Dear family and friends,
After a long break from decent email communication, for no particularly good reason, I have decided to inflict my thoughts upon you all. Thanks for being such willing inflictees.
Today is one of those days where 10 metres of rain a year seems like an underestimate. I have just watched the island across the lagoon from our house be engulfed in a black sheet of rain. It travelled towards me, covering the kilometre or two in a few minutes, and collided against our house so loudly poor Thom Yorke on the stereo was drowned out completely. He probably would have something to say about that, but I couldn't hear it.
We walked to a spectacular waterfall on Sunday morning, about 30 minutes drive (which took me nearly an hour because I foolishly give way to oncoming trucks, pedestrians and meandering pigs) and 1 hours walk away, on the east side of the island in Madolenhimw. (I think the Pohnpeians can proudly say they have recreated the feeling of a mouthful of peanut butter in their language, with their alphabet containing such chewy digraphs as oa, mw, ng and pw. Pronunciation of mw is described as 'velarised voiced bilabial nasal'. Yes, I have bought a Pohnpeian dictionary.)
Anyway, the waterfall was beautiful, about 15 metres high and pluming out of a narrow channel carved into the rock at the cliff top. We swam in the cool, deep, thankfully eel-free pool at the bottom, washing away the grime of the muddy and muggy walk. We had enjoyed it from the top about 30 minutes previously, as the route was not clear, and being a dense tropical jungle, the paths tend to become overgrown, even as you are standing on them. We just popped out of the jungle and there it was, the beautiful inviting pool just a shimmy up the nearby palm tree and a 20 metre leap away. 007 would have done it (not the new one though, he is a bit soft don't you think?). We now have the GPS coordinates for easy access next time.
It is breadfruit season here at the moment. Apparently there are 5 seasons a year so I guess that is no big deal. This is 'the' season however. If I enjoyed eating them I would be in gustatory paradise. Just wait around, anywhere, for 5 minutes and a breadfruit or two will be delivered at your feet from the heavens. It is such a shame they have the flavour and texture of plasticine. The most popular way of preparing them in our neighbouring island of Chuuk is to bury them in the ground for 6 months and let them rot. Thus, preserved breadfruit, which is the traditional staple of pacific islander nations embarking on oceanic travels. Due to the impossible popularity of Spam and rice, however, most breadfruit lies where it falls, slowly giving its plasticiney goodness back to the earth, and its week-old fruit salad aroma to the nostrils of anybody within a few kilometres. This is a smallish island, with billions of breadfruit (In a moment of contemplation, I estimated upon one of the trees next to our house more than 1000 of the wee blighters. I looked up the hill behind our house and saw dozens more trees, most bigger and equally densely packed. That's a lot of breadfruit.) Nobody eats them much, except one nice little restaurant (called 'Joy', isn't that pretty) fries them as chips which taste pretty good. I put them in the same category as taro. Stupendously starchy foods which could sustain a whole civilisation in abundance, but just not that tasty. We created a taro dip to serve at a dinner party we gave, and 1 taro of about 1 kg expanded into a monstrous slurry of carbohydrated goodness which filled a 5 litre Tupperware container, stalling our blender and resisting my best efforts at liquefying further. Each mouthful required a lie down afterwards. Beware.
Food does play an important role in our lives here, with the scarcity/abundance thing making every trip to the market exciting. There is a pretty regular supply of vegies available, but the real treat is the seasonal oddities that people have planted. Agriculture is not huge here, and there is still a lot of practising to get it right. We are getting avocadoes (the size of 1.25 litre coke bottles), pineapples, and tomatoes at the moment. The Chinese embassy have set up a farm to demonstrate how most things can be grown here. We suspect they have to be watched though, as the tomatoes which have recently been available are very, very perfect perfect... I wonder what on earth they have to spray on them to get them that way? It's a dilemma, as I like tomatoes a lot, and the usual imported offerings have spent a long time on a boat from the USA and often pick themselves up off the shelves into your basket.
The Chinese have a large presence here, building large buildings for the government which remain empty for years as nobody quite knows what to do with them, can't afford to run or maintain them, or just don't need them. Jo and I were in the Pohnpei Community Choir which performed at the FSM College (University) in their glorious, Chinese provided gymnasium (it really is spectacular, big digital scoreboards, sprung timber floor, stadium seating). We had to move the stage though, as half the light bulbs were out which made big dark patches. There are none of the special light bulbs on the island to replace them, and if there was, no-one has a ladder long enough to reach them. Apparently there is scaffolding which can be erected to reach them, but it takes 2 days, and nobody seems to know exactly where it is or how to do it.
I acquired a copy of a collection of student essays from the College, on the theme of 'How To Cook a Dog'. Dog is traditionally eaten here, and there are lots of them about, all non-desexed and rooting all the time. It is not uncommon to see dogs 'stuck together' after a bit of action. One couple on the road into town were stuck together for 2 days, but they seemed to just go about their normal business, but walking with a kind of self-conscious sideways shuffle. There are lots of cute puppies, and lots of mangy, nasty cursed beasts of satan.
I like dogs, but not barbecued. The essays make for fascinating reading, as the students are from throughout the FSM, and represent several different cultures. The FSM is a relatively new, artificial political construct which lumped together different regions for ease of administration. They all eat dog though, but I get the feeling it is a relatively new practice, as most of the 'recipes' suggest eating it with soy sauce and lime (kalamansi) juice, washed down with Budweiser. Hmmm, when is a cultural 'tradition' old enough to justify what I think is pretty nasty behaviour? Gandhi apparently said that you can judge a civilisation on the way it treats its animals.
[Ed. comment from Jo : Ben eats cows, pigs, sheep and chickens. And fish. And ducks. And many other animals. So do I. He is being a little cuturally judgemental for my liking. Although admittedly I wouldn't like to eat a dog. Especially not my brother's dog, Ralph.]
Jo has just booked a flight to Kosrae for us, for this Friday for a week. Yay! Dan (see the link to his blog on our blog) is having a significant birthday, and as he no longer lives here the party is in Kosrae, which is the next major island east. They apparently have beautiful sandy beaches, and I plan to become SCUBA certified there. I had an extremely persistent (and gross) ear problem for the first few months here, which just about sent me loopy with partial random deafness in either or both ears. It has been gone for a month now, so hopefully that is the end of it and I can learn to dive! I can't wait to get away from this tropical island to another tropical island.
I finally submitted my last assessment piece yesterday, after 2 months of way too little hammocking. Yay for me! Beers for breakfast again!
Ben
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