Love Vanuatu

Vanuatu is an easy country to love. I think it is, anyway. In a lot of ways, I feel like this last year in Peace Corps is like a victory lap. I've found somewhere I love, somewhere I feel comfortable and happy and at peace, where there's just the right amount of challenge and then lots and lots of rewards to make up for it.

I'm thinking a lot about my future and about where I want to go from here. I am not going to stay in Vanuatu. Three and a half years is a long time to be away from my family, and I do think that the longer you stay in Vanuatu, the harder it is to leave. That means now, it's time to roll on out. It's June 6th today over here (happy birthday, Ben!) and I'm going to be leaving in approximately ... eight and a half months. WHAT. HOW IS THIS EVEN HAPPENING.

I think if I'd closed my service and gone back home in December, I would have felt more conflicted about it. Having stayed on now an extra six months, with another eight to go, I feel really ready. It'll be sad to leave, but I think (or I hope) that I'll have a good sense of closure. It'll be time to head out and do something else. 

Until then, time to enjoy myself, work hard, drink lots of kava, swim in the ocean, drink my weight in coconut water, and keep on going.

Updates from Tongariki

I talked to my friend Elsie a few days ago. I think I’ve brought her up a lot on this blog—she is Tongariki’s headmistress-slash-my favorite friend. I got a good update from her on what the situation is like on Tongariki.

Mostly, it’s a lot better. The NZ Army put new iron roofs up on the school. They rebuilt the kindy, and our new water tank is being put up next week(thank you, Aus Aid!). Most of the houses are back up. The gardens are growing. Some of the three month vegetables, like Chinese cabbage, are already ready to eat.

The sad news is that there was a death. A little boy named David had to be helicoptered off of the island after the cyclone. He spent a month in the hospital in Vila, and he died. His mother, father, and siblings were with him in Vila the whole time.

The good news is that the community is getting ready to have a really big wedding. My old neighbor, John Lorry, is getting married to his fiancee, Esther. They’re going to do it towards the end of the month. Hopefully I’ll be in Vila before they get married, because I’d like to send a bottle of something for their party. It's good life is getting back to normal.

PAAMA DRAMA

I went to Paama last week on a big trip with my lovely friend Sam, my lovely counterparts Abelson and Sylveste, and the project officer from Malampa province. (Ahem.) The idea was that we were going to do joint disability/disaster awareness programs around Paama and set up Community Disaster Committees on the way. It was a partnership between TVET (which supports technical and vocational education training) and the Malampa Disaster Office. TVET did all of the logistics of the trip and we shared the budget. 

Day 1: We flew on Belair Airways to Paama. The airport is in north Paama, in this village called Tavie. We got on a boat, since the cyclone ruined the road and it's not been totally fixed up yet. Dropped off Abelson, Sylveste, and Lapi at the provincial guesthouse in Liro, which is the main hub on Paama. There wasn't enough space there for all of us, so Sam and I stayed with her host family in Tahi, a village maybe 25 minutes walk away. Around 2, we had a meeting with the Area Council. There is a big dispute going on in Tahi, and there are now two competing disaster committees. Oy. After the meeting, Sam and I walk back to Tahi, we drink kava, try to eat a nice dinner of beef, fail, go to sleep.

Day 2: We go to Lulep, on east Paama. My friend Kelly used to live out there, and now there's a new volunteer, Stewart, really nice guy. The walk doesn't take SO long in terms of hours -- like an hour forty-five -- but we're literally walking up to the top of the hill and then walking down again. By the time I got to Lulep, I was dreading walking back. I got a great picture of Lopevi, but since I plugged my camera to charge in my counterpart's computer and it's full of viruses, pikja i lus. Lulep doesn't look so great, but it doesn't look so bad, either. Their school lost its roof, so they're teaching under tarpaulins, but they've put all of the houses back up, and things are getting green again. We did our awareness program, which went pretty well, and in the afternoon, we did a little program to formally record their disaster committee. Half of our squad sprinted up the hill without saying goodbye, so Sam and I walked to Liro to have a small meeting, then back to Tahi. Her host dad made this spectacular chicken curry for dinner, but I was absolutely exhausted. Props to Kelly for doing that walk every single Friday while on Paama. 

Day 3: We went to Vaoleli and Vutekai in the south, by boat. Vaoleli had a nice attendance, and we did our program and set up committees in their market house. Vutekai had an ENORMOUS attendance because we caught them right after they'd had two other meetings, so it was like a captive audience.

Day 4: Like I said earlier, there is a dispute in Tahi. This caused a lot of problems, and we got ourselves caught up in some of them. We did end up doing a disability awareness and a minimal disaster awareness, but we had to change our program. We intend to go back to Paama in October, and hopefully Tahi will only have one disaster committee instead of two. We had a big community lunch afterwards, and Sam and I spent the afternoon hanging out with Megan and Stewart, the two Paama volunteers. (Megan lives in this subvillage called Noe. No! It's my favorite thing.) We had kava and Sam's host parents baked pig and kumala for her departure. It was really, really nice of them. Her family is so sweet. It's her mom and dad, a teenage brother named Cooper, a ten year old named Jamie, after a previous Peace Corps (and small Jamie is smart/sweet/a really good kid), and a little girl in kindy named either Dela or Taylor, who is super sweet, very verbal, and very strong head. It was really nice.

Day 5: Flew back to Malekula. We only barely got on the plane. Check in was at 7, we got there at 8, the plane landed at 8:05. Once we got back to Malekula, I felt absolutely bush whacked. I spent the morning just sitting around. Sam came over and we made tacos, then that night we had a little kava. I was so tired!

Paama trip was really fun, over all, and I'm really glad I got to see a new part of Vanuatu. It was our first really big overnight trip, and I was really glad to work more with Abelson and Sylveste. They're both really good guys. I was reflecting on this earlier, and, for all of our flaws, I truly believe that we run the best provincial disaster office. We go out, we do programs, we work well together -- It's a good thing.

Provincial Center Problems

Living in a provincial center is pretty sweet. I can't go to to yoga or to a swimming pool, but I had French fries and eggs for lunch at Lakatoro's newest restaurant on Monday. That's not half bad. I can always charge my electronics, I can always buy kava, and as of February 15, my water now runs 24 hours a day. SUCCESS.

I do have some minor whingey complaints, that, even as I think of them, strike me as hilarious. They're the Peace Corps-equivalent of saying 'but I don't even like my pony'. The response being, 'dang, you have a horse?' 

1. The bakery in Lakatoro had its oven malfunction! So ... no more bread!!! This is terrible because the bread at Consumer is the greatest bread ever, and local bread can really vary in its quality. For the past week and a half, I haven't been able to eat any, and you know I like my carbs. (For context: on Tongariki, we used to eat bread at Christmas, as a special celebration.)

2. Lately when I've been going out to Tautu or Norsup to drink kava at night, it seems like there are no trucks that leave at convenient times and I'm always waiting like 1/2 an hour for a truck. (Context: yo, on Tongariki, I sometimes waited days for ships. And yet, the 1/2 an hour is still bugging me. I'm getting soft.)

3. The fresh fish that they sell by the market tends to stink up my fridge. (I have a fridge! And ... fresh fish!!)

4. The butchery is always out of mince when I'm craving a burger. (Seriously -- listen to that. What is wrong with me?)

5. Not enough island cabbage! (This one is my own fault.)

What I do with myself

On a normal day, I get up around 6:00 or 6:30. I like to pretend that I'm going to exercise, and if it's sunny, I go for a jog around the football field or jump rope or do yoga at the house. I usually make a pretty big breakfast--something like pancakes, or fried banana or sweet potato. My mom gave me a mini French press for Christmas, and I use it daily. After two years on Tongariki, drinking luke warm or cold instant coffee with powdered milk, hot real coffee with real milk is still wonderful. I like to putz around, straightening the house, listening to podcasts, or I watch an episode of a TV show. I shower with my beautiful shower (running water!!!) and head out the door some time around 8:15 or 8:45.

I get to work about 5 minutes after I leave my house. What I do in the mornings really depends on what we have going on. Some days I have a lot of work to do, as far as getting reports done, or making plans for awareness trips, or working to develop new presentation materials. Some days, I really don't have anything to do, and I go to work in case anything comes up. When there's nothing to do, I read a book or a magazine and hang out in case there's anything going on. Some mornings (like today) I sneak over to the provincial headquarters and use their internet to check Facebook and emails.

Around 11:30 I leave work. Usually I head to the market to see what there is to see. Sometimes the market is great, with lots of fruits, vegetables, shellfish, crabs, and eggs. Sometimes there's not much there. It's always the luck of the draw, so I try to go every day. I like to keep my house really stocked with fruits and vegetables, because I'm trying to live a healthier life style. On Tongariki, I felt like it was feast or famine as far as fresh greens and fruits went. Either there were none available, or I ate six mango at a time.

After the market, I go home and cook lunch. My lifestyle in Lakatoro feels very civilized, especially since I have a two hour lunch break. That gives you enough time to go shopping, meet a friend, cook, read a book, do some chores ... Whatever needs to be done in the middle of the day. Whenever another Peace Corps is passing through Lakatoro, it's nice to go get lunch with them at one of the stalls, or at least, just hang out for a while and chat and eat an ice cream.

Around 1:30. I head back to the office. It's the same as in the morning. Some days, we have work to do; some days, we don't. I usually head out of work around 4:00 or 4:30, depending on whether or not we're busy. I go home, get my house cleaned up a bit, and figure out what I'm going to do in the afternoon.

If I'm not going to drink kava, and I haven't exercised in the morning, the afternoon is a nice time. It used to be my favorite time to go jogging, but because I live by myself and I like to be back in my house before it's dark, I can't usually jog and drink kava in the same day. If I'm going out for kava by myself, I either go meet up with a friend at a nakamal in Lakatoro, or I head out to see a friend in one of the neighboring villages. If I go to Tautu, usually I just sleep there, but when I go to Norsup, I need to find a truck back at night.

Whatever happens, if I end up at home, I cook myself something and go to bed. When I first came to Malekula, I was eating lots of fried sweet potato and soups. Lately, I've been trying to be a bit more adventurous with cooking and jazz things up a bit. At any rate, I'm usually in bed by about 8:30 or 9. (Yes, I've come to realize that I sleep like 9 or 10 hours a day. It's my favorite thing. Maybe that's why I feel so content in Vanuatu--SUCH AN INCREDIBLE AMOUNT OF DOWNTIME MULTIPLIED BY 10 HOURS OF SLEEP A NIGHT.)

Awareness in Laravat and Vinmavis

Yesterday my office conducted climate change, disaster, and waste management awareness sessions in West Malekula, in Laravat and Vinmavis villages.


This map comes from the OGCIO (Office of the Government Chief Information Officer) website. If you look at the west, you'll see a village called Lambumbu. Lambubu is like a company town, with a big cacao plantation. Nearby is the village of Laravat, where we conducted our first awareness. 

We organized the talk through a teacher at Lambubu school, Miller. Miller's really great. He let everyone know we were coming, and in a village of about 200 people (counting kids), we had about 45 people come. Considering that it was in the morning, when kids were at school and many people wanted to go work in the garden, I consider this an absolute success.

 [It was about a 45 minute drive from Lakatoro, made a little longer by the fact that it was muddy and had been raining all night. We went with this driver from Vinmavis called Bill. Carrying a laptop that doesn't have a battery (and must therefore be plugged into power at all times), a generator, a regulator, a projector, and a few posters.

[The community hall we used. Sorry the photos are bad--the lighting was weird and I'm not good at correcting things.]

[Laravat was a very pretty village. It was extremely clean, for a start. The houses were mostly made of local material, like you see in the front--braided strips of bamboo.]

[Syl is in the green shirt, Abelson is in the blue.]

[Somehow, Abelson only ever gets photos of me from the back. But enjoy my super patriotic outfit! Christmas 2013 from Mami Esther.]

I felt that Laravat actually went really smoothly. We started off by talking about climate change--what it is, how it is impacting Vanuatu, and practical ways people can adapt to it. Then I gave a really short toktok about waste management. Usually I give a first aid toktok, and waste is separate, but I'm trying to refocus the talks back towards disaster. My basic message was about the whole (disaster = hazard x vulnerability) thing, so how there are little water, hygiene, and sanitation things that people can do to improve the resiliency of their village. Keep pit toilets far from underground wells and other water sources. Don't leave rubbish all about. Stop burning plastics. Et cetera. Then we finished by explaining what to do during floods, cyclones, and earthquakes, since those are the three hazards that affect Laravat. Afterwards, we got a bunch of good questions about what developed countries are doing to limit climate change, and if greenhouse gas emissions are increasing or decreasing now. Close with a word of prayer, and at about 11:30 we got driving again.

We reached Vinmavis around 1:15. Vinmavis is actually not very far away from Laravat at all, but the road to Vinmavis is in poor condition, so the truck couldn't go very quickly. (We also made a pit stop at the Bible College to buy fish, so that was a little detour.) It was very bumpy. When we got there, Abelson, Sylveste and I had lunch with Sylveste's  auntie. Abelson and I had bought strong biscuits, cookies, tin tuna, and juice in Lakatoro, but Sylveste wanted to eat rice instead, so he had his auntie cook us some, and we'll keep the biscuits for later. We hung out until about 2:30, then started to set stuff up.

I didn't feel like our awareness in Vinmavis went very well. I think the difference is that in Laravat, I went through a key member of the community, but in Vinmavis, we just sent a letter announcing our arrival. At around 3:30, Sylveste's auntie, who is the nurse at the dispensary, and I went around to try and drum people up. Vinmavis is a big village--about 500 people--and we had really bad attendance. We had about 25 people show up total. We weren't aware that Wan Smol Bag had recently gone through to give a presentation as well, and all in all it was a bit of a wash.

[Local houses in Vinmavis.]

[Also very clean!]

[Picture with a few people]

We got back to Lakatoro about 7:30 p.m. Overall, I was pretty happy, but I definitely want us to talk about lessons learned. I think Abelson, Syl and I have gotten a really tight, interesting presentation together. Our first awareness toktok took about 3 1/2 hours, and that's way too long for anyone. The presentation in Laravat was about an hour and forty-five minutes, counting questions, and the one in Vinmavis was about two and a half, with the last forty-five minutes being a video show about disasters and climate change. So I don't think we need to change the format much. I do think we need to think about best practices for advertising awareness, though, so that we get good attendance.

Speaking of which--I have noticed a pattern. We get very good attendance in most smaller communities, and they seem to be more excited and invested in our arrival. Our worst attendance tends to come from larger communities, where people aren't as interested. They are less tight-knit, and also not particularly interested in having strangers come in.

Yo it's all okay

Sometimes I need to chill and remember that this is still Vanuatu. I reread the last post, and while those are obviously real complaints ... It is how it is. I think the most important thing in Vanuatu is not to have crazy expectations. In fact, have no expectations. If you go into it with an open mind and an open heart, you can face anything. If you go in thinking that things have to be a certain way, you're going to have a bad, bad, bad time. You have to be friendly and more outgoing that you feel comfortable with, and see where it all leads.

I'm trying to say yes to everything that doesn't seem terrible and just see where it leads me. So far, it seems to be working out well as a strategy. Like the other day: I've been trying to get to know one of my neighbors better. I was walking down to the store to buy bread, I saw the wife, and asked her if she wanted to drink some kava. She said yes, since kava is considered something of a medicine and she wasn't feeling top knotch. So I got a plastic at the nakamal -- and we hung out for four hours, including going to get more kava, and her giving me dinner, and then inviting me to go with the family to this big community event in Norsup village on Friday. It'll be Catholic mass, lap lap, skits, kava, and cake -- those are all my favorite things. I love parties. But just like -- if I hadn't been like, hey auntie, want to do suchandsuch? She never would have asked me to do anything either.

Or another example. This morning my friend Kelsey and I were talking about how last month we took this spontaneous trip to Uripiv island. We were supposed to go with our friend Jon, who's good friends with this family that owns a store, but then he couldn't go, but we still wanted to. We showed up, told Trelly and his wife that we wanted to go weekend on Uripiv, and they were like, YES, of course, come!! We went over on a boat, had kava and dinner with them, slept in their daughter's house, and made breakfast with them before the cyclone warning hit and everything went to hell. But we had a beautiful afternoon and we're all friends now. It never would have happened if we hadn't just pushed a little bit out of our comfort zone.