Sometimes it's hard to remember when I didn't watch the sunset over the Pacific Ocean every evening. On Monday my life had pretty devolved into that of a beach bum. Class had let out early because the people teaching us were as sick of it was we were. I spent a solid two and a half hours watching the sun's slow plunge into the ocean. It was a somewhat cloudy day, which always leads to better sunsets. Rays of sunlight wormed their way out of holes in the clouds, breaking free in fabulous multi-colored bursts. A rainbow was visible along the horizon, and as the sun neared the end of the journey it lit up low-hanging clouds like a Halloween jack-o-lantern. There's a tourism advertisement in Vila that I walk by every time I go in. It reads: “So many call it paradise, we call it home.” Paradise, I think, is a relative term. It's a place we can read about in travel books and sometimes visit for a few days when finances allow, but if you try to move in it inevitably turns into something of a drag. While watching the sunset, my gaze kept wandering back to the small coral road that separates the beach from the rest of the village. Like a thirsty man seeing mirages in the desert, phantom taco trucks kept passing in front of my eyes, dispensing greasy barbacoa tacos piled high with salsa and enormous glasses of iced tea.
As swearing-in approaches, training has taken on that listless feeling of the last week of class before summer vacation. We complain about being bored while at the same time resent being given anything to do. There's a general feeling that nothing that's going on is really going to count, like when you figure that the material covered in that very last class will probably only be worth one or two points on the final. I've come up with all kinds of elaborate plans of things to do once I get to site, few of which, I know, will ever become reality. On Tuesday, the village began constructing a stage for our swearing-in ceremony down on the beach. This seemed rather unnecessary, as there's already a rather nice shelter a mere ten feet away, where we've been having class ever since coming to the village.
On Wednesday we were slated for another trip into Vila to visit the teacher's college. However, only one bus showed up to take us, and so me and a few others had to ride in the back of the Peace Corps pick-ip truck. Now, by this point I'd ridden in the back of many a pick-up and was pretty well acquainted with the usual discomforts and dangers of traveling in the truck bed. I climbed in next to a big stack of luggage that other volunteers were having carried into Vila in preparation for next week's move-out. The truck was about to move out when we had to pick up a few more passengers that couldn't fit in the bus. “Danny,” said one of my trainers (Ni-Vans have a hard time with names not ending in vowels, so my name tends to devolve into Danny a few minutes after I introduce myself to anyone), “climb up on top of the luggage to make some more space.” I looked dubiously at the precariously tall stack of bags, just barely shorter than the roof of the cab of the truck. Being a good sport, however, I clambered up. “No, no,” said another one of the trainers, casually swinging himself into a seat on the roof of the cab, “sit up here with me.” Already in too deep, I climbed up on the cab with him, carefully noting the nice, smooth surface of the roof and the lack of anything, really, to keep me from being swept off the speeding truck, should, God forbid, the driver decide to make a turn. Or slow down, or speed up, or perform any of the activities that one normally associates with driving. Now fearing for my life, I clamped down on the metal bar which framed the back window of the cab with all the strength and determination of a main character of a bad action movie who is forced to cling desperately to the outside of a flying helicopter to prevent the evil-doers from making off with his sweetheart.
Fortunately, the driver handled the truck with the patience and care approximately equivalent to that of a teenager given permission to drive his father's Porsche on the autobahn, and the road connecting Mangaliliu with Vila only had slightly more craters and potholes than the surface of the moon. “Ow.” I said, as I was clocked by a low-hanging tree branch a few seconds after setting out. It was the only noise I was to make the entire journey, as I needed all the concentration I could muster to will myself not to die. Facing backwards as I was, I was torn as to whether or not I should keep an eye out over my shoulder on the road ahead. Doing this afforded me the benefit of seeing where we were going, allowing me to duck at the appropriate moment to avoid further trees. The downside, of course, was that I could see where we were going, and my brain definitely did not always appreciate being informed of the fact that, for example, we were descending the Hill of Death, a section of road almost steep enough to require ropes and harnesses, and that the truck was currently not showing any signs of possessing brakes. In the end, however, I did arrive at my destination, unharmed except for the fact that it would prove difficult for me to unclench my hands for several days.
At the teacher's college we sat in on a workshop being given by JICA, sort of like a Japanese Peace Corps, on early math education. The audience was mostly made up of current Ni-Van teachers. The main focus of the workshop was math teaching techniques, but it was obvious that a lot of teachers present also needed training in basic math. The most striking example of this was when they were covering perimeter. The presenter drew up a 3-4-5 right triangle and labeled the lengths of two of the sides, but left the third to be deduced. He asked the class what the perimeter of the triangle was (12). The class which, keep in mind, was composed of current math teachers, started shouting out random answers, ranging from 3 to 18. To solve this problem you need to know the Pythagorean theorem, which a lot of the teachers obviously didn't. That, however, wasn't what was surprising about the situation. The Pythagorean theorem is, after all, just a formula, something that you either happen to know or not. What was somewhat disturbing was the fact that most of the teachers didn't realize that they didn't have enough information to do the problem. Someone just piping up and saying “I don't know how to find the missing side” would have been a huge improvement over random guessing. Also, a lot of guesses just didn't make any sense. Guessing 3, for example, is obviously wrong as the sides whose lengths were given already added up to more than 3. All in all, a very interesting experience.
After our observation, we headed back to the Peace Corps office. The following day was Thanksgiving which, like Halloween, obviously isn't celebrated in Vanuatu. Also like Halloween, we decided that we were going to put on our own Thanksgiving party. I'd somehow been talked into volunteering to make the pumpkin pie along with Laura and McKenzie, and so I headed over to the supermarket to get supplies. A couple minutes after entering the store, I realized that it was going to be a difficult undertaking. A lot of key ingredients were missing, including, for one, pumpkin. There are a lot of things which are called “pumpkin” in Vanuatu (it's kind of like the generic name for all squash) and a selected a couple that looked vaguely like what I would call a pumpkin back home, hoping that them having an appearance similar to pumpkin would translate to them having a taste similar to pumpkin. Pie crusts were also lacking, and while I new that one could make them from scratch, I had no idea how to do this. Instead, we purchased a lot of danish butter cookies and a lot of margarine, hoping to make something similar to a graham cracker crust (there weren't any graham crackers, of course). There also weren't any pie dishes to be had which, I decided, would have to be a bridge we would cross when we came to it. Whipped cream deemed unnecessary, mostly because it cost about $10 a can, and these pies were already costing us about $40, mainly due to the fact that evaporated milk was $6 a can.
After class on Thursday, we set to work trying to craft a pumpkin pie. Class had gotten out early, which was good, because it quickly became clear that our cooking project was going to take forever. For starters, we needed to steam about 3 pounds of pumpkin over what amounted to little more than a camp stove. The crust also took a while, although it turned out pretty well, except for the fact that we ran out of margarine and had to borrow some from McKenzie's host family, making me feel somewhat bad about mooching things off of villagers in an underdeveloped country. The search for pie pans was also abandoned in favor of the more plentiful roasting dishes, meaning that our pumpkin pie would be rectangular. After the pumpkin was done steaming, we skinned it and mashed it. The recipe that I'd downloaded from the internet suggested using a Cuisinart for this, but we had to settle for forks. Finally, the batter was done and the pies were in the oven (a generous term for a small box with a butane burner in it), which didn't pack nearly enough of a punch because the pies were still good and liquidly a good ½ hour after the suggested cooking time had elapsed. Progress was also temporarily halted half way through as the oven ran out of fuel and we had to switch the operation of Ryan's family's oven. In the end, however, something similar to pumpkin pie (if a little undercooked) was produced.
That night's feast was awesome. I'd kind of forgotten what it was like to be in the presence of more delicious food than I could possibly eat. In lieu of turkey (only in America, sorry) one of our number had prepared an enormous rid-roast which, because a lot of our group are vegetarians, I got to eat most of. Nachos were also present which, being topped with both olives and guacamole, were probably the best thing I'd tasted in several months. After eating myself into oblivion, we watched “Charlie Brown Christmas,” which is always nice, and then hit the sack.
On Saturday, we took a field trip to Hat Island, which is a small island just off the coast of Mangaliliu, and is the last resting place of the infamous Roi Mata. According to custom, you're not supposed to make any loud noises on the island or else you'll either get permanently lost in the bush (an impressive feat on an island that you can walk across in less than 5 minutes), or the Ocean will become so choppy that you can't get back to the village. Someone must have been shouting up a storm the night before, because we woke to a rainy and windy morning. Now, in the US you might associate the words “rainy” and “windy” with the word “cold,” however, in Vanuatu this is not the case. As we are all learning, it is entirely possible for a day to be rainy and miserable and hot as all hell at the same time. At any rate, after a baking boat ride over to the island (how can it be baking if the sun's not out? I really have no idea, but it happens here), we paid our respects at Roi Mata's grave and then hit the beaches. Me and Dennis elected to go crab hunting along the coast with some of our Ni-Van guides. Crab hunting works as follows: you get a group of 8-year-olds to run along the rocks by the ocean and another group to follow along in the surf. Running along the rocks scares the crabs, causing them to scamper into the surf where they can be picked up and put into a rice sack. Me and Dennis' role in the whole thing was a little unclear. While the kids were quite adept at picking their way through the surf, trapping crabs underfoot and deftly nabbing them off the rocks, most of my energy was focused on trying not to slip on a rock and fall on my face. I think I probably was able to catch a grand total of two crabs during the whole hour-long expedition, but our guides came back carrying two bulging bags full.
While I'd been busy crab hunting, some others in our group had gone spear fishing and had brought in quite a haul. I was instructed to go get my pocket knife in order to learn how to scale and gut a fish. This turned out to be a lot easier than I expected, and soon we had a large pile fish ready for cooking. We made a fire on the beach and our guide demonstrated two fish-cooking methods. The larger fish we speared through the mouth with sticks and placed near the fire, kind of like roasting marshmallows. The smaller fish we wrapped in leaves and tossed in the coals. Limes were thoughtfully provided by the nearby lime tree and, although I definitely could have gone for a garlic or onion patch or something, it was probably some of the best fish I'd had since entering the country. For a place completely surrounded by ocean, I'd been eating a shockingly large amount of canned tuna.
Upon returning from Hat Island, we discovered that we were down another man. Dale, who'd been down with a bad infection for the past few days, had decided to call it and had been moved to a hotel in Vila until he was well enough to catch a plane home. I don't think I'll ever get used to people in our group going home. The speed at which Peace Corps gets people packed and out of here has such disturbing finality to it. It kind if makes me feel like a contestant on Survivor, anxiously waiting to see who's going to be voted off next.
On Sunday we all chartered a bus into Vila to say goodbye to Dale but, as usual, the bus was late in coming to pick us up and so we were left with some free time in the “city.” I can tell I'm starting to go local because every time I go into Vila I feel like I have less and less I want to do there. At the beginning, I'd spend hours on the computer and almost as long in the grocery store considering what snacks to buy. Now, I go head out to a restaurant for a quick burger and fries, quickly download my emails, and grab a couple bags of chips. The whole process probably takes me less than half an hour, and I'm left sitting idly around the Peace Corps office looking for something to do.
Upon our return from Vila, we were informed of the presence of a tropical depression in the area when the sky opened up and an almost biblical amount of rain was dumped on Mangaliliu. The roads quickly turned into muck and I arrived back at my house looking like I'd fallen into a very muddy lake. The tin roof of my house was pleasantly waterproof, but translated the falling rain into a deafening roar over which it was almost impossible to hear anyone talk. I'd just settled in to watch a nice Chinese bootleg DVD with my host siblings when Ryan appeared in my doorway, shirtless and soaking, to inform me that his family was throwing him a going-away party and that a plethora of cheese-garlic bread, pasta with tomato sauce, French fries, and Champagne (which, we later learned, Ryan's host papa had to bribe a shopkeeper into selling him on a Sunday) was available for our consumption. It was quite the night, listening to nature vent its fury while eating wonderful (at least, relatively speaking) American food and drinking Champagne. I had no idea what was on the slate for the following day, but I prayed it wasn't more class.
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