June-July Roundup

There has been a lot going on the past two months which has been great since I like keeping busy. The downside is that a lot of it was out of site, which hasn't helped with figuring out a community project that I can work on while I'm here. Anyways, here's what has been going on these past two months.

- I started a vegetable garden! At the beginning of June I planted tomatoes, peppers, and cabbage. They should be ready for picking soon! More recently I planted lettuce, beans, and lemons. This has been very satisfying and makes me feel more connected with the community, since everyone has gardens (although most people don't have a vegetable garden, mainly just root crops and island cabbage). Somehow everyone knows about my garden, even though it is behind my house in an out of the way spot, and I get asked about it a lot. A hassle has been keeping chickens out of the garden and they've dug up some plants more times than I can count. Relatedly, I recently started a compost pit to deal with my food waste.

- I've been teaching grades 4-6 every day that I've been at site. The headmaster wants me to do an extra class, not teaching out of their textbook, which is what I've been doing but I might have to change that eventually. This isn't really what Peace Corps wants me to be doing, since we're supposed to be co-teaching, but it's working out for now. The students are great and I've been enjoying getting to know them.

-A psychologist from D.C. along with our Peace Corps Vanuatu nurse came to Ambae for a visit. They visited my site and then I went with them to visit another site I hadn't seen yet. It's really great to visit other sites because they are all so different, even on the same island. 

-I spent a week translating for a medical ship that docked at Ambae. What a week it was! I spent the week translating during the day, swimming and eating delicious ship food in the evening, and sleeping on a friend's hammock at night. I'm not sure of the exact numbers,  but a few hundred people came to go to the dentist, get reading glasses, and see a doctor. This was something I never thought I would ever do because I am not good at languages, so I never thought I'd be translating anything, and I can't look at needles so anything medical is not in my future. However, it was really interesting and sad to see what people's common medical problems are. The following week they were supposed to go to another island,  but ended up staying in Ambae and sending out trucks to villages. A truck full of people came to my school to give checkups to the students and some members of the community. Here is a video of their time on Ambae (I'm in a few pictures): 

https://www.youtube.com/embed/5B8Zu4A8KyU

- I went to Port Vila with the headmaster of the school for reconnect, a training that happens after 3 months at site. The training was pretty good and mostly focused on working with the counterparts. The week was also good because I got to see all the education volunteers, eat pizza and yogurt, use a lot of internet, stock up on dried food such as lentils, and meet people from my village who live in Vila. I also ended up going to a diversity workshop, which was thought provoking. 

- I just finished re-reading all the Harry Potter books. Wow, what a great writer JK Rowling is!

- I ended July celebrating Vanuatu's 36th Independence Day in North Ambae. There was lots of good food, sports, and dancing.

Korea in Vanuatu

Disclaimer: I haven't actually met any Koreans in Vanuatu; these are all just random things that I have observed here.

I have a growing list of countries that I have an interest in and feel connected to. I like to follow the news of these countries (although that has been a lot harder since being in Vanuatu), meet people from those countries, and chat with people who have been to the same places that I have. When in Korea I was surprised and glad to see a plaque reading "Gamorjoba" (hello in Georgian) on the sidewalk in a foreigner populated area of Seoul. After spending two years in Korea, I am obviously interested in things related to Korea, so here are a few random things related to Korea that I've found in Vanuatu.

-KOICA in Epau
In one of the training villages, there is a garden near the school which has a sign that says it was a joint effort with KOICA. KOICA is a Korean governmental aid agency that is in many countries around the world

-Clothes donated in Sunai
In another training village, I was surprised to see a box with Korean writing on a woman's porch. I asked where the box came from, and she said that a Korean women's group had donated clothes to be sold cheaply as a fundraiser.

-Subtitles on the TV in the motel
During a stay in Port Vila, the hotel room had a TV with a USB stick filled with movies. My roommate and I chose a movie, and as it started playing, Korean subtitles came on the screen. I was pleasantly surprised that I could still read them!

-Ramen
I had never really eaten ramen before I went to Korea, but it is pretty much impossible to live there without eating it at least occasionally. I was happy to see my favorite Korean ramen being sold in the big grocery store in Port Vila. I bought a few packages to bring to Ambae, feeling weird but satisfied as I ate Korean ramen while looking out onto the Vanuatu landscape.

-Korean Embassy
I saw this weird sign in Port Vila. The Kia Motors dealership is the honorary Korean Embassy? I don't really understand it, but it makes me chuckle.

-Boy who died
To end on a more sobering note, during my first week on Ambae a teenage boy died while working on a Korean fishing boat.

Spiders

Warning: Don't scroll down if you have arachnophobia.

One thing that was difficult at first to get used to when I arrived on Ambae was the amount of large spiders that are in my house. To try to get over my fear of them, I've been taking pictures of them. Luckily, none (or so I've been told) of them are harmful. Here are some pictures of them for your enjoyment:

Luckily, Silvy likes to chase and eat the spiders. 

I sprayed this spider with so much poison until it curled up and died, and then was my bathroom decoration for about a week until it disappeared. 

Pregnant spider on the ceiling.

Spiders like to go where they don't belong.

A Tour of My House

My mom has been asking me to make a video of my house since before I even arrived in Vanuatu, so here one is.

A Rainy Day at the Ocean

One Sunday morning I was waiting for the bell to ring to signal it was time for church. My host dad came over to tell me that church was happening in another village that day, so instead we were going to go swimming. Good deal! It didn't really look like swimming weather- it was gray and windy- but I don't get to go swimming too often (well, I go swimming more than I ever have in my life, but relative to other volunteers who live closer to the water) so I take any chance I can get! 

People from my village have land at the coconut plantation by the ocean, so that's where they go when they want to go swimming. Avoiding the main road so that we wouldn't pass any church-going people, we walked through the bush trails. On the way we picked papaya, cocoa, and navara (dried coconuts) to snack on. My host brother used a long bamboo pole to knock down breadfruit from a tree for our lunch. Almost two hours later, we arrived at their swimming area. The waves were rough and the tide was low, exposing a lot of coral, but we had walked all that way to go swimming so swimming we went. It wasn't so much swimming as try-to-avoid-cutting-legs-on-coral, but it was enjoyable nonetheless especially since we had brought snorkels and I saw a lot of colorful fish.

My host dad had made a fire and roasted breadfruit, so as soon as that was done we got out of the water to eat. Almost immediately, it started to downpour. There wasn't any shelter, so we just stood there, laughing and eating soggy breadfruit. My host dad started calling people who own trucks to ask if someone could pick us up, but no one answered. After a while it stopped raining, and we walked the almost 2 hours back soaking wet. It was a pretty hilarious Sunday.