...i hope this works, its supposed to be a slide show of where she is

Gita pictures

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Here fishy fish! - December 5, 2009

Fishing is a man’s job. A woman would never be caught dead helping bring in the fish. We women are allowed to watch though. So that is just what I did. I heard a big commotion going on down by the water, so I grabbed Calvert (an 8 year old boy that lives with us) and we went down to watch the men fish.

The scene that greeted me was one of extreme excitement and commotion. It seemed that everyone out there had a job and they were all helping each other. There were about forty men from the ages of four to sixty and there were about fifteen boats, both local canoes and small skiffs. The boats were arranged in a U corralling the fish towards the shore with a huge net that the men held. The men on the skiffs were throwing locally made fish traps into the water to scoop up the fish and then haul them back to dump the fish into the boat. This was my favorite part because the men would lose their balance and fall or jump off the boats and then pop back up and hop back on the boat like nothing happened. The young boys had hand held nets that they used to pick up one or two fish here and there or swam around with a mask to secure the nets. It seemed like every one out there was yelling something at the same time and just having a good ol’ time bringing in the fish for the women to cook!

They did just that too! My host father, Simion, brought about 30-40 Mackerel home that were a little longer then your hand. He gave them to my host mom, Bibianna, and Sylvia, and I to prepare and cook. I scaled them and sliced them (kind of like you would a hot dog) and put garlic salt (thank you mom!) on them and then bar-b-qed them. YUM YUM! They were good too!

Medicine Ghost - December 2, 2009

Many people in Micronesia believe in using “local medicin” to heal. In Yap my family used some little remedies, usually involving cooked or crushed leaves that were eaten or placed on the body. Here on Falalop I am about to experience a much bigger remedy. There is a little boy that lives with us named Calvert. I am told that he has been sick for over a month with something that seems much bigger then local medicine. He has these bumps under his skin that have formed on the back of his neck, around his ears and jaw line and I think on his groin as well. His mother, Sylvia and other women have been cooking tree bark and placing it all over his body, but it does not seem to work.

A high schooler named Brandon just informed me that on Thursday they are going to begin a new remedy that seems much more elaborate. Apparently they believe that a medicine ghost could be possessing Calvert and they want to try and remove it. First we have to show the medicine ghost respect by walking with our hands behind our backs and slightly bent over (like you might if you were walking between people having a conversation). We also have to be done showering and home by 6pm and drink only coconut water for the next 5 days or so. The men cannot climb any trees during this time to show the ghost respect also.

At night is when it gets interesting. Sylvia and a man named Timothy – he came from a neighboring island to perform this local medicine – will walk around at night looking for the medicine ghost. The way they find it is by looking for trees that have shadows that look like scary people. When they find one they reach out and grab whatever they can and place it in their basket. they will then return home and prepare what they have collected. I’m not sure how many nights they do this for, but it sounds like it could be around 5 nights.

Brandon informed me on all of this and then told a story about a cousin he had that it worked on. They used the medicine collected and the ghost left her just like that! Who knows if there is any truth to these local medicines. I love learning about all of their remedies and seeing how they believe in their ways whole-heartedly. I think it is neat that using local medicine is a huge part of their culture and that even when they know and use western medicine they always try a local way first.

No Shirt, No Shoes , No Problem - November 28, 2009

I bet everyone of you is wondering what it is like for me to live without a shirt. No, I have not word a shirt outside my hut since I arrived here. Sometimes I will wear one at night because I am cold or there are mosquitoes (Luckily they are only biting the ankles!).

During the day and any daily activities, I am bare chested. I swim, prepare food, sit with the family, teach middle schoolers, make lesson plans, talk with my principal, play manacala with my dad, go to the store, wash my clothes, eat, garden and play with my kitten. You name it, and I do it.

No one wears a shirt here. Actually I saw someone wearing one and surprised myself by thinking it was strange to see someone in a shirt. They don’t need shirts here. It is hot, there is no type of media to tell them they need to look a certain way, so everyone has awesome self confidence. No one has mirrors or really seems to care about appearance wearing a shirt would just be another thing for them to wash, it really makes sense and is totally natural.

All in all it is not bad and I am getting more used to it every day. At the end of 2 years I’m not going to want to put a shirt on! Maybe I could start a new trend in the us. Ok, maybe it wont go that far. I’ll keep my island ways to my island.

Happy Birthday - November 25, 2009

Today is Charvirn’s Birthday. I don’t actually know Charvin, but everyone sang to him this morning. It was really quite beautiful. I walked into the assembly and saw a boy about 8 years old with maramars hanging from his neck and atop his head. His chest, shoulders and back were covered in a white powder and someone had drawn all over his face with red lipstick. The girls, who were all sitting on one side of the room began singing happy birthday, followed by how old are you now? And may the good lord bless you. All of which were sung to the happy birthday tone. I have to say that it was the most beautifully sung version of happy birthday I have ever heard! I cant wait for my birthday!

Noodles? - November 25, 2009

So, I just ate something really interesting. It’s called “flowa”. That just meants the main ingredient is flower. Many things are called “flowa” here. Actually the recipe is as follows:

1. Tons of flower (white of course!)

2. Water (however much you feel you need)

3. Lots of sugar (about 2/3 bag)

4. Coconut milk (when I say this I mean gather older coconuts, husk, open, and grate by hand. Then mix with water and squeeze milk out. This is the land where you fine peoples canned coconut milk comes from!)

Mix all of these ingredients together to make a dough consistency and then roll into little pieces. Place those pieces in a big huge pot ½ filled with coconut milk (prepared island style). Place the pot over a fire made with coconut husks and cook for a while.

I am not completely sure how to tell when it is done. If you ask e it was not done. Maybe it’s done when it’s not done. Anyways, when it is done schlop a bunch of strange shaped “flowa” on your place, put a little soy sauce on top and eat it with your fingers! Bon Apatite!

Now I know you all are going to go and make this for dinner tonight, but I suggest you don’t. it’s really only good when you have gone half crazy from living on an island and anything that is not preserved bread fruit (Mar) is a treat!

On a realistic note “flowa” fixed this way vaguely resembles fat noodles that are not cooked all the way. Actually they taste like noodles after I put soy sauce on them . before soy it was like eating semi sweet slimy dough-still better than Mar.

As I was sitting by the fire moving my feet every 5 seconds to keep the flies from collecting on my ankles, I imagined eating flowa with spaghetti sauce and garlic bread. I laughed at myself for thinking such a thought. What I would give to have a pasta dinner at home.

Invade my house and be eaten! - November 22

So, I finally got Gwen to come look at the crab and she got all excited and called Simion over. I guess they thought I was just joking about the crab! Simion came and looked at the crab, grabbed a big stick, knocked the crab from my ceiling, and said dinner!

Apparently, it was a coconut crab which just happens to be one of their favorite things to eat! My mom cooked it up and we ate it for dinner. Just like that! I was a little nervous to eat it because of my aversion to crabs, but Bibianna picked all of the meat out of the claws for me and it was actually quite delicious! I am hoping that all crabs take note of this event and learn to stay out of my hut! Invade my house and you will become dinner!

Nelson

As I was slumbering peacefully last night I felt a hand touch mine. I awoke to a man waking me up telling me that he wanted to talk. I immediately realized that I must have failed to lock a door and a “ninja” had found his way in! I quickly backed up and told him to get away and get out and I kept pushing his hand away. Then, I grabbed my flashlight and shined it on him. He must night crawl a lot because he strategically shined his light into my face so that I could not see him and left. All I saw were his gray shorts. I told my family in the morning about my visitor and they insisted that Gwen sleep with me for the next few nights, which is fine with me! My mom also told me that if it happens again I just need to yell her name really loud and she will come running and chase the ninja away. I believe her too!

Later that afternoon, they said they knew who came to visit me. It was an elementary school drop out named Nelson who is known to make unwanted visits to women. Apparently he had drunk to much Faluba (fermented coconut that gets you really drunk. Only the men are allowed to drink it) and thought it would be fun to check out the new girl. I have definitely learned my lesson and will be locking ALL of my doors from now on. I am not really scared at all though. I just do not want to deal with creepy drunk men. I also think it is a bit silly that they think they can just go into someone’s house while they are sleeping and wake them up and that be ok! Do they think that the girl is actually going to want to talk? This is definitely a culture thing that I am not going to embrace!

For those of you who are now scared for my safety, please do not worry. People here are pretty harmless and if anything serious happened my family would take care of it. This was really more of a funny thing that made me stop and say only in Micronesia.

Worst nightmare! - November 21, 2009

Ok, so I was afraid of that little hermit crab going to find his family right? Well, it turns out that my fear was not too far fetched! The only thing is that he was not looking for his wife, he was looking for his big humongous mafia FATHER!!

Last night when I heard a similar scratching sound in my ceiling, I went to investigate what was going on. Much to my horror I found a HUGE HUGE HUGE crab sleeping in my ceiling! He is about the size of a big foot. I tried explaining to my family that I am afraid of crabs I would like to remove it from my hut so that it does not fall on me! (I did not tell them that I cringe every time I look up there and take extra precautions to avoid walking under where it is sleeping.) My family just looked at me like, yeah so what. They also laughed at my persistence on having it removed probably just thought I was being silly. Looks like I am going to have to do it myself…

Lots of roommates - November 20

My hut is alive! There all sorts of critters that creep and crawl around the floor, in the wooden beams, in the ceiling, and even outside climbing up the walls. I killed my biggest most creepiest roommate tonight. I was going to try and be at peace with the spider the size of a small child’s hand, but my plan failed. I was all because I saw it fall on my cousin Brandon while we were playing Uno. It was a hit and run, but I nailed the spider later with my handy dandy shoe. I am down one roommate, but I am ok with it especially because my sister, Gwen, said that spiders crawl up under mosquito nets…Eek!

Speaking of mosquito net, I am ridiculously grateful for mine, it keeps all kinds of critters from flying or falling on me. I saw a lizard (uzarde in Woleaian) crawling on the ceiling tonight and I though to myself that I am very grateful for lizards because they keep the bug population down a little, but I do not want to be under that guy when he loses his grip on the palm fron!

Early this morning I heard this creepy scratching on metal sound and thought NINJA! However, it was 5 o’clock and I was pretty sure that night crawling hours were over. When I got out of bed around 6:30 I went to see what kind of creature was making all racket and I found a giant hermit crab! We all know how much I LOVE crabs and he was headed for my roof which means that he can get inside my house!

Now, I do have to give this guy some credit because he was a very pretty redish pink color and he got creative and was living out of some piece of plastic. I guess he was so big that he couldn’t find a shell big enough for his butt! However, Mr. hermit crab and I could not be friends due to the simple fact that he was trying to invade my house and he kept me awake at 5 am with thoughts of creepy island men trying to get into my hut! I grabbed the closest coconut I could find and knocked him off my house. Let’s just hope that he was not trying to get to his wife and 3 growing children!

No you are not dreaming… - November 19, 2009

Have you ever had one of those dreams that you are in a very public place when all of a sudden your clothes disappear but no one seems to notice? Well, I have not only dreamt that, but I am living it! I just spoke with the principal of my school with no shirt on and no one even noticed! Not only did I speak with my principal, but I was introduced to the whole school!

Today was my first day at school and I observed 7^th and 8^th grade. I do not feel like they got any work done at all today or really do much work at all on any other day. Let’s just say this school has a lot of room for improvement. I feel that I will be able to help this school a lot in many different areas, one of them being the “library.” Right now it is just a room with lots of old books on the shelves. I hope to get it back into operating mode so that the students can actually use it as a library. I think that every one at the school wants to see things improve around here and are willing to help me help them. It is going to be a lot of work but I believe that I am here for a reason and that these people need my help and I want to help them!

Woleai at last! - November 18

Hey everyone! this is Sarita serving as Gita's personal blog secretary!

WOLEAI!!!! Holy cow! I am here! I cannot believe it either!

So much has happened in the last 5 days that it is hard to believe life is real. The boat ride here was insane! There was tons of rain day and night and waves crashing over the front of the boat and onto our stuff. Luckily nothing important got really wet. The boat rocked in every direction which made me a bit nauseous but not enough for me to toss my cookies. Every night was a battle to stay dry, to get comfortable on the hard wood, and to keep from getting squished or slept on by a sweaty man or squirmy child. I think I experienced a little bit of what it was like to stay in steerage on a ship back in the day. I just imagined living on a boat for weeks with no bathroom and animals everywhere contributing to the chaos. Luckily there were no animals on our boat, just a bunch of coconuts to drink.

Every time the ship stopped at an island people would come bringing coconuts and other food for the passengers staying on board. It gave a sense of community among these people even when they have an ocean between them.

Needless to say, I made it! Woleai is absolutely beautiful. I feel very lucky to have such a beautiful home for the next 2 years. The water is unbelievably clear and blue and I just want to swim in it all day long! The people here are all so friendly too. I have been greeted with big welcoming smiles by every one that I have met. My family seems pretty great too! My mothers name is Bibianna and my fathers name is Simion. I have two sisters, Gwen who is 17 and Dortha Leen (pronounced torta-leen) who is 7. Dortha is a very happy girl who laughs at absolutely everything! I have a lot of fun playing with her in the ocean. I also have a brother, but he is attending elementary school on nearby island called Euripic. There is also Sylvia and her son Calvert who is 8. I am not sure how they are related but weather you are actually related or not you are still considered family.

I have a thatched hut just like I thought I would! It is pretty big too. I feel kind of bad having it all to myself because there is room for about seven to sleep. I’m sure I’ll get over that though and I will be very grateful for my own space. I have locks on all of my doors. That just means I put a nail into a hole to keep the door from being opened from the outside. This will hopefully keep out unwanted visitors at night (aka “ninjas” or “snipers”) who want to woo me by creeping into my house. Dating is very secret and strange here and I do not think I will get used to that.