Tiny Tidbits

I am running on 3 hours of sleep, due to another supervision of a sleepover. This time, I wasn't alone. Jaimie and I were up til 3 with some rather talkative girls. Needless to say I want to fall over right now. I'm too lazy to write much, but I already wrote the following yesterday. :) Enjoy!

Top 10 things I can always use in Majuro:

Flipflops (I’m a size 8-8.5. I have one only waterproof pair and it rains quite a bit)
Skirts (I’m a size 6-8, they have to be past the knee…)
Peanut Butter (creamy, please!)
Pencils (they go through pencils like none other)
Red pens (they get lost really easily)
Markers/crayons (my kids have lost almost all of my markers)
Laundry soap (it’s extremely expensive here)
Soymilk (they have been out at payless for a while. I hate real milk1!)
Chocolate (what can I say? A girl’s gotta have sweets!)
Bug spray (the bugs love me and my blood)

Here are some random facts about Majuro that I’m sure you wouldn’t know unless you lived here like me:

- The women’s clothing of choice is a muumuu
- It is not odd to see buildings painted extremely bright colors, for example, our school is in the process of being painted BRIGHT purple.
- No one cares if you spent 20 minutes getting ready or just rolled out of bed
- The lighter you are, the more attractive you are (supposedly)
- It is legal to ride in the back of a pickup on the road, and in taxis they don’t cater to just you, it is not full until everyone they can fit in the car has paid
- There is only one road that goes from one side of the island to the other
- Marshallese eat Kool-Aid on EVERYTHING! (pasta, chips, rice, ANYTHING)
- Most Marshallese do not usually live past the age of 47 due to Diabetes
- Rice is a meal you will eat at least 3-4 times a week.
- It is considered immodest to show your knees, your midriff, or your shoulders (for girls)
- Learn to bring a book to everything. When someone says it will start at 5, it will not start at 5.
- There are no such things as dog leashes. Dogs roam free and know their territories.
- Ants will roam freely in your home, and there isn’t much you can do about it.
- Cockroaches will think they are your roommates as well.
- Kids light up when a white person walks by. They run after you and ask for a high five, or they yell “goodnight” because it’s one of the only English words they know.
- Some parts of the island will feel like America, while some parts feel like a whole different world.
- There is one movie theater, and it is a game to see if we have ever heard of the movies that are out. However, we are not allowed to go there because it is “not Adventist like”
- Mold grows on almost everything. You will get used to the smell.

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"To Err is Human"

Well I guess everyone has their bummer weeks at some point. This week was mine.

Remind me never to procrastinate on grades again. Grades were due yesterday (Thursday) at 5pm. I was hoping to be able to get some things on the report cards done during class and the school day, but I was unable to begin until around 3:20. I was stressed beyong belief. I also found out that half of my kids were failing math (someone else teaches their math class) so I was running around trying to figure out if he really wanted me to fail my kids (i don't think any of them deserve to fail, they try really hard!) anyways. I was super frustrated. And kinda angry. Anyways. I guess it just got super overwhelming and I just wanted to crawl into bed at like 5:15. I finally turned in grades at around 4:40. I seriously could have fallen over with emotional exhaustion right then. I went to the computer lab, and short after I broke. I was just on the rocks by the water and just crying. I miss home, I miss being able to go places, I miss not having so much responsiblity. I know God has me here for a reason, but sometimes it is so hard to see what that is.

I also learned one new thing today: Bad news a thousand miles from home is a lot harder to take. I just found out our family's favorite cat, Zipper died. Now you might be thinking, "So? It's a cat." This was not any ordinary cat, my friend. Zipper was a part of the family. Sometimes I swear he completely understood everything we would say to him. He was our lap cat, our human. I miss him already. Haha. What a sap I am.

Bad weeks also make me extremely irritable, apparently. It is Mexican food night here at the resort, so to set the mood they are playing fiesta music. Evidently spanish music is not easy to find here, because they have a CD that has about 4 songs on it, and they keep repeating the stinkin CD. I'm about ready to go rip the stupid sound system out of its socket....

Now you're probably thinking, "wait, this girl is a student missionary?" Sigh. Yes. And I'll be the first to admit that I get irritable easily. I get sad easily. I get stressed easily. But what can I say? I'm human. A very wise person once said, "To err is human." Well, there you have it, I'm human. Suprise, surprise. And now I am going to go mourn the death of my deceased kitty. ;) Hope all of you are doing well! I'll be praying for you and would appreciate the same!

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Island Adventures

This morning it hurt to get out of bed. I got up, took some ibuprofin and got back in bed, unwilling to get up to start my day.

You see, yesterday (10/18/08) we (Jaimie, John, Scott, Travis, and I) decided to go on an adventure. We got up at the crack of dawn (okay, it was really only 7:20) and we took showers and prepared for our day. We packed a lunch, donned our chacos and flipflops, and headed out for an excursion.

We decided to go island hopping. By this, I mean we decided to walk from island to island. Here in the Marshall Islands, there are many tiny islands that are either empty or few people live on them, and they are all within walking and wading distance away. We wanted to see how far out we could get before the tide came in and stranded us. Near the first island out, the boys found a old rusty sunken ship. John wanted to climb out there, but he didn't want to go by himself. Travis said, "Ok, I'll go with you." And Scott, feeling a bit left out said, "I guess since all the other men are doing it, I need to to." We decided to stay and take pictures.

Apparently Travis was the only one aware we were taking pictures.

Here we are wading out to one of the islands.

This is the on the first island, we were rather excited as you can see.

We got TEN islands out! Mind you, we started walking out at around 9 AM (we walked part of the way to Rita, and hitchhiked the rest), and we took a break around 11:45 to eat lunch. The tenth island MUST be owned by an American. It has to be some sort of vacation home the house was the only thing on the island, along with a fancy treehouse, canoes, and their own dock. We were afraid that the people who owned it might come out and tell us to leave, but no one was there.


Upon arrival at our new-found favorite island (it made us feel like we were in America for a few minutes), we ate our lunches and made jokes and gave our poor feet a break. Soon after, it began to pour. Add some roaring wind to that and it gets a bit chilly. The only place we could find cover to keep us dry was under the canoes (thanks to Jaimie for finding it).

Disclaimer: I realize it looks as though we are both naked, but I can assure you, we are not :)
That is us hiding under the canoes. It was really stormy!

Anyways, imagine our dismay when we all realized that we had to walk ALL the way back! It was a rather rough trip. It sometimes rained, and most of the time it was extremely windy. The hardest part, however, was walking through the water. We all had water shoes (except for John, and then his 13 year old sandals broke haha) so we didn't step on any coral, but since the bottom of our shoes are not that thick, you still feel every thing you step on. My feet are rather sore today.

I got a bit burnt since it was so overcast yesterday. And yes, I always remember mom's words "You always get sunburnt worse when it is overcast!" It is true. And last night I lathered myself with aloe vera and slept like a baby.

It was a nice Sabbath and definitely worth the hurting feet and sunburnt arms.

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It's been awhile!

Hello world!

It has been pretty much an eternity since I have updated you on my life, and I’m sorry! Life has been hectic lately, but today is the official last day of the first quarter of school. I made it through a whole quarter as a teacher! I feel very accomplished and rather proud of myself. I’ve been frantically grading the past week or so, but it really has not been too bad. I’ve been grading the assignments from the day after school, and I’ve been caught up pretty fast. I just have quite a bit of 8th grade English to catch up, but grades are not officially due until next Thursday.

In the past few weeks, we have had three birthdays. Steven Baker from Union, Alana from Australia, and Mr. Spiva, from, well, Texas I guess. We had a joint birthday party for them last night and it was pretty entertaining.

The waves were so HUGE today! It was crazy! I almost thought about what would happen if the water got higher than the rocks. It was pretty close. Crazy talk. It’s such a blessing waking up to the waves every morning and falling asleep to the drone of waves and my fan in harmonic unison.

Last night was a full moon. I sat on top of the monkey bars on the playground right outside our apartment. I basked in the moonlight and the serenity of the moment. It was so beautiful. As I dangled my legs like a child, I was once again reminded of the peace I could have when I simply take all other distractions away. That was a nice reminder.

I dined like a queen during my lunch break today. Yes, ma’am, I had mashed potatoes and a fried egg on a piece of toast. That is pretty good since the past few days it’s been instant Easy Mac and PB&J sandwiches. Well, I’m out of milk, bread, and I need to get some apples or something to be healthier. We just got paid on Wednesday so I should be able to stop by Payless sometime this weekend and buy some necessities. The store was out of soymilk, so I was sadly (and not voluntarily) forced to buy real milk. That stuff is nasty. I want my soymilk back! I also bought Smart Balance, which I thought my parents would be rather proud of. It reminds me of home. However, the reign of my cooking legacy ended tonight when I made hard-boiled eggs but did not cook them all the way by accident. Gross. I just wasted an egg. Bummer.

Right now I am fighting the urge to put ‘Singin’ in the Rain’ on. I’m not sure how good my resistance will be. It’s a classic and also one of my favorites.

Jaimie and I have started a countdown. I know it’s horrible to be counting down the days until we leave, but in case you were wondering, it is a mere 240 days until June when we all go home for good. However, it is only 63 days until Christmas break. What a jolly time. We leave each other notes on the white board on our door, usually during our lunch breaks for the other to read, and today she left me one with that countdown on it.

Here are some pictures of my kids and I. We had a birthday party and took pictures on self-timer. :)







See the nice evolution of nice pictures to eventually falling on the floor...?
Next I have some pictures of the first time I ever wore my sweatshirt on this island. The other day it was crazy rainy and windy!

Welcome rainy season!!


Well, that about sums it up. I am not really needing anything at the moment, except for I can always use food ;)

I hope you all are doing well. I'll keep you in my prayers! I'd appreciate it if you did the same :) :)

God Bless!

-Carrie

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