The Bloozeman Concludes. And Introduces!

Yokwe aolep, and welcome to the weblog I kept during my year abroad in the Republic of the Marshall Islands.

From July 2007 to June 2008 I lived, taught, and learned on a very small island in the equatorial Pacific, in a region called Micronesia. I was there as a volunteer with WorldTeach, a nonprofit NGO based at the Center for International Development at Harvard University that offers year-long and summer volunteer programs all over the world. They are truly a fantastic organization that I would recommend to anyone with an interest in volunteering and travel.

If you are just now happening upon this website and are curious as to what my experience entailed, I urge you to at least begin from the first post (July 2007) and then jump around should you feel inclined. If you happened upon this page and are not curious, please type [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyson_sphere] into your browser’s address bar and spend a few minutes there. It will blow your mind.

The year that this blog details was one of the most incredible years of my life. I’d never felt such a range of emotion, at such intensity, ever before. Some of my best writing, music, and photography was inspired by and created in the Marshall Islands. And the paradox that humbles me to this day: I learned an absolutely immeasurable amount more about the World by living on an island of three square miles in the middle of the biggest ocean, wearing flip flops to work(!), than I ever did living in the richest country with high-speed internet and multi-thousand dollar higher education courses and curricula.

Inside you will find stories of yachting and spearfishing, school picnics gone awry, facts and figures, pictures and photographs, sociological mini-dissertations, tales of visitors (I had three!), the perils and perks of teaching, a video, and thoughts and ruminations on a peculiarly strange life in the equatorial Pacific, and, really, a whole lot more.

My contact information is in the side bar to the right should you desire to get a hold of me. I’ll be floating around Michigan for a while. At most, the contiguous U.S. And if you’re planning on traveling to the South Pacific sometime, let me know first. I know a few good places to go.

Love,
Ben

8 Weeks Later...

Apparently I haven’t posted in two months. Why? I don’t have too much to say I guess. This is problematic in one major way: I haven’t officially concluded this weblog, and I want to. It is nearly every day that I consider this Marshall Islands travel diary and think, “you know, I ought to wrap that up already.” And then I don’t. Until NOW.

If I had to choose one word to sum up the last eight weeks of my life in Michigan, it would be “BUSY.” Great food… that didn’t take much getting used to. Cleanliness… who can complain about that? Having family and friends around (well, what friends there are even left in Michigan, that is) feels truly great. The hardest thing getting used to again is how I have structured life here in such a way that even if ample time is scheduled to “relax,” there is always something I could be doing. Going from a place where nine hours a day was spent lounging because there simply wasn’t much else to do, to coming back to a place where my to-do list can never be fully checked off, is quite an adjustment. I’m still adjusting to it. Where are these errands even coming from? Why are they on my list of things to do? What’s all this stuff in my pockets… car keys, wallet, cell phone, pens, loose change, receipts, banana, palm pilot, business cards. Why do I need all that??

Actually, I am well aware of why I need all that. Okay, fine, maybe I don’t need it, per se, but realistically, if I want to live here and make money and stay connected, I do need it. And I actually enjoy carrying it all around with me. I like America. I’m a fan. I enjoy its luxuries, its pace, its activism, its opportunities, its involvement. I enjoy Michigan too. A lot.

Since I have left the RMI, they have declared a state of economic emergency over rising fuel and food prices. The already-malnourished people are eating less and less as a result of rice price inflation, and the power company is struggling to keep the lights on. The new WorldTeach volunteers are in their first week on island, though standing a dozen fewer this year due to budget cuts.

It’s a bit strange to think that I spent the last year there, on that little island in that little country in that big ocean. And it’s stranger to have Google providing me with their news updates instead of reading their weekly paper every Thursday.

So what’ll I do now? Well, I start by shoving all that crap back in my pockets. Then I’ll try to put on a few pounds. And then I’ll progress with my life. I’ll take hot showers, wear a suit and tie, eat fine cheeses, go to community-organized events (that start on time!), get back in the loop, and, most importantly right now, find a way to earn some decent income while, in doing so, advancing the world a little.

But I’ll still keep that orange, nylon, velcro tri-fold wallet in my back pocket, just as a reminder to “lighten up a bit” when things get too serious around here.

The Bloozeman Re-Enters America

I am writing this from a small metal table in front of a Starbucks in the Honolulu airport. There's a big green umbrella over me. I feel… fine. Like I’ve been away on some kind of long trip that suddenly feels a lot shorter than it actually was. Was that a year? Hm. Weird. But this coffee tastes absolutely phenomenal.

Boarding the plane in Majuro was fun. It was nighttime—8:00pm—and I walked right out on the runway, nearly underneath the airplane, and up that big staircase on wheels that connects to the side of the fuselage. Airplanes are very big things. Very big. Also I have been awake now for 27 hours.

After we took off I was delighted to learn that a meal would be served on this flight. I was even more delighted as I was eating this meal, because it tasted so very good (I am being very serious). And then, I couldn’t even finish it. It was just way too much food. So this is how it’s going to be, I thought. I can picture it already… “Yes I’d like three pieces of sushi please.” “Three rolls? Okay.” “No, just three individual pieces. That will be fine for me, thank you.”

Four and a half hours later we landed in Honolulu. The water… from the drinking fountains… it’s… potable? Fountains, of fresh water, free of giardia and e. coli and parasitic worms, flowing like crystal wine at the simple compression of a button! I felt like Tom Hanks in Cast Away, going from dancing in a loincloth on the beach exclaiming “I! I have created fire! Fiah!” to examining the click-on-click-off flame of a butane lighter with profound bewilderment in his hotel room in starched shirt and slacks after he was rescued. I approached with a certain caution and wonder. It was magnificent.

Then I walked upstairs and realized the sun was rising over, what are those, mountains? Is that… elevation? Is that an Audi? Excuse me, Miss, your legs are showing an incredibly obscene amount of skin. Is that even legal? I must avert my eyes now. Where’s the confession booth in this place?

This internet connection is insanely fast.

The pilot said the temperature was going to be nice and warm and mild, 76 degrees Fahrenheit. Very nice, I thought, should make for a smooth transition. Holy crap! I’m zipped up in a Patagonia over here! I can (almost) see my breath. Don’t they have those big heat grills in the ceiling anywhere in this airport? I’d like one of those. And wow, so many people know English here. Are you looking at me funny because a) I am speaking ridiculously slow and over enunciated, b) I just attempted to converse in Marshallese with you, or c) because I presently resemble the Encino Man?

I am sitting in a building that probably covers more area than the entire island I spent the last year on. There are Americans here, and people from other countries, lots of people, wearing all kinds of different clothing (or lack thereof) and piercings and hats and shades, ordering orange mocha frappucinos and stuff, with extra whipped cream and chocolate shavings and rose petals and fairy dust and magic beans or whatever you can get on them these days. I feel like I’m in some bizarro movie. I just saw a tiny old woman wearing a large sombrero, shouting something in a language I’ve never heard as she ran across my field of vision like a cartoon character. The large, rather formidable-looking dude next to me with the huge dreadlocks ordered something with a cherry on it and then promptly fell asleep in his chair. Some American girl is talking in an unnecessarily loud voice about things I would be surprised if she herself actually cared about. A little Asian boy next to me just packed down about six muffins and now may or may not be entering some kind of excessive-sugar/carb-induced shock.

And Ben sits at his computer and observes, takes notes, epiphanizes, stares into space, and thinks about where these particular coffee beans came from, how much oil was used throughout the process of growing, harvesting, transporting, and brewing these little brown seeds that bring pleasure to so many people.

So many people all around right now. It’s absolutely amazing.

Today, I leave.

Well, I have officially completed my assignment in the Marshall Islands. The school year is over. My term is up. My students’ grades have been submitted, my classroom walls relieved of everything educational. The parties and picnics have come and gone, the last load of laundry laundered, my international phone card used up. Okay enough of the sentimental stuff.

I attended an “end-of-service” breakfast a few days ago with my field director and assistant field director, Tam and Jeremy. We talked about things that have happened since I got here last July. I signed some papers, submitted some forms, got my $1,500 deposit back (awesome), and now as a free man I go forth.

Here is a favorite question posed to me as of late: “How do you feel?”

I will tell you: I feel pretty great. I feel ready for something new. I feel accomplished. I feel older. I feel like “I seen a thing er two.” I feel like I could not have done anything more worthwhile and educational and challenging and fulfilling during the past year that would come anywhere even close to this. I also feel anxious and nervous and a bit unprepared to return to Michigan. And most of everything else I am feeling I cannot properly articulate. I probably never will be able to. I’m okay with that.

Above all, I really just can’t wait to come home to Marisa and my family. ...And good food. And friends. And Michigan weather, however erratic it may be. ... And my couch.

So once again, thank you for following along. I received some very nice feedback from this blog and it was a lot of fun for me to keep it up.

Komolol tata and barlokom! (Thank you all very much and see you soon)

Signing off from the Marshall Islands,

Ben

Picnic Pictures

The Dynamite Pits.


The picnic wasn’t entirely filled with mayhem. Some students actually behaved sensibly. And early on I was actually smiling. But, in looking at this picture, I have to wonder… where are my legs?


Jumping into the dynamite pits. Rocky in the sky.


Donald in the sky.


Rocky on land.


Lunch. Mmmmmmm!




Manty


Geryann

Another Day In Paradise

One week ago the school year ended. For whatever reason this was very anticlimactic. The last day of school felt like any other day of the year, with the exception that all the students were signing each other’s uniforms and being just a bit more destructive than I would have preferred. The climax, little did I know, would occur after the weekend passed…

The following Monday we took a class picnic together with the class next to ours. Just past the airport, which is about 8 miles away, there are a few picnic areas, and this was my students’ location of choice. We even got to take our “new school bus.” (The middle school recently acquired a bus. I am not quite sure how this happened. I do know, however, that the RMI National Band (perhaps a topic worthy of its own post) had a bus—a grey airport-shuttle-like bus— and they now do not. I also know that our new bus looks remarkable similar, if not identical, to the bus they used to have. And, just to prevent any confusion, there is an 8½ x 11 sheet of paper displaying the text “School Bus” taped to the inside windshield.)

For the following, a geological explanation may be necessary. If I have not clarified this properly in previous posts, allow me to delve into more detail. Along the lagoon side of the atoll there are innumerable living coral reefs, all below water of course, and, despite the pollution, one can pretty much swim wherever. Along the ocean side, bordering the entire atoll, is what is called a “reef flat.” This is literally a flat shelf of grey/brown/white calcified coral that extends out 100 to 300 yards or so. At high tide you would never knew it is there, for the water comes right up to the shoreline. At low tide, however, the water recedes all the way back to the end of the shelf, exposing the reef flat.

In this particular stretch of the atoll where we had our picnic, along the reef flats are massive interconnected pits left over from dynamiting the area years ago in the effort to make sand. The kids aptly call them the “dynamite pits,” and, as they are literally in the middle of the reef flat, it is essentially an enormous saltwater swimming pool, self maintaining because the tide replenishes it with new water continually. It is a very cool place.

The picnic was called for 8:00am but we didn’t leave the school until 9:30am (because why would we start on time?). We picked up all the children from their houses as we drove down the road to the airport, and then spent all day swimming and cooking food. Despite my opposition, yet in accordance with Marshallese “custom,” the kids brought a 20-gallon tub filled with raw chicken meat and hot dogs, marinating in chicken blood and chicken juice, to grill on a coconut husk fire for lunch. I brought tons of apples and oranges and carrots, which, to my absolute delight, were entirely consumed with gusto.

The day was wild. Kids were jumping off 25-foot trees into the dynamite pits, volleyballs continually bounced into the street where they were punted a football field’s length away by the bumpers of speeding cars, and a teacher driving a pickup truck, who for whatever reason kept leaving and returning, routinely drove away with an excess of 20 kids in the bed, some of them either falling out the back or being pulled up the side of the truck by their classmates like a scene out of the movie Cliffhanger. I was in a near perpetual state of astonishment and severe stress throughout the majority of the day. 60 school children on summer vacation running unrestrained, plus their friends who had met them there who I didn’t know and didn’t approve beforehand, and I was commanding maybe 5% control. My only consolation was my continual reminder that, Ben, this is the way life is here. This is what they’ve been doing their whole lives. It’s different than America and it’s downright dangerous, but this is just life for them. But c'mon, enough is enough already. I refuse to believe I've been conditioned to the point of thinking this is actually OK.

The bus finally came back for us and I thought thank you GOD! However, unbeknownst to me until I discovered a trifle too late, kids had been eating the raw hot dogs from the bin of chicken blood and raw chicken legs because they were still hungry. As the bus drove away, I watched, utterly stupefied and speechless, as the kids who had been doing this vomited out the windows of the bus.

Then I waited for the next three hours—with ten students who were deemed “too wet to get back on the bus” by the bus driver—because our principal neglected follow through and make sure we’d all returned. When it became apparent that no one was coming back for us we hitched a ride back to town on a flatbed filled with hundreds of coconut husks.

Wow.


...One week from today...

Index: Month 10 (Final)

Days lived on a low-lying coral atoll in the Pacific Ocean: 315

Books read during this time: 29

Songs written during this time: 15

Length of time, in days, it takes for brand new guitar strings to exhibit rust in this environment: 3

Length of time this usually takes at home: months

Days spent teaching 7th grade Science and English: 178

Percentage of days spent in the classroom to total days lived on island: 56.5

Number of windows in my classroom: 7

Percentage of windows sustaining damage, whether from environmental forces or adolescent forces: 100

Total students throughout my three classes, out of my initial 67, that no longer attend MMS due to a multitude of reasons: 14

Time displayed since August on the rusted clock in my classroom: 3:14:57

Hours of TV (estimate) that I have watched since July 2007: 6

Number of hours my students and I were stranded at the opposite end of the island after our end-of-school picnic because the principal forgot to pick us up: 3

Days remaining of my stay in the Marshall Islands before I board a Continental Micronesia flight to “Amedika” next week: 8


And on a more serious note…

Percentage of Majuro Atoll’s land to be lost in the event of an 18-inch rise in sea level: 80

Inches that sea levels are predicted to rise by the year 2100 by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: 18

Number of islands already lost to rising sea levels in Kiribati, a coral atoll nation directly southeast of the Marshalls: 2

Amount, in US dollars, it would cost to construct a seawall on one (1) atoll in the Marshall Islands to preserve the land in the event of an increase in sea level: 100,000,000

Number of atolls that comprise the Marshall Islands’ two island chains: 29

Gross domestic product of the Marshall Islands, in US dollars: 115,000,000

National Debt of the Marshall Islands, in US dollars: 100,000,000

Percentage of Marshallese who report not having enough food to eat: 33

Percentage of RMI schoolchildren who are malnourished: 50

Child mortality, per 1,000: 45

Ranking of “severe malnutrition” as a cause of childhood deaths in the Marshall Islands: 1

Percentage by which if every American reduced their meat consumption, every hungry and starving human being on the entire planet could be fed with the resulting grain surplus: 10

Percentage of RMI population under the age of 15: 38

Percentage over the age of 65: 2

Confirmed number of cases of HIV in the RMI: 13

Percentage of teenage girls who became pregnant in the RMI last year: 17 to 18

Price of gasoline per gallon in Majuro, in dollars: 5.70

Minimum wage, per hour, in dollars: 2

Amount of dumpsters on island in usable condition, out of 70 total, prompting the Majuro Atoll Waste Company (MAWC) to declare a state of emergency: 11

Dollars MAWC has in its account to get them through September: 1,500

Dollars required to fix this “state of emergency": 1,500,000


The following are select results of a survey I conducted with 55 of my students:

Percentage who live in houses without running water: 31

Average number of people per student’s house: 11

Percentage who live in houses with 10 or more people: 60

Percentage who do not have a phone line in their house: 33

Percentage who walk to school: 29

Percentage who take a bus or public van to school: 33

Percentage who take a taxi to school: 24

Percentage who are driven to school: 14

Number of students who drink at least one can of soda per day: 4 in 5

Number who drink two or more cans of soda per day: 1 in 2

Number who drink three or more cans of soda per day: 1 in 4

Percentage who feel the Marshall Islands are “getting better”: 29

Percentage who feel the Marshall Islands are “getting worse”: 44

Percentage who feel the Marshall Islands are “staying the same”: 9

Percentage who did not answer the “condition of the RMI question”: 18



That's a lot of numbers.