Island Hoping

"The Big Island"

2009-11-27T16:04:00.005+11:00

In Bislama, the language of Vanuatu, sometimes people ask about America. When they do, they often want to know how big it is.

I explain: if you drove for 7 hours straight in my "province" you still would be in the same province. and we have 50 provinces.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin. My city.

They ask "How many cities are there in America" Mind you, the only city most of them know is Port Vila which has about 20,000- 30,000 people. I use an anology. I say "Well, I don't really know, how many pieces of coral are there on this beach?"

They start to get wide eyed and say "kas! mi no save" (Wow! I don't know.)

I say "Hemia nao, ples blong mi hemi olsem" (Exactly, my place is the same)

This is my first post in 6 months. and that is because I am home.

I am no longer in Vanuatu.

My wife and I have been back now for about 4 months. We are happy. Sometimes we miss Vanuatu. But we are now mostly readjusted to American culture.

I am writing because I am going to be wrapping up this blog and starting a new one.

In Vanuatu after explaining in these ways and others how big America is, often people say "Ahway Javi, Ples blong yu hemi wan bigfala island eh?" (Man Javi, your home is a really big island, huh?)

I would respond:

"Hemia Nao"

(Preach On my friend, You don't know how right you are)

My new blog is called

"The Big Island"

There I will discuss the unique viewpoint I now have on the culture I love. The Massive American Monoculture. The culture that I hate. The culture that I revel in. The culture that is revealed to me as ours.

as us.

We are special.

we are blessed.

but it's often hard to see how.

we sometimes lack the perspective.

I'll talk about baseball. and Mexican food. and kite flying and disc golf.

and buffets and all night workout clubs. Football and Thanksgiving.

Race and music.

subcultures, friends, and family.

And how my views on all of these have changed since I spent two and a half years in The Republic of Vanuatu.

I think Blogs don't have to be viewed only as ongoing serialized journals that fail when they end.

I like to think of them each as a story. Sometimes one has to end. For there to be a sequel. So this is the end of "Island Hoping" My views and experiences while serving in America's Un-Armed Forces. I am no longer there. That story has to end.

The sequel will often reference its predecessor however.

I hope this blog provided and continues to provide something of value to those who read it.

And I hope you join me for my next chapter.

Love,

Javier Alaniz

A Long Time Coming

2009-05-29T13:11:00.005+11:00

When we first got here, Seth (my partner in the vanuatu baseball project) and I decided we were going to teach baseball as a secondary project. We met regularily to determine how to go about methodically introducing baseball to Vanuatu.

We were told by some regional baseball officials that the first step was to start a baseball foundation or association in Vanuatu. That would allow donations and equipment to be sent, and it would also allow Vanuatu teams to enter into international competitions. At this time baseball did not exist in Vanuatu. It was a slight curiosity to some ni-Vanuatu when it came on TV (which suprisingly, it did fairly frequently thanks to Aussie broadcasts which play about 5 games a week plus replays). Besides that, our country director at the time Kevin George had a weekly game that he played with kids and volunteers.

We decided that the best way to get baseball to catch on with a wider number of people would be to work with primary schools. Each of our communities had primary schools and this allowed us to work directly with them, playing ball regularly with kids. This grassroots approach; just getting kids playing; was rewarding and satisfying. It helped us to integrate into our communities, it helped us form strong relationships with the youth in our villages, it helped us address gender issues with youth, talk about leadership, teamwork, sacrifice, respect. And lets be honest we had a ton of fun.

In our work with our two Primary Schools (me at Ekipe Primary School, and Seth with Eles Primary School) We realized that there were a great # of talented athletes, in close proximity with Port Vila, and all the National teams that are based there. Because there was no Sports Organization that brought the primary schools in North Efate together to play, these kids were all overlooked for selection on these teams that get to travel locally and internationally. We also observed the rapid pace of change that the island of Efate is facing and the divisions, rivalries, and animosities that this creates among many of the villages in North Efate. There are about 15 primary schools on "north Efate." Maybe 30 villages, two or three high schools (called colleges because they are boarding schools). North Efate includes 5 populated offshore islands: Lelepa, Mosso, Nguna, Pele, and Emao. The residents of the 30 or so villages in North Efate include "Man North Efate" who traditionally lived here, "Man Atong" who are from Tongariki island in the Shephard islands and came to Efate in the 60's, "Man Tongoa" from Tongoa island also in the Shephards, and small populations from other islands in Vanuatu. Languages spoken are Bislama (everyone), English or French (depending on which schools they happened to attend), and two local languages from the Shephard islands (Nakanamang- traditional North Efate language, and Namakura, language of Tongariki, Buninga, and half of Tongoa). All these differences only further enhance the divisions emerging from a market economy based on travel and sale of produce in Vila, and tourism.

We observed that schools were generally the strongest organizations in each of their communities. Because they draw students from neighboring villages, they often force youth from different communities to interact. Moreover the teachers at these schools come from all over Vanuatu. We decided that if we could get the headmasters and teachers of North Efate to come together to organize a Sports Organization that would represent all of North Efate, it might provide an organizational framework for cooperation, that might well serve these communities in the future. We proposed this idea to some of the headmasters and teachers that we were working with and they enthusiastically agreed. Shortly thereafter the North Efate Primary Schools Sports Association (NEPSSA) was born.

Throughout our service Seth and I have attended their meetings supporting and advising whenever we could offer help. Last year NEPSSA organized their first Inter School Sports Tournament in North Efate. It was a huge success. Throughout the life of the organization it has had a difficult time getting more than 3 or 4 teachers at any meeting. The challenges of communication and transportation were difficult to surmount.

Around Christmas last year Seth and I planned a workshop where we would bring together two teachers from every school in North Efate to learn first aid, and to teach baseball. We hoped this would provide a structured way to bring together all these schools for a positive, necessary training, while simultaneously getting them all together in one place to share stories, knowledge, and ideas. Ideally this would strengthen NEPSSA as well.

After a year and a half of trying to hold this workshop, we finally succeeded.

My current counterpart who runs the Adolescent Health and Development Project through the Ministry of Health, agreed to fund the workshop, and with help from another Peace Corps Volunteer working at the Min. of Education we were able to get the support of the Provincial Education Office. With all the pieces finally in place we held the week long "Sport-Teachers Training" at Onesua Presbyterian College in the first week of May. Just 16 months later than we had initially hoped. Here's some photos from the workshop:

Playing the "Pirate Ship" Icebreaker I learned in Americorps (Thanks Linda Zimmerman)

The teachers learning Adolescent Health and Development from my counterpart Joe Kalo

Exploring the difference between jaw and cheekbone during first aid training

Teachers from Pele and Nguna islands, Seth walking in the background and Simon "Lionshark" Kalmatak from Manua school

The walking wounded, with newly learned sling techniques on display.

The training was a great success, the teachers had a lot of fun, learned a lot, and all asked for more. We used the occassion to distribute the baseball gear that Ruth Bradford Johnson collected from the amazing donors of Racine, Wisconsin.

Sport Teachers Netty and Joel from Eton Center School (Grades 1-8)

Zorah and Tountas from Roau Basic School (Grades 1-6)

We distributed the gear primarily among the Center schools (Grades 1-8) because NEPSSA agreed to add baseball to its 2009 Tournament. But only the 7th and 8th graders would play, since we were worried about the younger kids playing with hard balls. Thus the Basic Schools all got a couple bats and tennis balls. They were encouraged to teach the game to the 5th and 6th graders who would then "graduate" to hard balls when they reached 7th and 8th grade.

Here are some photos of the baseball training. We also gave out "Bislama Baseball Manual's" that Seth wrote, and DVD's of Brewers games and the 2007 playoffs. Since the training we have heard that a number of teachers have run numerous practices with their youth preparing them for the 2009 NEPSSA Games (July 21-23) that will feature baseball as its new competitive team sport.

Taking on a high and outside pitch headmaster Donald before his solo HR

"Around The Horn"

Pussies (Only means Cat here, no dirty conotations) getting savagely beat by the Donkeys

Most of the teachers wanted to learn more of all three of our subjects rating the content high and suggesting the training should be done for all teachers. A number of the schools booked Seth and I to come do advanced Baseball training sessions with their students for our last few weekends here on Efate.

One of the nights NEPSSA organized an impromptu meeting to answer some of the teachers questions and complaints. Many of the teachers were angry at things that happened in last years tournament. Some came to complain and raise their objections to NEPSSA. At the meeting however, a great discussion ensued about the organization, cooler heads prevailed, and everyone realized that all the things they were angry at were a direct result of so few dedicated organizational members. The teachers realized that just a few teachers had been doing all the work of the organization, and that if it was to be successful and address all the concerns that they had, they all needed to take a more active role in leading it.

The next meeting, held 3 weeks later, was the first meeting that had representatives from EVERY NEPSSA school in attendance. I am hopeful that this organization will survive and continue to provide opportunities for youth and an organizational framework for collaboration and cooperation amongst the villages of North Efate.

Seth and I, with 28 teachers of NEPSSA schools. 14 men 14 women.

An Outbreak of Crabs

2009-05-29T11:25:00.003+11:00

Krissy went to the island of Emae this week. Emae is island blong crab,

i.e. This place is overflowing with crabs.

So Krissy being the considerate and loving wife she is decided to get a bunch of them for me to eat. She brought them back on the plane in a custom basket made of leaves and twigs. It was a beautiful basket and amazingly contained over 15 of these large crabs.

When she got home I put a big pot of water on the stove and got it boiling.

I opened the basket and the crabs all freaked out, snapping their big ass pinchers at me. I decided the best way to get them out of there and into the boiling water was to put on my baseball mitt and use a long wooden spoon to force them into it.

Surprisingly this worked really well.

I got five crabs in the boiling water and started salivating.

I re-fastened the basket the rest were in with clothes pins, but did not re-tie it with twine as I found it. Big mistake.

After eating two of the cooked crabs and cutting my fingers trying to open them, I decided while they tasted great, they were more trouble then they were worth. So I put the rest in the fridge as it was already 10pm and I was tired. My plan was to give the rest away to our host family and my counterpart at the Ministry of Health.

I took a shower, and went to sleep. At 1am I awoke to Krissy turning on all the lights in the house and shouting for me. I came out and all 15 of the crabs had organized a prison break. They attacked the clothespins holding their prison shut and scattered all over the house.

So in the middle of the night I put on some shoes, donned my baseball glove and grabbed a wooden spoon. I then proceeded to track down the crabs which had paired off and gone into hiding at various locations throughout the house: Behind the fridge, behind the stove, underneath the bed, inside the baseball equipment big, behind a big dresser, behind the gas tank. One by one I grabbed them all with the glove and placed them in various containers. I couldn't get them all back in their original home. By the end I had two buckets, a pot, a basket, and two cardboard boxes each with two or three crabs scrambling around inside.

Amazingly neither I nor our puscat or her kitten lost any fingers/limbs in this wonderful little adventure.

Mind you I've shaken many hands that were missing fingers lost to crabs, so I was very aware of this possibility. Ahway Vanuatu.

The Move

2008-12-22T13:57:00.008+11:00

Not sure why I can't move these pics around, so sorry, they're all at the beginning

4 of us in the Round Island Relay

Me passing off the baton to JJ

Speech to Ekipe

L to R: Kennedy, Parra, Me , Grenly, Dick, Johnny

Joel and the new chiefs

the small chiefs lined up for the ceremony

crushed skull

Chief Joel

On the way to his doom

Joel is on the right with the kastom pig killer

All the bubu's (grandpas) sitting together

OK, I know its Christmas.

My blogging has been infrequent and late.

for that I'm sorry

Here's some meet on a stick to make up for it

July was full of great experiences. It's amazing how much we were able to pack into this one month. After Krissy's parents left we turned our attention to spending as much time in Ekipe as we could, since we knew that at the end of the month we would be leaving Ekipe Village for the big city: Port Vila.

Most Peace Corps Volunteers (PCV's) are placed at a site for the full 2 years of their service. For Krissy and I, this was not the case. We knew right away, while still in Milwaukee that we would be living in a rural site for the first year and an urban site the second year. This happened because Krissy has her Masters in Public Health and was picked as a replacement for another PCV with her MPH living in Port Vila. Though we were well aware of this planned move it did not make it any easier.

About halfway through our time in Ekipe, everyone started asking us when we would be leaving, how soon it would be and if we would ever come back. This was frustrating because we were still trying to do work on various projects but all anyone could talk about was us leaving. Well the time finally arrived and we were pretty sad about it.

Though on this very blog, I bitched and moaned about bugs, heat, food, toilets, and other physical discomforts, the amazing feeling of truly being part of a tight knit community was very difficult to let go. Neighbors who eat together, worship together, greet each other when they come back from travels, play together, work together, all surrounding you day in and day out, this situation is unprecedented in my life. The comfort and confidence and happiness that are borne from living this life are palpable. And they are hard to leave. Even with the lure of electricity, refrigerators, tv's, DVD's, music, ice cream, etc.

Fortunately we had some big events to distract us from the move. One of our host families who we ate dinner with every Monday, began preparing for their patriarch's chiefly name-giving ceremony more than a month in advance. For the month leading up to the big day, families from Ekipe made the short walk up to a satellite village called Matthiew to bring gifts and show their respect to Joel who would soon be taking his chiefly name (becoming one of the six paramount chiefs of Ekipe).

While the village made preparations for the big shindig, Krissy and I trained for the Round Island Relay. A 10 person relay race around the island of Efate (AKA "My Island"). So since there would be all these people running around my island, I figured I better take part, lest somebody think it was THEIR island. So yeah, I trained, a little, and prepared myself for the thought of running in a race, something I have never done before. And never wanted to do before.

Crazily, these two events coincided on the same weekend. That is, our last one in Ekipe.

The Chiefly ceremony came first. It was beautiful, lots of custom songs, custom dress, pigs killed ceremoniously, besides the random white tourists who lucked into staying at Joel's Bungalows that weekend, it felt very traditional and authentic. What is it with living here that has made me racist against white people. Well not really white people, just white tourists. I hate it when I'm mistaken for a tourist, and it pissed me off that in our entire year in Ekipe this was the first custom ceremony we got to see, yet two kids from Oz on holiday from school got to see it on their 1 week visit. as if this happened every day! Anyway, I'm not REALLY angry, and not really racist either, I dunno, race relations here mean something totally different back home, so please excuse me if I sound insensitive...or whatever.

Anyway, so after standing around for hours, climbing into a camion (Big flatbed truck), driving up into the hills, herding cattle, watching a couple of them get killed, and then butchered right there in the bush, pieces of it roasted and eaten while the bull was still twitching, we returned to the ceremony and stood around watching stuff for a few more hours before going home to rest up for the big race the next day.

The race was a lot of fun before hand and right at the beginning. I got to start my section in Ekipe, So I had all our friends and everyone at the ceremony there to cheer me on as we started out. We then ran through the neighboring village of Epao, which is my normal running route, so everyone there was cheering me on too. But once I got past the end of my normal route, my legs started to tell me that I had done too much standing around the day before. the grew wobbly and jelly like, and my pace slowed significantly as the hot hot sun came directly over head. Somehow I pushed through (TV on the Radio-Wolf Like Me, and Outkast- Bomb's Over Baghdad helped a lot with that) and completed my section. Our team placed solidly in the middle of the pack, not spectacular, but not too bad either.

The next day was our last day in Ekipe. Our supervisor Linda came out to pick us up. Our replacement, Carol, and the entire village gathered outside of the New Covenent Church to say goodbye. We all gave speeches talking about our time together in Ekipe and what it meant to us. We ate good food, showed a slideshow of photos from our time there, and sadly walked around shking hands and saying goodbye. In the rain we packed up the last bits of our stuff and drove away. After a bumpy two hour drive as we approached Vila, we stopped at the scene of a recent accident. There were a bunch of people gathered around a van that had obviously been in a head on collision. There was a woman trapped in the front seat. Though they were trying to figure out how to extricate her from the vehicle, no one had thought to call police, or an ambulance. That's Vanuatu for you. a hundred people all standing around with cell phones, but no one calls an ambulance. So we called and I tried to get people to give her some room and not crowd around her as we waited. Eventually the ambulance came and they were able to get her out. This all felt very symbolic of the new community we were moving to.

I'll never forget my time in Ekipe, and even now, while still here in Vila, I frequently miss it.

Idyllic Independence Field

2008-12-02T13:36:00.002+11:00

I had a great moment playing ball yesterday.
It was our former country director Kevin George's last game before he leaves for the States. He has been here in Vanuatu for seven years and has been playing baseball with his team of kids in Port Vila for 5 years. There happens to be a lot of volunteers in town right now because a new group just swore in and an old group is leaving. So along with the 15 or so kids we had playing we also had 10-15 Peace Corps volunteers at the game watching or playing.
So I'm standing in Left Field with my back to the descending sun. Barefoot in the grass, shouting encouragement to the kids we work with on a hot Sunday afternoon. The sky has started to turn it's peculiar Pacific Sky Blue/Purple/Pink color with not a cloud in sight. We've got White Americans, a Black American, Black Ni-Vanutu, Asian Americans, a Puerto Rican, and a bunch of "Halfie-Castes" (Which is what they call people like me who are half white and half something else) all playing baseball together on the same field: Independence Park in Port Vila, Vanuatu. I was sitting thinking about how amazing this all was and suddenly I hear "America the Beautiful" drifting on the drafts of humid air faintly into my ears. I really thought I was imagining it at first, it even sounded like an organist at a baseball game. I turned around and saw a congregation coming out of the big church across the street, and for whatever reason that Sunday afternoon, their church keyboard player was playing "America" on the organ setting. And just like in that scene from the Sandlot where they play the 4th of July game by the light of the fireworks,and Ray Charles starts singing "O Beautiful for spacious skies..." and all the kids turn around and stand mesmerized as the ball sails up into the fireworks, just like that, I stood mesmerized gazing off at the setting sun over Port Vila Harbor, and the happy laughing kids doing handstands on second base, and the Peace Corps Volunteers giving up two years of their lives to their country, all playing together on this idyllic, beautiful day.
Thank you God, for moments like this.

Port Vila Harbour on a particularly beautiful night (Thanks for the camera mom, it's doing great things)

Crew blong Brew

2008-10-02T16:16:00.001+11:00

It is 3:04 a.m. in the island nation of Vanuatu. I'm awake writing this blog because I can't sleep. I can't sleep because I have butterflies in my stomach. I have butterflies in my stomach because in two hours the Milwaukee Brewers will be playing their first playoff game since Oct.20 1982. On October 21, 1982, the Brewers went home from St. Louis losers of their only World Series. Many miles away in Oakland, California, on that same day, I turned 1 year old. Being three years away from being moved to Wisconsin, I was not yet a Brewer fan. So forgive me for not watching any of these games.

So here I am 26 years later, on the island of Efate, in the capital city Port Vila, Southern Hemisphere, far far away from Milwaukee yet again. Apparently if Milwaukee is to get anywhere near the post-season, I have to live in a different time zone. Which is pretty damn unfair as much as I love the Brewers. Fortunately for me there is a new take Away Restaurant near my house that has an outside TV, that they leave on all night for their security guards. This establishment has agreed to leave on Fox Sports 3, an Australian sport channel that amazingly will be playing all playoff games LIVE as well as replays at night.

As a Brewer fan who watched religiously through the rough years, I just want to give a moments notice and a moment of silence for Ned Yost...

I know he caught a lot of hell from fans over the past two years. But I remember when he and Doug Melvin came in and turned around the culture of suck-city. Where the rest of the NL just came into Milwaukee for an easy 3 day holiday every time they had to play us. They'd beat the crap out of us and laugh at the pitiful defense, poor pitching, and shitty strikeout prone offense. When Ned came in he didn't have immediate success, but he did have an immediate effect on the team. the garbage was cut loose (Jeffrey Hammonds, Ruben Quevedo, Alex Sanchez) and players that worked hard and gave their all for every minute of every game, were given a chance to play (Brady Clark, Scott Podsednick). I remember Ned saying when he joined the Brewers that he remembered how great a city Milwaukee was when he was with the Brewers in the playoffs, and all he wanted to do was bring that feeling back to the people of Milwaukee. Now, after working tirelessly for what? 5 years? He has to sit at home watching as the Brewers celebrate and begin they're first playoff series in over a quarter century. Ned, I feel sorry for you, and if I ever see you someplace I'll buy you a beer, and tell you thanks for getting us here. We'll never know if the Brewers would've made it to the post season had you not been fired. Maybe they would've turned it around just in time to salvage their season, just like they did under Svuem. Or maybe they would've caved in and missed the playoffs, in which case you certainly would've been let go anyway. We'll never know that now, and I'm sorry you don't get to be there to see this project you started through to the end. But just know, that there are fans out there who are aware that this would've never happened if you hadn't joined us 5 years ago. So Ned, Thanks for all your hard work and good luck in the future.

A few words on the Cubs, and Cubs fans.
As long as I've been a Brewers fan I've been resentful (and quietly envious) of the Cubs and having to live in the shadow of their city. While the lovable losers of the North side of Chicago drew fans from all over the country on WGN, the just plain-losers of Milwaukee aired maybe 5 games a year on the local TV networks. Growing up without cable, I got to watch the Cubs more often then the Brewers, and this only made me hate 'em more. The fact that it was this trendy thing to do, and there were all these people living in Wisconsin, who apparently LOVED the Cubs but couldn't care less about the Brewers. The only reason the Brewers mattered at all to these people was that they provided a cheap alternative place to watch the Cubs every season. So as FIB's do, they'd drive up to Milwaukee on I-90/I-94 like they owned the road, take over our home field, call it Wrigley North, and then drive home drunk and reckless, celebrating the Cubs inevitable victory in Milwaukee. So this year it felt especially humiliating to see the Cubs sweep the Brewers at home over 4 games and then adding insult to injury, celebrate a no-hitter on our field while the Brewers were getting swept...over four games in Philly. Thanks Bud Selig and MLB for officially making Miller Park into Wrigley North.
As a small disclaimer I have to say that over the years I've met a number of Cubs fans that have become good, important friends to me. I was amazed to find out that they actually had real fans, that knew baseball, respected the game, and weren't assholes. According to these three: Carl Johnson (Racine, WI), Joe Engel (Kenosha, WI), and Seth Dallman (all over); according to them, there actually is a whole fan base of Chicago fans that are similar, it just so happens that those other Cubs fans outnumber and drown out the real fans.
So anyway, because of these guys, my animosity towards Cubs fans has decreased in general (it's just the ones who come to Miller Park, talk shit about Milwaukee (not the Brewers mind you, but Milwaukee, and its' people), that still get me real mad)...Let me tell you a secret though. A secret that may be in the heart of every Brewers fan...
I say all of this because I'm scared.
As a Brewer fan, I'm already satisfied. I know you're not supposed to say this but I'm just happy they made the playoffs, that's enough for me. Especially since I'm not there to see it. But I have this horrible dread that the Brewers and the Cubs are going to advance to the NLCS, and the Cubs fans will yet again take over Miller Park, and simply embarrass us in "Wrigley North," going on to win the World Series, forever condemning us to our traditional place of inconsequential laughing stocks. The other side of this masochistic fantasy, is that somehow, the Brewers will pull an amazing upset in remarkable comeback fashion and stun the Cubs in historic fashion, then go on to do the same to the South side in a White Sox- Brewers Word Series. If they were able to pull this off, it would spoil the Cubs 100 year anniversary party (that apparently entitles them to the World Series this year), and forever end the Brewers life in the Cubs shadow, simply by defeating the Cubs in the NLCS, the Brewers would become legendary as the team that beat the Cubs, the year they were destined to win it all.

I'll end this blog entry with a few shout-outs. First to Bill Hall and Rickie Weeks. Bill Hall became my favorite player when he came up as a September call-up in 2003. With a flair for the dramatic, game winning hit, and a willingness to play anywhere, and do anything for the team, he made me a fan. Here's hoping Svuem doesn't forget that ability in the playoffs. Rickie has had a shitty year, a lot like last year actually. He hasn't put it together and it's becoming less clear if he ever will. That said, numbers don't tell the whole story and I agreed with Yost when he said that despite the .230 avg Rickie always seemed to find a way to get on base and score important runs. Good Luck in the playoffs Rickie, I hope you can pull it together in the clutch and redeem your season and standing with the team.
Second, I gotta give a shout out to Ben Sheets.

I know it seems like no one cares about you right now Benny, what with all the (well-deserved) hype around Sabathia. But just like Yost you toiled with us through the lean years, and the injuries are not your fault. i'm sad to see that after all these years with us your arm is dead right as we finally make the playoffs. Rest up buddy, and maybe you can get in the World Series, if we make it that far.
Next I gotta go across to the opposing clubhouse in Philly and give a shout out to Goeff Jenkins. After 13 years with us, we sent you away and you finally made the playoffs, sadly you'll be playing against us instead of with us. Congrats nonetheless, you still have a lot of fans in Wisconsin who appreciate the way you played the game while you were here. (a side note, isn't it ironic that Brett Favre the player who defined his team for the last decade+ left the Packers for the Jets, the same year his look-alike Geoff Jenkins, who defined the Brewers for the past decade+ also left Wisconsin for an East Coast team? Does this mean the Jets and the Packers are destined to meet in the playoffs this year? Now that would be a story).

Sticking with the NL East I gotta sey hey to Wes Helms. Once a Brewer, always a Brewer huh? That go ahead solo HR you hit was the most important hit you ever got for Milwaukee, thanks for thinking of us when it mattered.

One more shout out goes to Yovani Gallardo, the 100th Mexican Major Leaguer, coming back as the future face of the franchise, and stepping up to the plate, after two knee-surgeries. Good effort kid, looking forward to seeing you today and for a long time to come.

And finally...A shout out to Lou Piniella and the Cubs. You guys have been the best team in the League all year, what's more your team is exciting, fun to watch, and just plain scary to play against. Thanks however for switching pitchers in that last game of the season until we found one we could hit. We appreciate the help and hope to see you in the NLCS. Though I would be scared to death of losing to you guys, it would be an exciting series to watch.

Peace Out Baseball Fans,

Go BREWERS!!!

Arrival of the In-Laws

2008-09-14T19:00:00.000+11:00

In June, we got our second arrival of visitors, Krissy's parents, Jim and Kathy Buchholz, flew to Vanuatu, to experience this Melanesian culture on the frontlines of Globalization

Coincidentally, two other volunteers had their families coming to visit them on the same flight as Krissy's parents so we all got in a bus to pick them up together. As we got to the airport to pick up Jim and Kathy, a soft mist came from a hazy grey blanket of clouds. As there often is in Vanuatu for everything, there was a long delay with their flight. We didn't think much of this until 1hr.30min had passed and still the airline hadn't communicated why there was a delay. Eventually they told us the plane couldn't land because of the weather?! and that the airplane had turned around and gone back to Fiji. Turns out theytried to land the plane twice, but both times the pilot was unable to do it, so they flew to The Solomon Islands (the island nation North of Vanuatu) to refuel. They also flew to Noumea (or New Caledonia) before returning to Fiji for the night. All this flying took up the entire first day and night. We had to restructure our plans because we were supposed to fly to Pentecost and spend the next 5 days there. Anyway they finally arrived after this crazy ordeal and landed the next morning...in the exact same weather...don't ask me.

With our plans messed up we were forced to spend the next three days in Vila, most of the time it rained and unfortunately there is not much to do in Vila when it rains. However one good thing that came out of it was that we were around for the swearing in ceremony of group 21A. We got to go up to Epao village and watch a VERY long but interesting (for Jim and Kathy at least) series of speeches. More importantly we got to talk meet and talk with the President and first lady of Vanuatu.

Here is the US ambassador to Fiji, with Vanuatu's President, Chief Mormor (an important chief who has a really strong relationship with Peace Corps), and Kevin George, Peace Corps Country Director, all drinking kava. We drank right after them, but yeah, I got stuck as photographer, so we were'nt in the shot.

Jim's first Tusker

With all the Vila sitting around out of the way we were off to the isle of Pentecost, a long skinny island that has a unique custom called land-diving.

the tiny, little plane to Pentecost. 7 seater. small.

The story of land-diving goes something like this.

A long time ago a man was angry at his wife, he was looking for her trying to kill her, and she was running away from him, hiding from him. Eventually she climbed up a tall tree to hide, but he saw her and followed her she had tied a vine around her leg and when he approached she jumped off and he jumped after her. the vine caught her and kept her alive, but he (lacking said vine) fell and died. After that, every year in Pentecost people erected towers, climbed them, attached vines to their ankles, and jumped off.

Here's Krissy and I in front of one of the towers

The land-diving ceremony is one of the most interesting, exciting, custum traditions practised in Vanuatu, and it is only done on Pentecost. A lot of tourists come to watch now, but it is still really cool and feels like looking back in time, here's a bunch of pics from the ceremony

The ceremony was incredible.

Here's a shot of "Cook's Rock" a rock that Captain James Cook made some nautical inscriptions on when he was first "discovering" all the islands round these parts. You can still see them. (but not in this picture.

Jim and Krissy and I taking a shell back at our house in Ekipe

bottom's up

Our two sets of parents, Only need Jill and Mark there now (Whattaya say guys, you ready for the trip?)

Krissy and Kathy on Pentecost with flowers

Jim with a coconut bra

climbing the tower, I would've jumped if I could've

LONGfala bamboo

Krissy and Mary, the volunteer on Pentecost who hosted us and showed us around

The three of us swimming in this beautiful river right by Mary's village

And a nice honeymoon shot to close it out.

We had a great time with Krissy's parents, thank you two so much for coming to visit us, all the gifts and food were really nice too, especially the Oatmeal Fudge bars, ohhhh I'm salivating just thinking about them

Who's next to visit Vanuatu?

come on guys, only 9 months left to join us in this little paradise

Junior Year: Water World

2008-09-14T15:07:00.000+11:00

In mid-May, Water, the precious life giving water, surrounded us and our Peace Corps Service, literally, and figuratively.

Ekipe Village tabbed as a host site for the Peace Corps Water and Sanitation In Service Training. This is a training put on by Peace Corps Volunteers for other PCV's. Due to our success with our Water and Health Committe in Ekipe, and our good fortune at securing funding for our big Ekipe water project, and our now extensive knowledge of water and sanitation related matters here in Vanuatu, Krissy and I were included as trainers. The day before the Water IST came however it started raining hard. The whole night it kept raining straight on through and the morning that the IST was supposed to start we awoke to find our kitchen underwater and our house surrounded by what seemed like a lake.

some mamas wading through "town"

I ran around in the rain to find a shovel and started digging a trench around our house as the water crept closer to our doorstep by the minute. I spent all day digging channels for the water to try and divert it to different places around the house, in hopes it wouldn't go inside.

our neighbor's house, (the kid with the umbrella doesn't seem too concerned)

As afternoon went on and we learned that much of the rest of village was flooded, everyone began asking us when Peace Corps would be coming to start the IST. They needed to know so that the mamas would have enough time to cook. Unfortunately the village phone (run on solar power) is the only way for us to contact anyone, and surprise, surprise, solar power doesn't work when it's been raining for a month. So we had no idea if they were coming or not. The rain kept coming down and we began to hear tok tok blong road (rumors) that some tourist buses had gone South to Port Vila but had been turned back at the rivers and had to spend the night on North Efate. Apparently the rivers in either direction from North Efate to South Efate had come so high that the bridges had big holes in them and had water flowing over them, making them impassable.
Since Peace Corps was supposed to arrive at 3:00 and it was starting to get dark, we told the mamas that they weren't coming and they should not cook for them. Some had already started and so they brought us big plates of food, so as not to waste it, and we started eating and going into relax mode. Just then we got word that Peace Corps was here.
Apparently the Peace Corps driver didn't think the the river flowing over the bridge with big holes in it, was a big deal. All the local villgers who were standing around watching were saying they had to go back, that they couldn't cross, but our heroic driver shrugged off their silly worries. He had one guy stand on the edge of the bridge and another stand on the edge of the hole, and just drove between them with the river swirling all around them.
So back in the village we quickly had to jump up and run around through the flood to all the houses that could still cook and get them started so that the 20+ volunteers would have something to eat for dinner. The Ekipe mamas rallied through the adversity and still got dinner ready, as we scrambled to make sure everything was in order for the workshop.

And so the show went on...
We pushed forward and had a very good training for all involved, and got excellent feedback, and cooperation from all participants. Fortunately the rain held off enough for the flooding to subside and everyone to have a great time.

The In Service Training participants

Ekipe Villagers who helped to organize and put on the training

All the while, down the road from us about a 45 min. walk, in the neighboring village of Epao the newest group of Peace Corps Trainees, "21a" had arrived and begun their training. This is the second group to arrive after us, which means once they swear in we become "Juniors," upper classmen in Peace Corps Vanuatu. Because we're close to Epao, and because we don't have a ton of actual busy work to do, Krissy (and I) decided to try and help out with the new groups training. Krissy organized the all of the Health Volunteers Technical Training (i.e. all the Health related stuff they'd need to know before becoming volunteers here) as well as a number of other trainings for the whole group;

Krissy in action at our house in Ekipe

The Health Team on a field trip to Lelepa island

a group shot from Lelepa

while I did trainings in Water, Toilets, and Waste Disposal; and for the whole group, Working with Schools, and Youth and Sports in Vanuatu.

After Technical Training the new volunteers put on a Reproductive Health Workshop for youth from Epao and Ekipe.

All of these trainings went well, as we got to know the new group, including Carol, our replacement in Ekipe.

Here's Carol talking about sex with teenagers in Epao

And Travis teaching 20 young men about the menstrual cycle
can you imagine being here for 2 months and teaching people something like that in a new language? Not an easy feat, but they all did a great job

A final group picture of the Health Team with all the youth participants of the Reproductive Health workshop

Well that's all for now, coming up next:
The In-Laws arrive!

All-Vol

2008-09-14T12:22:00.000+11:00

It's been a long time friends, 4 months in fact since I posted, for that I apologize.
It's been a busy, jam-packed, adventure filled, exciting stretch of time that zipped by in a flash.
I got no time to lose so I'll just start in with May- June
In early May we had the biggest awesomest annual event in Peace Corps Vanuatu
The madness that is All-Vol
aka The 2008 Peace Corps Vanuatu All Volunteer Conference

All-Vol brings together all 100+ Peace Corps Volunteers in Vanuatu, from their various sites and islands. It is a chance for volunteers to meet with the other volunteers in their project areas, attend workshops on sanitation systems, locally available grants, how to support local village committees, gender and development, and a wide variety of other workshop topics. Also it allows us to meet the other volunteers we've never seen before, exchange stories, ideas, challenges, successes.

As a whole I've been really amazed at the quality of people in Peace Corps. There are just a lot of really great people here and All-Vol is an amazing opportunity to network with them all. I've never been anywhere in my life that had such a wide variety of Americans with diverse skills, backgrounds, and home states. And as a result of the experiences we've all shared, it really feels like we have a network of close friends all over the country that would open their homes to us if we showed up on the doorstep someday. Additionally all of these people have lots of experience with development work, and I can't imagine NOT using these contacts in my future efforts to make the world a better place.

Obviously with 100 volunteers all gathered together after months of isolation in remote rural island villages, there was also a lot of celebrating and cutting loose. I can't understate how isolated a lot of these places feel, though I have had frequent access to the big city of Port Vila, and all the things that come with it (internet, grocery stores, soap) Many volunteers only get these things once every three or four months. The psychological impact of this is very strong and frequently leads to what are called Wack-e-vacs (or evacuations due to psychological issues(i.e. going bat-shit crazy beacause of all the religion, black magic, and hallucinogenic malaria medications mixing around in your mind). So when you see these pics, realize that this socialization is so necessary to our mental well-being, that even if all the other workshops, networking, collaborations, and other work related business were not going on, this would be a very valuable important conference to have.
So without further ado:
pics of All-Vol

(aka evidence)

There were a number of after hours events that involved costumes. This one of Krissy and I shows our costumes for our group talent show.

Here's a pic of fellow Wisconsinite from our training group, Tim Staffeld and his little monkey friend Troy (a good friend of ours who lived just up the road from us with his wife Jasmine, while we were in Ekipe)

Krissy and I dressed as a fellow PCV married couple Dennis and Sandra Melo
Everyone was really wierded out, because I shaved my beard, cut my hair, wore his clothes, and consequently looked TOO MUCH like Dennis. A number of people actually confused me for him and talked to me as if I was him. One volunteer, after a double take actually said "Hey Dennis, for a second there I thought you were Javi"

A final costume pic of me in my super player creepazoid mode (which was ok because everyone thought I was some other guy), with fellow volunteers Noelle, Neely, Krissy and the lonely Peace Corps Volunteers' best friend: a goat (played by Jasmine)

I organized a Physical Skills Challenge that each training group participated in.

Each group sent a male and a female to compete in each specific event.

Events were

1. Holding your breath underwater

2. Handstands

3. Push-ups

4. Splits Contest

5. and a Footrace

Here I am getting ready to start the female foot race competition.

Here's Krissy winning the women's push up contest

Next year I'm planning some additions and changes that'll make the competition even better- sports skills and mental skills components will make it the awesomest competition in Peace Corps Vanuatu Volunteer History.

Lo and behold, someone thankfully remembered to bring the camera to the Gender and Development workshop, so we have proof that work was being done.

A final pic from our balcony overlooking beautiful Port Vila Harbor at Sunset. This made all the lice, bedbugs, worms, mosquitos, tics, chiggers, scabies, ringworm, and every other parasite of our first year in country worth it.

Ekipe Vs. Vila

2008-05-22T10:17:00.000+11:00

After a month plus of rain, flash floods, digging drainage ditches, and washed out bridges and roads,

the big day finally came. The first matchup between Team Ekipe and Port Vila (Our country director's team). We piled into the camion singing take me out to the ballgame the whole way there. There were over 50 youngfala boys and papas from Ekipe that came with us or met us in Vila to watch Ekipe represent North Efate.

The game commenced at about 2pm. Team Ekipe was nervous. They saw the size of "The Port Vila Independants" and immediately became worried. A number of the kids on Vila's team are on the back end of their growth spurts while most of Team Ekipe is just starting theirs. I reassurred them that the other team might be bigger, but it didn't mean they were better. I told them they had practiced hard for the last four months and that they would do fine. They seemed doubtful, but fortunately as the visiting team we got to hit first. The hits started falling right away and after a couple errors, Ekipe realized they weren't outmatched.

It was a great game back and forth, lots of lead changes. Lots of errors on both sides. One of the Port Vila players hit a towering home run over the center fielders head, fortunately no one was on base. after a short rain delay and a bunch of muddy slides and collisions between players we decided to go five innings. Ekipe had a five run lead in the bottom of the fifth. 2 Runs scored with two outs after a controversial play at third base in which Ekipe's third baseman dropped the ball after applying the tag. The Ekipe cheering section thought the game was over and erupted into cheering as they stormed the field. Umpire Seth Dallman had to send them back to their seats so we could continue the game. The error left the bases loaded and The Independants down by three. The hitter for the Independants was clearly looking for a walk as he watched strike three go by to end the game.

Hot dogs were had all around, and all 50 plus Ekipe villagers piled into the Camion and returned home. The 1.5 hr. ride was celebratory singing the whole way home. We disturbed a number of villages on the way back to Ekipe with our hooting, hollering, and singing.

The whole Ekipe crew. Here's a fun game "Where's white man?" just like "Where's Waldo?" only easier

A great game, can't wait for the rematch next month in Ekipe.

A big thanks to everyone who has donated equipment to our project it is well used and loved already.

Ruth Bradford Johnson, Todd Johnson, Adam Hinkle, Nate (sorry, don't know your last name or your friends' who sent the lefty glove) and Karri, Who am I missing? Ruth maybe you could add the names of others that have contributed, I'd like to send some thank you's out but need their addresses, please email them to me if you have them.

Love always Javi

Counting Chickens

2008-05-01T20:04:00.000+11:00

My dog likes to eat chickens.

But not full grown ones, just the little baby fetal chickens that can't run away cause they're still stuck in the egg.

This is gross. They smell horrible, and thus, so does he.

But the bigger problem is that chickens are food for humans too. Thus every chicken he eats before it's hatched is a potential chicken that humans could have eaten. This makes people in my village not like my dog very much. In fact if he continues to do this they'll want to kill him. So yeah, I hope he stops.

April has been a great month. In April 2008 everything worked out the way it was supposed to.

A summary:

1. After a long tortuous wait, and lots of rumors, we found out that our water project has been completely funded by UNDP. Yes that is right the water project is a go. In the next week or two our committee will recieve funding and be able to continue the previously started water project. Photos of happy, soaked, rejoicing people soon to follow.

2. Krissy's good friend Karri and her boyfriend Nate came to visit us and we had a blast. We went to some beachside resorts, hung out and played baseball in Ekipe village, took a short boat trip to the island of Pele, and another to Nguna where we hiked up a dormant volcano. They also brought us a ton of goodies including a new digital camera so guess what, pictures on the blog are back. Thanks Mom and Mark, Tony Scalise for the video camera, everyone else for all the wonderful gifts and Karri and Nate for carryng it all.

3. Krissy and I took a group of the kids from Ekipe who have been playing baseball now for about 7 months and brought them to Port Vila for Vanuatu's first-ever Inter village baseball match. Ekipe won 13-10 and everyone had a great time.

4. A North Efate Primary School Sports Association has started. Seth and I had been working to get the Headmasters from these schools to meet and begin collaborations and now it has happened. The launching (with the second inter village baseball game and first inter village ultimate frisbee game) will be at the end of June.

Seth and I hard in the Resource Room at work on the North Efate Sports Program and a trip to Iririki Island Resort for a cure for what ails you

This is the typical island pose for a camera

Gettin on the Camion to drive to Ekipe I love it

The day after we got to Ekipe we played a baseball game with the kids, Nate's team won.

Teaching kids about the most important American that ever lived: Brett Favre and Nate learning how to open a coconut

The walk to Paonangisu and goofin off with some kids

We stopped along the way to enjoy the Beachcomber Hot Springs (about 1.5 hrs from our house)

We got to Paonangisu and celebrated the long walk with our friends Jasmine and Troy

The next day we took a boat to Nguna for a day on Pele with Seth and after that a boat to Nguna to hike up the volcano. Here we are launching the boat and riding to Nguna after. We were greeted with lots of rain. And after a month straight of rainy days....

...it made it very muddy. Nguna is basically an hour long hike straight up, and there were lots of falls... see Nate's ass

but it allowed us to get the steretypical Peace Corps shot:

The hike up the volcano was a bit of a bust, these two guys followed behind us the whole way mocking our laughs and making weird little devil noises. Meanwhile the local leaders of the trip hacked through the tall grass since no one had come up here in a long time. The slow going was made especially painful after we encountered swarms of black ants. Here's a picture of Seth and I freaking out. These things are very painful and then itch for a week after. I got three or four bites on the same foot and the whole thing was so swollen the next day I couldn't walk.

Eventually we made it to the top for a wonderfully cloudy view and a torrential downpour

After a grumpy hike back down, we returned to Ekipe village the next day. Nate was a champ and chewed his and Karri's kava himself, something I've never been able to do.

I always have a friend chew mine

After a night of candlelight stories back in Ekipe

We went to some Sunday Churchin,

After all the excitement we had another day of relaxin on the beach in Vila before Nate and Karri headed back to the States.

All in all an awesome trip. Thank you guys so much for coming to visit us and sharing our crazy life. Also thank you Mom for the awesome new digital camera, absolutely love it, the blog was hurtin in its absence and so were we, love you.

Well, coming up next, an In Service Training for 20 Volunteers in Ekipe, The All Volunteer Conference in Vila, and training the new group. Talk to you after that.

For those of you in the doldrums.

2008-03-28T12:33:00.000+11:00

For those of you annoyed at your commute.
For those of you who are really pissed at the old lady at the counter holding up the line.
For those of you sick of shitty tippers and for those of you cringing at the harsh neon lights.
...for those of you thinking, fuck it, I should just run away and join the Peace Corps.
Here's what my life is like.

I live in Ekipe Village on North Efate. Efate is oriented around "The Big City," Port Vila. +20,000 people. But it's a big 20,000. Busy, traffic, bustling, exhaust and man are there asshole drivers. I thought FIB's were bad (they are) but in Port Vila, Pedestrians DO NOT have the right of way. There is not a single stoplight in town but there should be. Big minivans that serve as public transport cruise by too fast, and hell, if it rains you WILL get splashed, just a matter of fact, no sense in arguing. So instead of just looking both ways when you cross the street, look both ways when you get near a big puddle. Especially if the puddle is near a couple of overflowing trash cans, or a flooded sewer.
I'm not complaining, Chicago is worse, in some places. Africa is worse, Latin America is worse, or so I hear.
The long arm of Globalization has stretched across Oceania with small and futile resistance. They say that Peace Corps Vanuatu is one of the last places in the world where you can actually get the advertised Peace Corps experience. The one with greenery and remote villages cut off from civilization. Where cell phones don't work, and Radio doesn't reach. For some of my colleagues this is true. But not me. The cell phone towers here have been erected, annoying rings go off in meetings here just like back home. I can write emails to my friends around the world two or three times a month, no problem. 3-4 buses travel from Ekipe to Vila each morning and back again each afternoon. It's a $5 trip one way. 6 days a week. Not remote, not cut off.
When I go back to Ekipe today I will meet one of the chiefs of my village. Chief Atanawara, aka Willie. He is part of my host family. He drives a bus, sometimes his family members drive it for him when he's busy. Krissy and I will meet him at the market. The Mama's Market is a big open building at the center of Vila Town with hundreds of Mama's and Mama's in training (young girls selling produce for their families.) The Mama's Market is the center of economic activity for Ni-Vanuatu on Efate. Though with a 6% growth rate other sectors such as construction and tourism are booming and providing lots of jobs lots of activity, people digging and pouring and picking, sweating, and taking breaks in the heat.
When we drive back to Ekipe, we will pile in with all our stuff, about 12-15 people. We will swerve to avoid potholes and I will get queasy. We will listen to reggae or Rod Stewart or Akon. Probably over and over again. People will sleep with their heads bobbing up and down. We will get to the two big, no I mean BIG, giant Banyan trees that stand like sentries, the only marker for Ekipe village, one on either side of the road. We will jump out and our neighbors and friends who happen to be near the road will sing out to us in Namakura "Daravi Javi!" which means "Good Afternoon" in local language.
We will walk down the narrow trail with our groceries and our luggage, our supplies to hold us over until the next time we go into Vila. We'll pass by all our familiar friends and neighbors greeting them all on our short walk back to our house. When we get close our dog Oreo will flip out run around jump on us and make us yell at her. She's excited because when we're gone she lives in fear of everyone else in Ekipe. The feeling is mutual. She usually barks at them and plays the role of the guard dog perfectly. Well, except that she occasionally chases small children and forces them to climb up trees to get away. This makes us mad. We yell, and try to learn her good. But alas, she really likes to chase children. Pigs on the other hand she's scared of. With good reason. There are many pigs in Ekipe running loose. Some are not normal, they are battle pigs. Remember Battle Cat from He-Man. If you put a saddle on some of these behemoths, small people, like Mugsy Bogues, could ride them into battle. When faced with two barking growling dogs, they do not always run away. About half the time they just stare them down. Occasionally they faint a charge and the dogs run away. There are many wounded dogs, and many stories of dogs killed by pigs.
After we get Oreo off of us for a second, we'll put our stuff down and sigh happily "Home Sweet Home." We'll open the six windows of our tin shack propping them up with sticks. Before everything is back in the house we will definitely have at least two kids show up to watch us and talk. Probably Joy, JoAnna, Tyline, Annitha, Sandrine, Harriet, and Tyler Moses or some combination of these 7. They are our immediate neighbors and friends. As we unpack they'll ask questions, and ask to play SET (which Lauren sent) or Uno, or Hula Hoop. Our small dog Bilavil (Bill) will jump around and bite heels, and small childrens' butts and shirts. Our pusscat will meow insistently until we pet him or give him tuna.
As we unload we'll plan dinner. Depending on what fresh vegetables we have we'll probably make one of our staple dishes: Brown rice and Lentil Curry with kumala, onion, fresh cocnut milk and whatever else is around is our current favorite. Otherwise we'll have beans and rice with a packet of Old El Paso Taco seasoning, also we make pasta with tomato sauce now and again. If we're lucky (once or twice a week) One of our host families will bring us a plate of manioc simboro, or yams and coconut milk, or white rice and chicken or tin meat (if I'm really lucky and my wife is really unlucky). I think tonight probably curry. I'll open a dry coconut with my machete, then I'll use our coconut scratcher to work it until all the shredded pieces are in a bowl. Krissy will squeeze it with water to make the coconut milk that we'll add to the dish later. I'll build a fire and get water ready to boil. If we're low on water I'll have to walk 75 yards or so with a big bucket to get our daily drinking water. I lift it onto my shoulder then walk carefully, so I don't spill it all over myself.

After dinner we'll drink Milo (Hot Cocoa like drink) or tea and either playScrabble, or read a book, or Newsweek or National Geographic. Krissy will go to bed at 8-9pm I'll usually join her from10pm-12am. We read by candlelight or sometimes kerosene lantern. we sleep on the ground on a thin mattress underneath a mosquito net. it is hot and stuffy under there. Also ants eat away at the wood in our house and the little granules of wood will be all over the sheets, so the nightly ritual involves sweeping the bed of this wooden sand. If cockroaches or spiders or geckos are running around our cat will hunt them and enjoy a latenight snack. After a few nights in the village I'll use my ipod at night to listen to the NPR Podcast of All Songs Considered or Movies. This has kept me sane. Thank you friends for the wonderful gift. I download podcasts in Vila and cherish the little bit of culture I get from them. Thanks to Bob Boilan and Fresh Air I hear new music and reviews of movies I wont see for another 6-9 months. This makes me happy.

Our days are spent washing clothes, getting water, washing dishes, preparing food: Breakfast is usually Oatmeal or Raisin Bran and powdered milk, bananas are usually involved (as they always are in Vanuatu); For lunches we usually have Ramen, or powdered soup. This is not satisfying so I spend most of my meal thinking about what I will eat in 15 months when I get home. This has turned into a game called taste of Wisconsin. Usually I play this game by myself, but sometimes Krissy plays with me, more on Taste of Wisconsin later. The rest of the day is spent exercising, scratching mosquito bites, or louse bites, or various rashes and other itches, entertaining guests (mostly kids who are entertained by looking at us (it feels a lot like being on the other side of the bars at the zoo) sometimes though we can distract them with Newsweeks, or crayons.) reading magazines, reading books and occasionally working on things. Only short bursts of energy are usually necessary to complete our work tasks.

On Mondays we eat at Bethel village a short walk away. We watch a Philipino soap opera named Sarap Gulang (everyone is crazy about this soap opera because Filipino life seems very similar to life here, stark class distinctions between natives, and expatriots; also they eat similar foods and speak a similar pidgeon dialect). A lot of people in Ekipe have TV's and DVD's and a generator to watch movies at night a couple times a week. On Wednesdays I run baseball practice at Ekipe primary school, lately we've had well over 20 kids at practice. They're getting better and their first inter-village game is next Saturday: Ekipe vs.Vila in Port Vila. Wednesday nights is also our luxury night where we eat snacks that our friends have sent us and use half the charge on our laptops battery. We just finished Band of Brothers, and I'm not sure what we'll watch now. Fridays is frisbee practice. Less kids come out for that, but popularity is growing. Sundays we go to church in the morning, we sing and sit quietly marvelling at the pious, excited, emotional worship around us for 2-4 hours. We watch kids run and throw tantrums and be naughty. Then Sunday afternoon we go and spend the day at the beach down in the next village over (Matarisu). We soak up sun and swim and look out to the North East at the island of Emao.
The next week we do it all again and usually at least one of us goes into Vila afterwards to stock up or work on something.
This is our life.

We should have already found out whether or not our water project is funded, I hope this is not a bad sign. But they were supposed to tell us this week. Please keep Ekipe in your prayers.

In a couple weeks we will have reached 1 year of service and Group 21A will come for training. They will be stationed in Epao for training which is about a 20 minute jog from Ekipe. We will be doing a lot of training for them, and see them a lot. This means lots of food, and fun times teaching the rookies. Incidentally this means we are now veterans.

So, this South by Southwest festival. (SXSW). I've been meaning to tell you about it. It's got 1700 bands playing live.

That's insane by the way. And so fucking rad. When you're angry at American mono-culture, aggro-culture, Big ass better than you culture. Please remember how cool it is that one-thousand seven hundred different bands play in one city at one time each year. And then think about if that has ever happened in the history of mankind (by the way, the answer is no, even if you're some stupid history nerd who can prove me wrong) [Dude, Brandon, Bob Boilen mentioned Troubled Hubble on the last SXSW feature on all songs considered, cool little story.]

Peace Corps is like College in Fast Forward but better and in another language.

I have never before met 98 Americans at one time in my life from all over the States. Alabama to Alaska, California to New York, Nebraska to Virginia. Is there anywhere else in American society where you can get to intimately know 90 people who more or less equally represent the fifty States? And on top of it, unlike college, they are not segregated by age. We have 71 year olds and 22 year old's. Where else can this happen? Yes most are younger or youngish but the mean is rising. The experience that is being shared here is unlike any other facet of American life.

In the Peace Corps in the modern age, I can meet people who have big music collections. They have lots of music that I don't and then we can trade and go back to site. In the Peace Corps I have found awesome new music that I love, that I didn't even know before. This is a good thing for all those who bemoan the digital age of music. I've found out about Stars, Camera Obscura, Godspeed You! Black Emporer, Andrew Bird, Animal Collective, Architecture in Helsinki, Band of Horses, Bear Vs Shark, Broken Social Scene, The Format, FourTet, Low, The National, Panda Bear, Southland, and a whole lot more I'm embarassed to say I didn't know or appreciate before. This is so cool.

Taste of Wisconsin

sometimes I get hungry.
and I think about what I want to eat when I go home. If you would like to join me in gaining back the 20lbs. that was stolen from me by Vanuatu, you can join in the journey when I return home sometime Summer-Fall 2009. In the meantime if you would like to eat at these places and then tell me about it in a letter or a comment on this blog. I will think of you with spite and envy and relish the sweet taste of awesomeness when I get home. P.S. for all those who prefer me skinny, enjoy it while you can...it will not last (Krissy I'm talking to you).
Here's my list in no particular order:
Jimmy Johns Country Club with Avocado and Salt and Vineger chips.
The Sausage Kitchen House Special on Italian Bread with Giardineira-Racine
Fulbeli Deli Brett Favre- Milwaukee
Jenny Malacara's Turkey Taco's
Grandma Malacara's Tamales
Mrs. Buchholz' Easter smorgasborg (Beef Tips, Meatballs, Ham, Green Bean Casserole, Party Potatoes, Mashed Potatoes and Gravy, Fudgie Oatmeal Bars)
Veggie Burgers and Catfish Sandwiches with Sanddollars- The Yardarm- Racine
Ravioli's-Toteros- Racine
Wood Fired Pizzas- Mangia-Kenosha
Chile Verde, Fajitas- Baldo's or Los Mariachi's
Chili, and Hamburhers, Fresh baked pie at South Point- Stevens Point
Crunchy Spicy Tuna, and buffet- Tokyo Steak House- Stevens Point
Kai Fire Roll- Sake Tumi- Milwaukee
Buffets (watch out, I don't want to injure anyone)
Bloody Mary's and Veggie Burgers at Hilltop- Stevens Point
Salad Bar OH GOD GIVE ME A SALAD BAR
Ribs, Bread, Baked Potato, Salad, Veggies, Wine- Digger's Sting- La Crosse
Burrito Del Mar- Manny's- La Crosse
Old Dutch Custard- Racine
Kopp's Custard and Burger's and Onion Rings- Milwaukee
Muffins of all sorts- Blueberry Muffin- Stevens Point
Hot Dogs, Brats, Italian Sausages, Miller Park Parking Lot- Milwaukee
Italian Sausages Ed Pavlik's on Sundays in Racine
Homemade Salsa and Guacamole, Gourmet dinner: fish with rice and roasted veggies- Mom and Mark's
Gosa Gosa A- The Blue Nile- Minneapolis (I know but it's good anough that it gets put into Taste of Wisconsin, Cngratulations)
That little diner place in Baraboo, I don't remember the name but everything I've hd there has been sooo good.
Kringle- O& H Bakery- Racine
Coconut or Pineapple popsicles from the Mexican push carts- Racine
Sandwiches and Taco Dip and Garden of Eatin Blues from the Peoples Food Co-op- La Crosse
Super Bowl with onions, beans, cheese, oyster crackers- Chili John's- Green Bay
Brotomushapepper thingy at The Wooden Spoon- Stevens Point

Notice I didn't include fast food chains.
This is what I think about. Rich mental life.

Peace out America,
don't get jaded
I love you all, not in the grand general sense, but in the specific never got to tell you how much I loved you sense, I'm telling you now. Let me know if you ever need a reminder, I'll be happy to oblige
Javi

Quick Hits

2008-02-21T11:16:00.000+11:00

I've been out at sight for a while so contact has been brief, as have updates. Friends I apologize, but here's the thing. Krissy and I are trying to save money while we're here and that means not coming into Port Vila too often. Shit is expensive here. The mighty dollar has fallen pretty spectacularly as you know. If I exchange $100 U.S. I get back only 9500Vatu which has the spending power of about $95. Additionally a shitty beer here is $5. a good meal at a restaurant $10-$20. Not cheap. So, sorry. Here's some quick general updates.

Time blong spell is over which means everyone is back to work. Our water committee has kicked ass and gotten the entire community to lay all the pipe we had. We have now gotten the pipe from the source 2.5km down the bigfala hill. We have just 1.5km left before we reach the village. A number of villagers have approached us sweaty and tired after hauling pipe and cement 4km straight up a hill, saying "ok our work is done, now its your turn" ...no pressure...really none at all. Fortunately we seem to be having some preliminary success with funding sources. We have a grant into the UNDirect Aid Program, they've already accepted our concept, so now we're just adjusting the format by the end of March we'll know if we got funding or not. Also yesterday I made a proposal to Port Vila Rotary in the hopes that they will fund a secondary water support system, if anything goes wrong with the piped source (fallen tree, souce gets contaminated) it will alow us a backup of potable water. Additionally we have two other funding sources as a back up plan. Overall we are fairly confidant that by the end of our time in Ekipe (July), our water project will be funded and complete.

I have been working with three primary schools on North Efate teaching Frisbee and Baseball and trying to re-establish a North Efate Primary Schools Sports Association that used to operate in the area. I've gotten our first donations of baseball equipment (Thanks Hinkle and Ruth). I have a teaching workshop at Onesua Presbyterian College (A high School) on Wednesday. A number of the students there learned baseball and frisbee with me in Emua and Ekipe so I'm hoping it'll be successful. Unfortunately, I am out of frisbees so even if I teach frisbee there I wont be able to leave one for them to play with... Anyone interested in sending Ultimate quality frisbees??? I'll name the teams after you.

We have a new puppy as a replacement for Ninja. In the Ekipe tradition, the names of all dogs have to be completely inappropriate animal names. For example there are dogs named Jim, Panadol (which is a pain releiver), Medicine, occasionally this practice can extend to children, such as the little kid named Halloween. So in honor of our 42nd president here is our dog Bill. We also have an adopted dog Oreo, and our pussy, Milo. My favorite dog name of all however is the three legged dog named ...wait for it...Dancer

OK, sorry, but that's all for now. I'll give another update next time I'm in and hopefully it won be so long in between.

lots of love

Javi

To my Valentine

2008-02-19T16:37:00.000+11:00

Dear America,

I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't be writing, but I miss you. You probably wont even read this and if so, I understand. I left you, you have no obligation to still love and care for me. But I just want you to know that no matter what I still love you.

I find myself reminiscing about the silliest little things we used to do together. Carnival rides at night at Great America or St. Rita's fair. All the incredible movies and music you introduced me too. Staying up late at night watching PBS and eating frozen pizzas, bars with good beer, Brewers games, Road Trips to see all your ballparks,

all the great cosmopolitan restaurants we'd go to, cool book stores, comic books, great live music and record stores...I could go on and on.
I know I shouldn't still be thinking about you. It's been almost a year since I left, and my new country is beautiful and fun, and exciting...but I still miss all the great times we had. I hope some day you can forgive me for leaving you. And though I love my new country, I just don't think it's going to work out. So... I don't know...Maybe it's inappropriate to say this all now while I'm still here in Vanuatu, but maybe after we've spent some more time apart you'll be willing to accept me back. I know that I'm willing to come back to you.
Don't get me wrong...there were serious things that bothered me about you, and they will probably never change, I hate how much time you spend looking in the mirror, and watching stupid ego stroking TV shows, the only TV we watch in Vanuatu is an occasional sports game and a movie. Your obsession with money and accumulating stuff was seriously disheartening, and it really pissed me off when you'd compare yourself to other people and talk about how much better your stuff was than theirs. Jealousy and envy always made you look ugly. And the way you tried to cover up your wrinkles and scars with makeup, plucking out grey hairs or dyeing to hide your age. You look beautiful when you don't focus on these things, but obsessing over makeup and ways to hide your age just made me pity you. Despite some of your actions lately I know you have a good heart and generally would like to help people but you seem to be letting your desires for self satisfaction interfere with your ability to make the right decision. I know it's tough to do the right thing all the time. With everyone always watching you you're bound to slip up and people will be there to remind you about it. But I just want to say that it's ok. We all make mistakes, we need to learn from them and move on, and hopefully do better in the future.
So speaking of the future...what do you think...will you take me back? I promise to support you and be there for you if you need me. You've given me everything that I have and helped me become who I am today. I am glad for that. Thankful. I owe you my life and I want to enjoy the rest of it with you. Please think about it. I wouldn't be able to come back immediately, though I love you more, I love Vanuatu to, and it'll take me awhile to figure out the right way to tell her that I'm leaving. I don't know if she'll be disappointed, but it's better to end it now before she gets too attached. It's just not fair to string her along like this when my heart belongs to someone else...
Ok. well I should go. I'm just gonna send this and throw caution to the wind.
With hope and admiration
and eternal love

Javi

remember this ???

High Highs and Low Lows

2008-01-05T10:13:00.000+11:00

Disclaimer: This is a long one.

Friday Jan 4

"High Highs and Low Lows,"
this is the cliche description of the quintessential Peace Corps experience. When you're happy and feeling good, it feels like the best time of your life, the top of the world, the greatest life you could possibly lead. You thank God, Fate, and anything else you can think of for your good fortune. But when you're feeling down, it feels like every decision you've made has been wrong. You feel isolated, alone, scared, sad, you long for the comforts of home and a familiar face. I guess I would say that the best thing about experiencing the Peace Corps with my wife by my side is that the lows are never as bad as they would be if I was on my own. Everything was going so well for so long, we were just constantly amazed at our good fortune. We felt blessed and lucky, and to a large extent we still are, but the last stretch here has been a little rough.
To be fair, we were warned that nothing happened in Vanuatu in December and January, but our projects in Ekipe seemed to be moving forward with such ease and support that we couldn't imagine suddenly taking a two month break. At the beginning of December Krissy and I finished the preliminary work on the water proposal. The community had held a number of productive work days. We measured all of the existing pipes, drew maps of where the community wanted the new pipes to be lain, we even received some strong words of encouragement from two different funding sources. We submitted an excellent grant request to the two potential funders and went back to Ekipe hopeful we'd hear something in late January from one or both of them. We tried to hold a final meeting with the Water/Health committee in hopes of doing a final year end report, but twice no one showed up. Not a huge deal but made us realize that December would truly not be a time for getting any work done. This was disheartening for me because we had been trying to get the community to hold a youth leadership camp for all of the youth who were home for the holidays from their boarding schools. It quickly became apparent that this was not going to happen.

I scaled back the plan and kept hope alive that we might still be able to do some sports workshops that had previously been just one component of the larger youth workshop, but as Christmas approached it became obvious that everyone was focused on the holidays and all of the travel and visitations that went along with them. We had also heard that the holidays were wild in Vanuatu and that many single female volunteers took vacation during this time, because if they didn't they would have to stay inside their houses at all times for safety. We got a few indications why in the weeks leading up to Christmas as we walked around at 9am and encountered groups of young guys bleary eyed drunk, shouting randomly and dancing. 9am mind you.

On Christmas eve Krissy and I woke up early and packed for a 2hr walk up the road to a little hotel/ hot springs/ restaurant called BeachComber Resort. It rained the entire walk there and we were soaked through and through. Fortunately it cleared up by the time we got there and we were able to enjoy the perks of electricity and refrigeration. We listened to Christmas music on the laptop, ate a big expensive lunch and in typical Vanuatu fashion, enjoyed a few Tuskers well before noon. We walked back that evening and made a big Christmas Eve meal.
Christmas morning we were awoken at 4am by a bunch of young guys still drunk from the night before. Off in the distance we could hear them chanting Whoah- Ohh-Wo to string band music on a boombox, they walked right by our house chanting the whole way. By 5am a young kid that we call Mr. Fart (I'm sure you can figure out why)showed up and told us that we were supposed to eat with our host family at their house. Our host mama had mentioned something about this late last night, she quickly told us how to walk up the road and to go through (under or over which ever we preferred) 4 no 3- no 4 barbed wire fences, she assured us it wasn't very far. As Mr. Fart led us through wet muddy trails that caked to the bottom of my sandals and eventually forced me to walk barefoot, he also assured us that the house was just a little further, we reached the first barbed wire fence after walking maybe 40 min. I asked how far and he assured us it was just over that hill, we heard that about five more times (and sure enough 3 more fences) before it was actually true. Once we got there however we had a nice breakfast of bread with peanut butter and tea and watched some string band videos.

After breakfast our host papa took us back to Ekipe in his truck which was very nice, and we proceeded to make our rounds to the various houses we had to go to. The first one was in full party mode by 11am. There was booming music, kids, adults all dancing. One mama was dancing while proudly holding a live chicken in the air and bouncing it up and down so that it flapped it's wings all about. The young guys were still drunk from the night before and were making raucous merriment. Some mamas suddenly broke out in a food fight they were rubbing raw laplap, a mushy substance with the consistency of oatmeal, into each other's hair. They were running and finging laplap at each other, one mama after getting a facefull of the yellow goop launched the big metal mixing bowl in her hand at one of the other mamas like a frisbee. The other mama just ducked it and gave out a long satisfied cackle. One of the drunk guys tried to join in the fun by getting his friend (who was not drunk) with a handful of laplap, the sober one convinced him not to and so the young guy looked around for what to do with his handful of laplap. He saw our big dog Oreo and decided that she would look better covered in yellow goop. Oreo looked at us sullenly with her best Eeyore expression, as if to say "Why did you bring me here?" One guy started dancing with another dog and a big group went on a beer run, we took that as our cue and assured them we would be back that evening, "to party until the sun comes up." We made our rounds all day and found similar situations everywhere we went. By night-time we were exhausted, but we promised adamantly that we'd be back, so we made an appearance. The situation had not gotten better. More people were drunk, and there were a number of people who just seemed kind of menacing, so after dancing to a few songs we checked out and went home quietly to sleep.

The next day was supposed to be family day, where you spend the day with your family. After an early morning run Krissy and I, and our two dogs went down to swim. This is our normal routine after a run, we all cool down with a quick dip into the water and walk back to the house about 2 minutes away. On our way back a group of young guys were coming by in a truck. As always we shouted at our dogs not to chase the truck but they never listen and we didn' do a good enough job of training them. So as usual we just kept walking assuming they'd have enough sense to get out of the way. I saw our small puppy walking in front of the truck, and kind of cringed, but the truck was going real slow, so I assumed it would stop if he didn't move. After a few steps I heard our dog Ninja yelp and two crunch sounds.
Krissy cried out and I turned around sad and scared and asked if he was dead. I saw from the look on one of the young guys faces that he had indeed had been run over, before I saw him. When I got to him, all the kids who had been walking with us gathered around and confidently assured us, he was dead. I got down and tried to talk to him as he gasped for breath. I wanted to try and give him rescue breaths but couldn't with all the kids watching. I picked him up and carried him back to our house. The truck didn't stop. When we got back home I had to ask the kids calmly and politely to let us be alone about 5 times before they left. Once they did I tried to breathe in through his nose to see if it would help, but he had loosed his bowels and bladder by this time and it was a lost cause. I closed his eyes and wrapped him in some cloth. Because it's so hot and humid here, it's important to bury anything that dies very quickly. We borrowed a shovel from one of our neighbors. Fortunately she has spent a lot of time around ex-pats and had a lot of sympathy for us because she realized that animals are like a part of our family. Most of the kids and people who heard however laughed when we told them we were sad. It would be as if someone was really sad about a dead street rat back in America. It would seem weird and almost comical. I was often unable to restrain myself from explaining somewhat curtly why it wasn't funny. After burying Ninja, we had to go eat lunch with our host family at one of the chiefs houses. It was there that we realized the young guys in the truck were all sons of our host family. Only in Vanuatu do you have to eat lunch with the guys who killed your puppy. They were ashamed a little bit, and apologized because our host mother had already found out and reamed them a new one for still being drunk and spoiling everyone's Christmas.
That night the drunkenness continued. As we ate dinner with a family we were interrupted by a frantic young guy who shouted something in language to our host who then ran off. Everyone was moving hurriedly, but they were all talking in local language so we didn't know what was going on. I got up to investigate and saw a bunch of drunk guys gathered around, some of them covered in blood. The guy laying prone on the ground had a huge gash in his leg and I immediately began giving directions to people to help me administer first aid. The leg was spurting all over and there were mostly only drunk guys around to help so it didn't go as smooth as possible but it could've been worse to. We patched him up the best we could and commandeered a bus to bring the youth to the clinic (about a 20 min. drive). I figured he would be alright when he roused himself from an unconscious stupor when he smelled a plate of food passing nearby. He reached out a hand and quickly snatched a chicken wing and began chowing down.

The rest of the week was sad as we mourned Ninja's death but we had to move on and prepare for New Years as we were hosting a party in Ekipe for a few other volunteers. A couple days before New Years Eve our host family had us over for the whole day as they had a bunch of relatives in town. We ate and made food all day, I set up a tire and hung it from a tree and we played a game to teach pitching and the strike zone. In the afternoon we had kave. Ekipe kava is strong. I have only had it about 5 times since I've been there and every time I get pretty drunk. But this time after one of the youngfalas chewed mine and his and we drank I was completely immobilized. I was trying to eat, but could barely lift up the fork. I looked up to see if everyone had noticed and was looking at me but all the other guys had the same worn out look about them and none of the 14 people sitting around were talking. All of us basically stared at our plates. after about 20 minutes of this I decided to go home, on the way I promptly puked it all up and crashed on our mattress for the next two hours.

On New Years Eve two of our fellow 20a volunteers showed up and we began preparing for the evening. One of the members of this same host family (who also happens to be a chief in the village and one of our strongest supporters and allies) brought our friends and us to our house. He had already put a few in the tank when he dropped us off and decided that he wanted to stay and drink a Tusker with me and listen to one string band song from the radio on his bus. I'd like to mention that this is one of the nicest guys we've met, always supportive, kind and friendly, and he assured us that he only drinks on New Year's once every Year. So we each drank a beer outside his bus and danced to the song as our friends and Krissy unpacked and started getting some things prepared. At this point we heard our other host papa and neighbor (who owns our house and the land we were on as well as the church that is just across the way), also a very nice man who never drinks and is the pastor of the church hollar out something from his house (maybe 50 yards away). We learned that he had told the Chief who was with us that he shouldn't be drinking and dancing in front of the church because it was disrespectful and as a chief he had to set a good example for the younger generation. We politely stopped dancing and he went on his way. Approximately two hours later just after it had become very dark, we suddenly heard a loud commotion and lots of blood curdling screams coming from our neighbors house area. We were all very worried, and thought someone was injured, I was thinking that I'd have to perform first aid yet again. We rushed out to find out what was happening. A huge group of people were gathered around and we learned that the chief of our first host family had come down and launched a bottle at the head of the pastor and patriarch of our other host family. The only thing I saw clearly in all the confusion was our host mama trying to restrain the pastor as he charged forward with a large axe in his hands. Eventually the attempts at murder were foiled and a heavy calm came over the neighborhood. We went back to our party a little shaken but happy that no one was injured.

We celebrated at the scene of the Christmas day laplap fight. This little satellite community is based around a big hostel/bungalow type thing and is about a half mile away from Ekipe. We went up there and used their generator to make steaks and dance and party until New Year's. The food was great, so was the company, so was the music. After the countdown we ran the half mile to Ekipe in the dark dragging pieces of corrugated tin, banging on bells, screaming and chanting the national party chant of Vanuatu: " Whoah-Ohh-Woah." It was a beautiful resplendent moonlit night, and we shouted our revelries to the stars.

The next day we recovered at the beach and got ready for a baseball tournament/workshop that had remained as the last remnant of my attempt to do something productive around the holidays. The workshop went great though a low turnout due to the fact that most people had just gone to sleep as we were starting it. Unfortunately something I had eaten had given me the worst case of sit-sit wota I had ever had and much of the workshop was run by my baseball partner Seth. I was indisposed searching for toilet paper and holes in the ground. After approximately 40 trips to the shitter and a long day of baseball capped off by a walk off three run triple, we closed the party and went to sleep.

Within two days our friends had left. We got a phone call from our Country Director letting us know that Krissy's Grandpa had died. We were kind of in shock and rushed into Vila to call her family. At first we thought Krissy might go home for the funeral, but we all decided that was not the best thing to do. Apparently he slipped on some ice and broke his hip on the way out of church. This led to some complications a few days later. On the bright side all but one of his children were able to be with him and Grandma in the hospital as he passed. It's very hard to deal with the guilt of not being able to attend the funeral and it really just emphasizes the hardest part about being here: that we are so far away from all of our friends and family. When we came into Vila, Krissy was able to talk to her parents on the phone and that helped her feel better. But unfortunately whatever I had seems to have appeared in Krissy and Jen (our other friend who was with us on New Years). The medical staff thinks it's giardhia, a wonderful little stomach parasite. No one knows why I got it right away and it took three days for the girls.
On top of all this I just found out my mom and step-dad just got robbed. Not sure how much was stolen, or what exactly, but that never seems to be as bad as the feeling of violation.
So I hope this is as low as it gets for us right now, because as bad as it is it could all certainly be worse. Mostly we're just hoping that our community can recover from all the craziness enough to keep momentum moving positively on our projects. And I hope that this insanity is not a sign of things to come for 2008.

P.S. My digital camera broke so no new pictures for awhile. Sorry for the blandness of type on screen.

P.P.S. I now weigh less than I did in 9th grade. I'm down to 168 from 192 when I got here 8 months ago

The Sun Also Rises

TEAM EKIPE

2007-12-04T11:11:00.000+11:00

Here are the baseball cards I printed out for the youth in our village

The Sandlot 2: Island Ball

Seriously this script is already written. Somebody pass this photo on to their producer friends and we'll get this started.

The Hot Season

2007-11-10T09:02:00.000+11:00

That's how hot it is

For my birthday, I went to a fellow volunteers site for a fundraiser she was hosting for her village.

Krissy couldn't come because there was a training starting in our village that she had to be around for.

I jumped in to the back of a camion (a big open trailered truck) with 20 of the new volunteers from 20B. A number of older volunteers from our group and some others also came along. It was a hot grey, rainy day, with lots of wind. There was a cyclone in the Northern most islands of Vanuatu which created heavy windy stormy conditions down here in South-Central Vanuatu.

We drove around to the North side of Efate close to our training village Emua and piled into two small boats for my first real excursion off the island of Efate.

A short 20 min ride later and we were across to Nguna

We jumped out into the choppy waves on shore and grabbed our bags in the steady drizzle. The thirty of us climbed up a giant hill, we climbed and climbed and climbed and when we got to the top, we realized we weren't at the top yet. Eventually we all reached the village ontop even the 72 year old volunteer who was a trooper the whole trip.

At Dominique's house we all unloaded played some frisbee, some Scrabble, some Cranium. We ate steaks and chicken wings for dinner, drank kava, a string band played that night, we all danced with the mamas and kids in the village.

The older volunteers set up camp down below the village at a clearing that was just 75 ft. from a huge cliff. The cliff dropped down to the GIANT boulders some 900 ft below. Big crashing waves and water as far as the eye could see.

In all it was a great birthday, fun, wonderful, inspiring.

Halloween was pretty great. Krissy and I had one of our friends, another Peace Corps Volunteer staying over cause there was a training in our village. So we got some candies from Jeff Rice and Krissy's family and we told the kids to come over when it was klosap dark for trick or treating. Halloween is An American Holiday, we explained, where kids get lollies if they dress up in costume and yell TRICK OR TREAT! Well, klosap dark can mean both afternoon and 4:30 in the fucking morning. So at a knock on our door before the sun had risen, I got out of bed to see what the hell was going on I opened a window and saw four kids dressed not in costumes, but in kastom (custom dress) which basically means some leaves strapped to various parts of their bodies. I started laughing my ass off as I went to get candy. Krissy told them that "You have to singout something, remember?" So in unison all the kids yelled AAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH (A kastom war cry). To which we laughed our asses off again. I then opened the door and gave them each one measly little candy pumpkin. We laughed at how they probably went home thinking "This holiday sucks, you have to wake up at the buttcrack of dawn, put on your whole kastom dress, and all you get is one measly little candy?"

Longside Work:

We met with the newly elected water/health Committee in Ekipe and have begun plans to secure water for the village. Our engineering/mechanical genius friend Phil (also a PC Volunteer in a neighboring Village) came down to go look at the water source. We didn't really know what this would entail, but 5 hours later we had hiked through heavy bush and up and down big hills. Our guides walked in front of us and cleared new paths with their machetes. When we reached the swampy mud pits that enveloped our legs up to our knees Krissy made fun of me for wearing socks and shoes when everyone else was wearing sandals. Instant Karma struck when shorty thereafter everyone with parts of their feet exposed was attacked by big black biting ants. These little fuckers bite hard, it hurts like a bee sting, and then itches tremendously for about a week. It doesn't get better, at all for an entire week. Krissy got eleven bites in all.

After getting to the source, we came up with some plans for getting water piped from up there to the village, and have now all begun the preliminary work towards that project. We surveyed all the pipe that is currently laid throughout the village and talked to some agencies regarding funding. The village has a lot of the materials necessary to start building, so in a couple weeks we will be going up and starting to build the dam and fixtures ontap.

My sports project:

I have begun Ultimate Frisbee training with the youth in our village, to fire them up and get em motivated I've told them that this youth group in Vila has already challenged them to a game. In fact I have also set up a workshop to teach Ultimate to the youth group on Dec. 1st where I will tell them that the Ekipe team is challenging them to a game. Hopefully the Aussie volunteer at this org will be able to get a team up and playing regularly. so that the first scrimmage will be good.

I also taught kickball this week which will help in getting kids accustomed to baseball rules for when we start doing that. Elijah kicked 3 Home Run's in 3 at bats (at kicks?)

Left to Right: Elijah, Terrenson, and Keven

Me and Seth, (another volunteer and Cubs fan(bastard)) are working on this sports project together. We will be doing youth development camps the next few months teaching sports and teamwork, following that we will be doing some league management and event planning workshops where we will hopefully build capacity of individuals in the rural communities to run and take ownership of these leagues. We're hopeful that this will have a number of positive effects:

Provide something to keep youth from drifting to the urban center of Port Vila by providing something exciting to do on the other side of the island,

Teach local youth leaders skills such as fundraising, promotion, and planning which can be used in lots of different avenues,

build up sports infrastructure on Efate to increase the level of play in a number of different games,

provide local opportunities for fundraising and potential tourist draws through tournaments and games,

Draw funding for infrastructure development on North Efate

We will also be having the teams engage in workshops and trainings in first aid, waste management, and others as well as doing service projects related to these areas for their communities.

I will be sending out some materials on how you can help us secure equipment and funding necessary for these projects in the future, so stay tuned and start thinking about all your old little league and high school teams that might have old bats, gloves, Catcher's gear, helmets, shoes, etc. that they'd be willing to donate. The biggest problem will probably be shipping costs but we have some strategies we'll be developing in regards to that as well.

Alright, well that's it for now.

Peace in the Middle East

Perched precariously

2007-10-26T09:59:00.000+11:00

Got a message from my guy Nick, went like this:

"Javi-

got your last couple of emails. sounds as though things are....i don't know, consistent? i still have a pretty hazy idea of how things go for you out there. specific questions on my part are probably key to understanding just what the fuck goes on in your lives at this point.

how can you even begin to paint a picture, anyway?

so, here are a few, if you have the time:

-what did you eat for breakfast?

-what do you wear on your feet?

-name 3 people, besides krissy, whom you spoke with throughout your day today?

-what time did you go to bed?

-wear did you go poop today?"

So here's my day in the life:

First there are actually two different styles of life here. Out in the village and here in Vila. They are totally different so if I just told you based on what I did today it would not accurately reflect my life here. So Each question will have a Vila answer and a village answer.

-what did you eat for breakfast?
Today like many days I did not eat breakfast, when I'm in Vila I gorge myself on unhealthy food. at around 11am (woke up at 7) I ate a Heaven Bar (Cookies & Cream Ice Cream Bar) Afta, I went to AU BON MARCHE (the local supermarket) and paid 300 vatu for a small (not small) dish of Spaghetti bolognese. In addition I ate a Tootsie roll and a Tootsie pop that Jeff Rice sent, I also ate some Big League Chew, and a handful of M & M's

village: On a normal day I usually wake up between 8-9am. well after the sun has risen. I get up from our mattress on the floor and emerge from my mosquito net covered in sweat (even though its the cold season). A slight breeze cools me down on my walk to the smolhaos (outhouse). Then I come back and spread some Peanut butter and Jelly on three Breakfast Crackers A uniquely South Pacific creation. White hearty cracker with a slghtly sweet taste. Usually there are a couple bananas involved since we almost always have a bundle of one of the many varieties in our house.

-what do you wear on your feet?
Great Question
I brought three pairs of footwear with me to Vanuatu.
Their fates:
1. My good Teva all purpose-sandals. These are sturdy velcro that I used for hiking, running, swimming, and everything else. Their drawbacks- they gave me blisters on various parts of my feet. In Vanuatu blisters are dangerous because every open sore gets infected, I've been pretty hearty and have only had 1 infected sore (on my hand). Most volunteers get many more. Maybe one per week? [Here's one from my favorite Alabaman]
The TEVA's got so worn out in 6 months that their straps came out of the bottom leather part. I recently found superglue and have repaired them, I probably will not be able to run or swim in them any more however.
2. Flip Flops: My pair of relatively cheap sandals with no straps just the normal slip ons were my favorite footwear because they did not give me blisters. One of them ripped at the fibrous toe part and is awaiting creative repair on my part.
3. Merrill Running/Hiking shoes: I bought these on our honeymoon last year in Utah.
In a long tradition of leaving things places I left them on a bus and made a Ni-Vanuatu bus driver very happy.

I now have four replacement pairs
Their current condition:
1. I bought a pair of flip flops for 150 Vatu ($1.50) These are the same kind as most of the locals wear. So I bought them to see how long a pair of $1.50 sandals would last me. The answer is one week. They too are awaiting creative repair.

2. Replacement Sandals pair number 2. I spent a little bit more and these have been adequate footwear for the past three weeks or so. Except when they get wet, then they are slippery and my feet slide off them and onto the muddy rocks, gravel, coral, or whatever I happen to be standing in at the time. Obviously these are unsuitable for swimming.

3. NEW SANDALS! Krissy's parents sent a pair in their most recent package, I am trying them out for the first time today. They seem to work out fine, but they are a little tight, so we'll see about blisters.

4. NEW SHOES! One of the guys in our group went home for his sisters wedding so I ordered a pair of Merrill water shoes and had them sent to his house. He brought them back a few weeks ago and I have been running in them and using them for swimming (You have to wear footwear when you swim or your feet will get cut on coral.) They are good but give me blisters on my Achilles Heels. And I have to wear socks as a result which sucks in this country.

-name 3 people, besides krissy, whom you spoke with throughout your day today?
In Vila most of the people I talk to here are other volunteers but here's three I spoke with today

Annie Api: Our counterpart and Village Health Worker and Neighbor in Ekipe was sitting outside the Mama's Market downtown with her daughter JoAnna. We talked about when Krissy and I would be coming back in to the village.

Michael Jones: An old guy who's in the Peace Corps with his wife. I did a Blues radio show with him last night and will be trying to get my own show when we move to Vila next year.

Margot: A Volunteer from group 18B who just left for home. Stuff with her site didn't work out and she terminated her service a few months early. She was one of the few volunteers left in John Roberts group. After his death and Margot leaving, they have 7 volunteers left from that group. They will be completing their service at the end of November.

Ekipe:

On any random day most of the people I talk to in the village will be kids. Here's three peeps that I usually talk to.

Manu: Our friend Manuel is one of the yungfala (young single guys) in our village. I usually see him at least once a day cause he lives near the phone (there's only one) and he likes to play frisbee with us.

Joy and JoAnna: Two neighbor girls

who like to come over and play games with us.

Small John: A hyper kid who always comes over to play games and look at us. (That would be a piece of metal stabbed through some leaves and stuck into his visor. FLASS!)

-what time did you go to bed?
In Vila:
I went to bed last night at about 2am after a night of dancing at CLUB VOODOO. Where they set the bar on fire any time you order the special FLAMING VOODOO DOLL shot. I fell asleep trying to watch Eragon and woke up today at 11:45 am the latest I have ever slept in Vanuatu.

In the Village:
I usually go to bed around 10:00 and depending on my brain usually go to sleep before the first roosters crow. Sometimes I stay up for the second roosters crow. And once or twice I've been awake all the way through to the Third Roosters crow which precedes sunrise by about 10 min.

-where did you go poop today?
Today I pooped in the Peace Corps office. There is a real toilet here, with a plastic seat and it flushes, so I was very happy to do so.

In the Village: I don't poop. I've trained my body to take a crap once a week. But when I have to I use our Smalhaos. Which is a bunch of sticks with leaves as walls, a tarp as a door. The toilet is a large cement slab that forms up ino a bowl shape. On the sides of the ground you can see where dirt has fallen into the pit and the toilet looks precarious as if the whole thing could fall in at any moment. Let's hope that doesn't happen.

First Projects

2007-10-18T12:27:00.000+11:00

Blog Oct. 17

Sorry. I read Brandon’s comment and realized that I haven’t actually told you all what I’m doing, or what it’s like here. I guess that’s the point of this thing.

So here’s one problem. I’ve adjusted.
Things that before surprised, amazed, astonished me; They’re normalized, I’m used to them. So my point is, if you think of questions that you want to ask please ask away. I’ll answer them as best I can.

Longside work:
Krissy and I have been at site for 2 months. It seems like a lot longer. Peace Corps Volunteers are supposed to enculture themselves into their communities for the first 3 months. We’re not really supposed to start working on projects until after three months, but yeah, that’s not gonna happen. First of all we’ll only be in Ekipe for 1 year as opposed to most other volunteers who’ll be at their sites for 2 years. And on top of it Krissy is an ass-kickin, driven, goal oriented worker. I’ve never seen anyone like it, so trying to convince her to hold off and wait is a futile effort.
After about 2 weeks we started a Community Census and Needs Assessment. These are tools to help us learn the village and also to help the village learn about themselves. The Village Health Worker, Krissy, and I went around to all the families in the village. Krissy designed a cartoon visual aid to represent all the possible projects that we could help with in our time in Ekipe. 95% of the Village was united in selecting water projects as the primary need for the village. So we have our work cut out for us. The census told us that there are around 350 people in the village. Over 40% of whom are under the age of 12.
Last weekend Krissy and I ran our first collaborative project. It was pretty cool to work on something so closely and directly. We always discussed theoretically how good of a team we make, Krissy working in Health and I in Education and Youth. But this is the first time we have ever fully teamed up with equal responsibility. I helped a little bit with her Captain Condom program in LaX,
and she has given me lots of guidance and support for various projects I was heading up, but teaming up directly was exciting and encouraging. The project is called PACA- Participatory Analysis for Community Action and it’s a Peace Corps standard. Kind of a preliminary workshop to get your community prepped and open to work together towards Sustainable Development.
So we got together on our third try, two previous attempts were met with cancellations due to our Chief not being in town, and not enough people showing up. One of the bubu’s (grandpa’s) in the village helped us get people to the workshop in a creative way. He pulled out a scimitar, yes a scimitar, a pointy Arabic sword, not a bush knife/ machete (which would’ve been normal) and walked around to the houses shouting
“YU! YU KAM LO WAN WOKSOP HIA, YU NO STAP WITIM PIKININI, YU NO STAP MEKEM KAEKAE, YU KAM NAO” (Which translated means: Hey you get your ass over here to this workshop, quit playing with kids and making food, come here now)
So shortly thereafter we began our games and icebreakers which everyone loved. The laughing and clapping and cheering quickly caused our workshop population to triple. Over all we probably had about 60 people attend at least some of the workshop.
We presented our findings from the census and the needs assessment and led 4 projects: Community Mapping, Seasonal Calendar, Village Timeline, and Resource Appraisal. The villagers were enthusiastic and supportive, and the workshop was a great success.

From the workshop, all of us in Ekipe came to a clear understanding about what our needs are. Everyone wants us to help secure safe, regular access to piped drinking water.
In addition I have been asked by the chief to storian with some of the olfalas in our village and create a Village History book that each church can get a copy of.
These are two of the projects that are focused solely on our village. There are a number of others with a different scope and focus. Next week the village Health Worker Training for our province is being held in Ekipe, and I am teaching the new group of trainees in 20B how to run a Camp BILD and Camp GLOW (Boys in Leadership Development and Girls Leading Our World).

So, are you sorry you asked? There’s a lot more, but I’ll update other projects as I can.
This blog is going to be updated infrequently but thoroughly each time.
Hope this clears up a little bit what kind of stuff we’re working on.
Love
Javi and Krissy

Supposed to be.

2007-09-23T17:50:00.000+11:00

* I remember reading a recommendation from a friend who had served in the Peace Corps. She suggested that you bring a lot of good books with you. That the most important thing you could bring was really good books. Initially to read, and then, to trade with other Peace Corps Volunteers. At the time this caused my right eyebrow to raise slightly. My left traveled in the opposite direction. The corner of my mouth went up a little bit and I found myself with a disapproving sneer upon my face. I thought: "You're supposed to be helping people with AIDS, and helping without AIDS from getting it. You're supposed to be forming friendships that will make people reconsider their hasty judgment of Americans, and learning new languages. What do you need books for when you have the Arabian Sea, why do you need books when there are monkeys 100 yards from your hut, why do you need books when there are a bunch of kids playing soccer over there. I mean, Jesus, look at them, they're playing barefoot, with a coconut for a ball!
Well…I have now been in the Peace Corps for about 5 months. I've finished 16 books. I don't know what the average American's book reading rate per month is, but I know mine, and it certainly is not 3/month. Granted, back home I read comic books almost exclusively (magazines too), but the only time in my life I could say I've read three books in one month (adult books, not the Hardy Boys when I was 13, or the BabySitters Club when I was 12(for shame, how did I ever turn out straight?) was in college where a crazy prof. who didn't show up for class for the first two months (But inexplicably kept leaving notes on the door every Tuesday and Thursday that she would not be in that day) finally showed up with half the semester gone & told us that we would not be adjusting the syllabus and we would have to read all the books as well as write reviews for them. And the only reason I read the books and did the work, instead of bitch and moan, and complain about the workload was because I had already flunked English 150 and was re-taking it to replace the F (that and the books she assigned were really good (the best of which was The Things They Carried-Tim O'Brien).
Anyway. Now…now 3 books a month is the rate at which I read books. My average over 5 months. Yeah so my point is sorry for the sneer. The Peace Corps isn't what I thought it'd be. Well that's not true. All those things I expected my friend was neglecting while reading books? Turns out you do all those things by dinner time. Then the sun goes down, and unless you're ok with going to sleep at 7:56pm, you gotta do something. No electricity, equals books. In one of the more frustrating Catch 22's I've faced, the supply of books is extremely limited during the one time in my life where I've become an avid reader. So when we Peace Corps Vanuatu volunteers see a book that we'd like to read we immediately snatch it and hide it away from the other volunteers so that no one else can take it first. We've actually had books stolen out of mailboxes by other volunteers. Desperate for entertainment.

*I had another friend who was in the Peace Corps. She put me on her email list and I got monthly updates accompanied by plaintive requests to send her stuff- anything, postcards, letters, packages, emails, anything. At the time I was bartending to make up for the deficiencies in my Americorps living allowance & a guy who came in to the bar who also knew this girl, and was also on her email list would occasionally bring her up in those notorious bartender- drinker conversations that fill bad jokes and propel crime-noir from one scene to the next. Usually he would kind of dismissively roll his eyes and suggest that she wasn't worth his attention. But one night (maybe he had one extra Vodka-Red Bull, or an extra shot of Sambuca) all this pent up anger that had apparently been building in him overflowed and was released in my presence. He ranted that she was an insensitive-uncultured priss, she was supposed to be over there helping people, learning from them, loving them, spreading international peace and goodwill, yet all she could do was send emails about how much partying she was doing, and how people smelled bad, and how she had to piss and shit in a hole in the ground, and "oh its so hard being me". Spittle flicking out he slurred "Duh dumbfuck, that's why it's the Third World and none of us want to go there! You chose to go there to help, so the least you could do is not bitch about how awful it is. I didn't sign up for your fucking email list to be told how awful it is from your unique perspective. The least you could do is provide some inspiration in my boring day at work, but no, instead I get some pile of shit saying how it sucks to eat beans and rice for every meal." Ok, well, I'm paraphrasing, and he was drunk, and this was two years ago, but that was the spirit of it…So I'll try to stop talking about all the stuff that I miss, and how bad people smell.

P.S. I would really love a pepperoni pizza and a Spotted Cow. If anyone could send these via email, I think they would still be safe to eat in three weeks. (I'd eat them even if they weren't safe.)

P.P.S. So I guess the whole point of these stories is that conceptions of what Peace Corps is "supposed to be" just really doesn't jive with "the reality on the ground." So throw out your hopelessly misguided notions and accept my words as gospel.