One Week Update

The whole M-78 gang!

Wow, it’s been quite a week! I moved in with my first host family – I’ll be staying here probably until August, and then I’ll get placed in my permanent site. My nohno (host mom) is divorced, so for the first few days it was just the two of us in the house. Now two of her kids are staying here too, Caleb and Leilita. Leilita speaks remarkably good English for a nine year-old. She’s super sweet and always smiles. We've been playing lots of cards and marbles. Caleb only speaks a little English, and he gets frustrated when I can’t understand him. Leitina has been translating for him (although he mostly talks about worms and bugs, so the translation isn’t really necessary anymore). I don’t understand the custody agreement (or if there even is a formal custody agreement), so I’m not sure how often they’ll be living here. Hopefully a lot! All of Ruth’s family lives on the same street, so I’ve been meeting the extended family bit by bit. 

My family owns some HUGE pigs. They're like twice the size of me!

Our house has electricity and running water, but no hot water, so showers aren’t much fun. I really thought the cold water would feel refreshing since it’s so hot here, but nope – it still just feels really cold! I’m becoming a fan of the bucket shower, though, since I don’t need to be under the freezing water the whole time. Plus, once I’m done weather immediately warms me up. 

Kolonia is the biggest “city” in the Federated States of Micronesia, but it’s the size of a really small town in America. It’s so small, in fact, that you only have to give the taxi drivers the name of the person whose house you’re going to and they’ll take you there! 

The main street of Kolonia - big city livin' ;)

Each day all the trainees have training sessions from 8-5. In the mornings we have teacher training with local teachers who are getting their certification (the government is cracking down and demanding that all teachers be certified, so we’re with lots of people who have been teaching for 10+ years). In the afternoons we have sessions with the medical officers (PCMOs), safety coordinator (SSC), or some other person with an acronym for a title. I’ve quickly discovered that the Peace Corps LOVES acronyms. Training is sometimes helpful and often menotenous, but I always look forward to going because I get to hang out with all my amazing fellow volunteers!

This photo sums up my love for my fellow volunteers!

 Some random observations:

-Pohnpeian is difficult to pronounce when you only have the spelling. There’s a street on the map of Kolonia called Pohnumwpwamwpw. No joke. Your guess is as good as mine.

-Pohnpei and Chuuk (another state of Micronesia) have a not-so-friendly rivalry going on. Everyone here tells me not to go to Chuuk for Peace Corps (not that I have any say in the matter) because there’s lots of crime. Garrison, one of our Peace Corps coordinators who’s actually from Chuuk, told us that Pohnpeians used to always say “OIC” meaning “only in Chuuk” whenever they heard about the frequent power outages in Chuuk. Lately, however, Pohnpei has been having lots of problems with their electricity, so in Chuuk they started saying “AIP,” meaning “also in Pohnpei.” It reminds me of a high school rivalry or something. 

-When it rains, it pours! We Washingtonians may be very proud of our rain, but it’s nothing compared to the rain in Pohnpei. Pohnpei is one of the rainiest locations on earth, far surpassing Seattle in both number of rainy days and (particularly) amount of annual rainfall.

-Dogs aren’t pets here – they’re either guard dogs or wild dogs. You don’t pet them or play with them, which is depressing. We have three guard dogs at our house, and one of them just had puppies! I wish they were pet dogs so I could cuddle with them! As it is I just have to be content watching their adorableness from the window.

-Immigration to the United States is very relaxed for citizens of Micronesia (part of our Compact agreement with the country – I don’t know the details of it, but basically we get to use the islands for military purposes if we ever want to in exchange for lots of foreign aid and relaxed immigration rules). Tons of people have family members in the United States. A lot of Micronesians have served in the United States military as well. A lot of people talk about relatives that served in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

-The academic performance of students here is depressing, to say the least. There’s an entrance exam for high school, and more than 90% of students don’t pass it the first time. Some go to summer school and then retake the test, but a lot don’t continue to high school. 

-Instead of saying “yes,” people just raise the eyebrows. For the longest time I couldn’t figure out why everyone was raising their eyebrows at me! I thought they were looking at me skeptically or judging me. I’m still not used to it. 

-There’s no public transportation on the island, but taxis are really cheap. It’s only $1 per person to go anywhere within Kolonia. Since my host mom doesn’t have a car, I’ve been taking taxis to and from training each day. 

-Most of the cars have the steering wheel on the right, but cars are still driven on the right side of the road. What?

-I thought I’d be confronted with lots of exotic pests, but the worst offenders are common ants. They’re absolutely EVERYWHERE! I don’t even know how many ants I’ve accidently eaten with my food so far. There are also a few lizards that live in the bathroom.

I'll try to post again next week! Love you guys and miss you all sooooooo much!