It may not be Oprah's, but it was my book club.

So while on Utrik, there were many things to do.  My social calendar was so full, I was so constantly busy and holy cow, I just couldn't keep up.  (okay, I'm kidding.)  I had a lot of free time on my hands.  And somethings to keep me busy - watch Filippino soap operas (Luisa and Carding!!!), write epicly long letters to my friends.  (Fun side note story, the one time the plane was broken and I started writing a letter to my friend Holly (thinking the plane was coming later that week, but alas it did not come).  Well, what was originally going to be a 6 page (front and back) letter turned into a 30 page journal saga novel, and I honestly spent 6 pages talking about open faced sandwiches.  Poor Holly...)  And besides writing letters, I read - ALOT!

I was actually surprised the amount books I was able to read in such a short span - way too many.  I feel like I filled my quota for life.  But I like the over time work because I love reading.  (In fact, one of my main goals in life is to read all 7 Harry Potter books in 24 hours)  And it got to the point on island where I was reading anything I could get my hands on.  Thankfully my parents love me, and would send packages filled with books!!!  And Utrik's past WorldTeach volunteers left many many many good (and not so good) books for me to go through.  And let's just say I had a great variety and selection to pick from.

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One book that got me thinking about life was The Animal Dialogues by Craig Childs.  It was all about his different encounter with animals (as well as some information about each animal - and the information was information one would not normally find or know.  For example, mountain lions' mouth and teeth formation is perfect for biting at the base of your head. The teeth are perfect for driving into the nerves and essentially ending your life with one bite.  Or that crows are incredibly smart.  Or that mosquitos have a sci-fi tech system.  They can identify if you are male or female, spot you across a football, and can identify where you are the sweatiest.  Its rather remarkable).  But after reading this book, it dawned on me that I don't have enough experience in the wilderness.  I need to get some.  And I don't have enough experience living in a ti-pee.  But it was a very good book.

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Another book that I liked (in the lieu of many many many many I had read) was Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life by Jon Lee Anderson.  Okay, I feel that I need to warn you first.  The book is broken up into 3 parts (and this book is incredibly long and in the middle of Part 1, I had to stop - where I read 3 crime mofia books but part 1 (for me) took a while to get through.)  The 1st part focuses on Che's beginnings and his life in Argentina.  The 2nd and 3rd parts focus on overtaking Cuba and life in Cuba, and his political and physical adventures in Africa and Bolivia.  This book made me get a different outlook on how I viewed the United States, and my opinions on Cuba.  It was well worth the read.  And now whenever I see someone wearing a Che shirt, I always stop and think - do you really know what he represents? Do you really know?

And on a funnier note, my host family had some books - mainly books explaining the different stories from the Bible, and they had a Mormon bible.  I tried to read it, and put it down after 1 page.  Yeah, no thanks.
But there was this one book -

 And honest to goodness - one of the questions inside was...

Yeah, so in the words of Mean Girls - you have your cousins, and then you have your first cousins...

Let's go to the movies!!!

Well, if Utrik had a movie theatre, then I would honestly have gone like every weekend, even if they were playing the same movie (and if that were the case, then I would have memorized it and performed the best one woman show around and it would have been Oscar worthy, just saying).  But alas, Utrik did not have a movie theatre (Majuro did, but it was closed/shut down the whole time, so I don't know if that counts or not...)  But I did get to watch movies, and there was a huge variety to choose from - horror (some medicine gets out and turns people into semi zombies, and they are used as military weapons until gone wrong), comedy... (continued below the picture.)

And that is how we do it!!  (Side -note, they are watching Barbie and the Mermaid, and ALL of them are drawn into the movie's well written plot line, amazing special effects, and that super catchy surfing song...)  What a great quality movie.  I didn't waste my time at all.  Its not like I'm wishing for that 1 hour back...

children's (in which, I would highly recommend Hotel for Dogs - super cute and all my little brothers and sisters loved it, and they loved Max Keeble's Big Move and the evil ice cream man), military (Jessica Simpson's horrible military movie and actually played a huge part in making me consider the National Guard, Inglorious Bastards (okay, I confess, I brought this one!!) and some Matt Damon one) and my personal favorite - FILIPPINO SOAP OPERAS!!!!

Holy cow, those movies (and when I mean movie, I mean like 20 dvds consists of 1 movie - so it was more like a television series) had some great plot lines, great acting, great special effects (holy cow, that house on fire looked absolutely real!  Did you see that?  That looks like real, legit fire!)...

And they were freaking awesome!!!  There were whole days where I would just sit there and stare at the tiny 6 inch screen and watch disk after disk after disk of soap opera.  And for some odd reason, I would always feel like I accomplished something that day.  My favorite was Luisa and Carding (okay the real title was Gulong ng Palad) and after I watched this one, all of the characters in my classroom (for example if I was teaching body parts or acting out a concept), their names would become Luisa and Carding.

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This show was simply amazing!!  Okay, so Luisa comes from a dirty poor family, and Carding is super rich.  Well, Carding and Luisa are friends when they are little (Luisa's mom is a maid and works for Carding's family), but then Carding's family moves to America because his father suddenly dies from a heart attack.  Well several years pass and now both are teenagers.  And guess who comes back into town... CARDING!  Well, he falls in love with Luisa and same with her.  Haha, well both families don't like this... and lets just say that many many many people try to tear them apart.  And include babies, illegal kidney donations, and very gorgeous people - bad things will happen.  It was great for me to watch!!  And now I am officially addicted to Filippino soap operas, and it is a good addiction.  I hope it never stops...  No 12 step program needed.

Hockey withdrawal - it was H-E-double hockey sticks

Now I know that I'm not Canadian (although people from Pittsburgh swear that I sound Canadian), but I love ice hockey.  It developed on later in life.  Okay, I should rephrase.  I'm not that old.  Why, I'm only 24.  So I should say it developed later in my young adult/teenager life.  Now some background, I'm from Erie, Pennsylvania.  Erie happens to have their own hockey team - The Erie Otters (you otter be there).  The Erie Otters are a part of the OHL (or the Ontario Hockey League - basically high schoolers play each other in a professional league.  (other fun random side note, when I was growing up, I had NO idea that the league was Canadian.  I knew the other teams were from Canada and I always thought that it was very nice of the Otters to play the Canadian national anthem.  And then in college I realized that they would always play the Canadian national anthem because it was the ONTARIO Hockey League.  Mind blown!  And discovering that when the London Knights would play the Erie Otters, they were not actually from England.  MIND BLOWN AGAIN!!))

So this one time in college, my friends and I (all back from our universities for the holiday/semester break) decide to attend one of Erie's attractions - An Otter game.  And this was the first game many of us had attended since elementary school when they would have game nights.  You could buy discount tickets and sit with your school.  While Grandview Elementary School never did manage to get a yellow and green out, it was still fun to sit and watch the hockey game, and more importantly to see what your other 2nd grade classmates' families looked like.  So anyway, my friends went to a game and  MIND BLOWN THRICE!!!

I knew what I was missing in my life.  It was like a missing piece just fell into place.  How could I have not noticed this beautiful sport before?!  IT WAS AMAZING!!  The action, the pace, the way the game was played, the amount of physical endurance needed, the skill - it was all there and it was incredible.  And at that point, I became slightly obsessed.  And then I went back to college, with a new love for ice hockey and a new love for the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Okay, so fast forward to Utrik and island life.  There was no ice hockey on Utrik.  Geez, there was no ice.  (Okay, some houses had ice boxes where you could fish, coconuts, chicken, beef/steak, and ice cream!)  And it was hard to explain what ice hockey was because both ice and hockey didn't really exist on island.  So I asked my parents to send me any information in any media form that had to deal with hockey and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

And they did.... sort of.  I guess I should have been more specific.  I should have said to send recordings of games (any teams would have been fine at that point) and information about the Pittsburgh Penguins as a whole team.  The things I got in the boxes where articles about Sidney Crosby's brain (he just had a concussion the year before and his brain rattle incident was still top news) and how he was adjusting or not adjusting to stuff, Slap Shot 3, and the Pittsburgh Penguins Stanley Cup 2009 DVD movie thing.

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What a great ZEN movie!!!

So I guess you could say that my hockey withdrawal process was getting better.  I had some hockey exposure to get over the fact that before, I had nothing.  The one thing that I absolutely hated was the Stanley Cup DVD of the Penguins winning.  THERE WERE NO GAMES ON IT!!  It was just a bunch of interviews about their season and how the playoffs were - "Game 5 was the game that like never happened.  No one was feeling jittery and there was a feeling of calmness.  And then we hit the ice and I don't know what happened.  It was like the game that never happened.  And afterwards, Mario came to our locker room and said just told us to shake it off."  (Now, I have to admit, its pretty sad when I can almost quote this.  It just shows how much I liked yet hated it).  Now I hasn't a fan of the interviews, and to be honest, Sidney's voice slightly gets on my nerves - eh.  But it was something that dealt with the Pittsburgh Penguins, so I was okay with it.  I did however love the microphone set up with Billy Guerin.  That was cool.

And the articles my parents sent me, they always dealt with Sidney Crosby's brain and how it rattled.  Okay, I know that a concussion is a very serious injury and not taking the correct steps in healing and recovery can result in some very serious problems.  I get that, and I award him for waiting for his comeback and waiting for his brain to get better.  But my issue was about the team.  The team still played, even if Sid did not.  The team was winning or losing game, but I never heard any of it.  Thats because I kept getting articles about the concussed captain.  I'm sorry, but there are many other extremely talented and athletic players on that team, so why is the focus just on one guy?  If I was on that team, that was get under my skin so much.  And that is what irks me as a fan.  

But at the same time, I was reading about hockey.  So it was all good.  I feel that I went through a 12 step recovery program to get over my addiction and came out a stronger, interested but not super crazy fan of hockey and the Pittsburgh Penguins.  And I guess it was a good thing that this happened because now the players and owners where at a stand off, so there was no hockey.  I guess the world (okay, probably just Canada) had the wonderful opportunity to experience what I experienced - hockey withdrawal.  And just to let you know, there is no pill to fix it.

Why little darling, get on your dancing shoes! Its time to get down and boogey!

The damn music box.  The people would spin while Christmas songs/noise played.  Holy cow that thing was so annoying.  It was a blessing when the batteries ran out!  (And then a curse when Baba put new ones in months later.) 

Well it was that time of year again, Christmas.  And while in the States, I would be celebrating with snow, hot chocolate, presents, putting lights up, and watching A Christmas Story (You'll shoot your eye out!)  Oh man did I miss that leg lamp.  Well, I had a very similar Christmas experience here - minus the snow and hot chocolate and presents and shooting my eye out.  But I did put up Christmas lights!  And there was that stupid music box - holy cow that damn thing was so annoying!  Check it out!

I think thats underwear...

And as you can see, the place was pretty swanked out.  Lights, random felt ornaments hanging from the ceiling (and I'm pretty sure that they are still there) (and another fun fact, when it hit Valentine's Day, my mom sent a box with some stuff, and I hung up this swirly heart things from the ceiling as well.  It looked like the most commercially decorated holidays threw up all over the house.)



And what really happened besides the decorations...

DANCING!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep, thats right.  Christmas time was the time for dancing.   And when I mean dancing, I mean standing in two lines, shuffling your feet, and doing hand motions.  Forget stage presence, its way too hot for that (in fact, many of the women standing next to you are sweating profusely and have sweat rags.)  Forget smiling.  The only thing you have to do is remember the steps and don't step on the little kids that are running around or are sitting at your feet.  And for some odd reason, most of the men don't enter the church.   Only the important men do, like the ribelle doctor, or the principal, or the pastor (and I still don't like that man.)  Otherwise, you have a ton of peeping Toms.  They crowd the windows and just stare.  I have to say that it feels very weird.

And despite the fact that the dances only have a few basic steps, practicing consumes all your evening/night time free time for 6 weeks prior (or at least in my case.  In Max's, he said that he learned his all in one night.)  So every night, I would go to the neighbor's house with Momma and a kid or two, or no kid at all if they were watching a movie or sleeping.  And then for several hours, we would practice the same routine, over and over and over and over and over.  It stuck in my mind, but apparently in other's, not no much.  So we had a combo dance of both men and women (I know right, something where both males and females are together.  HOLD THE PHONE!!  and yes it was okay), the men had there own dance (which after watching looked more like a cardio workout.  It was freaking nuts) and the women had their own dance has well.  But let me tell you something about the men's performance, they actually had two dances...

And I had the wonderful opportunity of leading them in this dance.  I happened to make the mistake of saying that I knew the dance to the Cha Cha Slide (in which, makes a good ESL listening activity if you are teaching adults direction words such as left or right, fyi).  BAD MOVE!!  Next thing I know, I am teaching all the men of our church how to dance the Cha Cha Slide (which isn't that hard, you just have to listen to the music, but apparently they needed help).  So whenever I'm at a wedding/dance and I hear that song, I start to dance to it.  Well, I get half way through the song and decide I'm finished and I honestly want to stop dancing (most of the time I do.)  So I can clearly only handle this song for about 1 minute.  Let's just say that when we were practicing, we would practice for about 2 hours!  THAT IS 2 HOURS OF HEARING AND DANCING TO THE CHA CHA SLIDE!!  AND THAT WAS EVERY NIGHT FOR ABOUT 6 WEEKS!!!!  I was not a very happy camper.  And I told Max this, and he didn't really believe until he watched the performance.  And you could hear him laughing during the entire thing.

I unfortunately don't have any pictures of me Christmas dancing, but I do have some, enjoy.


Now to make this a new Christmas tradition or not.... that is a good question.  Let me think that one over...

Abraham (being silly as usual) and Bajin getting ready to do their dancing.

The children dancing their Christmas dance.

Me and Abraham being silly while we were waiting, inside one of the churches,
 for Max's dancing group to get ready

Max, ready and waiting to go.

Shake it and shuffle it sister!

Get jiggy with it!

Dear Friend,

Dear Friend,

Hello, my name is Seiko.  I am 15 years old.  I am from Utrik Atoll, Marshall Islands.  I am in the 8th grade.  My favorite subject is math.  I have one father.  His name is Nickner.  I have one mother, her name is Mommy (yes, its true, her name was actually Mommy).  I have 2 sisters and 0 brothers.  I like to dance and sing songs.  What are your hobbies?  Where are you from?  What is your favorite food?  Can you send me one apple?  Can you send me one i-pot (suppose to be i-pod)?

                                                                                                       Love from your best girlfriend,
                                                                                                                  Seiko

That is a sample letter from one of the 8th grade students on Utrik.  I did a pen pal activity with my friend Kasey, how happened to be a teacher in North Carolina.  And I have to say that of all the activities I did with my students, this would have to be the most successful.  I originally did the international pen pal activity with my Honor's Club.  There was a select group of students who stayed after school and would do extra activities.  Well, it sounded like a great idea, but once it actually started, students wouldn't come, or the activities were a little too advanced, or it was just absolute chaos.  But one of the better activities was the international pen pals.  And holy cow did it work!

I have never seen my students so excited about school before.  My class was the first to write the letters, and then we waited until Kasey's class wrote us back.  And when they wrote back, it was like Christmas in an envelope!  And one of the best parts was when Kasey actually included pictures!  Holy cow!  My students would look at the picture - "What does my person look like?"  "Well, look at your letter.  What name do you see?"  "Brandon!"  "Okay.  Ah, here is Brandon!"

And some of my students decided to write 2 or more letters (some of the girls in the pictures are cuter than others and therefore got many more letters.)  In the following weeks, Max (the other WT volunteer) had his 8th graders write in their jounals about something they liked about America.  Most of the students wrote about the pen pal letters!  And to top it off, Honor's Club that night went an extra 2 hours longer than what it was suppose to. 

On the downside - that night I found out about the hammer and the boyfriend.  :(

And on another side note, here is the conversation that played out with Max and Seiko (and her mother's name is Mommy)

Max - What is your mother's name?
Seiko - My mother's name is Mommy.
Max - NO.  What is your mother's name?
Seiko - My mother's name is Mommy.
Max - NO!  What is your mother's name?
Seiko - My mother's name is Mommy.
Max - NNNOOOOOOOOOO!

When it rains, its pours... and floods your house.

So when I was growing up, I was always taught never to be in or near water during a thunder shower.  "Beth, the lightening will come down and strike you as you wet, lather, rinse, and repeat."  Well, I'm starting to think that its all just a load of crap (and I still would be covered in shampoo).

Well, on island, I discovered the real truth to this.  It at first was a normal day.  I woke up, I went to school, I taught some English (whether it stuck or not I don't know, but I would like to think that I made an educational difference  - but I digress), I came home.  I decided to go on a walk with my two little brothers to a church because some of the women where practicing singing for a church thing.  Well, the sky started to turn very dark (now if I was an all telling fortune teller, I would have realized that the heavens were about to open up and tens of thousands of gallons of water was about to be dumped, but I am no fortune teller).  And there was something weird happening with the tide.  It was huge.  It was like high tide on a very powerful performance enhancing drug - or the scientific word is "king tide."  Well, one of those was happening.  The tide was literally coming over the sandbar.  It was as if the sandbar was nothing, a tiny speck in its path to ultimate destruction.  It was incredible.  And lets just say that when both forces combine, you are going to get a flood.  Nuf said.

Well, once Babba finds us and we (host brothers and myself) race back to our home in the downpour, and then you would think that the fun is over and that we are safe in a nice, dry house.  HAHA, fooled you.  Next thing you know, the roof is leaking.  So lets place many many buckets.  The tides are going nuts, break over the sand dune, and bam, knocking at our front door.  Now its race to see if we can pick everything up off the floor and onto higher ground (and by higher ground, I mean the beds, which are maybe 2 feet off the cement floor).  And then the flooding comes into my room.  I quickly move everything onto higher ground (because having a wet mattress sucks).  And I put my books (that were originally on the floor) onto my giant tupperware container that was used as a dresser.  Did you know that giant tupperware containers can float, even if it is full of clothing and has many many many many big books on top.  NOOOOOOOOOO.  That sucker floats and rolls over (like when you teach a dog new tricks).  So then all my books are now in the water - shoes are floating everywhere - packets of ramen are sailing through - leaves, sticks, small rats, and other rather disgusting debris are washed in as well.

Have you ever had sopping wet books.  They are incredibly heavy.  And I actually rang out my Marshall Language Manual.  Thats right, twisted it like you would a wet towel.  And quite surprisingly, a lot of water came out.  Now that I think about it, it would have been funny if a lot of Marshallese came out of it as well (haha, let's just say that I was a very unmotivated slacker to learn Marshallese).

So now, everything is wet, and water is coming in at all angles (up, down, left, right, sideways, backwards) and we are having a blast.  (Fun side note, right when the flooding was starting to occur, I noticed that Babba was trying to get work done, but all the kids were getting in the way.  So I grabbed my shampoo and we all took showers in the rain.  But after I dried off, I just got wet again, no luck.)  And people start coming over - the boyfriend, neighbors, people on the other end of the island.  "Where is the ribelle going to sleep?"  Ah, I was going to sleep in this bed, with my sister Bajin (who rolls a lot and kicks) We manage to eat something, and drink coffee, and the children go to bed.  And I go to bed to.  It was incredibly cold and all I can say is thank goodness for that extreme fleece blanket with the motorcycle on it.

And the next day (and forever), I could never find my missing sandal...

Island sick?

Well its been a while since I last posted and I guess I should post again.  I would like to apologize for such a long wait, but my computer's motherboard decided to pass away.  So I held a funeral for it at the Mac Care shop in Chiang Mai, Thailand.  (Oh, I should update you, right now, I'm teaching English at a government school in the mountains of the Chiang Rai province in northern Thailand).  And now my computer is fixed (like a Mac Frankenstein!) and running perfectly!  So thank you guys at the Mac Care shop - ITS ALIVE!! ITS A-A-ALIVE!!

Combine - 7 years old

Abraham - 5 years old

So lately I've been kind of moody, kind of day-dreaming, and kind of wondering what if...  And now that I am away from Utrik, I feel that I need to go back and that it was a mistake to leave.  What if I stayed and did an extra year?  But at the same time, I needed to leave.  But now I have this overwhelming urge to venture back into my old life. I sometimes find myself conversing in my very broken Marshallese, when I know I should be learning Thai.  I imagine my little brothers here with me - Abraham and Combine.  I see them as students in my school here.  (And then I start laughing to myself and the other teachers look at me like I am crazy.  Maybe I already am?) I often day-dream about what it would be like to take one of them home with me (and home meaning the United States).  I often dream about Combine sitting in an American class, or I often dream about me living back on Utrik.  I see pictures and events run through my head (with a marathon pace) and no matter how hard I try I can't seem to get rid of them.  I miss Utrik terribly.  And I want to go back. (or try to bring Utrik to me)  And its getting weird because now I start to smell the smells of the island.  I'll be teaching and all of the sudden, it starts to smell like copra or it will start to smell like the lagoon (which is pretty weird because there is no ocean where I'm at).  And one of my third grade students looks like Combine - which is really starting to freak me out.  I'm just hoping that one of these days I don't actually call him Combine in class.  That poor kid would be so confused.

So I don't know what to call this disease, this sickness.  Is it home sick?  Because I would not call Utrik my home.  The United States will always be my home, but Utrik will always hold a special place in my heart - particularly my host family and especially those two boys.  There were times when I acted like a mother (yeah, I tested out my mothering skills - I called it Rent-A-Child), and I really loved them.

Don't get me wrong, there were things about Utrik that I would personally not like to experience again - for example the boyfriend/movie dude hammer incident and situational starvation (although now I know I can consume clear jello/mush and live to tell about it).  And there are somethings in Thailand that I love and I am glad to be experiencing them right now (interesting comparisons - the students in Thailand can behave themselves.  They can sit for long periods of time and not have to throw rocks at each other.  And the teachers actually come to school and do their jobs and are qualified to do them. But when asked whose English levels are better, I'm going to have to say the Marshallese.  Only because all the of text books are in English.  So the students are learning science in English, social studies in English, and so on.  So the students are learning English and other subjects at the same time all the time.  That is not the case here in Thailand.  Just thought you should know.)  So this puts me at a difficult spot.  Do I stay or do I go now? (name that song!)

So I guess what I am trying to say is, I'm island sick.  Is there a medicine or some prescription to fix this?