i am a part of something big, or, my thoughts from this morning

in september i started getting up early to pray with the sunrise. i have a flat chunk of concrete i spread a towel out on and i meditate, calming all the worrying and planning about the many stresses that buzz through my brain all day long. i listen to the waves and the wind and God. sometimes i have deep, moving experiences but mostly i don't.

this morning i had a great feeling of joy. i opened my eyes after meditating and was overcome with how beautiful life is. i am a part of this huge, minutely detailed, incredible patchwork of life with God running through it all. i looked around and saw the ocean and the sun and the clouds and the houses of Small Island and the coconut trees and i just couldn't help smiling and even laughing a little. this is all so amazing! not the tropicality of my location or what i'm doing here in majuro, but this whole earth is such an unbelievable place and i get to be a part of it. i get to see and taste and draw meaning from all of this incredible creation. what more could a guy ask? there's no reason in this crazy world to be angry or sad or anything you don't want to be for more than a second!
its simple but it absolutely set me on fire.

public library, or, books on bata's porch

in the weeks leading up to this fall’s election, a series of large deliveries were made to assumption schools. aa man running for office (mayor, i think) arranged for mass quantities of books to be donated to the school. i’m not certain how expected these deliveries were but every time one was made there were so many books no one knew what to do with them. unfortunately, most of them were things that we didn’t need. some boxes made their way to the library, but many boxes were full of outdated textbooks in poor condition. i think most of them came from hawaii. eventually the majority of them were thrown away. the thought of so many pages going to waste makes me sad. however, before they were disposed of, all these boxes full of words sat stacked on the porch of fr. rich’s house, next door to ours. instead of playing “iraq” (a war game involving two teams and toy guns with rubber bands that fling pop can tabs at high velocities), the throngs of little boys who haunt the neighborhood would sit on the porch rifling through this public library, for that is truly what it was. it did not have shelves and dewey would surely have scoffed at the lack of organization but anyone was free to take anything they wanted. one day i was coming home from school in the afternoon and saw a father and daughter going through the volumes, picking out one here and one there to take home and become memories.

where' waldo? sucks when somebody already circled waldo.

gender relations or lack thereof and outgrowing reflections

one of the facets of life in the marshall islands that has been getting under the skin of the collective JVI community is the relationship between male and female people. men and women do not talk to each other unless they are going to sleep together. they do not make small talk and they are definitely not friends. there is this strange seperation between the sexes that is hard to breach. the women that work in the cafeteria at school will say "iokwe" when i greet them but that is about it.

clearly this is frustrating. while i want to avoid stereotyping the gender roles prominent in marshallese culture, the things that men do and the things that women do are very exclusive and clearly defined. i sympathize with my female community mates who are frustrated by the constraints these gender roles put on their behavior. men are allowed to do pretty much whatever they want, while women are held to a much higher standard including, but not limited to, not showing anyone your knees. i hesitate to write much more about if, for fear of coming off as judgemental.

as far as this sort of cultural examination goes, i realized the other day that i don't do that much of it. while i do not automatically accept every aspect of marshallese culture as good i do not think about such things as much as i would have expected. my peers struggle over what their response to cultural standards and attitudes that they do not agree with should be. should they speak out against them? should they accept them simply because they are a part of this place?

i find my own examination of such things to be lacking. its not that i don't notice things that make me uncomfortable or that i do not see the value of. there are things that bother me about how life is conducted here. for instance, the adjustment to marshallese time (everything starting 2 hours later than scheduled) can be an annoyance. however, for some reason my reactions to these things are very much internal. the thought of speaking out about values of the marshallese people that i do not agree with is not something that occurs to me often. i don't feel it is my place. i am not here to change or fix anything external. the only thing that i can legitimately expect to change through my time here is myself. it is my place to examine my own view of the world in light of the marshallese culture and not the other way around. certainly there are aspects of life here that are destructive to people, just as there are in any culture. but how can you remove the speck from one culture when you have not removed the plank from your own?

it is thinking like this that leads me to see my future work and vocation as being geographically (and culturally) located in the united states. it is hard enough to work for change in a social environment governed by cultural standards you are more or less familiar with. to be an outsider ostensibly working for social change in a literally foreign environment seems impossible to do effectively. also, i miss my friends.

a continuation!

last time my photographs stopped uploading, so i gave it another go today.

here is tsuyoshi, our kitten. he's dead now.

some of the friendly locals.

here is the desk of one of my colleagues, Pablo after I put CAUTION tape all around it!! its not exactly a stapler in jello, but some people laughed.

this is something i found the last time i was correcting my biology students' notebooks. also pictured is my response.

finally, here is a picture of me and my mustache, Robespierre.

someday i'll write something

recent developments, or, a smorgasbord of images

here are some pictures.


first up is our community christmas picture. this was taken christmas eve by a 2nd grader, so it is a bit skewed, but ocean did a pretty good job. this was right before we went out to eat before midnight mass.






this is some bread i baked:




this is the view from my desk in the faculty room. notice the stacks of notebooks to grade and the multitude of file folders. also the I CLOSED WOLSKI'S bumper sticker. i usually put my feet up and so things tend to get a little sandy.





there were a few more i wanted to add as well. i will try again at a later date.

these are some thoughts i wrote down about christmas a year ago

i thought alot about christmas; what it means to me.
it is God showing us what its all about. God, Emmanuel, comes to us, enters into our midst not at the head of a host, but in the most vulnerable, marginalized context possible: in a backwater region, to a homeless family, as a normal baby. what could be more humble?

i think the message is that if this homeless baby can speak truth to power, so should someone born to ease (even though that ease is the product of the injustice we are meant to cry out against). little baby jesus didn't have alot going for him: young mother, poor, people living under an oppressive imperial yoke. yet despite all this, jesus actualized that potential within each of us to be people of God. whats more, he tells us exactly how to do it. if that baby can go on to inspire us, what excuse do i have not to do God's work? with supportive family, friends, and most importantly the power of an education (the most powerful tool imaginable).

in other words, the message of christmas is that we all start somewhere. our origins are important, but in some ways they are irrelevant. everyone has the same potential to change the world and be the hands that build God's kingdom. its just a matter of actualizing that potential by seeking God. be still. listen. be open. God is there.

failures of power and another sort

the 2nd quarter ended last week. i'm not sure what happened, it was here and then all of a sudden its gone. it was a pretty good quarter. i became much more comfortable in the classroom and efficient in preparing to be in it. keeping that unlruly class in line is a bit easier now as i have a better idea of what works and what doesn't. i've also had success "breaking through" to some students. there were some that wouldn't talk to me for the first few months of school and now they do. although i still have stacks of grading to do, it feels good to have the first half of the i make it sound nice and smooth, but last week was a bit bumpy. the rough draft of the final paper for my freshman english class was due on monday and more than 2/3 of them didn't feel like doing it so i sent the whole lot of them to sandy, the principal's office. she made them stay after school until they finished it, which for some was after 6:00. so they have their rough drafts done, but the night before the revised paper was due, the power was out so none of them could type it. which is why i am in the school computer lab now, 10:00 am, christmas eve morning. of course the hitch is that so far none of the students have shown up to finish their papers. i have about half of them and many of the students who didn't hand theirs in yet probably won't bother to at all, which means that they have a good chance of failing. i don't like giving F's, but when students won't pay attention in class or do their work, what am i supposed to do? there were 3 kids who hadn't turned in any homework all quarter. one of them was already dismissed for disciplinary reasons and one of the others is on her final warning. one slip and shes "fired," as they say here.

the power has been going out alot lately, sometimes it is announced and sometimes its unexpected. a few weeks ago it went out without warning and there was a rumor that the power plant exploded. it kept going out in the final weeks of the quarter and everyone got a little nervous with having to prepare and copy exams in time. also, its hard to cook dinner without power. although its an inconvenience, it certainly isn't that big of a deal. the flow of electricity in majuro is pretty reliable compared to some other places.

the assumption faculty christmas party was friday night and as the new male jv, it was my role to emcee the affair. i cracked jokes and made fun of people while leading a few games. musical chairs was a big hit. we also played a game suggested by one of my favorite teachers, pablo, that was like dancing charades. the capper of the games was a race of sorts, in which 4 contestants tie a string around their waist that suspends an empty soda can. participants must move their hips to swing the can in order to move a small object on the ground. sr. monica was the defending champion but lost to the 8th grade teacher, deanna. it wasn't a bad party. before it started i hung out in the cookhouse with some male teachers drinking coconuts and grilling the chicken and fish. i drank 6 coconuts that night. mmm, delicious.

i will be sure to post again soon, describing christmas vacation adventures, of which there may possibly be one. i'm looking forward to reading, playing guitar, walking around, trying to stay out of the rain, and doing laundry.