worth the wait

It’s a little late but I hope that you have all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  Without all the cold weather and runners getting ready for the Turkey Trot, the holiday almost snuck right by me unnoticed.  But, Gabrielle and I were able to make the most out of the day with some help from Ma and Pa Perkins who sent a couple packages with some essential Thanksgiving items like canned turkey, canned sweet potatoes, and canned gravy.  And I’m not being facetious – that’s some seriously upscale living.  I’m sad I wasn’t able to be home with the family but it was a great day and a lot of my students wished me Happy Thanksgiving even though I’m pretty sure they don’t know what the holiday is.  What am I thankful for?  Obviously my parents for being amazing and generous, Gabrielle for putting up with Morning Scott, and lastly the rat poison that my 8^th grade neighbor gave me.  Hopefully now I won’t have to worry about all the lentils mysteriously disappearing from the top of the fridge.  

Our Thanksgiving feast.  Canned turkey mixed with stuffing, cucumber onion salad, marshmallow sweet potatoes, and cranberry sauce!

 I’m also thankful for being able to do what I’ve wanted to do since before I came to Pohnpei – spearfish.  About three weeks ago, Tony, a friend from church and father of one of my students, took me to a local craftsman who sold me a handmade speargun for just $35.  Since then, my no-ocean blues have gone away and I’ve managed to make it out to the water at least once a week.  Whether on a boat or off the reef of Nahlap Island, I have been and will be having ample opportunities to do some serious fishing.  My first time out on the boat with Tony and his wife was amazing.  Not knowing anything about spearfishing or really, fishing in general, I had a lot to learn. 

Tony taking me out on his boat on a beautiful Sunday afternoon.

It turns out that all the good fish like to hide out and swim along the coral reefs surrounding much of Pohnpei.  And since these fish are a lot smarter than people give them credit for, it’s all about patience.  I learned that the best way to catch these guys is to swim down until you’re about 30-50 feet underwater (or whatever is deep enough to make you question yourself), grab onto a piece of coral, and just wait.  Usually, when you dive down, you scare all the surrounding fish into their hiding places, but after you wait for a little while, their curiosity drives them out of the coral and back towards you to investigate.  After expending the energy to get to that depth, I would say I have a lung capacity of about 30 seconds.  Hopefully, that is enough time to wait for a fish to get close enough and release the spear.  The most disheartening thing to happen is when you wait this long for a real beautiful fish, your lungs are screaming and your muscles are aching, you get a perfect opportunity, aim, shoot, and miss.  The biggest fish I’ve speared was so deep that the surface of the water looked a like a distant memory shimmering above me.  I speared it high – a little below its fin – and as I was bringing it to the surface, it ripped itself from my spear and darted away.  The water muffled my scream of frustration but if you could read those air bubbles, they would have been filled with four-letter words. 

Lurking behind some coral.  Believe it or not, this is the cloudiest I have ever seen the water here.

On a different day, when we went fishing during a thunderstorm.  The visibility under the water was maybe two or three times the visibility in the air - which was a really interesting experience.  The black dot in the center is the top of my head.

The fish that Tony and I did catch went to his wife who stayed up on the boat line-fishing – she was much more successful than either of us.   One thing I’ve learned here is that Pohnpeians like their fish fresh.  By fresh, I mean that Tony’s wife scaled them and gave them back to us to eat raw off the bone.  We went back to the boat to take a break and we’d eat the fish that had been swimming beside us in the ocean only ten minutes before.  It’s kind of like a jacked-up version of sushi where you don’t bother with the rice, seaweed, cucumber, or preparation of any sort at all.  Add it to the list of weird things I’ll happily eat.

My first catch of the day, ready to eat!

 Recently, I also got to get up close and personal with my competition.  Off the dock of Nahlap, I was having a particularly bad day fishing when I spotted a huge school of reef fish in close range.  Excitedly, I maneuvered through some coral structures to sneak up on them.  Right as I was almost close enough to take aim, a 4 foot flash of silver streaked across my path and stopped my progress immediately.  I guess I made a pretty enthusiastic 180 degree turn because when I surfaced, the local guy I was with couldn’t stop laughing.  It was hard for me to have a similar sense of humor after getting a “friendly” hello from Mr. Shark.  Some of my fears were assuaged when I saw the same shark an hour or so later and nothing bad happened.  My school counselor said that their bites are accidental and that they don’t really like the taste of people - so I guess that counts for something.  I wonder what you have to be doing for a shark to accidentally bite you…

Gabrielle in the shark-infested waters of Nahlap Island.  I think it's worth it :)

Getting a gun has gotten me all sorts of awesome offers though – I have plans with my neighbor to go out to the reef after school tomorrow.  It should be a great way to unwind after a long, hot day in the classroom.  Life is good. 

no reservations

When someone travels to a foreign country, the first question many people ask is: “What was the food like?” Because I now feel like I have been here long enough (4 months!!) to have an adequate grasp on this part of the culture, I’ll try to answer it to the best of my ability.  Generally, food in Pohnpei is grouped into two categories: local food and imported food.  I could go into great depth about the motivations and implications for eating one food or the other but I’ll just focus on the foods that are different from what you would encounter in the United States – and ones that I have good pictures for.  Be warned though, I made no attempt to censor myself!

Bananas: They come in many varieties, shapes, sizes, and they are as plentiful as water.  In fact, if you were to actually purchase a bushel of bananas here, it would cost you around 60 cents.  The absolute best kind of banana I’ve ever had in my life is the Uht en Guam (translated as: bananas from Guam).  They are about a third of the length of a normal banana and less thick.  While they definitely have a banana flavor, you almost can’t recognize them as such because they are so sweet.  Gabrielle has made me banana pancakes with this variety and it makes me feel like I’m having dessert for breakfast.  The best part is that – like candy – they are fun-sized, so you don’t feel guilty downing five or six of them in one sitting.

The bananas to the far left are the Uht en Guam.  They make for a much better snack than a bag of chips.  In the foreground is the remains of a local oven, or uhm, made from red hot rocks and banana leaves.

 The other kind of banana appeals to the immature side of me.  The Karat banana is known for its abundance of Vitamin A and soft texture.  When pronounced quickly and without rolling the ‘r,’ it sounds like “crotch” banana.  The Karat banana has fueled more penis jokes than Anthony Weiner himself at the height of his Twitter scandal and would make you doubt that WorldTeach consists of actual college graduates.  There is an abundance of “Go Karat” bumper stickers around Pohnpei that are supposed to encourage eating local food but instead they just encourage me to make childish remarks.

This is me holding my Karat banana (haha) but you can see that it has a leathery red peel and a soft orange center that you eat with a spoon.  Very delicious!

 Pig: Pigs, or pwihk (pweek), are a delicacy and are usually only served at large festivals, fundraisers, or Komedipws (parties honoring the traditional chiefs).  Unfortunately, I have yet to see a respectable piece of bacon served to me, but rather, pork is presented in all its glory with attached bones, tendons, fat, and hairy pig skin.  To prepare them for the feast, pigs are stabbed in the heart with a machete, organs are pulled out, and the meat is quartered after the children are finished playing with the carcasses.  Pohnpeians would seriously make great anatomists or surgeons because of all their experience throughout their life with pig bodies. 

At a komedipw.  You can only see a few pig carcasses, but there are about 15 or so pigs behind it with children also playing in them.

Some of my favorite dudes playing with pig hearts.  Completely normal.

 The majority of people here raise pigs on their property and if they don’t eat them, are able to sell them for anywhere from a couple hundred to over a thousand dollars.  While I was stuffing myself at lunch one day, Gabrielle was discussing with a friend what people usually do with leftovers.  He said that Pohnpeians usually just give it to their pigs in order to fatten them up; Gabrielle responded that she does the same exact thing with the pig she has at home (referring, of course, to me).  Our friend did not catch on to this and we led him on a merry conversation that ended with him suggesting that we could get four to five hundred dollars for our 185 lb pig that lives in the house with Gabrielle and that he would be willing to buy it.  Tempting as the extra money would be, I did not feel like moving out of the house and living in a pen.

A freshly slaughtered pwihk.  This one would probably sell for several hundred dollars if it was not being presented to the Kitti Nahnmwarki as a gift.

 Dog: Like other Asian countries that eat what we consider to be household pets, Pohnpeians also think of dogs as a delicacy.  However, the consumption of dog is more reactionary than it is planned out for a party or celebration.  For instance, Gabrielle went on a run one day to find herself being chased by a vicious dog that crossed paths with her.  Before she could defend herself, a zorro-like figure jumped out of the woods and stabbed the dog in the stomach with a machete.  To emphasize the ruthlessness of these animals, the dog CONTINUED to bark at her while it was impaled with a 3 foot knife.  Needless to say, this man was definitely eating well that night. 

In Pohnpei, I think of dogs as just being big squirrels; no one pets them, feeds them, or even notices them, but they still find a way of ruining your picnic.  They are a nuisance that chase me down the road when I run and wake me up with their barking when I’m sleeping at night.  When I was in Kolonia, I used to half-wish that the dog barking outside my window would bite me so that I would have an excuse to put the damn thing to rest.  If you’re interested, dog meat is like dark chicken meat and tastes even better with a side of vengeance.  

To the dog lovers: I am sincerely sorry, but I couldn't resist.  Gabrielle tapped me on the shoulder with this after we finished eating dinner at church one night - definitely didn't see that one coming!

 I was planning on writing about more foods but these three seemed to have occupied me pretty well.  I will make a food blog Part II some other time to describe the rest of Pohnpei’s culinary characteristics.  I hope you’re all doing well and eatin’ good back home!

a slippery situation

You would think that in my abundance of free time in the past week, I would have been able to write a decent blog entry.  Perhaps it was an issue with a lack of will rather than a lack of time.  Two weeks ago, on the first day of a four day weekend, I managed to completely de-skin the balls of my feet during an entirely innocent relay race.  Since I am a determined competitor and also a useless one while wearing flip-flops, I decided to go barefoot on the hot track where the race was being held.  I sprinted off the starting line alongside my coworkers and fellow competitors, got to the first cone, went to turn around, and slipped out of my skin.  Unknowingly, I finished the race before I looked down and noticed the shredded tires I was rolling on.  Although I have had many people very unhelpfully tell me, “Ya know, you should wear shoes when you run,” I think it was a pretty innocent mistake.  Plenty of other people were running barefoot at the race and the same thing even happened to a local lady – albeit, to a lesser extent – even though Pohnpeian feet are reportedly indestructible.

As someone who wants to eventually practice medicine in a developing country, the following experience was enlightening.  I got rushed to the ER by none less than the Director of Secondary Education himself while he swerved past traffic and tested the endurance of his car horn.  In order to avoid potential amputation at the state-run hospital, we went to the private hospital and I experienced what I imagine to be a similar sort of pain.  Without introduction, a doctor with an unconvincing toupee proceeded to clean my feet, cut the flaps of skin off, disinfect my wounds, and dress them.  Needless to say, the hospital bed was soaked with sweat and my voice hoarse from screaming into the pillow.  My only regret is that we didn’t record some of it to play outside for trick-or-treaters on Halloween.  After a mere twenty minutes, I was dispatched from the hospital with antibiotics, pain-relievers the equivalent of ibuprofen, and no way to move myself around except my hands and knees.  Luckily, after some asking around, I was able to procure a wheelchair and some higher-quality pain-killers in order to make the next week a little more bearable. 

To say that having to wheel myself around Pohnpei was inconvenient would be an understatement.  Likewise, I imagine that it was not fun for Gabrielle and Kate who provided for almost every one of my basic needs while I was in town.  And then afterwards at home, when it was just Gabrielle - cooking dinner, washing dishes, washing my clothes (by hand), and going to school by herself while I sat at home and did fun things like read books and watch movies.  I can’t describe how much I owe to her, but I am determined to make it up to her in some way or another now that I can finally walk again.  I’ve also gained a new perspective on what it is like to be disabled, helpless, and useless and it was definitely a humbling experience in all of those regards.  Sitting in a wheelchair is no way to be forced to go through life and I will always empathize with people in that situation.

This was my first week back at school and everyone has been incredibly helpful and considerate.  I’m pretty much back to normal now, but I appreciate the concern everyone has shown – you guys are the best!  I am certainly looking forward to making up for lost time this weekend though.  The wife and I have a trip planned for Saturday where we will hopefully kayak from Nahlap Island to Black Coral Island nearby.  Don’t google those places unless you want to feel an overwhelming urge to come visit me J  Be safe in the snow!!

At Cupid's Restaurant for Emily's birthday dinner the night of the accident.  I learned that drunk people think it is funny to push you around if you're in a wheelchair.

Me with some neighborhood kids who came to visit.  I was able to go outside because it didn't rain that day, but I sure would have liked to have a pair of off-road wheels.

My new skin about a week and a half afterwards!