Ripelles are Party Animals

This weekend I was
invited to 3 different parties. The
first was a an opening party for my new school. The senators from 3 different atolls came and gave speeches including
the assistant to the Ambassador. There
was lots of food and quite a few people there. Let me say that those senators and guests left with some awesome swag. They got a bouquet of Wotje wots, a lei, a
crown of Wotje wots, a little model canoe and a HUGE basket of food. It was nuts. The next party was for Women's
Day and it happened at the Protestant church. There were a lot of decorations and singing from various groups. The women served some more amazing
Marshallese food in the trademark coconut leaf plates. More singing and dancing. The last party was the wild one. One of the teachers, Connie, had a birthday
party and Kathleen, john, Gabe and I went. They served some more excellent food and then Glenn, Connie's uncle
coerced us to get up and give a "program" which means dance and
sing. Kathleen had taught me the
birthday song from TGI Fridays just in case so we were prepared. We sang our song and before we could retreat,
they had turned on the stereo and were dancing with us. I got thrown around like a rag doll. Marshallese women are shy and mild until
there's music . Then they turn into
professional wrestlers. Connie ran
inside to get clothes which she roughly pulled over my head and then she
smeared lotion on my leg and face. Kathleen
had the same done to her. We didn't know
what to do so we continued to dance. It
was a very bizaare thing. To my
astonishment, John and Gabe were not exempt. They were pulled on to the dance floor and Connie dressed them in
dresses and smeared lotion on their faces too. Then I'm not sure what happened, but Gabe was running and the ladies
were chasing him. They ended up tackling
him onto the floor where they proceeded to spank him and wipe more lotion on
him. At this point, Kathleen and I were
standing there trying not to die from laughter. We went back to our table with our pilfered clothes and hair accessories
and watched as Gabe was attacked. It was
pretty hilarious. After that excitement,
we all decided to go home, but not before they gave us more food to take home
and big piece of chocolate cake. I guess
it was their way of making reparations for the near slaughter of Wotje's
ripelle population. All in all it was a
great weekend and on Monday, Connie came up to me and invited me to the
Christmas party in December. I have
plenty of time to study up on my self defense moves before then.

Why Ripelles are like Pet Monkeys

As I've worked and lived with these amazing Marshallese people, I've come to realize that although
I am a reasonable intelligent, independent and hardworking person, here I am treated more like a pet monkey. I mean this is the most flattering way of course. It's more of a fact that I am an oddity and this brings out the same
tendencies and mannerisms a person might have towards a capuchin in a fez.

-I am asked if not
forced to dance at any and every special occasion

-I am rewarded with
either a pat on the head or food

-They always laugh
and indulgently smile when I try to speak Marshallese

-I often get dragged
places without knowing why or where we're going

-People come by the
house just to watch me do things like read or write

-People call out my
name everywhere I go

-Everyone just says
"come" or "go", simple commands

-I'm asked to give
speeches at events and everyone laughs even when I'm not being funny

-People talk about
me even when I'm sitting next to them

The first picture is me and the Senator. He's also the King of the Island of the Irooj. It was the opening ceremony of my new school. Notice I'm all decked out in my island finery?

Second picture is a Halloween picture with my 8th grade. Can you spot the Ripelle?

Third picture is me and one of my 3rd graders, Rana, at the Field Day. They play lots of games and have foot races. Plenty of fun for the whole family!

The Fall of the Internet

As you've probably
figured out, there is no internet on Wotje anymore. Something happened and it hasn't been fixed
yet so I'm sending these blogs out from Majuro since I'm here for mid service. I wrote them throughout the internet dry
spell so I could update everyone on what's been going on. The likelihood that the internet will be
fixed anytime soon is slim so if you'd like to send me letters, I would
probably kiss your feet with gratitude.
After January 6th, I'll be alone on an isolated island in the Pacific
without internet so any and all communication with me will have to be done by
snail mail. BUT the good news is, you
can definitely count on a reply because
writing letters a new hobby of mine. :)

For the last month,
there have been no planes an d no boats so, in effect, I have been completely
isolated on Wotje. It's a weird
sensation to be so totally cut off from everything. Thank God for the WorldTeach radio check
ins. Because of the lack of news here,
I'm going to have to apologize now for ignorance when I return. My friends and family will have to fill me in
on all the news. It's a novel sensation
to be almost entirely out of the loop.
Yet another reason for my friends and family to send me letters to
update me on life outside the RMI.

Halloween in the RMI

Hello and Happy Halloween!

Unfortunately I'm not in the States this year for Halloween so no candy corn, jack o lanterns, or goofy costumes for me. Although it's not all bad because with help for the Dartmouth teaching supplies and 3 hours on the internet downloading the monster mash, I was able to piece together a little celebration for my kids. This is a run down of my lesson for Halloween: We watched a slide show I created about the history of Halloween and it's roots (complete with pictures of Olivia in her Halloween costumes). Then we made masks and I had the kids decorate them with spiderman, cats, bats, pumpkins, whatever they wanted. After the masks, we put them on and then I taught them the Monster Mash, which I made up my own dance too. They loved it! Then there was a scary story and finally, we sang the Hearse Song and ate candy (courtesy of Shelly G). It was a lot of fun and the students really had a great time. I've got some great and hilarious pictures and videos of my kids dancing and singing. Hopefully I'll get them uploaded soon.

The week has been pretty busy what with Halloween, the speeches by the candidates for local government, and the Dengue Fever outbreak. For those of you who don't know, Majuro has recently had 199 confirmed cases of Dengue Fever. One of the volunteers on Majuro is hospitalized with an IV. They don't know how long or how many will be affected. Fortunately, there hasn't been any dengue on Woje atoll yet. I'll try to keep everyone updated on what happens.

Thank you so much to everyone for your letters and packages. It's all appreciated and I don't think I can express how thankful I am for all your support.

Kathleen's Mama: I sent you an email with an update of Kathleen. I forgot to tell you that I beat her at Cribbage AGAIN and she really appreciates the candy especially the candy corn. I'll let her know about the Christmas stuff. She had a lot fo fun with her students on Halloween. She got some great pictures of them in their masks. Unrelated, she also taught them the song, Wild Thing, for her W day with her Kinder class. Thought you might get a chuckle out of the image of Marshallese children running around singing Wild Thing. :)

Welcome Party

It's a tradition here in the Marshall Islands to throw a welcome party for the newcomers. These parties consist of heaps (for the Aussies) of food and singing and speeches. My elementary school threw me a welcome party on Monday although I've been here for awhile. We've all been so caught up in getting school started that they forgot. It's alright because the food made up for everything.

They piled me with three plates full of fried fish, sashimi, fried chicken, hotdogs, and salted fish. Then they gave me another plate with pumpkin, breadfuit mashed, breadfruit fried, breadfuit with coconut sauce, and breadfruit raw. Can you tell it's breadfruit season? Then another plate witht he baked goods, cookies, little cakes, bread, rice, and these little coconut drop cookies that are AMAZING. Then they also gave me coconut milk AND a Dr. Pepper. Such an eclectic mix of food and I was only able to make a dent in the first plate, but no worries, my host brothers polished off the rest.

In addition to the wonderful food, my principal got up and made a speech as well as a couple other teachers. Then, my favorite part, the Kindergarten teacher, Limon, got up and sang me a song on her ukulele about mosquitoes. This song was complete with hand motions. Classic Kinder. Then she pantomimed how her husband was shot in WWII. I quickly added up the years and there is no way she's that old. But then who am I to contradict her story...

All in all it was an awesome party and I'm excited to work with such generous and kind people.

Kathleen's Mama: Carleigh, the Dartmouth director, went out to Wodmej on Thursday and took Kathleen's package with her. I also sent out little cakes so she can hand them out to her students on Halloween. Carleigh says the whole island saw the cakes and was really excited. I got another manila envelope with a bunch of letters for her on Saturday so I'm sure some of your stuff is in there. She seems to be doing well and I beat her at Cribbage last Sunday. Pretty typical.

Sea Turtle, the other white meat.

I love the Marshall Islands but there are many things that make me feel slightly uneasy doing. The most recent of these is my consumption of an endangered species. I know that there are only 7 species of sea turtles in the world. I know that they are endangered. I know that the Marshall Islands is one of their many nesting areas. I know that in order to catch one, they wait on the beach for the turtle to come up and lay its eggs and then they walk up and flip it over. I also know that they take the eggs and eat them as well. Knowing all this, I still ate turtle.

On Saturday, there was a funeral for a big important ex councilman for Wotje. There were tons of people there, all the muckity mucks fro the atoll. After the service, we all go to the church and listen to some speeches. While this is happening, they bring in 2, count them, 2 turtle shells that are so big, I could sit in them. They are full of meat and one has the turtle stew complete with baby sea turtle eggs. They serve me up a generous portion of both. Even though it's morally wrong and I felt absolutely guilty about it. I ate the turtle. I couldn't eat the eggs though. Knowing that they would have looked adorable, just like Squirt from Finding Nemo.

The Marshallese people have been eating sea turtle forever. So I don't know if I can feel outraged that they do this. It's not that the Marshallese are consuming turtles at a ridiculous pace that they are disappearing. I feel like it's a gray area. Also, endangered species would last longer if they didn't taste so delicious. It had the texture of well marinated beef and tasted light like chicken but WAY better. Just if you wanted to know.

I'm sorry Tram. I had to.

Kathleen's Mama: Saw her this weekend and she's doing well. Her classes are hard, but it seems like she's getting into a groove. We tried to go snorkeling but it didn't work out. I told her that if you want to email me with questions for her, I talk to her on the radio on Wednesday at 5pm. Oh and I told her Congrats on the 9 law schools!

I Want it That Way and Girls Just Want to Have Fun

Last night I went to the high school welcome feast for new students. My mama and baba were invited because he's the doctor on the island and Ketty is the women's representative for Wotje. Needless to say, in true Marshallese fashion, there was an obscene amount of food. On coconut palm frond plates, we had BBQ chicken, meatballs, pig, breadfruit, pumpkin, cornbread, cookies, and nothing is complete without rice. We also had a few oddities like hotdogs, fruit cocktail in condensed milk and bubble gum. It was absolutely delicious and I ate so much I was actually scared that I would throw up. :S

In addition to feeding upwards of 300 people, the students also put on a show. Each class, 10th, 11th and 12th would sing to the 9th graders. Then the 9th graders sang back. After these traditional Marshallese songs, John and Gabe, the two Dartmouth volunteers, got up and whipped the crowd into a frenzy with Backstreet Boys' I Want it That Way. There was a little dance off at the end and the positive reaction is throw gum at them. After their performance, Nazila, the contract teacher, got together with Grace and they sang Girls Just Want to Have Fun. There wasn't as much of a reaction, I think the song was before their time.

It was a great night and to top it off, we got to take home some more food! I'll be eating some BBQ chicken for lunch today!