Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has come and gone.  I missed being with friends and family, and the turkey of course.  I searched everywhere here, and after trying to explain what a turkey was, realized they don't have any here.  I was not surprised, but still a little disappointed.  I am one of only 2 Americans on the island, and the other one seems a bit off her rocker.   So I talked to the staff at work about what Thanksgiving is, and they were all excited about it.  So we took a half day off of work, and I bought the biggest fish in the market.  It was 100 SBD or about 15 US.  I could barely pick it up, it defiantly weighed more then me.

We filleted the fish and marinated it with some limes, and everyone cooked food in there Modo, the traditional ovens here.  You basically take everything you want to eat, wrap it in leaves then put hot stones on it all night, and in the morning cooked food.  It is similar to a crock pot only no electricity is needed.  We had Kasava, Fish, Banana Pudding, Potatoes, Fried Rice, lots of fruits, fresh breads, and some beer of course!  Everyone had their kids come and enjoy in the food.  It was a lot of fun, and kind of exciting.  I started thinking that the pilgrims were starving so the Indians brought them food on thanksgiving.  Well I am always hungry here, and the locals cooked all of the food their way, for us to enjoy.  It was easy doing the dishes as well, when you use leaves for all your plates!

We probably had about 50 people come.  The one and only radio station on the island even got wind of it, and said Happy Thanksgiving to all the staff at Dive Gizo.  A guy named Kennedy came, his grandfather rescued and hid JFK and his crew from the Japanese during the war after their PT boat sank.  He was nice enough to bring some Lobster and beer!

Dude Where's My Canoe?

This weekend, I spent diving as usual. On Saturday though I had a problem, most of my staff did not show up for work! I found out that the truck that drives people from the villages did not run. On Sunday one of the carpenters showed up and apologized for not being at work on Saturday. He had a very good excuse and a funny one. He did not come in the day before because he could not find his canoe! Unfortunately some fishermen in his village had borrowed it without asking, because he usually does not work on the weekends. I thought that excuse was just a riot, and had to share it with you all. It is defiantly interesting watching how many people still use a canoe as transportation. On Mondays like today some people travel 2 days by canoe to come to the markets here, and we complain about a 30 min commute in an air conditioned car!

Luke

What goes on in Gizo

Life here is a bit different, and it constantly reminds you how it is.  It seems like everyday I learn something new.  Well the other night I was reading on the veranda, and heard a knock at the door.  It was some of the neighborhood kids wondering if they could climb my coconut tree to get some coconuts.  I had lots of small ones, that are very sweet to eat, and they even chew on the skin. Now I have seen many people here shoot up the coconut trees but these were small kids, about 5 to 7 years old.

I was fine with them doing it, and just said not to drop the coconuts on someones heads.  They thought that was funny as the ran off now smacking each other on top of their heads.  While they were knocking down the coconuts, one fell within a foot of another child, and they laughed at how close it had come.  What is interesting is there are a number of injuries and deaths here from the coconut trees.  If I forget and sit under one, someone will quickly move me, for fear I get hit by a falling coconut.

After this I went by my neighbors house.  Joe Bruno lives there and also works with me.  He is by far the loudest person in town, and rides with me to work everyday.  He generally rides in the back so that he can talk to or yell at everyone we pass.  He bangs on the roof and I stop to pick up people.  His youngest son was one of the boys in the coconut tree, and I go by and chat and eat some food with him during the sunset.  Bruno also has a grandson Jaygone, that lives with him.  Jaygone is not shy at all and loves talking.  He rides down to the market once or twice a week, wearing a big straw hat, and home made clothes.  He does not like to wear new clothes, only ones made from hand me downs.  He calls me Luku, and talks about Uhos (fish) every chance he can get.  He is fascinated by trucks, and when ever one goes by he says it is Danny, my boss.  He is in the photos above.

Today I learned how to fillet fish, and actually did it one my own.  Then we built a fire at work, and grilled some yellow fin Tuna, it was a huge fish that only cost about $4 US, it fed about 12 people lunch!  It was not the most tasteful fish, but they have run out of beef and pork, and the chicken is too expensive.  So the fish is cheaper and better tasting then Spam here, so that is what I have to learn to love.  I defiantly like it better grilled or fried, I do not care for the boiled fish.  I have been loosing weight and either need to eat more or find someone to take in my shorts.  I eat donuts from the market for breakfast, or eggs if I get up early enough.  Then eat Tuna Salad, noodles, or go out for fish and chips during lunch.  Then dinner is usually cooked at home, except Fridays when most the other ex pats and I eat at the Hotel.  About once a week I splurge and go to Wing Sun Store, where he has American candy bars.  I buy either a Mars or a Snickers and it is so wonderful!

Hope all is well at home

Luke

Good Diving Days

Well this weekend I had four students that had finished their Open Water course so we all went out for some fun dives.  We went on two wall dives and one plane wreck.  The wall dives is like diving the side of a building that starts just under the surface and generally continues for about two or three hundred feet below towards the bottom.  The dives were at some of our best reefs here, Yellow Corner and Secret Spot.  We dove a Hell Cat fighter plane that crashed into shallow lagoon when it ran out of gas in WWII.  We saw lots of sharks at Yellow Corner, and at one point had 4 or 5 circling us.  Don't be worried they were all small reef sharks, the largest one being about a meter and a half long.

Since I did not have any students I was able to bring my camera along and get some pictures.  I got a few of the sharks, but they are rather hard to get good pictures of.  I also got some photos of Nudibranchs, a lion fish, a crocodile fish, and of the plane.  During our surface interval a storm kicked up as we were cooking some fish over a fire.  I felt a little cold for once, it was almost pleasant.  It passed in about an hour, and we got on with our lunch and the rest of the day of diving.  It was a fun relaxing weekend, and am glad I got to take some photos.

Luke

Sick...

So I have not been sick much in recent years.  And if I was I always had my mom (love you), or even my brother that I lived with to kind of look out for me.   Well the other night I got home from work but did not have too much of an appetite to eat.  I don't know why, I had some perfectly delicious Spam and some fresh baked rolls.  Well I did not eat dinner, and soon afterwards started throwing up.  I don't mean the kind of throw up where you feel much better afterwards, I mean the kind that makes your sides and stomach muscles ache.

This decided to go on for the next 20 hours or so, just a good bit of vomiting on the hour, also accompanied by a large fever.  Now I don't have a thermometer but I know when I am getting a fever.  Now when you get sick at home you drive to the store and buy whatever of the many drugs you need.  But when its the middle of the night and there is only one pharmacy in town, which is closed by the way.  Rumor is the owner is in jail, don't ask me why.  You have to make due.  So I rummage through some medicine in the closet, a vast assortment from different countries and different languages.  Trying to find Tylenol to reduce the fever.  Of course it can't be that simple, it seems the US is the only country that has Tylenol, and I could not remember the active ingredient in my fits of vomiting.  I finally found one that did not look too old, and promised to reduce fevers, so I took 4, and low and behold an hour later my fever seemed to go away.

Well now the fever is under control but I am in a very hot country sweating a lot with no AC and can't keep liquids in my body.  I am severely dehydrated so I try sipping some sprite.  Well now I had the pleasure of throwing up Sprite.  I decided if it went on for longer then 24 hrs to go to the hospital just for fears of passing out due to lack of water.  Luckily it stopped and I am feeling much better, but being sick alone, and crawling around the house is no fun. 

Now that I feel better I am craving all of that food you want after you were sick, like soup.  So I go to the Chinese shops in town in search of soup.  Well first I have to explain what soup is to the people, which is hard to do, because I wanted to say "Its liquidity, you know like soup".  So between the language barrier and the people never apparently having soup, I failed.  I did find two shops that knew what I was talking about, but did not have it.  So I was stuck between foods I knew would be good on the stomach, $2 noodles, $40 cereal, $10 snickers bar.  I went with the noodles and snickers bars.  I mean $40 for a box of counterfeit Kellogg's is just outrageous.

I missed all the friends and family back home, and hope you enjoy some soup next time you are sick.

Luke

Teaching Open Water Dive Classes

Well I just finished teaching my first dive class here in the Solomons.  It went really well, I had four students that volunteer in the hospital here.  They were all lots of fun, and we had a gorgeous place to learn in.  The training consist of five class room sessions, five pool dives, and four final training dives in the ocean.  For the class room portion we did it on the large veranda of my house, overlooking the ocean and the waves breaking.  The learning environment was quite nice compared to a stuffy class room with no windows.

There is no pool here, so doing the pool dives we needed to improvise a little bit.  We found a shallow lagoon that was between 3 and 12 feet deep, and used that to practice our skills.  We would set up our equipment on the beach, then wade into the water and start doing our class.  It was nice being in 90 degree water, as clear as a pool, with lots of fish.  One annoying aspect of teaching in a real swimming pool, is that it is hard to swim around in such a small space, but being in a large lagoon we could spread out and really practice the skills.

For the open water dives we did the first three off of Kennedy Island, on a site called Kennedy Wall.  This is the Island JFK was marooned on, hence the name.  We had clear warm water, and plenty of fish to see.  We saw some large jacks, trigger fish, and one of the biggest jaw fish I have ever seen.  We were also able to find 3 different kind of Nudibranchs .  The nudibranchs are a small snail like creature that are brightly colored and hard to find.  They are often smaller then your finger nails.  The last dive we did at a site name Naru Wall, by Naru Island.  We got to see some lion fish here, as well as a few small sharks.

I hope all is well back home, I was able to hear the election results, and I hope Obama will be able to do some great things for our country and the world.  America is a very great place that got that way through innovation, hard work, and God's blessing on the people there.  I just hope that everyone realizes that when you want something you need to work for it.  One thing I have noticed here, is everyone has complaints about the government and corruption, and why their problems are someone else's fault.  But..... All day they sit around, do not work, or strive to open businesses, and all night they spend their money on beer.  Their are some that contradict that statement, but they seem to be in the minority.  If you want something work for it, and I think Americans are forgetting that now more then ever.

Luke

Market Clean Up

Well like in America, people here litter.  The problem is that they can not afford to pay someone else to pick it up for them.  So today was a market clean up day organized by the government.  They closed down the market, which made a few people upset.  Then they gathered volunteers by riding through town in a truck yelling with a bull horn.  About 200 volunteers showed up, and in about one hour, they cleared about 12 truck fulls of trash from 1 city block.  It was pretty incredible to see.

Next they passed out sand paper, and all of the wooden booths were sanded by hand for painting.  Keep in mind this is the area of a city block and all the sanding was finished in about 45 minutes.  Next some paint arrived and brushes were passed out to everyone.  After about 3 hours of painting, it is nearly complete.  The market looks incredible, I wish I had taken some before and after photos.  I never thought they would put such effort into it.  They also have new laws for the market to prevent it from getting so messy.  Everyone here is very proud of their work, and I think they should be.  I have seen lots of community projects done before, but never with the enthusiasm and hard work that they did here.  I just hope everyone appreciates it and keeps it cleaner from now often.

Luke

Halloween

I have learned that Halloween is really an American holiday, the brits and aussies here never do anything special for it.  But since I wanted to, we threw a party at the Gizo Hotel.  It was quite a blast getting everyone dressed up, the staff at the hotel really loved it.  You may ask yourself where do you buy a costume when you are in a third world country, especially one that is a small island?  Well, the answer is you make it,  I decided to be an Island Warrior so making my costume was quite easy.  I walked through the jungle and got leaves, and flowers to put together a skirt, head dress, and arm bands.  I then had the guys at work make a spear and shield. I even learned how to make black paint out of charcoal and coconut oil.  It was quite, fun and I won third prize, which was 100 Solomon dollars or about 15 US. 

Things here have been good.  I have done a good bit of dives, and enjoying the weather.  It was quite cool yesterday evening it got to 79 F, the lowest it has been since I have been here, it made it quite nice and easy to sleep.  I started a class with 4 people doing there Open Water class, the basic diver course and enjoyed it a lot.  There is no swimming pool here, so we do the first part of the course in a shallow lagoon, about 6 feet deep.  The water was crystal clear, and about 90 F, hows that for a heated pool!  There was even large schools of silver fish and some clown fish hanging around.  It was nice having fish swimming through your swimming pool!  I am doing great and really enjoying things, and hope all is well with everyone in the States.  I am very anxious to see the results of the election and am sure there will be a log of finger pointing the next few days no matter who wins.

Luke