Laura beach day

The first semester ended on Friday December 19th.  We wanted to celebrate the end of the first semester and just to start off our break right so we decided to go to Laura.  Each student/family was to bring some food (chicken, rice, or some other food) and 6 pack of soda. I decided to make my oatmeal chocolate chip cookies which I baked that morning after my run because I decided to go to the Christmas party.

I got to the school at 8 which was the time we were supposed to meet.  Some students and their families started trickling in.  We waited, waited, and waited for the bus.  I was getting frustrated because I was looking forward to swimming with the students.  The bus finally arrived at around noon.  We got in and hurried to Laura.  

Me and one of my students waiting for the bus.... 

While we were waiting for the bus, one of my students climbed the lightpost in front of the school.  She just turned 6 years old.. 

Another one of my student attempted to climb the lightpost... 

I was in the van that stopped along the way to pick up some students in Ajeltake.  When we arrived, a prayer was said and we ate.  Everyone was waiting for us to arrive.  We had BBQ chicken, rice, pasta, potato salad, sashimi, and breadfruit.  I ate and then swam with the students. I had so much fun interacting with the students and families outside of school. 

Christmas gifts I got from some families. 

Some of the early intervention families that I worked with attended as well.  Chinilla worked out transportation for them and brought food for them so they could see other deaf children and just have fun with us.  I think they enjoyed themselves.

Me with two of my students (Kindergarten class and Early Intervention)

Early Intervention families

I took one of the babies into the water with me.  No one told me that you are supposed to take the diaper off the baby before they enter the water, so the families laughed at me.  I took the diaper off and entered the water again to rinse him off. 

Everyone commented on how red my face was.  Yeah, that's what happens when you put a ribelle under the sun.  Haha. 

We left at 4:30 to drive back to school, dropping off families along the way.  I got home at 6:30.  I was very exhausted.  I cooked my dinner, took a shower and then tried to read my book but zonked out.  

Laura Beach Day

(From last week...)

One of my favorite places to go to in Majuro is on the other end of the island-Laura Beach.  It is all the way through the "country" of Majuro where the water is clear and seems to be untouched.  

On Saturday, I decided I needed some time away from everything and a reason to try out my new hammock (thanks, Jenny!) so I hopped on a taxi and rode all the way over to Laura.  It took about an hour to reach there although it is only about 30 miles away.

When I arrived, I found two good trees, set my hammock and then saw the dark skies over by Rairok (I think) and hoped it would go away but it did not.  It started to rain, a little at first then the wind came and it started to pour.  I hurriedly packed everything and found shelter.  Good thing because the storm only increased its strength and lightning/thunder came.  I stood under the shelter for about 15-30 minutes waiting the storm out.  While I was under the shelter, there was another group cooking food.  It was cool to watch them cook Marshallese style, using an old tire rim to hold the fire in and cooking hotdogs on top of a pan. 

After the storm seemed to pass, I emerged back to my original place only to have it rain again so I went back to the shelter, thankfully only for about 10 minutes before the rain stopped. 

The water was low so I could see all the corals and tide pools so I walked over to the water line and explored the tide pools.  

The other volunteers arrived at this time and found a teeny weeny kitty meowing and trying to stay out of the rain.  It was cold, hungry and scared so they took care of the kitty.   It's very adorable!

Eno the cat, not enno (delicious in Marshallese language hahahaha)

Compare this pic to the previous hammock picture... See how low the water was! (And dark the skies were)

Next to our beach site, there was a group of people that we knew from various places on Majuro.  One of the guys wanted us to play volleyball so we did, we joined a Marshallese volleyball game. It was so much fun but very hot in the sun!

After the game, I went into the water to cool off.  There were some children playing with a stand up paddle board.  I have always wanted to try it.  When one of the guys asked me if I wanted to try it, I jumped at the chance!  I got the hang of it after 3 times of falling off.  It isn't as hard as I thought it would be.  You just need to balance yourself on the board.  Of course we had to take a few pictures! Photos coming soon!

We left the beach, walked along the road to try to find a ride, either by hitchhiking or a taxi.  We had a bit of a hard time finding a ride when a truck stopped to let us on.  We rode in the back of the truck with like 15 other teenagers.  It was a very good ride back into town, the entire 1 hour of it! We stopped at various houses along the way to drop children off and at one of the houses, they gave us a pan of rice, the truck driver gave us some chicken and that was our dinner.  If the Marshallese people offer you something, you can't really turn it down which is how I got over many things that I didn't like in America (fish, beer, etc).  

It was a great day, full of unexpected events!