly alerted to my presence. In about 5 minutes I was the proud father of about four mosquito bites – some big, some small, all new, and all really annoying. Mosquitoes have always had a natural penchant for my tender flesh. In Minnesota they attacked me like piranhas in the water. In Europe they attacked me like Karl Rove on gays. And now they were attacking me like, you know, something that really sucks.

At the twenty minute mark I was already asking myself what the hell I was doing here. I mean seriously. Here I was, in the middle of the ocean, on an island that is at most half a mile wide, and being assaulted by mosquitoes and spiders as large as my hand (I kid you not). Perhaps my spirit for adventure had directed me down an inappropriate path…

But before I could think any more I found myself lei’d by a local WorldTeach supporter and whisked into a sixteen seat school bus whose seats were so close together that I had to sit sideways in order to fit. Our destination was Laura, a peninsular type formation on the opposite end of the atoll.

(Quick aside for those of you who have heard of an atoll and would use the word in a conversation but really aren’t sure what it is. Actually I’ll be brief. It’s a bunch of coral islands surrounding the lagoon in a quasi-circular formation. So when I say at the opposite end of the atoll, I mean Laura was across the lagoon from the airport on another island but we had to drive around the entire circle so to speak in order to reach it. The islands are usually close enough together that they can be connected via bridges.)

Along the way the atoll reminded me why I was here. There was no big business. There was no one selling out to big business. Trendy and hip did not exist. All I saw were people being themselves, not padding resumes, not racing to get ahead, not striving to be something that other people are or striving to possess what other people have, just husking coconuts on sticks and fishing in the waters. They had never heard of human capital and did not care about attaining it. Everyone was helping everyone else. It was as far away as possible from everything I have ever known. Despite the heat, the humidity, the man-eating spiders, the shark attacks, the death by coconut droppings, the poisonous fish, and the poisonous snakes, I knew that this was going to work.

Once we reached Laura we began orientation. It’s going to be a month long and jammed with activities every single day. All the volunteers are staying in elementary school classrooms in an arrangement that’s somewhere between a hostel and a military barracks. I am writing whilst sitting on a rusty cot (everything metallic in the Marshall Islands is rusty due to the heat and humidity) with my towel lying next to me acting as a pillow. There are six other people in my room. Four are on cots. One is on an uncovered mattress. The remaining one is on a table about to collapse. The 36 other volunteers are all housed in classrooms next to us under very similar circumstances. We’re tired, cramped, and hungry. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Today was dedicated to introductions. Tomorrow is language. Bring it on.

July 25, 2005 – 9:58 PM – The One Week Juncture

Snorkel with sharks. Check. Hack open coconuts with machetes. Check. Husk coconuts on rocks and tree stumps. Check. Eat off of a plate I wove from palm tree leaves. Check. A very skill-building first week to say the least. The initial euphoria of simply being somewhere new and different is beginning to wear off. Instead, the realities of living in a developing nation are making themselves readily apparent.

My diet has changed dramatically, or at least it will as soon as I will be forced to stop consuming the catered food I eat everyday. WorldTeach is trying to acclimate us to the tropical island diet by integrating some type of “local” cuisine into every one of our meals. Thus far I have been introduced to a fair amount of raw fish, and about a half dozen forms of coconut and breadfruit products – including but not limited to grilled, pickled, and fried.

I also had my first glimpse of “downtown” Majuro. Remember, Majuro is actually an island in an atoll which is also called Majuro (the other islands in the Majuro atoll are not named Majuro). The island of Majuro is divided into separate regions or villages. I am living in Laura during orientation while “downtown” is located in what’s called the D-U-D, which stands for something that starts with D, Uliga, and Delap. The D-U-D is a stark contrast from what I’ve experienced this far. It is developing in every sense of the word. Dirt, grime, and pollution pervade the entire area. The lovely turquoise/blue/green lagoon is covered with oil slicks and stray animals are common.

Insects are ubiquitous and quite large. While I was showering I saw a cockroach that was so sizeable that I initially thought the wall was moving. My legs have become smorgasbords for all manners of biting bugs. Ants live side by side with us along with rats and lizards.

Of course the notion that I have still yet to completely embrace is that I am not simply a tourist here. I will be living and working here for the next ten months of my life. My time spent here is not merely an extremely extended vacation. Every inconvenience I have encountered will be a permanent inconvenience unless I adapt myself and change my ways. It’s a funny idea, really. At 22 years of age I have to change myself in order to get by.

But despite the downfalls of living in a developing tropical nation, one of the benefits definitely deserves its own paragraph. The view underwater is spectacular. Lagoon side snorkeling provides a spectrum of greens and blues that I have not seen anywhere else and a myriad of brightly colored critters. They are literally everywhere. The coral grows roughly as close as five feet off shore and is simply teeming with life. On the ocean side, the coral grows just as close to shore and drops off quite dramatically about 50 feet farther. That drop off is home to schools of larger fish including, yes, sharks. Thus far I am the only one in the group to actually see a shark though we have been told numerous times that they are everywhere. The shark I saw was a white tip reef shark about four feet in length. Initially I thought, “Holy fuck! A shark!” But quite frankly I have never seen anything look for docile or placid. I have never felt so unthreatened in my life. I sat around and watched it for a minute or so before poking my head above water to try and motion for someone else to take a look. I couldn’t find anyone and descended back into the water but by then the shark had already left the area.

Back to the D-U-D tomorrow and more orientation in the upcoming week. Somehow the power adapter of my laptop was damaged during transit and I was forced to order a new one. If I’m lucky it will arrive late next week and until then I’ll have to hope that I have enough battery life to blog and what not.

PS: I shaved my head.

Wait for it

2005-07-26T20:38:00.000-07:00

Marshall Islands update soon. Watch for it.