Final Words

Eleven days. Add one for travel time, and in twelve days, I will be "home."

In these final days, I feel a huge hole in my heart forming as Pohnpei slips through my fingers. "So... when are you leaving?" is undoubtedly followed by "So...when will you be back?" I have to say, each time, "I honestly don't know." Part of me wants to say, "at the end of the summer!" "January!" "Next May!" and tell that to enough people that I am forced to make it come true... but to do that would be misleading and unfair.

The truth is that I do not know what lies ahead. I can't even say what I will be doing at this time next month. I have no job, no definitive plans for continued education, and little direction in terms of a career path. Last month at this time, that sounded pretty exciting. Oh, the opportunities that lie ahead! Now, as it seems more and more likely that I will be taking a waitressing job for a few months, it seems silly and reckless. Why am I leaving this place that I love? This place where I have made a life for myself? This place that needs me as much as I need it? These people that I love?

And then I remember. There are people that I love in another place, who have been patiently waiting two years for me to return home. My mom, who has been faithful with a long, loving email and phone call at least once a week, often more (once during the tsunami scare, about 15 in one week). My brother, who traveled 7500 miles and spent thousands of dollars at Christmas, to travel to Pohnpei, just to see me. My aunts and Gram, whose cards and care packages of sweets, body wash, and stuffed animals keep me going on hard days. My cousins, uncles, and my dad, who never say much, but have made a point to say, "We can't wait for you to come home." My roommates from college, who will be my rocks of strength upon my return, who beg for Skype calls, but humbly resign to the fact that they, along with everyone else, come in second to my mom. My friends from John Carroll, my mentors, and the many other friends I have picked up along the way. These are the reasons I am leaving.

I imagine if I could say all of that, everyone would understand. But instead, for the most part, they see the tears well in my eyes, and that's enough for them. I am enveloped in a hug and nothing more needs said.

At the 2011 Commencement Exercise of Our Lady of Mercy Catholic High School, following the awarding of diplomas to our seven graduating seniors (kamwaramwar), I was given a certificate and t-shirt by my co-worker and my principal, which set the tears steadily flowing. I struggled to regain composure, failed, and delivered a short speech with tears running down my cheeks.

Here are my "Final Words"

"Today is one of our last times to be together as a whole school community, and so, to the parents and other guests who have joined us today, I hope you will not mind if I take this opportunity to say a few words to my family.

I often think that people we have loved and who have loved us become part of us – and we carry them around all the time, whether we see them or not. And in some way, we are the sum total of those who have loved us, and those we have given ourselves to.

Today, I need to say thank you to these people who have loved me and who I have loved. In less than two weeks, I will leave Pohnpei, and I cannot say with any certainty if or when I will come back – if or when I will see some of you ever again. It is sad to say, but life works in that way – there are as many closed doors as those opened, as many goodbyes as hellos.

But there is one thing I can say for certain: I am changed forever by knowing you. For the rest of my life, I will carry you with me, in my heart and in my memories.

I will remember every raised hand, every “Good Morning, Ms. Cocco!”, every smile, every “Ohsa!” when I assign homework.

I will remember every after-school conversation in the computer lab or classroom, every hug and “Hi Teacher!”, every time I was sad and you made me feel hopeful.

I will remember my Pohnpeian language lessons, especially your patience with my silly questions.

I will remember every flower behind every ear, every missing pencil, every bird that flew through the classroom during my lesson, every dance and every song. I won’t remember the bad things – only that which makes me smile.

I may have taught you how to multiply polynomials, approximate square roots, and graph parabolic functions, but really, today, I need to say “thank you” for being my teachers. You have taught me so much; more than anything I could have taught to you.

You have taught me to be understanding, forgiving, and patient – with you and also with myself.

You have taught me to slow down – you have said, “Samantha, kommoal!” and “Ke dehr doadoahk laud” and “Ms. Cocco, stop working! Kohdo mwenge!” You have reminded me of what is important.

The mistakes I have made are many. At times, I have expected too much of you. I have scolded you when you did not deserve it. I have been distant or rude when you have tried to show me that you care about me. For these things, I am sorry. I have not been perfect. But you have taught me that this is okay.

Many years from now, I will forget some names and faces. But I will always remember how you made me feel – loved, welcomed, and part of this OLMCHS family. Part of Pohnpei. On June 6, I will leave knowing that I will always have a home in Pohnpei. For this, I say: Gracias [Spanish], Kinisou chapur [Chuukese], Aisha hashikashik [Woleaian spelled very, very wrong!], Salamat po [Tagalog], and Kalahngan ong kupwuromwail [Pohnpeian]. Thank you."

Moving Sands

April 22, 2011, 6:20am

Pisar – the island of change. Its name in Chuukese, “pi sar” means “moving sand.” It is remarkable how fitting I have found this name to be, physically. Everything looks different than ten and a half months ago when I last visited these sands. The drop-off point that we ran towards at full-speed, face-planting into the ocean, is much less dramatic (and, presumably, less fun). The southern shore at high tide is different, narrower, and at low tide, a surprisingly lengthy sandy peninsula suddenly appears. The flies have multiplied by the thousands and have an affinity for my toes.

How am I to feel? Last June, Pisar promised me nothing and everything. In one way, I suppose, Pisar doesn’t owe me a thing. By this, I mean that I fully understand that Pisar is an island. An island, in its very nature, being a mass composed of sand, a matter infinitesimal in size and multitude, must undergo dramatic change with each day’s tide. But in another light, Pisar owes me the world: knowing I would be back within the year, and knowing what  Pisar meant for me that summer, I knew what I wanted, what I expected Pisar to look like, to smell like, to give me this year.

And if I were to return next summer, would I not feel the same pull? A resigned joy at its having stayed the same is juxtaposed by a wistful nostalgia of the discovery of how it has changed. I have felt this pull in the nature of our retreat thus far, as well. We did community affirmations at the end last year, and this year, we were finished with them by the second night. Last year, the first day was in silence – this year, it will be the third. In my mind I have cried, That’s not how I remember it! That’s not what I expected!

And so it will be for me in a mere month and a half. The world I once knew and its people, smells, taste, sounds, and joys, is every changing. Its sands are ever moving with the tides of each new day.

And yet. I sit here imagining it, expecting it to look quite the same as it did when I left it in July 2009. In my anxious and longing mind, my relationships will pick up where I left them. My favorite foods, smells, and sounds will affect my senses in the same wonderful way they did when they became my favorites. And more than anything, I have operated by the misconception that I will not have changed. At “home,” two years ago, I was Samantha. When I plucked myself out of that “home” and moved 7500 miles West to discover a new name for “home,” Pohnpei, I became Ms. Cocco, Samenda, or Saman. And now I will travel 7500 miles East and I expect to find Samantha once again. And in part, yes, I will still be Samantha. But I will also be, for all time, Ms. Cocco, Samenda, and Saman. These identities have merged.

And what of my discovery that, as have the sands of Pisar, everything has changed? I may feel confused, betrayed, frustrated, and angry.

And yet. As there is comfort to be found in the unchanged, the stagnant, the  sameness, there is also great consolation in admitting that nothing worth loving can ever stay the same. In admitting such powerlessness in the face of time, we can find healing. We can accept what is now, not what was then, and search for goodness.

Everything changes, but does not necessarily fall apart, unless we allow it to do so. We’ve all heard Stevie Nicks lament, Well, I’ve been afraid of changing…the landslide brought me down. Can we alter this image? I would like to no longer imagine a terrifying, life-threatening wall of land at the hands of gravity that brings us change, but rather, in the theme of my Micronesian home, the tide. Listen this morning, and Pisar will tell you a little something about how the tide transforms…

The ‘swish’ as the water gently washes over the sands. The ‘swosh’ as gravity softly drains the water from the sand. The ‘swish’ as the water gently washes over the sands. The ‘swosh’ as gravity softly drains the water from the sand. The ‘swish’ as the water gently washes over the sands. The ‘swosh’ as gravity softly drains the water from the sand.

This exchange is anything but alarming. The great Pacific lives up to the linguistic origins of its name in these early morning hours. The water is unconcerned by gravity’s effects on it, with knowledge that it will be back, again and again.

Kobayashi Issa, an 18^th century Japanese haiku poet, spoke of the longing that can plague us when faced with change. He writes, The morning dew is the morning dew. And yet. And yet--  It is said that these words were inspired by the sudden death of his baby daughter. How can we comprehend that something so important as a human life be as fleeting as the tiny, perfect world in a drop of morning dew? And yet. As the dew reappears each morning on the blades of grass and leaves of trees, the world looking ever the same but ever different, our lives must also ebb and flow in the same way.

Ecclesiastes expresses this paradox for us in a timeless way: There is a time for everything beneath the heavens. All things, God has freely given in His love, for use and blessing each in its appointed time. There is a time to weep and a time to laugh. A time to mourn and a time to dance. A time to find and a time to lose. Must we choose? Can not every occasion be a time for both? To weep at the injustice of life but to laugh at its irony; to laugh at the joys of life but to weep in knowledge that they will not last; to mourn while dancing, to lose one part of ourselves while also finding another.

As I sit here now, the morning sun on my face, my body strong from sunrise yoga, my feet sinking into the wet sand, my unchanging seated position reveals startlingly how the level of the tide has changed in my short time by the water. I gauge this by the frequency with which the soft waves wash over my feet, lessening every few moments with each swish and swosh. I catch myself feeling dejected – how I wish the water would keep washing over my feet! (It keeps the flies away.) And yet. Admitting my powerlessness against the BFG* that is the Pacific allows me to exist here on this morning with unspeakable freedom.

In the face of disappointment and devastation, can we remember to smile? Can we dance?

*BFG stands for Big, Friendly Giant, as coined by the genius of Roald Dahl.

My Questionable Teaching Methods

As I've mentioned before, I often get bored in the classroom. Math is just not interesting for me. I never asked to teach it; rather, it was thrust upon me, and we (math and I) have had a shaky relationship ever since. Sometimes I have trouble staying awake during my own lessons:

“So then, it should make sense that an angle formed by two secant lines cannot possibly have its (yawn)… vertex at the… ex… exterior of the…. [SNORE]”

“MS. COCCO!”

“Wha-!? … the, uh, exterior of the circle.”

Who’s interested in that garbage, anyway? I don’t blame my students for trying to sleep through my lessons. I should also mention that I work strictly out of the teachers’ edition of the book – no provided worksheets, no overhead projector, no activities. I have some homemade Algebra Tiles to model polynomial multiplication, and some small bits of construction paper to model adding and subtracting positive and negative numbers. I have some rulers that I periodically steal from the sewing class, that I usually have to give back when it has been discovered that I stole them. I was lucky to find cheap protractors on island, but no compasses, and certainly no TI-89 scientific calculators. The Internet provides little more than a bunch of lesson plans that are much more boring than my own.

Can you blame me for trying to spice things up in the classroom a little bit? But, sometimes, it turns out, I push the envelope just a little too far.

Sometimes I show off my cheer-leading moves that I picked up in 7^th grade during a short-lived week of fame as an alternate on the cheer-leading squad. Teaching an all-girls junior class means I get to really let loose. During a lesson on absolute value inequalities, I was trying to prompt the sixteen of them to say the word ‘split’ (which I must have already said twenty-five times in the span of that lesson) in reference to splitting the inequality into two in order to simplify. I prompted them verbally – “Ssss…?” Sssppppp…?” – and explored a number of other bodily movements – splitting apart two fingers, two hands, my whole arms – before resorting to the extreme: “Ready, okay!”, hands on the hips, hands together, and before any of us knew it, I was in a full split on the floor. “SPLITS!” they all exclaimed, before falling out of their chairs laughing as I struggled (and failed, twice) to get back on my feet.

My other cheer-leading move that, I pray, will remain in the hearts of my students for the rest of their lives, is the FOIL dance. FOIL, First Outside Inside Last, is the method used to multiply two binomials, thus creating one trinomial. It goes something like this: “Ready, okay! F – O – I – L! Bi– to the bi– to the tri-nomial!” Here is a diagram of my hand motions; please forgive its crude nature:

The FOIL Dance / Cheer-leading Routine.

For those who are thinking about trying it out, note that the first four beats are really a whole-body effort, similar to the YMCA dance. The last four beats are simply finger motions, similar to throwing up gang signs, which I have a suspicion is really the reason the students like the dance so much – they love throwing up “style” in Micronesia. A posed picture is incomplete without a face of intense attitude and a peace sign, hang ten, or more complicated form of “style.”

Sometimes I put mathematical concepts to song. For four days, I made the seniors sing, to the tune of “Frere Jacques”, a lovely song about the quadratic formula. Go ahead and sing along with us: “X equals negative B, X equals negative B, plus or minus square root, plus or minus square root, B squared minus 4 A C, B squared minus 4 A C, all over 2 A, all over 2 A.” They weren’t that upset about it at first, but after I made them sing it in rounds, their hatred for me was pretty solid. I thought they sounded like angels. But alas, guess who passed that test? Well, most of them. Some of them were lost causes.

Last week, I guess I took it too far. Or maybe they did. But I started it. We’re on Chapter 10 in freshman Algebra I, which means we’re talking about Relations and Functions – graphs, for those of you who have forgotten your Algebra terminology. Whenever we encounter new classification words, I try to explain them thoroughly in English and sometimes Pohnpeian so they can truly understand the new word. For example, when teaching substitution, I ask for other examples of things we substitute:

“When I can’t come to class because I’m sick, who stands up in front of you and gives you an assignment?
“Russell!”

“Now when I come back, is Russell still here?”

“No!”

“And how about when we’re cooking – if we substitute butter for margarine, do we also put in the butter?”

“No!”

“Why not?”

“Taste bad!”

By these curt exclamations, I can get a sense that the students really understand that when substituting a number for a variable, the variable is no longer present in the equation.

And so, in trying to explain relations and functions, I used an analogy that I thought would be appropriate for instruction in a Catholic high school, where we teach the Ten Commandments. It started out pretty innocently.


I taught them that a mathematical function is like a functioning marriage. Anyone can be in a relationship with anyone else, just like any two variables can have a relationship to one another. But in order to create a healthy, FUNCTIONING (are you seeing where I’m going here?) relationship, also known as a marriage, those two partners need to be faithful to one another. Similarly, to create a FUNCTION (can you tell I’m excited about this analogy?), each value of the domain, or set of x-values, cannot be paired with more than one value of the range, or set of y-values.

I should have stopped there. But these adorable, sly smiles started creeping onto their faces as they always do when they suspect I’m about to get silly, and I couldn’t end there. I pointed to the board:

“Is this relation a function?”

“No!”

“Who is being unfaithful?”

“Three!”

“How about this relation – is it a function?”

“Yes!”

“Yes, because no one is cheating on anyone else. How about this relation – is there any adultery going on here?”

“No!”

“And this one – are the partners of this relation breaking the eighth commandment?”

“Yes!”

“Who’s a cheater?”

“Six!”

Well, any lesson where the whole class is excited enough to answer in unison is a success story for me. Despite their laughter, I could tell that they were really understanding it. I walked out of the freshman classroom feeling good about myself.

This past Wednesday, they took their test. I must say, their cumulative average was one of the highest I have ever seen on one of my tests – a 90%! As I graded, however, I felt more and more uncomfortable with their responses. I didn’t think they would actually take my analogy too seriously, but I was wrong.

Here are some of their answers to the question: “Is this relation a function? Explain why or why not.”

“No, three is a cheater.”

 “Not a function because the domain has many partners.”

“No because the range is fooling around with two domain partners.”

“Not a function because 1 is cheating on 2, 3, 4, 9, and 5. Geez!”

“No because one x cannot have all of the y’s. That’s not the way God wants it.”

“Not a function because x is cheating on every y variable.”

“No because the domain value is having relationship with all the range.”

“X is a lying cheat.”

“It’s a function because x is being faithful to y.”

“Not a function because one cheated and have plenty relationship.”

“Three is having relationship with two people and one of them is going to find out.”

“No because I catch somebody cheating in the domain.”

“No because everyone is cheating on everyone.”

“Yes, no adultery.”

“No because everyone is breaking Commandments.”

“X is unfaithful.”

“No because 3 is cheating on 4 with 5, or on 5 with 4, depends on who is the married couple and who is the mistress.”

 “Yes because no adultery. Everyone married. No one cheating or sleeping in someone bed.”

I guess this will, at the very least, spark some lively discussion among the parents regarding my teaching methods. Whoops! Good thing I'm out of here in less than two months..


It's true - I will be back stateside on June 6, back in the Midwest June 12. It's honestly impossible to wrap my mind around; I can no more imagine myself back in that environment than I can imagine myself NOT in this one. Pohnpei has become my home; the people I call my friends here have become my family. I don't know how I will be able to pick myself up and drop myself back in that place I used to call "home," but I'm sure it will be a challenge. I look forward, however, to the immense support I know is waiting for me.


I'm still waiting to hear back from a couple of positions - one volunteer, one a "real job" - before I'll be able to say "what's next." I seem to remember, however, a little more than two years ago, less than four months before leaving the country, answering the question of "what's next?" with "who knows!?" So maybe I'm not so far off track. Isn't age 23 the exact age when you're supposed to be allowed to have such uncertainty ahead of you? I like to think of it as keeping my options open. After all, that's the attitude that brought me to Pohnpei. And I wouldn't trade this experience for the world.


See you all this summer! Thanks for reading.

Rain

Note: This blog entry is about liquid precipitation, not the star of “Ninja Assassin”.

It’s really wet here. Kolonia town, where I live and work, gets just under 200 inches of rain annually, but the mountain peaks at the interior of the island receive an estimated 400. However, since many people have never heard of our islands, Pohnpei often and unjustly does not make the top ten lists of “wettest places on earth.” Having lived for a year and a half in one of those places, I think about rain a lot.

Each morning, I spend a few moments deciding whether it will rain during my walk to school. I consider hooded jackets, umbrellas, sometimes ponchos. If it’s already pouring when I am ready to leave the house, I might wear a skirt that is different than the one I plan to wear for the day, knowing that when I get to school, the lower half of my body will be drenched, and I will need to look at least somewhat presentable for my students.

At school, I live in constant fear of the rain. Each time I’m about to leave a classroom, I peer at the sky and wonder if it will burst open and blow liters of rain through the open windows while I’m gone; I usually close them when I leave to be safe. Each time I walk from my classroom to the main building to use the bathroom, I walk as fast as I can in case it starts pouring while I’m there, thus preventing me from walking back to the classroom in time for my next class. Sometimes, in the middle of a lesson, a crazy storm will wreak havoc in my classroom. The windows will slam suddenly shut, any loose papers on the students’ desk will waltz around the room together, and the door will slam. The rain will be so loud that no matter how well I project my voice, my students – bodies leaned forward, head turned slightly to position one ear in my direction, faces scrunched up in that familiar way that means, “I have no idea what you are saying” – cannot make out a single word of my lesson. I laugh helplessly and sink into my chair, and they sit back and grin, silently (and sometimes quite loudly) thanking God for this gift that has caused their teacher to be quiet for a few glorious minutes.

The walk home from school isn’t so much of a concern – if I end up soaking wet, which is often, I will just change once I walk in the door, and hang my clothes up to dry. Late at night, I sometimes postpone my bedtime in hopes of a heavy rain – there’s nothing like drifting to sleep, cool and dry in my bed, as the rain falls, angry on the tin roof. (Thanks for getting stuck in my head every time, Edwin McCain.)

In my seventeen months of intensive meteorological ponderings, I’ve been able to discern the direction from which the storms blow in, and even how strong a storm will be. I used to marvel at the ability of our groundskeeper, Immanuel, to show up at school in the morning and say, “it will rain all day today”, and go home, but now I, too, can determine these days – the difference being that I am not exempt from my job in the event of poor weather.

Despite my revelations, I am usually overly confident in my abilities to dodge raindrops, and, discovering that I am not a duck, often find myself immobilized by the rain. I will have been on my way to the post office, or from the container store where I bought a mid-day, off-brand cherry cola. The rain will be light at first, refreshing even, but then -things change. I can hear the heavier rain coming, ominous, before I feel it on my skin. I'm never quite certain where the sound is coming from – behind me or before me, depending on how the storm is blowing in, or sometimes directly above me, as one standing beneath an overturned bucket would hear the water splashing against itself as it descends… the sound of impending liquid doom. The only certainty in my mind is that I need to find cover. NOW.

There will be an awning, a large tree, or, in the worst of cases, a very small tree that is not keeping me dry at all. Whether successful or in vain, I will cower under these objects and curse the rain, curse the heavens that sent it, curse my stupidity and lack of umbrella, curse my skin for not being made of duck feathers. It is during these times that I think about rain the most. More specifically, I think about the differences between the Pohnpeian reaction to rain, and my own.

When I was trying to pack for my two years here, I was told by someone who had lived on the islands that, considering the amount of annual rainfall, utilizing an umbrella would make me the "island idiot." I decided to risk my dignity and pack a small yet fashionable, collapsible, purple umbrella. Upon arrival on the island, I discovered that there were enough white folk (who, really, do so many things other than umbrella usage that make us island idiots), as well as a number of Filipinos and others, who use umbrellas that it would be relatively safe to do the same.

My handy umbrella gets a lot of use, but as I mentioned, sometimes an umbrella just isn’t enough, especially when the winds are strong. But why, I wondered in those first days on Pohnpei, did I seem to be the only one that arrived at my destination soaked? How do Pohnpeians navigate the rains when they’re not even using umbrellas? How are they staying dry? It didn’t take me long to discover their strategy – and what a simple strategy it is: find a dry spot and don’t move. It’s essentially what I had been doing under my awnings and trees, but I failed to mention that my American impatience and anxiety usually had me conceding to the skies within minutes – at the first sign it was letting up, or sometimes even before then. I had places to be! Things to do! Classes to teach! Documents to author! And so, my attitude had to be, “whatever – I’ll just get wet.” I would go lunging into the falling water, my mind cursing my legs’ decision.

When I find myself stuck in the rain here, car-less and with long distances to walk for the first time in my life, those words run through my head every time: “whatever – I’ll just get wet.” I discovered that Pohnpeians have the same attitude, but with the opposite result: “whatever – I’ll just stay here and miss whatever I was on my way to do.” Rain presents a great opportunity to pause, sometimes for an hour or more, under that awning or tree. There are many options for occupying oneself during this long pause. I’ve watched people hum or sing to themselves and sway back and forth, chew betelnut, laugh at the white people dodging the puddles, or strike up a conversation with other waiters – sometimes a full conversation, sometimes just: “Uhdahn kotou rahnwet!” (“It’s really raining today!”) Another option is to run through the rain like a child, laughing so hard that crying is inevitable. Waiting under my awning just yesterday, two grown Pohnpeian men ran past me in a laughing fit, running and splashing in the puddles. One following the other, the man in the lead ducked behind a car while the other man wasn't looking, circled the car, and ended up running behind the other man, switching their order. This sent them into absolute hysterics. I don’t know where they were going, if anywhere, but I wanted to join them. The one thing Pohnpeians don’t do during the rain is look worried, angry, or upset in any way – which white people have decided is an absolute requirement for getting stuck in the rain.

There’s a reason for the sour looks; the Western perspective of rain is universally negative. We are acclimatized to adages that reinforce this outlook. Children sing in desperation, “Rain, rain, go away! Come again some other day!” Dolly Parton imparts her wisdom upon us that “if you want the rainbow, you have to put up with the rain,” and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow reminds us that “into each life, some rain must fall.” The gist of these sayings is that rain, though unavoidable and unpleasant, will soon be gone from us, and in the meantime, we can take comfort in the fellowship of the whole world in that we all experience some rain. In this way, rain is sort of like one’s mother-in-law.

Even the language I’ve used here to describe rain is largely negative – “poor weather,” “impending liquid doom.” Rain ruins things, as Barbara Streisand’s number from “Funny Girl” regarding her parade can attest. Just for fun, I typed “rain ruins” into a Google search, and came up with 165,000 results, mostly news reports of the various world events that have apparently been devastated by something so simple as drops of water. Rain ruins T20 opening ceremony, rain ruins racing at Coffs club, rain ruins Portuguese test session, rain ruins West Indies’ chance, and rain ruins Wednesday’s activities. An especially somber news report is simply entitled, “Rain Ruins Day.” In the United States and elsewhere, the phrase that must be uttered before any major event is: “let’s just pray it doesn’t rain.” Even when the rain is not busy ruining things, Igor from Young Frankenstein soundly expresses our Western style of optimism: “It could be worse. It could be raining.” And, without fail, the rain begins to fall.

But between being upset and anxious during those hard rains, I’ve been passively observing for the past seventeen months. My conclusion: I haven’t seen a single Micronesian upset about the rain. I guess they’ve had a lot more rain to get used to than many others around the world, but I find their attitude calming and inspiring. “Whatever.” My attitude was "whatever," too, but I didn't mean it. I'm usually pretty upset about the general outcome - which is to say, me, soaking wet - of the battles between me and the rain. (The current score: Samantha, 2; Rain, 393.) I’m not saying rain doesn’t ruin things. Aside from important events, heavy rains can ruin roads, infrastructure, plants, clothes, and womens’ hairstyles. It keeps us from appointments, helps us get into terrible accidents, and makes dogs smell horrible. But instead of getting upset about rain and, symbolically, the many other misfortunes that come our way in life, what if we adopted a different attitude?

Langston Hughes had a different attitude about rain. “Let the rain kiss you. Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops. Let the rain sing you a lullaby.”

No impending liquid doom there.

 There’s a loose translation of “whatever” into Pohnpeian – “sohte lipilipil.” It literally means “not choosy/selective,” but is used more casually to mean, “it doesn’t matter” when faced with a choice or unpleasant life situation. It’s the Pohnpeian attitude to most of the “rain” – literal and figurative – that visits us all. It is what it is - no point in getting upset. Just wait it out - this, too, shall pass. Whatever.

I Have Parasites - from the acclaimed author of "I Have Fleas" and other short stories

When Philip and I set foot on Pohnpeian soil almost a year and a half ago, our veteran community mates started us off right by frequently discussing their need to get “de-wormed.” Phil and I would exchange confused looks, clear our throats, and ask tenderly, “Do you mean to say that there are worms in your bodies?” They would laugh and respond, “Probably not," our anxious minds soothed. We learned, however, that, to be safe, it truly is suggested that one living in the tropics get “de-wormed” every three to six months.

When I say worms, I'm not exaggerating - they look just like the worms that flop around in the sidewalk cracks after a rain. These worms in particular are classified as parasites – disease-causing organisms that live on or in an animal or human and derive their nourishment from their host. Lice, fleas, and many bacteria and viruses are examples of parasites that live ON humans; parasitic worms live IN humans. The eggs of these worms contaminate food (including the questionable meats I have consumed), water (including the tap water I sometimes drink), animals (including the pigs that used to live outside my bedroom window and the roosters that peck around my feet on campus), and frequently used, but less frequently cleaned, objects like toilet seats and door handles.

Well, those months flew, really. Before we knew it, we’d been here for over a year – fifteen months to be exact – and found ourselves as the veteran community mates. Having, so we thought, escaped the worms for the duration of our time here, we followed in the footsteps of our JV predecessors and made a pretty good joke out of the whole “de-worming” thing for our first-year community mates. When something went inexplicably awry in our bodies, Phil or I would nudge one another and remark casually, “…probably the worms!”

Well, it’s all fun and games until someone finds out they have worms, isn’t it? One fateful night, in conversation with some ex-pat friends, I learned of some side effects of these parasites, and made the connection between these side effects and the realities of my own body. I have been (thankfully) very healthy since my last bout of boils this summer, but had been feeling incredibly tired all the time, especially since the beginning of the new school year. I tried to regulate my lifestyle with sleep, diet, and exercise, and then resorted to extraordinary amounts of caffeine. Yet I still found myself, not just exhausted, but falling asleep - on my desk grading papers after school, once during class, and every day at lunch, when I curled up in a ball behind my desk and passed out. More recently, too, I had been having some inexplicable abdominal pain. The conversation was enough for me. I was off to get myself de-wormed.

I quickly acquired the six-pill, three-day treatment of a drug called Mebendazole, and was skeptical. The pills are some of the smallest I’d ever seen – about the size of a Claritin – and look very unimpressive. How, I wondered, can these tiny white specks expel worms from my body?

While I waited to see if the medicine would kick in, I found myself on WebMD (a dangerous, dangerous place) and other sites seeking more information about how I could find out whether or not I did have worms. Most reported that having a stool sample taken would be necessary to know for sure. I wasn’t sure if my healthcare would cover a “just out of curiosity” stool sample. I also found some things that I wish I hadn’t – for example, that these eggs lodge themselves in the intestine, hatch, grow up to twenty feet long, and multiply well into the hundreds. There are roundworms, hookworms, pinworms, whipworms, and tapeworms. It started sounding like a bad musical after a while, so nauseating that my skepticism grew and multiplied along with my hypothetical worms, and I decided that I didn’t have worms. Not me.

My skepticism of Mebendazole was unwarranted. I discovered, courtesy of WebMD (whose slogan should either be, "fostering fear and anxiety for just about anyone with Internet access" or "making the lives hypochondriacs even worse"), that Mebendazole, despite its size, is incredibly effective, keeping the worm from absorbing sugar, causing loss of energy and death of the worm. I also discovered that wiser, more sensible ex-pats really do get de-wormed every three to six months.

My skepticism of my hypothetical worms was unwarranted, too, and I’ll just say that I didn’t need a stool sample to help me figure it out. Mebendazole forgot to add a “Surgeon General’s Warning for the Weak-Stomached: Do NOT look in the toilet bowl while on this medication. You’ll thank us later.” It goes without saying that if I hadn’t joked about it for fifteen months and de-wormed myself in a timely manner, I wouldn’t have almost passed out when I did look in the toilet bowl.

As a teacher, I’m tempted to force myself to write on the blackboard 100 times: “Intestinal worms are a serious matter. Intestinal worms are a serious matter.”

Math is FUN!

Sometimes, teaching math is so boring, I have to do something to amuse myself. I have discovered that the “Bonus Item” is the best way to accomplish this without losing my credibility as both an adult and a teacher. The “Bonus Item” appears at the end of an otherwise orthodox, boring exam. Aside from amusing me, benefits of the “Bonus Item” include: keeping students distracted who are finished with their test and may be tempted to distract others; allowing students who are very clever but not so good at, or interested in, math to earn a point or two on an exam they may have otherwise failed; and giving students the impression, albeit false, that Math is FUN!

Bonus Item Example #1: (from freshman Algebra)

Q: “What pneumonic device can you come up with (other than ‘Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally’) to remember the order of operations?”
A: “Please Excuse My Dear Augustine Sue LOL!”   [Augustine Sue is the former principal of Pohnpei Catholic School, where about half of the freshmen went to elementary school. His initials are unfortunate as far as this test is concerned.]

A: “Pohnpeians Eat Many Donuts…for example… Augustine Sue HAHA”

A: “Please Eat My Dog, Augustine Sue"   [I’m not sure if Augustine Sue is the name of the dog, or if he’s requesting that Augustine Sue eat his dog. Either way, there’s no laughter following this one – he wasn’t kidding.]

A: “Pohnpeians, Everytime, Make Delicious Apple Sauce"   [This is not true, judging by the time my mom sent it in a care package and I brought some to school. The other teachers asked, ‘Dahkot men?’ (‘What is that?’) ‘Applesauce,’ I answered. Receiving questioning looks, I tried again: ‘Apel...en waii...sukusuk?’ (‘Apple...of the foreigner (as opposed to local apple)...pounded?’) ‘Weioh...’ they said, understanding.]

A: “Pohnpeians Eat Mangoes Daily At Sundown”

A: “Planet Earth Moves Directly Across (the) Sun”   [I’m no science teacher, but that sounds like a stretch of the truth...]

A: “Please Enjoy My Daily Announcements, Sir!”

A: “Please Educate My Daughter And Son”

A: “Pig Executioners Mostly Don’t Act Sorry”  [An animal lover! An answer of my own heart. I wonder if so many pigs would be slaughtered if the people doing the slaughtering knew they were being called “executioners”...]

A: “Paul Executed Mom’s Dog At (the) Substation”  [Why? Why, Paul? And where exactly is there a substation on Pohnpei??]


Bonus Item #2: (from sophomore Geometry)

Q: “As we learned, a conjecture is an educated guess based on observation. Make 5 observations and conjectures about any subject.”

A: “Ms. Cocco doesn’t wear makeup and doesn’t have pierced ears. Therefore, Ms. Cocco must have brothers and not sisters.” [It’s true!]

A: “Ms. Cocco has slowtes [editor’s note: she means “slouches”]. Therefore, Ms. Cocco must have back problem.”

A: “Ms. Cocco doesn’t always shave her legs. Therefore, Ms. Cocco doesn’t like to shave her legs.” [Long skirts, come on! The students weren’t supposed to notice!]

A: “Ms. Cocco wears local skirts all the time. Therefore, Ms. Cocco wishes she is a Ponapean."

A: “Ms. Cocco looks old. Therefore, she’s about 25.”

A: “Ms. Coco always matches. Therefore, she’s had good style.” [THREE C's!]

A: “Ms. Cocco is light-skinned. Therefore, she is a Australian.”

A: “Ms. Cocco has great calves. Therefore, she hikes a lot and teaches aerobic class.” [A brown-noser extraordinaire.]

A: “Ms. Cocco talks about her dog all the time. Therefore, she must love dogs.”

A: “Ms. Cocco doesn’t know how to teach biology.” [There was no reason given for this. I’m not sure what to think, but I’m glad it says “biology” instead of “geometry”.]

A: “I don’t understand this, therefore this is hard. I am bored, therefore this is boring.” [He may not have intended to answer this correctly, but he’ll get full bonus credit for this answer!]

A: “Ms. Cocco is always wearing a cross on her neck. Therefore, she’s atheist. LOL”

A: “Ms. Cocco walks everywhere, therefore she is poor.” [These answers are making me poor in spirit…]

A: “Ms. Cocco teaches barefoot sometimes. Therefore, sometimes she loses her slippers.”

A: “Ms. Cocco taught us a cheerleading move last year to remember how to multiply binomials. Therefore, Ms. Cocco has a second job as a professional cheerleader.”

A: “Ms. Cocco speaks some Pohnpeian words. Therefore, maybe she’s tricking us and actually knows a lot of Pohnpeian and understands everything we say about her!!!!!!”

A: “Ms. Cocco is wearing a polo shirt today. Therefore, she’s kind of a nerd.”

A: “I didn’t fall asleep in this class yet this year. Therefore, Geometry is better than Algebra.” [Orrrrr…. Ms. Cocco is a great teacher?]

A: “Our Lady of Mercy Catholic High School has the word Catholic in the name. Therefore, it is not a school for Jewish or Islam people.”


Two successful Bonus Items; I am thoroughly amused.

A Long Overdue Post

The end of my first year as a teacher was a blur. May was busy and complicated; Luke and Jo were preparing to leave the island for good (or for a while, at least), Philip and I were dreaming of vacation in Chuuk, finals were advancing upon us, students were restless, and we were all ready for the month to end. For me, things were complicated further with the almost-daily practice of graduation songs with the graduating seniors. Having a decent voice and a connection with the girls put me in charge of this task.

I brought in my iPod and all of the CDs in our house and let them go through all of it for a few days. They were particularly taken with "Wide Open Spaces" by the Dixie Chicks, but we decided it was too hard to sing. We finally settled on "In My Life" by the Beatles, and two other songs we wrote together. I wrote the lyrics for "Time to Say Goodbye" (I knew that "Introduction to Poetry" course from college would pay off someday) and a senior wrote its melody, and another song, "With You" was thrown in at the last minute, its origin completely unknown to me. We procured a keyboard, and a hidden talent of keyboard playing was revealed in one of the seniors, and we went to work. They decided to change the melody to "In My Life," which was almost upsetting for me, as it's one of my favorite songs, but I reminded myself that this was their graduation, not mine. We practiced, practiced some more, changed some things, then practiced more. We practiced sitting, practiced standing, practiced lying on the floor when we got tired, and doubled over with laughter when someone came in too early. I loved every minute, exhausting as it was. Pohnpeian women love to sing, I discovered, and they love to sing the same songs over and over!

The time finally came for Baccalaureate mass, followed a few days later by Graduation. Both ceremonies were beautiful and fun, and the girls looked perfect in the baby pink gowns and caps they picked out themselves. I teared up when they were handed their diplomas and Bibles, and watched each of their families honor them with mwaramwars, flower and shell leis.

As I watched them, I reminded myself that in a few months they would all be headed on to pursue higher education at the College of Micronesia. We had spent the entire year preparing for the mathematics section of the College of Micronesia Entrance Test, as I breathed down their necks, assigned copious amounts of homework, and reminded them daily that their futures were on the line. In January, all of their hard work paid off as every one of them tested into the National campus, where the quality of education is higher. In two or thee years, they will receive associates degrees, and then decide whether they want to leave the island to pursue bachelors' or higher education degrees.

The senior class, I'm told, started out with 29 girls, and five graduated on Tuesday, May 25th. From what I've come to learn about their lives from themselves and others, they have each overcome unique and great obstacles in their education paths. One, graduating at age 17, has a five-year-old son.

I am immensely proud of them.

"The Death of the V-Neck" and other pointless stories by Samantha Cocco

The Death of the V-Neck

Micronesia boasts a very strange type of window in most buildings and homes. These windows are made of smaller plates of glass called louvers; each louver is, on average, 3" x 24" (the math teacher in me would like to remind you that that is a surface area of 72 square inches), depending on the size of the window. Sets of 5-10 louvers are connected on a metal frame that has a small handle positioned so that, when pulled down, the entire set of louvers opens. Push up, and all of the louvers close. I don't know where one can buy louvers, but everyone seems to have them, including my school. I've only seen a handful of buildings with actually panes of glass as windows.

The thing about these louvers is, when you close them at the end of each day, if you push a little harder on the handle, it locks the louvers into place, and the handle snaps into place flush with the edge of the window. Behind this handle is just enough space for a gecko to lurk during the night and on through the morning.

A favorite game of mine (read: the most dreaded part of every day on this island) is one I call, "Where's Gecko?" (you guessed it - inspired by the infamous Waldo). Every morning when I unlock my classroom and push the door ajar, I can sense it: the geckos are waiting. They've been waiting all night, hiding behind the louver handles, chirping their absurd little noises, that high-pitched cackle that I know would be translated, if gecko chirps could be understood, as, Where should we hide tomorrow morning? Did you see the look on her face today?

The room has been warmed by the morning sun, and, having had no air flow, the stuffy heat is unbearable. I have to open some louvers. The students will be here any minute. My eyes scan the room and I wonder, will they be hiding behind the same handles as yesterday? Will they have switched up their game, knowing I'll be expecting them hidden within the top louvers on the right side of the room? Do geckos have higher brain functioning? I'm dripping with sweat, partially from the heat, partially from fear. They have no higher brain functioning, I decide. They could be anywhere. I have to open the louvers. I push the door open further and start towards the first handle.

It's not that I have a phobia of geckos. My mom has a phobia of snakes, and if she knew tiny green and black snakes were slithering behind those handles, she would be paralyzed with fear, too. For me, the thing to understand is, it's not the sight of geckos that strikes fear in my heart. It's the fact that sometimes, they are not only behind the handles, but hanging onto the back of the handles, and the force of pulling on that handle, the sudden unlocking, sends geckos flying -- right at my face.

Once, a gecko flung off of the handle and whizzed past my ear. I heard it chirping for dear life as it flew past my head. I, of course, thought it would land on me, and did a song and dance of shrieking "GET IT OFF ME!" and jumping around the room for a few moments. That was the day we had a new sophomore student that had arrived early and was sitting in the back of the classroom. The look of terror on her face at the sight of her psychotic new teacher left me wondering if she would be back for a second day.

This past week one morning, I arrived about 40 minutes before homeroom began, giving myself ample time to work up the courage to open all of the louvers. There are 36 handles to pull down; it's a large classroom. It was Friday and I was feeling good about finishing up a second week. A current of fear ran through my heart, but I pushed it away. Not today, geckos! I started for the first handle, the bottom louvers on the right side of the room. All clear. I continued along the perimeter of the room, whistling to myself. Keep in mind that, some days, there turns out not to be any geckos at all, and I feel pretty silly for opening all of the louvers so cautiously. This must be one of those days!

I arrive at the 11th set of louvers: top louvers, with a handle at about eye-level for me. I'm absent-mindedly looking out of the window I've just opened, beaneath the 11th set, watching students walk towards the building. Still whistling. Unbeknownst to me, all the while... a gecko had been silently lurking. Not only lurking, but clinging -- to the handle of the 11th set of louvers. With the force of the handle unlocking, he flies off of his handle (literally), and in mid-air, spots a safe, new, dark home to aim for -- down my v-neck shirt. He slides in perfectly, not even bouncing off of my breastbone first -- a swish, you might say, if he were a basketball instead of a gecko. I would have much preferred a basketball.

My reaction? Let's leave it at the fact that the juniors should be very thankful they had not yet shown up for homeroom, for the sake of immense trauma. It took only a few moments for the gecko to realize he was unwelcome, and scurry down my shirt onto the floor, where I maniacally stamped his life to an end. May he rest in peace.

I won't be wearing v-necks to school for a while, I've decided.


Not So Goofy

You may remember a blog entry in February that mentioned how I'd be spending Valentine's Day with a new man who had entered my life: a tiny, struggling, doorstep puppy named Goofy. He arrived at Our Lady of Mercy Catholic High School one dark, cold February night (it had dropped below 80 degrees) in a soiled cardboard box, whining pathetically and in bad shape. I found him in the morning and fell in love with him immediately, but resigned to the fact that I couldn't keep a dog on a volunteer's stipend, that he was not my dog, and that the treatment of dogs is different here on Pohnpei than it is where I come from.

Fortunately for us both, the woman who rents the campus apartment where he was left decided to keep him and raise him as a watchdog for our school and her apartment, as both see a high number of break-ins along with the rest of the Catholic mission. I was elated, and even more so when she asked me to care for him for the first month while she was off-island. Just a puppy, he couldn't stay outside all night, so for that whole month he was in my care last Spring, I locked him in her bathroom when I left for the night - and cleaned up a growing puppy's night's worth of presents each morning. But I loved him no less - Goofy (named by our principal, Sr. Maria, another of his admirers) was young enough to be trained not to be so territorial and mean as most other dogs are here, and further, to show me as much affection as I desired.

We fed him real dog food, not bones and ramen like most other Micronesian dogs get, and he grew much faster and more normally than other dogs. I continued to be very affectionate and playful with him, and he with me. My Micronesian students and coworkers laughed at my baby-talk and told me they were going to eat him, but I'd been missing my Shih-Tzu at home in Ohio, Teddy, so much, I didn't care. I knew they wouldn't really eat him, and he was the only thing to make me smile on some very homesick days.

By the time I returned home from Chuuk in June, he was sleeping outside each night and seemed to have grown even more in the three weeks I was away, looking like a full-grown dog, though he couldn't have been more than a year. He was so happy to see me, so I tried not to be bothered by his horrible stench that had accumulated from never taking a single bath in his life. I noticed he was venturing off-campus much more during the day, and wondered where he could be going until he started coming home with scratches and cuts, and once, a very broken leg. I knew they were the result of fights with other dogs, and realized suddenly that my babying and affection had ruined him. He couldn't survive in Pohnpei.

I wanted to send him home, but I didn't think my mom would be too pleased with me. I wanted to take him into our house, but realized that we four humans hardly fit in there, much less a large, stinky dog. I resigned to the fact, again, that dogs live differently here on Pohnpei than what I'm used to. Other dogs would continue to fight him, even, as I witnessed, venturing onto our campus to find him and pick a fight. I became so sad everytime I watched him try to befriend other dogs, only to be chased away or beat up by the territorial beasts. I described him to my friends and family back home as similar to Buddy the Elf, played expertly by Will Ferrell in "Elf": tragically friendly, unable to understand the meanness of this world.

In July, walking to school on our usual route one morning, three dogs were playing at a store close to our schools when one broke from the pack and made a beeline toward us. I began to reach down for a rock, but then realized - That's Goofy! He has made friends! Two friends! Two dogs were being raised by a Filipino family living above the store, with kids that go to the Catholic elementary school across the street, and they were raised the same way Goofy was, with affection and real dog food. He jumped on me, then ran back to play some more. The two of them are good-looking dogs, not mangy and straggly like other dogs here, and they played very nicely with him. I was so happy. I thought, maybe I did ruin him, and maybe he'll never be a real Pohnpeian dog, and other dogs will still seek him out to pick on him, but at least now he has a couple of friends to help watch his back and treat him well.

Goofy, with his unconditional love and pleasant disposition, continued to keep me good company during long hours put in at school over the summer, and as we advanced into the school year and students began to flood in, he bounced around, tail wagging furiously, to greet the returning students. They marveled over how big he had gotten and threatened to eat him, just like always, but patted his head when I wasn't looking, and I saw the slightest glimmers of affection in their eyes. After school and at lunch, I saw some students playing gently with him and chasing him around. I knew then that a mean, territorial dog wouldn't do well at our school with so many teenagers, and thought, maybe I didn't ruin him. Maybe he's just the right dog for our school! But I still felt sad that he wasn't tough enough to really protect anyone, or himself, when it came down to it. I spent half of my after-school hours fending off other dogs when they lurked around campus looking for him.

This past Friday, I was working late in the computer lab long after school had ended. Goofy was sleeping just outside the doors to the lab, ever close by my side. Sr. Maria was locking up the other buildings when suddenly I saw my docile, bumbling little friend stand up quickly, ears sharp and pointed, tail straight, staring in the direction of the building Sr. Maria was locking. I called his name, trying to calm him, but it seemed he didn't hear me. He didn't move a muscle, but began to growl and bare his teeth. I'd never seen him do such a thing.

I stepped behind him and looked in the direction upon which he was focused, and saw a man walking towards Sr. Maria. She turned around and listened to what he was saying, which I couldn't make out. Suddenly, Goofy made a beeline for the man, barking furiously. The man turned around and backed towards the building, clearly scared. I ran towards them, calling his name and trying to make him leave the man alone. When I reached them, I swatted him and said to the man, "Kupwuromahk, maing," (I'm sorry, Sir), but he began backing away from the dog, who was still barking and snapping at him. I went to swat him again, but Sr. Maria grabbed my arm and said in her Basque accent, "No, let him. That is a drunk man harassing me. I think he is the one who tried to break in the other night." Our timid little dog, whose instincts I thought I had ruined, snapped and barked at the man until he left the campus, following him all the way out of the Catholic mission.

The next night, a Saturday, I was working in the lab all day, walked over to 5pm English mass, and came back to continue work on a project I've been focusing on - putting together a school library. I was there well past dark, being cautious by locking the doors and locking Goofy in the room with me, feeling more confident in his abilities for protection. I had the lights turned off, because the termites were swarming, so the only light in the room was the dim blue coming from the computer screen. With the doors locked and lights off, anyone outside the room would not have known anyone was inside. I hadn't heard anything at all outside when suddenly Goofy had the same reaction he had had the evening before - sharp ears, sharp tail, eyes piercing through the darkness. He went to the locked doors and stuck his nose in between them, blowing air out of his nose furiously. I got up from my computer, peered outside, and quietly unlocked the doors. He shoved through them, and stood outside for a moment in the same stance before taking off in the direction of the kitchen. Frightened, I quickly locked the doors again and listened through the darkness. He began barking and snapping and I heard a man yell, "SET!" (the Pohnpeian equivalent of "Sh**!"), and take off through the bushes behind the kitchen. I didn't see Goofy again for the rest of the night, but I have a feeling he was busy patrolling, or hunting down that man.

I can't say for sure that the drunk man had any intention of harming Sr. Maria, or that the man who ran through the bushes was trying to break into the kitchen, or do anything to our campus at all for that matter. But some sort of instinct kicked in for Goofy, and he transformed into a wild, territorial beast, out to protect me, Sr. Maria, our school, or all of the above, from anyone who seemed threatening in the least. Not so "goofy" anymore.

Bumbling, loveable, licking-my-toes Goofy by day; sharp, instinctual, territorial watchdog by night. Maybe I didn't ruin him after all.

Rascals in Paradise

For our mid-service retreat (Re-Orientation), we spent five days on a small, uninhabited island on the reef of Chuuk lagoon. A couple of definitions: by "uninhabited," I mean, Population: 2 (two men whose family owns the island, who live there occasionally and upkeep the island); and by "small," I mean, there is no point on the island from which you cannot see the ocean from all four sides. During our 1 1/2 hour boat ride to get there, one of the second-year volunteers who had been there the year before looked at me and asked, "Are you ready for total island paradise?" I smiled, but thought, Don't I live on an island paradise every day in Pohnpei?

I discovered that I had underestimated Pisar. As we advanced upon it, our boat reduced its speed to accomodate for the shallower waters, and my community mate Luke motioned and said, "That's it." I followed his gaze to see an island of tall green foliage in the middle, surrounded by beaches of white sand, which is nonexistant on the main islands of Pohnpei and Chuuk. One tall, renegade palm tree perched on the edge of the white sand, separating itself from the other hues of green and leaning out over the edge of the water, its huge trunk curved into the shape of a negative exponential fuction (just reminding you all that I'm still a nerdy math teacher).

The water became shallow enough that we had to anchor our boat about 70 feet from the shore and taxi in by an even smaller speedboat. Pisar met us in traditional island fashion, with a tremendous storm that poured fresh, cool water on us as soon as we finished unloading our belongings and the food and drinking water that would sustain us for five days.

From my journal that first night:
How is it possible, I asked God tonight, my eyes fixed on the night sky. How is it possible that there is so much beauty in the world that I've yet to discover? My eyes stayed glued to the stars for a long time tonight, as though I'd never seen it before. I suppose I haven't - I've seen the same sky, but not like this. Almost a year ago, Chris [Kerr, a Campus Minister and friend from John Carroll, who had been on Pohnpei for a summer in '99] had written in a farewell card, "Pohnpei is God's planetarium." I passed on this comment to my community mates as we discovered that he was right on certain, cloudless nights on Pohnpei, when the sky was clear and the island dark enough to see so many stars - easily twice the amount I've ever seen at one time before in my life. I wish he could see Pisar. I wish everyone I know could see Pisar. Even as I write this, every time I look up, I become fixated again for a few moments, as though I've discovered yet another of the God's secrets, a new freckle on the incredible face that belongs to nature.

Pisar was awe-striking for me for many reasons. It provided for me a "retreat" in the truest sense of the word. I was able to retreat from all technologies, even down to lights at night other than the moon and stars, and even retreat from myself - my worries and doubts about the year ahead, and musings about the year I had just finished. My head was clear, the world made perfect sense, and there was a peace within me that I've certainly felt before, but never for five consecutive days. That peace compounded upon itself and engulfed me, allowing me to leave the island still wrapped in its warmth (or coolness - additional warmth on top of the heat and humidity of this island doesn't sound particularly comforting!), refreshed and ready to start a second year. The therapeutic effects of the natural world.

I think the sound, or lack thereof, of Pisar was most striking. One day I lay back on the sand, put my journal aside, and listened. I heard:
The wind making music with the palm fronds
A small bird, very close, or maybe far off, carried to me by the wind
The ocean, far off, crashing loudly on the reef
The ocean, close, washing on the shore a few feet away
Someone's soft footprints in the sand
That's it. I lay there for about an hour, concentrating very hard on sounds and nothing else, and could only pick out five sounds. Tell me where else in the world that's possible.

Also from my journal, on the last day:
For five consecutive days, I've worn no shoes on my feet. The island boasts many wonders, one being a walking distance from one end to the next of one minute and 26 seconds, at a leisurely pace. A constant ocean breeze wraps around me, a breeze to trump all other breezes I've felt in my life.

Snorkeling, I wonder at the Pacific in a thousand hues of blue, hiding magnificent coral, big and small, round or jagged, orange, brick red, pure white, cream, brown, and tan. Schools of fish take no notice of the big, awkward, human-shaped fish that has just moved into their neighborhood, and they swim, around, beneath, and over me. Tiny aqua blue fish, orange clown fish (none had a defective fin - I checked - thus, Nemo must be elsewhere), big blue starfish, skinny long fish, and tiny electric fish that form a huddle around me - all are luckier than the flat black fish that got barbequed for dinner last night. Sand in places I didn't know sand could find its way into, sand that will demand some serious scrubbing, is currently working its way between the inner and outer layers of my shorts. I have no keys with me, because there is not a single keyhole on this island. There are no precautions to take before heading otu to the ocean, which is a few feet away from where I sleep, to snorkel for three hours - no bed to make, no lights to turn out, no money to run out of.

I feel that I no longer look like the pale American I was when I arrived to Pisar, the place of healing. My feet are softer and callous-free, my toenails bleached white by the coral sand. My skin is tanned a light bronze by the sun, and my hair is thick with salt water and salty ocean air. What of tomorrow? My hair will wash clean, my tan will fade, and my feet will harden and be dirty once again, but what of the rest of me? What part of me will refuse to leave this place?

On the boat ride home, we were welcomed back to the troubled Micronesia we have all come to know as the men operating our boat threw our carefully collected, tightly tied, black trash bags into the water as we sped along. The tide was high, and water splashed up into the boat from all sides, soaking us. The honeymoon was over, but I stared at Pisar until it disappeared below the horizon.

As we approached the main island of Chuuk, a dolphin appeared from nowhere and accompanied our boat for only a few minutes, pleasing us with tricks and jumps, before disappearing as suddenly as he had come.

Rock

(A poem about a hike that has given me strength, clarity, and peace in the past year)

Climbing, always climbing, trying to reach, trying to grasp, trying to conquer, trying to perfect.

The long walk to the base, black pavement, blinding sun, dogs chasing, hot, dry, dry heat, sunburned shoulders, no shade, cars whizzing around corners, angry sun, hot, hot.

The stairs, Nature's Stairmaster, winding, slipping, steep, steeper, wet rocks that never see the sun, spiders and their invisible webs, the bats' cries from their deep caves, humid, dark, only patches of sunlight, harder to breathe, quads burning, lungs burning, contacts burning, sweat dripping, wet, wet.

The rock, the sudden wind, the climb, the challege, the view, my God, the view, the adrenaline, the fear, the slipping grip, the focus, the determination, the muscles rippling, my arms failing, the elusive footholds, no more pain, no more fear, can't feel the pain, gotta get to the top, the top.

The top, the wind, the peace, the waves that crash upon the reef, that white foam, the toy boats, the airstrip, the entire airstrip, the pineapple bushes ripping ankles open, the scuttling crabs, the drop, my God, the drop, the fear and wonder, anxiety and awe, the wind, the view, my God, that view, the birds that soar, the view, the view.

Mother Mary, come to me..

When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary, come to me;
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be…

During the last meeting of the ten-week preparation process for this tomorrow’s Confirmation, I and the other confirmants were asked to formulate a response to the simple query: “Confirmation is over; now what?” In other words, how do we expect our lives as confirmed Catholics to be any different than life before? This question is especially vital for me, as I’m not only confirming my existing commitment to the Christian faith, but also officially changing my denominational affiliation – from Lutheran to Catholic. My reasons are many, but not altogether revolutionary. I’ve been discussing joining the Catholic Church for some time, and hoped for an easy transition. Recent conversations, however, have encouraged my suspicions that I’ll have a lot of work to do when I get home to set minds at ease about my decision.

I don’t mean to sound like I didn’t see it coming. To my best knowledge, my entire extended family on my mom’s side (five children, eleven grandchildren, and three great grandchildren) have been baptized and raised in the same Lutheran church, in the small town of Petersburg, Ohio. During the recitation of the Apostle’s Creed, in place of the line that reads, “I believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church,” an unnamed member of my family says loudly and clearly, “…one holy CHRISTIAN and apostolic church…” This practice goes unshared by the rest of my family, but I’m not certain that some of them necessarily disagree, based on some of their reactions to my conversion.

This work of explaining my faith is work I feel prepared and glad to do – after all, what would be the point of joining a Church whose practices and beliefs I am unable to explain and support? Confidence in my ability to represent the Catholic faith was one of my primary answers to the posed question.

The strength of the reactions I have received has been surprising; some have been very encouraging, others frustrating, while still others that have left me with questions of my own. More often than not, the reactions are expressed innocently, in true Peter Griffin (“You know what really grinds my gears?”) or Andy Rooney (“And here’s ANOTHER thing that makes me angry!”) fashion. The most common grievance, at least among my family and friends: “…and why are they so obsessed with Mary?”

Among all of the disparities between Catholics and Protestants, from the hierarchy of the church to transubstantiation, interpretations of Scripture, and the sacrament of reconciliation, the Church’s perspective on Christ’s mother Mary has proven to be a hot button issue. I’ve heard some ridiculous claims, including that the Church honors Mary more than her son. Though I suppose it may seem that way to some, as James Martin puts it, “so intricately woven is she into the tapestry of [Catholic] religious culture,” I think a deeper understanding of Roman-Catholic Mariology reveals that an appreciation of Mary actually gives way to a deeper understanding of Christ.

My understanding of Mary has always been one of absolute awe – imagining myself at her young age to be suddenly pregnant, forced to flee to another country, and handed the responsibility of raising a child in very difficult and dangerous circumstances. Her unshakable faith, amplified by her immense strength and courage, make her a woman to be admired – even BEFORE weighing the more mysterious and difficult-to-fathom aspects of Christ’s Immaculate Conception (which my mind of reason still struggles to digest).

The story of the Annunciation – when the angel Gabriel reveals Christ’s conception to Mary – further demonstrates her amazing faith. As the Gospel of Luke tells us, she is at first terrified. It is in her terror, her bewilderment, her questions of ‘How can this be?’ that I find myself most comforted. Who hasn’t questioned the events of our lives, chalking them up to the ‘will of God’ and thus asking, exasperated, ‘Why me?!’ Mary’s response is wonderfully and refreshingly human. Her eventual response inspires me further: “Let it be with me according to your word.”

Additionally, the feminist in me holds Mary in great esteem for the unique role that Mary, as a woman, played in Christ’s mission. Mary did something no man could do. You go, girl! I’m touched by the roles played by Veronica and Mary Magdelene during the Passion and Resurrection for the same essential reason. A mentor and friend of mine from John Carroll, Paula, has a wonderful piece of art hanging in her office, depicting a group of women at the foot of the cross with the simple caption: “It was the women who stayed.” During my long hours in her office during retreat planning, I would find myself staring intently at the piece, certain that that caption meant something significant for my own life.

Thus, despite all of the criticism of the Church’s often not-so-subtle commentary on the role of women, which is an existing grievance of mine as well, I find their dedication to and portrayal of the humble, trusting Mary as surprisingly empowering, and one that, as a woman myself, helps me feel closer to Christ. To me, this is the essence of intercession.

Intercession refers to, at least in the Christian use of the word, mediation between oneself and Christ through an intermediary, usually a recognized saint, including Mary and the apostles. In my experience, especially recently, the purpose of and philosophy underlying intercession is the most misunderstood aspect of Catholicism. As many friends and family have expressed, why go through someone like Mary when you can go straight to the source of the answer of your prayers, Jesus? Half-jokingly, I’ve heard it said, “When I go to a doctor, I don’t want to talk to his mother.”

However, that’s not what we say about our pastors. When Protestants talk with their pastor, she is often asked to pray for them. She does not, in turn, put her hands up and back away, defensively declaring, “Don’t talk to me! Just pray to Jesus!” Pastors, priests, and anyone else to whom we look for guidance and prayers, have great compassion and indeed, intercede for us. They pray for us and want to assist us in our relationships with Christ. Their true desire should be to bring their congregants closer to Christ. This is no way diminishes Christ’s role as “the source”.

I feel myself increasingly drawn to Mary through my experience in Pohnpei, surprisingly having nothing to do with my decision to become confirmed. Working at Our Lady of Mercy (I’ll give you one guess who the lady is!) Catholic High School has surrounded me not only with images of Mary (enormous posters in each classroom with the caption, “Our Lady of Mercy, Pray for Us”) but with three strong and devoted women (the Mercedarian Missionaries of Berriz sisters who run my school) who emulate the faith I hope to have for my own life – the unwavering faith of Mary. The distinctly Catholic “Hail Mary” has become for me a great source of comfort, especially on some sleepless nights when I lie awake, fingering the gorgeous white rosary I was either given or took without asking from my mother – I can’t quite remember which. My deep and unexpected connection to Mary, I suspect, has a lot to do with my maturing relationship with my own mother, aunts, and grandmother, the sources of unconditional love in my life. That relationship, I am pleasantly surprised to say, I think has grown even deeper in the past eight months despite the 7000 miles between us.

I’ll never claim to have all the answers on Catholicism – I’ll leave that to Richard McBrien, author of the incredibly comprehensive (and longer than the Bible and War & Peace combined) Catholicism. But as I slowly and clumsily weave the tapestry of my own faith discoveries, I can promise to share.