Smooth Sailing

(Pictured above, some of my students from Rm. 104 -- Ponalynn, Connie, Amanda, Nebwij, and Julie)

First I want to say that it wasn't until today, the 12th, that I realized that 9/11 was yesterday! It is amazing to me how being out in the Pacific has removed me from American culture and media, which I am sure was full of messages of remembrance and hope yesterday. To those still grieving and those still fighting, my best wishes go out to you all.

This week was an anticlimactic follow-up to last week but that is probably a good thing. After changing my methods in class -- teaching simpler, more focused lessons and using more class discipline -- things have been running a lot more smoothly. Mandy suggested that I do some one-on-one testing of my students reading abilities so I spent this week testing students on Dolch sight words (words that you are supposed to be able to read just by seeing them, not phonetically). While I was testing individual students, I had the rest of the class read Shel Silverstein poems and write their own in response. While most of my students wrote poems about their names or the poems they read, one of my brightest students wrote a beautiful love poem. I was sad to find out that it is a derivative of a poem already written but he added his own to it so I asked if I could put it on my blog and he said yes:

The Love of Two Couples by Lanjo Ned (with original mistakes...)

I wrote your name on the sky but the wind blew it away.
I wrote your name on the book but the eraser erase it away.
I wrote your name on the sand but the wave washed it away.
I wrote your name on the cake but the people ate it away.
I wrote your name on my heart and it didn't got blewed, it didn't got erased, it didnt got washing, it didnt got aten, but it stayed here foever and togeather will be lovers forever.

I was pretty moved by his ability to understand and express metaphorical thoughts about love in English. On the flip side, another one of my bright students attempted to pass off "Invictus" by William Ernest Henley as if she had written it. This I squelched quickly by telling her I was an English major and that my mother used to recite this poem to me when I was younger since she learned it when she was in elementary school. It was pretty funny to me nonetheless.

On Friday, when my testing was through, I was able to hang out with my classes. One of my classes was able to show me some pretty awesome dance moves. Lanjo had a lot of breakdance and Michael Jackson moves down. I was very impressed again. It was fun to finally have time to hang out with my students as a whole.

The biggest highlight from this week has been playing rubgy and soccer with a group of Fijian guys. I met one of the guys in a taxi one day early on in my time in Majuro and he has always been friendly to me whenever he has seen me around the city. However, when Lauren, a Ministry of Education employee who is good friends with Anna, invited me to play soccer, I did not expect to see my Fijian there. When she did not show up I was even more surprised that he asked me to play rubgy with him and his friends instead. I have always wanted to play rugby but was always a little intimidated by the huge players. These guys were huge also, but they played a dumbed down touch version of rubgy that I felt I could get the hang of. While it was difficult for me to grasp the concept of passing the ball backwards while still trying to move forwards, I ended up scoring once and learning a lot about the game. When I came on Wednesday, the same group of guys and Lauren were there to play soccer. We played a rousing game that lasted into the night. I am going to try to do some kind of sports with these guys each week from now on.

On a sadder note, this week Coconut passed away. We always knew that she was the runt of her litter and that she was sickly but she took a turn for the worst this week. She not eating and was not really moving much. We had to feed her through an eyedropper and despite the fact that we thought she was getting better, she left us. Papaya is still doing fine however.

And now for the RMI surprises of the week:

19) The diversity of people on Majuro surprises me constantly. While "diversity" is usually confined to blacks, whites, asians, hispanics, and, sometimes, native americans, the RMI draws people from all over Asia, Australia, New Zeland, and the Pacific Islands. I never expected to meet people from the Soloman Islands or Fiji or that there would be so many Phillipino, Chinese, and Japanese people here. There are also SO MANY islands that i have never heard of before like Chuuk and Palau.

20) Even though it rains multiple times almost every day, I have only seen lighting once. That was this past Saturday.

21) Power outages are not THAT bad. We have had three unplanned power outages this week and for some reason whenever they happen everyone in the Bungalow gets quiet and reads or works silently. Usually the silence is not so pervasive. I guess the lack of electricity stills us. Kinda cool.

Thats all for now!

Bar Lo Kom,

Andrew