Day Two on the Island

After sleeping for almost twelve hours, I awoke to discover that my iPhone has finally gotten onto Micronesian time. I was no longer in the United States of America, and even my phone had to acknowledge this.

Internet access here is rather limited. At the moment, I’m only able to have access to contact with people back home through Facebook or Messenger or Line when I’m in the team room at the hotel. The college set us up with a Wi-Fi hotspot, and it’s pretty efficient, but it’s a huge shift in the ways you communicate when you’re 19 hours ahead of the people you’re trying to talk to and you only have a few moments each day to get a little bit of a sense of home.

We decided to go shopping this morning, only to discover that lots of places are closed on Sunday. The church—well, the churches, since there are many here—has a strong influence over people in the islands. We did manage to locate three different stores that were open, each of them offering a somewhat different experience. The first was ostensibly a grocery store. Almost everyone stocked upon water since we’ve been discouraged from drinking the water from the faucets (a different strain of E. coli to worry about, apparently). I also purchased a bar of soap to replace the ones provided by the hotel that happened to be covered with mold (no doubt from not being used for several months of humid weather) and, for good measure, some Filipino chocolate. The chocolate was pitched into a garbage can after a couple of tastes—just terrible. By the way, if you find yourself in a grocery store on an island in the South Pacific, be sure you check the expiration dates. Such dates seem to be more like suggestions here, and it took a while to find any chocolate that wasn’t at least three months beyond the “Best Before” date.

The next stop seemed to be another grocery store, except this time we had stumbled into a co-op that offered food, clothing, artwork (wooden carvings, mostly), and assorted other odds and ends. I picked up a couple of t-shirts (one for myself, one for The Boyfriend), and I took another shot at a snack, purchasing a package of milk arrowroot “biscuits” made in Fiji. The biscuits (cookies, really) were quite good. The t-shirts were okay, too.

Our final shopping experience occurred at what appeared to be a general store crammed to the ceiling with just about everything except food. If you’ve ever wondered about the ubiquity of American culture, go to a store like this one. Disney, World Wrestling Federation, Marvel—you name it, it was here. There was also a bin with DVDs and CDs, many of them used, including the soundtrack to To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar, not a CD I would have expected to find in the Federated States of Micronesia. I didn’t purchase anything at this third store, but the rest of the team seemed fascinated by the rolling papers available here.

Lunch was at a lovely ramen place located on the edge of a river. The views were spectacular, of course, and we got to watch a rainstorm pass through the area. The owners are of Japanese and French descent, and the food was delicious. I had the miso ramen, and we all shared a couple of crepes, both with bananas (which are amazing here), one with chocolate, the other with honey. You wouldn’t perhaps expect a great ramen noodle shop on a small island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, but it’s apparently a favorite of the locals as well. We even met one of the vice presidents of the college we’re visiting there. I took lots of pictures there; you could even climb onto the roof of the structure to get a better view.

I think what’s most noticeable about the island is the lushness of the landscape. Even though Pohnpei has been suffering from a drought, there’s green everywhere. Lots of banana plants and palm trees and so many, many flowering trees and shrubs—it’s quite beautiful. It’s my first experience with a truly tropical climate.

After a quick stop at the hotel, during which I washed my face again, we were off to our cruise. It was originally scheduled to begin at 5 p.m. but was moved up to 3 p.m. No one ever seemed to know why, but it turned out to be a good idea after all when the sun disappeared behind a cloud bank at about 5:30 p.m. After we arrived at the Pohnpei Surf Club, we were greeted by our captain, a Brazilian who has spent the past thirteen years living on the island, making a living taking people out on cruises like ours but also taking groups out for scuba diving and fishing. He seems to have a very simple, rather uncomplicated life, and he seemed like a very happy guy overall.

We took a spin around the lagoon leading into the Pacific Ocean, a lagoon of about 80 acres, by the way, so just a tiny little body of water. We anchored near a coral reef close to an island that had been occupied by the Japanese during World War II and which, apparently, still has some relics from that era. We didn’t go onto the island, of course, since the boat wouldn’t have been able to navigate through the reef and because most of the islands surrounding Pohnpei seem to be privately owned. Still, it was a lovely place to sit and relax and talk for a while and enjoy a beer or two. Our tour guide/captain also cracked open a series of chilled coconuts for us to enjoy the milk and the meat. He used a substantial machete to chop the top off of the coconut, a much simpler method than the one I tried back in California when I followed a YouTube tutorial to crack one open for The Boyfriend and me. The juice was delicious, and the coconut meat, while not as sweet as what you’re accustomed to in America, was nevertheless quite good.

 

There are sunken and half-sunken ships throughout the lagoon, and there are some ships that have been confiscated because they’ve been involved in illegal fishing. That’s rather peculiar since it’s seems like almost every kind of behavior on the island seems okay. We’ve been here two days, and I have yet to see a police officer. Getting back to the ships—many are just rusting in the lagoon. Some have been abandoned due to the death of the owner or some other reason. Now they just float or lie there with no one to claim them. It’s pretty disheartening to think that they will just become a part of the ecosystem, which doesn’t really need junk like this.

I asked our skipper about the name of his boat. He shrugged and said he just tells people that it’s the Pohnpei Surf Club pink boat. And that it is.

By the time we returned to shore, I had been sprayed with so much sea water that I could no longer feel dry, but I could still taste the salt. I had to have a shower when we got back to the hotel because the salt spray had started to make my skin itch. Before that happened, though, we had dinner at the Mangrove Bay Bar, which overlooks the lagoon and offers very large drinks for just $5. The bar is apparently famous for its sushi, and I did sample it (not bad, really), but I chose a grilled chicken salad from a neighboring restaurant that delivers to the bar for those patrons like myself and another member of the team who are not particularly sushi-eating types.

Back at the hotel, I posted a few pics on Facebook, texted The Boyfriend (who was probably asleep since it was after midnight back in California), and transferred more than 300 pictures to my laptop to make room for tomorrow’s photo opportunities.