sensory overload!

This weekend was quite the weekend for some bizarre encounters that got me all in a buzz. First, SWINE FLU!

FSM Department of Public Health has not officially confirmed a case of swine flu here on Weno, but that hasn't stopped the island from entering Defcon 4. At church on Sunday, Pastor Remi called on the Lord to save "our small island of Weno" from the pandemic. I'm right there with him... Of course, as gossip tends to go here in Micronesia, very little ever actually turns out to be true. The rumor got started last Friday, and since then, Chuuk State Hospital has been requiring all patients and visitors to don protective mouth masks upon entering, thus giving everyone the sneaking suspicion there might be some truth, and adding more fuel to the fire. Fingers, toes, and eyes crossed...

Second, police car chase! Suzi, Kester, and I were standing outside at Shigeto's store (typical grocery store) waiting for our DiGiorno's pizzas to cook in their toaster oven (sweeeeet!). It was probably near 6:30pm or so, and we were just chatting, when I looked up to see a gray sedan come flying by heading south down the main road on Weno. (When I say "road" I really mean "glorified snowmobile path", as I have seen seasonal roads in upper Michigan with better maintenance; I make this aside only to stress that this car's speed, marked by the ensuing 1930s-esque Dust Bowl, was significant, considering the potholes, mud, and standing lakes of water). We all paid it very little attention, other than to scoff and roll our eyes. I, however, turned my head up the road to the north, and saw a police truck (the police in Weno drive pretty new Toyota Tundra extended cab pickups) doing a U-ey. Within a couple seconds, it, too, came blasting by, honking its horn (not using its lights and siren). Most noticeably were the two officers who had been sitting in the bed of the truck, and were now half standing/half crouching in the bed, holding on to a metal handlebar rigged across the roof of the cab behind the lights. They both looked like they were skiing, as they bobbed up and down with the truck over the mogols in the road. And if that weren't excitement enough, one had drawn his weapon, a huge, silver piece, and was holding it aimed straight up in the air! Suzi and I both sort of just looked on with our mouths agape, until we saw the gun, and both gasped.

Without making any judgment about the evasive driver, I can say that that officer's decision to draw his weapon while standing in the bed of, and barely holding on to, a careening and bouncing pickup just takes the situation to a whole new caliber of danger and misfortune. Suzi said it best: it really scares me, because that kind of action moves it to a level where something is guaranteed to happen which otherwise wouldn't have.

Third - I danced at a wedding reception! Okay, so I've danced at wedding receptions before. But not as the center of attention. Saturday night, at about 8:30pm (normally nearing my bed time), my family said "get dressed - we're going dancing!" So, in typical Chuukese fashion, I threw on a polo and some decent shorts, and ran to the car, excited for the night's festivities. We arrived early, and sat around waiting for the newly wedded couple to come. I hadn't eaten dinner yet, so I snacked on donuts, cheetos, and what I think was egg salad on a roll. One of the guys who stays with us, plus my host uncle, busted out the keyboard, and within minutes, hip Chuukese techno-pop-cum-disco were blaring and I was swept up with a mad rush of 30-something Chuukese women dancing to their hearts content. I danced two songs, but was upstaged each time by a slightly inebriated acquaintance of mine (the brother of the new husband), which was fine by me.

We left near 10pm, and I immediately went to bed. What a weekend!

school year ends!

Finally! The rush of relief that surrounded the end of my first school term has ebbed and left me a little bummed that I won't get to see "my seniors" anymore, loafing around the island, playing basketball, or just lounging wherever's comfortable. I have remarked, countless times, on the stresses of teaching, made especially apparent to a "non-teacher" like myself. But maybe I've been selling myself short. Because, now that I'm reflecting on it, I take great pride, and find much solace, in the fact that, despite all the inefficiencies and corruption of this sprawling bureaucracy, I have accomplished something far more important and lasting: the education of people.

I have relied on that fact. And, no doubt, I will continue to rely on the hope that my work educating students will pay off in each of their lives one day. It has been my prayer that I would remember to keep a servant's attitude about myself each day I put on my Peace Corps Face. No matter how late the school year starts, how often we go without food, how many delays prevent entrance exam testing - the simple accumulation of English language knowledge opens doors immediately for the young men and women of Mortlocks High School.

Even though "summer vacation" will always have an irresistable tug at my heart, deep down I just hope the school year was long enough to have done it well and to have done it right. All of this, with an eye toward September...