Thanksgiving is over..

And Thanksgiving is OVER! Oh my. Oh my! I don’t know what Joy and I were thinking with the entire thanksgiving feast day, it was soo much work!! But our kids absolutely loved it, so it was worth it. :) haha they were fascinated by cranberry sauce. They kept saying, “Miss? Miss? Is this cranberry?” haha it was really cute. Oh, and the Indian and and pilgrim thing went great! The kids looked so adorable sitting with their little Indian and pilgrim hats around a table eating together! To start the day the pilgrims traveled to “America” (our classroom) and Squanto was the only one who could talk to them (duh! Everyone else could obviously only speak in Indian gibberish). Then we played thanksgiving games, such as Indian Indian pilgrim (instead of duck, duck goose), I read them an indian legend, my class performed their indian rain dance, we had a pilgrim and indian skit, my indians showed everyone their indian names and explained what it meant in English (they drew their names and decorated them on colored paper), then the pilgrims sang a thankful song and the feast began! Joy and I put the desks in my room together to make two long big tables, we decorated them with table settings the pilgrims made, got out all of our cookings and were finally ready! It was literally like a week worth of work in one day haha but worth it..

Now it’s Christmas time! We started decorating my classroom today! I’ll definitely be taking pictures soon! :) I have been CRAZY busy this last week and a half there is SO much I want to blog about from running a 5 k, to directing a christmas play, to having a spa day with my kids lol hopefully I will be able to soon! But as for now I must go, there is always something that needs to be done! Miss all my family and friends. Xoxo.  

A thought on the death of a fellow missionary..

I have began this blog about six times, and some how my fingers have found the back space bar each time. I honestly do not know where to begin. The array of emotions myself and so many others have experienced throughout this past week is remarkable…

Satan is working SO hard right now, I know however, that my God is working harder. The murder of Kirsten Wolcott has been something extremely hard to grasp, accept, and understand. I am assuming that most of you have heard the horrific news, but if not I regret to inform you of the incident.. A fellow student missionary, from Southern Adventist University, who was teaching on the island of Yap (an island that is also part of the FSM just like Pohnpei) was murdered last week. I have heard varying details, but what I do know for sure is that they found her body, and it is unbelievably terrible.  To be perfectly honest, I don’t think this sunk in nearly as much as it should have at first. I think I was in shock, so life continued on in a normal fashion for a couple days.

Then yesterday it hit me. I was entirely upset. This girl had been living a life ridiculously similar to mine these last three months. Dealing with the same struggles I faced as a new teacher, going to the island grocery store for the first time, receiving her first package from home, going running, experiencing exotic island fruits for the first time, falling in love with her students, having her fist wave of homesickness, discovering God in a new way, facing some bug or insect invasion, being overwhelmed with lesson plans, having her breath taken away from the beauty that surrounds us at these islands, and so much more. And to have her life taken in such a horrific way?

Earlier that day my kids made cards for the Wolcott family. It was absolutely adorable and heart warming. I had to fight tears from coming to my eyes in class. These fourth graders who had never met “Miss Wolcott” or any one of her family members were writing things like, “Dear Mr. and  Mrs. Wolcott, we love your family so so much and will be praying for you every day.” or  one girl who just lost a sister a few weeks ago said, “I hope Miss Wolcott is with my sister in heaven, we love you.”  I told my kids that I would write some comforting bible texts on the board, and if they wanted to they could add one to their card. There was one verse however that I could not bring myself to write up on my dusty chalkboard. Hebrews 13:5 “Never will I leave you, Never will I forsake you.”  How could I send that text to the parents of a missionary child who was just murdered? Where was God for Kirsten huh? It was simply appalling to me.

I decided to take my frustrations out on the track, questioning God with each stride. I just couldn’t grasp my mind around it. I felt like yelling, “GOD! SHE GAVE HER LIFE COMPLETELY TO YOU FOR A YEAR! WHERE WERE YOU?!?!”  I replayed Hebrews 13:5 over in my mind again and again, and then it occurred to me. He was there the ENTIRE time. He was there while everything was happening, however appalling, terrible and horrific it was. He did not leave Kirsten, He did not forsake her, because He promised her that He would not. And God cannot lie because it would be a complete contradiction of Himself, of His word. For He is truth, His word is truth, and He is His word (John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” ).

Just as my mind will never fully grasp the greatness of God until I stand before Him with a song in my heart and on my lips, my human mind cannot even come close to grasping the horrors of sin in this world. Until the time when I can understand both, I chose to follow the Truth. I chose to follow a Promise.

Yes, It is easy to be angry. Anger does not require faith. Anger does not require trust. Anger does not require love. But Hope does. This is what I pray we can all chose in this time. Jesus come soon, and until you do, guard our hearts and minds with Your peace, a peace that transcends all understanding.

 

Kisses, Karaoke, and Strange Green Substances..

So we had the school fair yesterday. It was SO fun! I was kind of worried about it because it wasn’t very organized, but it turned out great! The fourth graders made a kissing booth and it was adorable! I personally think our booth looked the best (it was covered with hearts and checkered red and pink papers the kids decorated that said things like “kiss me” on them), but then there is a huge possibility that my opinion is very biased. :) I turned into Miss Breann the make-up artist and with my oh so limited artistic and make-up abilities covered four of my boys and three girls with lipstick and hearts all over their faces. They looked soo cute! A customer would come to our booth pay fifty cents to have that special someone kissed, and then an eager 4th grade kisser covered in melting makeup would race off to find their next love victim. Haha then that person could come to our booth and pay fifty cents to find out who kissed them (we had a top secret love book with the names in it of course). It ended up being really cute. I think my favorite booth (besides ours OF COURSE) might have been the “love connection” booth. Haha you could pay to have two people handcuffed for like ten minutes. It was great. Definitely had some good laughs over that one! Then there was jail. Of course. Joy got sent to jail like eight times and I just kept laughing at her. It was great. Then at the end of the day the high school kids put like six of us sm’s in the jail. We thought this was fairly normal until suddenly water balloons started splattering everywhere. Next thing I knew an entire trashcan of water was being thrown on us innocent jailbirds. Once this happened every child felt it their responsibility to dump as much water as possible on their beloved teachers. After about the fourth bucket of water, twenty water balloons, and ten water bottles I escaped by crawling through some of the mesh and forcing the door open. This led to a jail wide prisoner escape and a huge water fight. Then to top it all off, it started raining outside. I was DRIPPING wet. I swear I had no idea who half of these children were haha I was yelling, “I don’t even KNOW you!!! Who are you?!?!? What have I ever done to you?!?!” and the kids were just laughing and spraying me more. One time I turned around just in time to see a child throw an old ice cream bucket straight at my face. Just as this was happening I thought, “that’s not water..that’s green..” During this moment I should have been thinking, “I should probably close my eyes because a liquid is being spewn in my face” unfortunately my previous inquires of the green substance ended up being true. For whatever was thrown at my face was indeed not water. This was confirmed by my eyes stinging for the next two minutes. I was in the heat of battle, however, and could not take the time to feel sorry for myself, or question what exactly this green substance was. Needless to say it was an eventful day :)
On a completely unrelated note, Asians LOVE karaoke. I’ve always known this, but not at all to this extent. Haha! A couple nights ago a group of us went to this resteraunt called coco marina that is right on the water and pretty much just a hut. There aren’t walls or anything. If that isn’t awesome enough, they had live karaoke going. Lets just say that I ROCKED some mamma mia soundtrack with the help of three back up dancers! :) I also made Andrew (another sm here) sing grease with me, and desperately missed my brother (no one rocks grease like the crook children, we’re pretty much an unstoppable team). The best part of the night however was when MJ (in previous blogs I have referred to her as Joy my favorite Filipino but since there are two Joys I’ve decided to call her MJ so no one gets confused!) started BELTING out “I will Survive” by Aretha Franklin. Oh. my word. Those Filipinos do NOT mess around when it comes to karaoke. I was laughing uncontrollably in between my soul filled back up singing and disco dance moves. It was great. :)
I absolutely love MJ and her family. I’ve been spending a lot of time with them lately and have enjoyed it so much. It’s really nice. I feel like I have some family here. Some days I just want family time, so I go hang out with them and play with Hailey, MJ’s adorable little girl. :) Well I’m going to go fry up some delicious eggplant I just bought. I have actually been cooking here. And the crazy thing is…I can actually kind of cook! I’m surprised with myself, and a little proud I’m not going to lie haha. Oh! and I received some fall decorations and leaves in the mail and was SOO excited! Hurray for seasons! Thank you for all your prayers and packages and love. :)

kissing booths and pumpkin pancakes..

It has officially been WAY too long since I have blogged. I am getting so used to living here! Some of the things that happen I don’t even think about blogging about now cuz they are normal to me haha. Well for one thing the school fair is tomorrow! My class is doing the kissing booth. We just set it up and it is soo cute! I’ll have to take pictures :) you pay fifty cents and one of my kids goes and gives someone a kiss for you, and then they can pay fifty cents if they want to find out who kissed them. They are all really excited about it! also the Christmas pagent is coming up and my friend joy and I volunteered to be in charge of it. We ended up deciding to write it from scratch. Lol I don’t know exactly WHAT we were thinking. But it is coming a long! I have been needing a creative outlet, and this is the perfect thing! Slightly stressful, um YES. But fun as well. We’re making it a news report, and it is going to be hilarious I’m not going to lie! Hopefully we can finish writing it this week so we can start having auditions (this is for pre-school through 12 grade by the way. Ya. I know. I’m crazy.) THEN we have to start practices and get the set going and costumes and everything. Which I won’t be working on cuz I’ll be holding the practices and directing and what not. But I still have to organize. Anyway, so we’ll see how that goes! I’ll have to find a way to record it so I can show everyone at home :)

The last few weeks I’ve had a lot of fun with my kids. We made spiders for Haloween and pumpkins, and haloween night SO many tricker treaters came to our apartment! We were raiding our pantry for ANYTHING to give them. Lol all of our candy from home was handed out, granola bars, fruit snacks, haha but it was worth it. A few weeks ago I showed up to class and my kids kept saying that I looked like a rock star. I was like What are you talking about?! Lol and they explained that it was because I had my hair down (I have it up in an ugly teacher bun like every day so this they were not used to apparently..) and because I was wearing make up (which I was not, but apparently there was the slightest trace of eyeliner from like vespers two days earlier which they detected). I found this pretty funny and so for Halloween I put my hair down and put on eyeliner and was a rockstar! :)

Besides that I am just getting closer and closer to my kids. They make me feel so loved. The other day almost my whole class made me a picture that said they loved me and all signed it. then they taped it up on the chalk board. I couldn’t help but smile the rest of the day. I also have a few boys that are what I guess you would call “trouble” boys that adore me, and I in return absolutely adore them. The sm before me wrote a letter of advice about my students and mentioned one student in particular as being very difficult and frustrating. Last week this boy drew me three happy halloween pictures repeatedly said, “Miss we love you soo much.” Or “Thank you for being our teacher” or “you are the best teacher ever, we love you soo much” . These boys melt my heart. I don’t know how I’m going to leave them. I don’t want any one to ever hurt them, I feel so protective of them. If anything ever happened to any of them I would just want to hold them until everything was ok.

I feel like God is teaching me how to love this year, and also how to be loved. I can definitely say that I am growing, and I can also say that it hasn’t been easy. But as I have needed God in different ways, He has had the opportunity to reveal himself to me in ways I had never seen Him before. THAT has been amazing. 

Speaking of amazing, my dad and gramma sent me pumpkin pancake mix and that as been quite amazing as well lol. (Miss you guys!!) My roommates and I have definitely enjoyed that! :)

This week I have particularly been missing my close girlfriends. I am so blessed to have some truly incredible woman be a part of my life and I thank God for friends like them :). Hugs to everyone back home..

A full weekend

I’m really starting to fall in love with this island. I have a feeling that these next seven months are going to fly by. It is so beautiful here, and there is so much to experience. I am so glad that I am here, and feel so blessed that God picked me. Grades and school can definitely get stressful and some days I don’t know how I’ll make it to the end of the day. This past week or so I have felt like Satan has been really trying to bring me down. At first I felt so small and frustrated and even hurt, but now I’m realizing that that is the opposite of how I should be feeling.  Instead of becoming discouraged and upset I should be excited. I should be excited because that means that I’m doing something right. That means that something amazing is happening through me and the devil desperately wants it to stop. So I am trying to persevere through the days and hours exhaustion has its grip on me, and an invisible weight clouds my mind and heart. I’ve realized that I need to look to God for restoration and hope instead of myself, a movie, or even a friend. This weekend I was reminded of how great God truly is, and how unfathomable His greatness is, even in comparison to the devil and his attempts to distract me, to hurt me, and to bring down my spirits. For God takes distraction and turns it into incredible focus, He takes hurt and turns it into joy, into hope, into love. And takes broken spirits and builds them up with amazing faith and perseverance.

This island is beyond beautiful, and to think that this is just a fraction of the vast world He has created (that I had never seen before just three months ago) is crazy. Sabbath afternoon we climbed the one rock on the island. It is the highest point, and I had SO much fun climbing it. At first it was more of a steep hike, and then you get to a part where you have to climb up holding onto a rope otherwise you’d fall. The last part is literally straight up and you aren’t attached to anything, just free climbing. Needless to say I was loving life, and scambered up as quickly as I possibly could. Once at the top, I sat on the rock looking out across the island and at the vast sea. In that moment the realization of how small I am, and how big God is captivated my heart and thoughts. It is something that I cannot come close to completely understanding. I hope that through my life’s experiences I will continue to grasp a greater understanding of that concept.

As far as the rest of my weekend has gone, it has been quite full. Friday as soon as I was out of class I ran back to my apartment and changed as quickly as I could. Two of the other girls and I went out with our scuba instructor for our first dive. We actually did three. Haha one more day out and I’m certified! It is so easy to get certified here J I’m not going to lie though, it was a little bit more scary than I thought it would be. I just feel like I didn’t have very much control which I think is the scary thing. Haha I just felt so awkward, I was like I want to move this way, but I’m floating this way or turning in the complete wrong direction. I went down to thirty feet though! And next dive is sixty feet! So that will be crazy. I’m excited slash nervous. Our instructor is good though, he was my buddy J I definitely would not want to go without him!

Then Friday night we came back to the school for a bonfire vespers. We taught the kids how to make smores and they were really excited J one of the girls had me help her make like five. I was like ahh a little girl after my own heart. J Then after the climb on Sabbath all of the SM’s went to this restaurant where there was a hula show outside. A few of the students were in it, and it was so cute! Us sm girls have decided that we want to take hula lessons J it was really cool! Then we walked to another place and had dinner which was very fun. After that all the Sm’s decided we wanted to play tag outside haha which turned into darebase (greatest game of all time) this was followed by rain which led to a HEATED game of mofia (oh dear. Oh dear. I won’t get into that one). Finally a group of us played games at our apartment (its like one in the morning by now) followed by football in my apartment (surprised we didn’t break anything) and then a movie (which I did NOT make it through haha). Then this morning shaun came over to our apartment to see if we wanted to go to lunch and Amy and I were asleep, we were like huh? You mean breakfast? And then we realized it was past noon. I haven’t even slept like past nine since I’ve been here! so that was nice J as for now, I probably should stop blogging since I need to enter in all of my grade reports. UGH. Hope everyone is doing well. Miss you guys! 

Sabbath and Wallets..

How do people survive without Sabbath? I truly and honestly do not understand. It is so amazing, and one of the greatest and thoughtful gifts that Jesus gave us. Friday night we went to kitchi (the church on the other side of he island) for vespers and it was so fun! J we played this bible acting game and I was loving life if you can imagine. J we played the party game, and I had to act like I was the second coming haha so I was marching around trumpeting and singing GLORY at everything and being raised from the dead and running and jumping. It was fun and the kids were laughing so hard, it was great. Then today we went to church which was actually really nice today and had a WONDERFUL meal at Mrs. V’s house. She cooked all night last night and this morning for us. It was delicious! I have decided that phillipino food is amazing. AND she made pumpkin pie!! I about exploded with excitement. J I decided that it was an answer to prayer considering that I have desperately been missing the seasons so much haha. After that, one of the locals, Joy came over and the girls next door and we “danced like david” before the Lord. Haha it was soo fun! We were blaring gospel music, and doing the electric slide haha and making up dance moves. It was great J after that we went to sakus ridge to watch the sun go down. That was CRAZY. Ok, so we climbed this ridge about a month ago, I think I blogged about it. anyway, it is ridiculously steep, like we’re talking amazing glutes workout to the max haha. Anyway, there were about 16 of us in the back of Jon’s Ford truck and he was like, “you guys don’t have to climb, we’ll just drive up” I was thinking there is NO way that a vehical of any sorts can make it up this rocky steep trail. Especially with 16 people sitting in the back just like on the edges. I’m a Chevy girl, but I must say that that Ford did America proud today. It was soo crazy! I felt like I was on a Disney land ride especially when we drove down it at night time. It was like the Indiana jones ride but real life haha. The craziest thing was when we were driving up and going pretty fast and one of the tires like went of the edge of the trail for a second cuz its really steep and narrow. Anyway we were all like OH MY GOODNESS haha cuz if one of us fell or the truck slipped we would have all pretty much plummeted to our deaths.. anyway needless to say it was quite fun and a beautiful sunset.

            When we got back to the school everyone wanted to go get ice cream but I had already had my share of pumpkin pie for the day so I decided to stay back. I ended up going over to Mrs. V’s house next door where she lives with her daughter and son in law and their ADORABLE little one and a half year old hailey and hang out. J we watched wolverine and chatted and I ate left overs J it was really nice. It was cool having like “family” time. I really enjoyed it. then after that I wandered down to the gym cuz I saw a lot of people. I guess it was an open gym night for the church or something, it was SO fun! I attempted to play volley ball with the locals (I really need to learn how to play haha) and then started playing basketball. THAT was fun J I was playing with these like eight grade and freshman boys and it was soo fun! Haha they were like “Miss! Miss!” whenever I made a shot, and I mean “Miss” as in Miss Breann, not as in ball don’t go into the basket. J it was great, UNTIL I sprained my ankle. Apparently playing basketball in crocs and no ankle brace on your bad ankle isn’t the greatest idea. Haha it isn’t too bad, I walked it off and am icing it now. It is rather swollen though. Oh well, I’m thinking it should be fine in a few days. Hopefully cuz it looks like I’m starting my exercise class this Wednesday! I’m really excited about that! I’ll have to let everyone know how that goes. I’m going to teach yoga and pilates two Wednesdays out of the month and Joy (Mrs. V’s daughter who lives next door and has the adorable little girl haily) is going to teach hip-hop and belly dancing the other two. Haha I guess she used to be an instructor in the phillipines J its going to be really fun.

            On a creepier thought, I was freaking out tonight. So last week when my roommate Natalia was in her bedroom with the door shut and the rest of our apartment left to watch a basketball game some man broke into our apartment and took joy’s (different Joy) wallet. Natalia had no idea he was in our apartment, and when we came back one of the administers daughters told us they saw a guy come out of our apartment. Anyway, Joy called and cancelled her credit card the next day, and found out that right after she had cancelled it someone had tried to use it three times. THEN tonight (like three days after this all happened) I was going through my duffle bag under my bed that is full of all my medicine to get something, when what is at the bottom of my bed? Joy’s wallet. I was like no way. AND her card is in it. so we don’t know if some weirdo broke back into our apartment to return the wallet and then decided to hide it in my random bag under my bed, or what. Maybe he just took the card info and then hid it under my bed? I don’t know the whole thing is weird cuz her wallet was in her bag out in our living room so why would he then put it at the bottom of my medicine bag in my bedroom? Its just all weird.

            Anyway, I think I’m going to get some sleep! J haha and try my best not to think about creepy guys watching me sleep or breaking into our apartment. Anyway, the main point of this blog is that Jesus rocks, and I love Sabbath J hope everyone is doing amazing back home. Much love. 

Positivity?

Some nights I dread going to sleep because I know what awaits me in the morning. That sounds so terrible but its true. This is one of those moments. Wednesday is approaching much too quickly. And unfortunately Wednesday feels like it should most definitely be Friday. I got sick last Friday and haven’t completely recovered so teaching yesterday and today have been two extraordinarily long days. When you’re tired, teaching is just NOT fun. It takes so much energy to be a good teacher, and I have felt like a terrible teacher the last two days..I’m trying not to get discouraged and to remember that I haven’t been feeling 100% and that this most likely is the entire reason while I’m depressed about my teaching abilities this week haha. I think the whole sick thing has just thrown me off to be perfectly honest. I have been feeling pretty homesick too. I am just finding myself really missing my life at home, and college. Particularly the whole college scene. Walla Walla just started and everyone is starting to put up pics and I’m like, oh dear. This sucks. Haha that’s what I get for leaving to be an SM while I was LOVING college. A lot of people leave because they want a “break” from school. Not I. I left at the highlight of my college experience. Also, today I found myself missing class. I was like someone slap me in the face, what is wrong with me?! But its true…I kind of enjoy class haha like I kind of miss going to class and having my brain stimulated (wow I sound like such a nerd). Even dare I say writing papers?! I know, I know, this pohnpeian heat has to be seriously getting to me. Maybe it’s the sickness?? Anyway, if I cold have one comforting thing sent to me in a package right now it would most definitely be the seasons. Its only October and I’m missing them so much (what sucks, is I know its only going to get worse). At least I have made a life decision. It’s official, I’m living somewhere with seasons. I love them so much, I’d do anything for Autumn leaves right now, a cool and crisp day (yet still sunny), and the smell of pumpkin spice…A trip to starbucks to get their pumpkin spice latte with Emily on a girl date/study break sounds like simple perfection. Sigh…I probably sound pathetic. I keep telling myself I need to toughen up and then I get mad at myself. I don’t want to be here missing home, I want to be here living up every second I can, because when I leave I’ll probably be missing it here! anyway…I guess this is me openly admitting that this week has been well…hard, I have felt a little a lone and dare I say it again..homesick??? (ugh, what a terrible word!) The sickness that I got here was super weird. Amy got it to, but a little different. Kat assured us that most SM’s get it when they first come here, and one of the parents said it was like an island thing. Its like pretty much just exhaustion. I can’t really explain it except that you have NO energy. Like it takes almost all your strength to lift your arm. Plus I had a terrible sore throat (why does that accompany EVERY sickness I ever acquire?? And me off all people…) and my throat and like glands got super swollen, and I was pretty achey all over. But mainly just the exhaustion thing. I slept like all weekend. I just feel like there is so much that I want to do here, and I’m just too tired at the end of the day to do anything but recharge for the next day. It’s like this vicious cycle. I want to spend time with the people here, play basketball with the local boys, start an exercise program for the high school girls, cook meals at our house for the other SM’s, have a weekly bible study, etc. And I feel like I’m slacking. Like there is so much I want to do that I’m NOT doing. Well…I’ve complained long enough J The more trials I encounter the more I should be rejoicing in the opportunity to overcome them, and grow. I have been told that being positive is a quality that I posses, and I wish I could agree with those people more right now. I really do want to have a positive attitude and appreciate the incredible opportunity I have here. Even if I don’t have the energy or opportunity to do all the things I want to, at least I have the opportunity to teach 22 children every day about Jesus. He has chosen to love these kids through me this year. That is a privilege beyond words, a privilege that I don’t deserve. That should be enough for me..

Puke and Particularly Creepy Creepos

So it has officially been way too long since I’ve blogged. And I apologize. There have been quite a few um…lets say interesting events, I can fill you in on. J haha lets see here, oh about three weekends ago we went to sda church that is on the other side of the island (its like a half an hour drive). They invited all of the sm’s for vespers. When we got there we sang songs, played a game, and THEN they announced that we were having a sing off! Lol I was like what?? So they divided the pews into two groups and explained to us that each group had to have one solo. One duet, one trio song, and a quartet song. And we had five minutes to prepare this. Haha so me and one of the other sm’s brice decided that we were all over the duet. We grabbed a hymnal and picked out “Tis so sweet” after five minutes we had our own little gospel version to perform haha it was really fun J when we sang it the kids at the church went Crazy, it was so fun J they had like a judge panel and everything, and needless to say we dominated the other groups duet ;) haha so that was really fun! It’s nice having a few guy sm’s here that can sing and are willing to! Ok, so now to the more interesting stories..

I woke up wed not feeling up to the tasks of teaching an entire class of fourth graders all day long. Regardless I got up and went to class. Second period I was up front teaching a long when I hear all of my kids start to yell “Miss! Ayaka Vomited! Ayaka Vomited!” I turn around to see one of my girls bent over her chair with vomit everywhere. She had puked ALL over. Like we’re talking ALL over the floor, on her backpack, on herself, in her hair, dripping from her hands (…ok I think you get the picture J) In this moment I was like, oh dear. I have to act like this isn’t gross. Oh my word. Haha so I was like, “ok everyone sit down please”  and all the kids are yelling out what they think she ate for breakfast. I walk over trying to mask the terror and disgust on my face and place my hand on Ayaka’s back asking if she felt better. She decided to take this opportunity to randomly wip her hair back onto her oh so loving teacher, splattering her upchucked breakfast all over me. I ended up taking her outside and washing off her backpack, her, me, etc. and then sent her to the office. I went to the office to get some cleaning supplies and I was reassured that someone would come clean it up for me. I was like great! So I took my class out to the field and improv a new outdoor spelling game of red light green light with spelling words haha. Half an hour later when it was almost time to go back in the classroom I looked inside and saw that indeed no one had cleaned it up. It had just been sitting there..I guess the person they asked to clean it up replied saying, “if it was my vomit I’d clean it up, but not someone elses.”  Haha so Cindy (our awesome secretary) and I charged the crime scene, destroying all evidence of the mornings events with a good amount of bleach! I’m not going to lie, I  think I was in a slight state of shock haha I was like I can’t BELIEVE this just happened. Especially because I am quite the germ freak for those of you that know me. J anyway, so it was definitely a um…growing experience I guess one might say. Ok on to interesting story number two! Which unfortunately might be more interesting than this one..

Ok before I begin this story I first need to explain the set up of our apartment. Our windows do not have glass or any covering like that. It is too hott and we do not have air conditioning. So we have this criss cross like black wire with a screen behind it so air can come in. also our bedroom has two big windows in it right next to each other, and my bed is up against them. Like we are talking RIGHT up against them. Just for a visual, if I am laying in bed the screen would be like one inch from my face. Ok, moving on. Behind our apartment (the windows face the back) there is apparantly a ledge (we are on the second story). We did not know about this ledge until about a week and a half ago when one of the girls in the apartment right next to us had an interesting experience. She woke up at six in the morning to see a man just standing watching her sleep. So she screamed at him to go away and he just stood there. Then she got out of bed and ran out to get her roommates, by then he had left. All right, so now you know the background. Well after hearing this, Amy was like Courtney we should move your bed. And I was like eh, its fine lets just put these little cloth curtains up so no one can see in. possibly not my greatest idea ever and I’ll tell you why. But before I do! I have a quick side story about the ledge. So I was deep in slumber one night when I was suddenly awaked by two cats fighting (SO loud) an inch away from my face on this ledge. Lets just say it was one of those moments you would do anything to have on camera. I literally jumped like a foot in the air flailing and flew off my bed onto the floor knocking over our fan onto the ground with a huge thud. It was really funny but scared amy and I half to death lol oh man.. ok so back to the story at hand..So last night I was EXHAUSTED and about to climb into bed. You see I woke up Friday with a terrible sore throat and could only teach my class until noon. Oh no I’m getting side tracked again haha. Ok funny quick side story!

So here I wake up with a sore throat and its terrible. Basically I can not talk. But I didn’t really feel sick besides that so I was like meh I’ll just teach today. And my kids were actually really sweet about it. I had to have one of them read for me outloud haha and I would just like write everything on the board. Then I started to feel worse right before lunch, like exhausted, achey, hot flashes and whatever, so I put my head on my desk will my kids were finishing working on an assignment. Then all of a sudden I hear all my kids going “SHHHH! SHHHH!!! Be Quiet! Miss is sleeping! Miss is sleeping!” haha it was so cute. I was like, so THAT’S what I have to do to get them quiet! J

Ok I’m back, SO its Friday night and I am not feeling well. My roommates are in our kitchen and familyroom talking or whatever and I am walking around our room getting ready for bed like half awake. I strip to my underwear and my sportsbra (yes necessary information for the story) turn off all the lights, and the walk over and climb onto my bed. As I’m climbing into my bed I realize that our curtain is like open a little bit in the middle, so I’m like huh the wind or our fan must have blown it, so I reach to fix our curtain when I suddenly realize that less than an inch from my face and hand is NOT what it is supposed to be on the other side of our window. I was like oh my gosh. There is a man standing by my bed staring at me. So I quietly just turned around and stepped into our family room saying “um girls, I may be over reacting, but um…I’m pretty sure there is a man standing outside our window.” I thought maybe I was crazy, cuz it was really dark, and I wasn’t feeling well. I don’t’ know. So we walk into our room and we are all talking outloud like saying “is there really someone there? I don’t know, but why would they just be standing there while we were talking about him? Maybe its something else..” because you see now our curtains had closed so we could only see outside of them when our fan or the wind blew them open a little bit. Then the curtain moves and my roommate joy who had taken a step forward goes, “oh my gosh it’s a man. She grabs her toothbrush (who knows why lol) and yells, GO AWAY! NOW! GO AWAY!”  I take this opportunity to take cover behind the door to our little cubard of a closet because I realize that I am half naked, trying to put clothes on. We turn off the light in our room, so he can’t see us as easily. Then we are like, no it can’t be because whatever it is, is STILL there and hasn’t made ONE sound. Like at all. So then Amy took a step forward to look and she confirmed it for the last time. She raced to take cover with me and said “it’s a man. Oh my gosh he’s just standing there, I saw his hands the were moving. It’s a freakin man.” (I’d like you to keep in mind that this creepo can hear EVERYTHING we’re saying” so then Amy grabs this little stuffed animal that she has and chucks it at the window and this guy is STILL standing there! So we all leave the room and I grab our broom and am like, this is ending now. This creepo is not doing this. So I turned on our porch lights and went out of our apartment with my broom stick yelling “You creepo! Freakin leave! I have a broom stick!” lol and then I yell really loud so he can here to the girls in the apartment next to us, “I just thought you guys might like to know that there is a creepo staring at us through our window who won’t leave!” then Charlotte (one of the girls from the other apartment) ran outside yelling “yes! I wanna mace him! I wanna mace him!” So she runs out with her spray haha. Then Jon, (Kat, the sm coordinator’s husband) came outside because he heard us yelling and came up the stairs to the apartment. We explained the story (I’m still yelling loudly so this jerk can hear me) and Jon climbed behind our apartment, just in time to see the guy running away. Talk about a way to get your adrenaline going! Who needs medicine when you’re feeling exhausted and sick? All you need is some creepy stalker that watches you sleep! J anyway, I guess this is pretty normal here. like these men know that the sm girls live in these apartments and a lot of times especially when they’re drunk they’ll come and try to watch them. We were like, this is NORMAL?? Jon told us that sometimes girls have looked up while they were showering and there would be someone just watching them from a little window in the bathroom. We also have a little window in our bathroom, needless to say, we are covering that up FAST. Lol and Jon told us that he doesn’t think the people here know what mace or pepper spray are and that perhaps this would be a good time for them to be introduced. I’m SO on it. I’m already sending a package request to daddy to send me some J haha so ya. That’s interesting story number two. It was pretty exhilarating. I was ready to bust out some serious moves with my broom stick. Haha who needs pepper spray. I just want a medal bat! J  no but seriously, since we’ve told the boys, everyone wants to make a trap haha. Anyone that climbs up to ledge by our window is from this tree. So I think they’re going to saw it like almost all the way trough but not, so whoever tries to climb it will just fall. And then also, we’re talking about putting like sharp pieces of glass or something on the ledge so if anyone tries to grab it to pull themselves up it will just cut them. Haha and amy wants to put salt there too to make the cuts sting. Oh man…I’ll have to keep everyone updated on that idea. 

writing projects haha

So my kids have been working on a writing project in English class. They had to write a character sketch and setting sketch (they could create ANY character they wanted and use any setting), then write their rough draft, illustrate their story and finally make all my corrections (oh my dear were there A LOT haha) and write up their final draft. I’m grading them right now and they were making me giggle so I thought I’d stop and write up one of the really short stories for you. This particular story is by a boy named Marion in my class that could win a prize for worlds most energized child. He never stops. Never gets tired. Is ALWAYS ready to do something next haha he sits right next to my desk. Gotta love him…gotta love him J ok here we go

            Once upon a time there was drunky. He liked to go Viking with his friends. And liked to scare everybody in the jungle. One day drunky had a problem. The problem was he had to go to war because they were attacked by other dead pirates. And they were not enough for the war. So that’s why he had to go. So then he went. The war was really deadly. After the war drunky’s team won “The Tough and Rough.” Drunky was so happy so happy that he could couldn’t stop cheering for his self. Then the next day drunky was called by his leader named Mr. Jorgy. Mr. Jorgy surprised drunky to be the leader of the army. Then drunky was so happy again. Drunky is nice, kind, an dfaithful, and good responsibility. He doesn’t scare anybody, he just walk away and be brave. He’s the leader of the army, so he just wants to be normal. The End.

            Thought somebody might enjoy reading that J oh, ok here’s another really short one (some of them were like three pages) This is by a boy named Edgar in my class, oh and his main character named Yitzi is a talking basketball, he just forgets to mention that minor detail in his final draft haha.

            Once upon a time there was Yitzi. He looked dirty and he went to ben the toy. He live at the sea castle one day he had a problem. The problem was that Yitzi escaped and I ben the toy chased him. He was running cause he went to Ben the toy. The Yitzi boy was a very bad and soon Ben the toy got him and spanked him. Yitzi stole my jaket and my cellphone. Yitzi was scared and he kept running.

            Love everyone lots, hope all is going well at home. I sure have been missing football season and college coffee runs lately….sigh…mk, back to grading! Xoxo 

An Unreal Weekend...

I don’t exactly know where to start. This weekend was a surreal experience. It was so beautiful; it was like I couldn’t enjoy it completely because I couldn’t wrap my little mind around the fact that I was REALLY there. We went to Ant Island for the weekend. Wow, um, ok so. Imagine the most incredible colors of blue you can imagine changing and stretching as far as you can see, with a blue sky full of fluffy clouds as far as you can see. It seemed as though the earth and sky met and turned into one.  Haha pretty much what I’m trying to say is that I lived in a tropical paradise Christmas snow globe this weekend. Ya know, the ones were Santa is lying on a white sandy beach with a terrible sunburn and huge smile on his face. I felt so free this weekend. At night I found myself wading out into the ocean by myself just standing in the waves with the soft sand beneath my feet staring into the night. There was this incredible mystery that accompanied the night there, it was glorious. Here I was standing in the middle of the ocean looking at millions of gorgeous stars I have never seen before, a cool ocean breeze is sweeping around me. Waves are crashing to about my waste as they continue on their way. (you could wade out for a while and it didn’t get deeper at all, so I was standing far out but still standing.) When I look back it’s a thick and haunting, in a beautiful way, jungle, and from in front of me an abyss of water and sky. It was just me and God and it was amazing. I stood there for who knows how long, soaking it all in and singing my little heart out. Truly an incredible experience. I feel like I’m experiencing so many things that people could never dream of experiencing. I truly feel so blessed to be here. Oh and Saturday was the most amazing snorkeling EVER. Wow. Wow. Wow! I couldn’t help but miss Laura haha my little snorkeling partner in crime. I found myself just kind off by myself. Haha I didn’t want anyone holding me back as I explored! It was soo fun! I’ve NEVER seen coral like that. ALL different shapes and sizes and colors too! There was bright blue, and purple coral. Soo cool! Oh and speaking of Laura haha there were these AMAZING clams! AMAZING!!!! They had the most beautiful patterns on them I have ever seen in my life. Haha it made me think of all of my fashionable girlfriends. Seriously. Like I kept thinking, oh my goodness I could SO see Laura wearing a dress with that pattern haha or wow, that would make the most amazing curtains! (I’m can’t believe I’m admitting that I thought that…) anyway, it was awesome. And I became quite attached to a few fish, I went through naming them all. Oh! haha and there was this little fish (his name was Raphael) that followed me around kissing me! I’m NOT even kidding! Haha he kept pecking at my legs and it tickled haha.

            After snorkeling I found myself lying in a hammock that looked over crashing waves with no one around, reading a great book. I was living in a postcard. Seriously. Ridiculous. Then decided to be scandalous and take off my basketball shorts (got so sick of being fully clothed all the time) and swam out to the big boat that was anchored out a little ways. Oh how I love swimming! I climbed up and layed on the front, it reminded me so much of all the happy lake memories I have! When I closed my eyes it was like I was at home J Then I took the opportunity to dive off the boat into the crystal clear water a few times, it is pretty high at the front so that was really fun. It’s very interesting. I find myself spending a lot of time by myself here. and its ok. Its like I’m discovering an introverted side of myself that I never knew I had, I think it’s really good for me. I’m happy with just being with Jesus and nature. I can feel free and alive, adventurous, or relaxed and renewed. Its all quite new to me haha but pretty cool I’m not going to lie.

Lets see here, oh another thing I never thought I’d experience haha I’m pretty sure I never want to eat peanut butter again! That is literally what Amy and I lived off this weekend. And now I feel gross. Lol. Definitely am looking forward to getting to the track tomorrow! Ooh I slept in my hammock! The first night I wasn’t really used to it, but the second night I slept like a baby. Seriously, like the best night sleep I’ve had since I’ve been here. (thanks daddy!) It was pretty great.

            The way back today was quite an adventure. Haha! At a certain point we all had to get off the big boat and climb onto the little boat. We’re talking like a little tiny boat with a motor on the back that Mr. B steers. And there were like 26 of us on this thing. It was about to sink haha and we had to cross through these shallow coral waters. One of the guys had to stand at the front of the boat with this huge stick and push us through the water (I was like, this is awesome) so we wouldn’t hit stuff, and cuz we had to turn off the engine sometimes. And THEN it started raining like crazy, and we had zero shelter haha I can for the first time say that I was cold in pohnpei. This took like forty minutes, it was definitely a bonding experience haha everyone was like huddled together and couldn’t like move or stand at all otherwise we’d all probably fall in. J but we all got back safe and to top it all of got WARM showers! Haha we never have warm or hot water. It’s just something we’ve accepted. I take like a freezing cold shower every day. Which I can’t complain too much about because I’m usually really hot and sweaty, so after the initial shock of cold water its nice J anyway, so that was my weekend.

Oh also I didn’t really mention this, but right before we left I ate this cinnamon bread only to realize after eating a piece that it had cashews in it. I had officially eaten like a whole cashew if not more. I panicked. It was terrible I sprinted to my apartment and shoved benedryl down my throat (for those of you who don’t know I am very very allergic to cashews. Very allergic.) and then tried my hardest to throw up. I could only dry heave though. It was not fun. I wasn’t even really reacting badly but I was freaking out because I knew I would and we were JUST about to leave in like on minute. Anyway, I ended up being ok, it was SUCH an answer to prayer. First of all that I decided to randomly have a piece of this bread right before we left (because I hadn’t packed any benedryl) and secondly because I didn’t have a bad attack even though I ate so much. I still don’t even understand how that happened. The cashews were cooked, a lot. Like they were bendy and almost looked like dried fruit. That’s what I thought it was at first until I looked at it closer and everyone verified that it was cashew. So the only thing I can think of is that since it was cooked so much, I didn’t react as badly and also that maybe since it was cooked it was taking longer to get into my system and the benedryl got into my system faster? I’m not entirely sure, but I know God had something to do with it. I was so scared. I ended up sleeping on the way out to the island and was pretty tired and out of it that day from the medicine but as far as the reaction went I only had like on tenth of the stomachache that I normally have. It was such an answer to prayer. Anyway, God is good, and I can’t BELIEVE how beautiful his creation is. And to think that he made all of it for me. For me to explore and soak in and enjoy. Because He just loves me THAT much. A pretty cool feeling… J I felt very loved this weekend. Miss you all, XOXO. 

Muscles/Boobs

So I have actually started to have brief moments where I find myself enjoying teaching.. I had to stay in my classroom until almost five today though and have about two more hours of classroom work to do. This job is quite demanding sometimes. Haha but I can’t complain because I’m finally getting to go to Ant island this weekend. I CAN’T wait! It is supposed to be the most amazing place around here. It’s an island with no electricity, bathrooms, shelter, ANYTHING. And we don’t have school Friday so this whole weekend we’ll be roughing it J I can’t wait! I’m sure I’ll have many exciting things to blog about once I return!

            Ok, random clip from my class today. Haha just thought I’d give your imagination a little picture of what I deal with everyday. J I looked over at one of my chubby little twins named julien and he had tennis balls (or maybe it was just wadded up pieces of paper, who KNOWS) under his shirt like muscles and was flexing. How could I NOT laugh? But they were SUPPOSED to be doing science, so I asked him to stop flexing and put his muscles away. About five minutes later he walks up to my desk with his once muscles conveniently placed on his chest, in order make two quite large breasts. I was like. What??? Lol, I’m pretty sure that his muscles/boobs then transformed into basketballs as he turned into Kobe Bryant, throwing wads of (I still don’t exactly know what) around my classroom in a very sorry attempt to make a basket in our classroom’s (always overflowing and disgusting) trashcan.

            As far as exercising goes, I’ve finally figured it out J well getting there. Last week I dragged someone with me every day but one to go running or walking at the track. Then I figured out that a towel makes a perfectly good yoga matt for our dirty floor in our apartment. Haha last we had exercise class with Courtney. Five of us girls spread out in our apartment and I made the girls to “killers” where you do jumping jacks for a minute, then quick feet for a minute, then back to jumping jacks etc for ten minutes. Then I led out in a yoga class J haha from the limited amount of yoga I know from going at walla walla (thanks Lisa). So I’m thinking I might start like a workout class a few times a week for all the girls, or whoever wants to join. Maybe even some of the locals J I’ll keep you posted. I’m thinking I’m going to need a few yoga movies to learn stuff so I can teach everyone haha.

Oh! and I have FANTASTIC news! I found a piano on campus that I can use! Or a keyboard at least. Who cares! Something I can sing with J I’m soo excited! I haven’t played it yet but hopefully soon! Definitely an answer to prayer J anyway, hope everyone is doing well. Love you all! Xoxoxo!  

this past week

So, the last week..Hmm..well as far as class goes, it went much better. I think I’m starting to get the hang of the teaching thing. Well a little bit more at least J I seriously adore my kids already, I can’t imagine how close I’m going to be with them after the year is going to be over. It’s going to be so hard to leave them. Even the ones that I was worried would drive me absolutely crazy are making a way into my heart. I think I am finally understanding about where they are academically so it will be easier for me to deal with when they don’t understand certain basic concepts. I’m more prepared for that, so I don’t think I’ll get as frustrated. Since school has started they’ve had a three tests. The first two (science and math) some did TERRIBLE on so I let them find the right answers and fix it (I mean I just want them to learn the stuff) but for social studies almost all of them aced it! I was proud of them J later in the week we were talking about different cultures, and Irish dancing was mentioned, so I told them that I had a friend who was an Irish dancer and they thought that was pretty cool (I love you Megan!) and then the next day I brought in my laptop and played them some Irish music. Haha but all they wanted to do was see pics on my computer, so I gave in and showed them about four pictures. I have told them about Zac and how he is in Majuro as the coach. One day in prayer requests I prayed for him, and now the kids raise their hands and say “Zac!” I was like who? And they were like, “Your brother!” haha it was really cute. They all want to meet him J and when I showed them a picture of him making a silly face with me they were laughing so hard. It was super cute. So now they ask if he’s coming to visit and I have to keep telling them no L I am also figuring out the whole grading thing. It goes like this, grade ANY free second you have, then I don’t have to do it after class. However, I haven’t recorded ANY of my papers yet, which is now a massive stack. Ha, better get on that! Oh, and my kids finally like to sing! I guess they were just shy at the beginning. I taught them the Milk song and they LOVE it haha it’s so cute. This week had its rough times in the classroom for sure, but over all it went pretty well. And the days that I was struggling I got to open care packages from home (which just make EVERYTHING better) thanks familia and walla walla! J J

            As far as this weekend and last weekend, pretty great. J last weekend we went to this AWESOME waterfall that you had to hike to. OH MY GOODNESS! I was seriously in heaven. Pohnpei has to be the best island hands down. I LOVE the jungle haha anyone who knows me, knows that exploring through a jungle is most definitely my idea of fun J we started the hike and then like we turned straight into like the thick mass of the jungle and kept going there like wasn’t a trail at all, so we were like climbing over and under trees in the mud, jumping across creeks. (I had to pee, quite exhilarating actually…in a rainforest J) and then we got to the waterfall. There was like a forty-foot drop straight down and so of course I immediately jumped off. SO fun! And then we climbed up the side of the waterfall where all these rocks were, I was like oh my goodness this is why I was made! Lol I love exploring soo much! It definitely makes me miss some friends from school though. Wow. Anyway, then you had to quickly cross the river where the waterfall was so you could get to the other side and jump off again. Haha so I saw the current and was like, ah its not that far why don’t I just swim it really quick. Bad idea. Lol I just lunged forward and realized that I didn’t quite make it and suddenly I thought, “oh my goodness if I can’t grab onto a rock or something I’m going to go over the water fall” haha luckily I grabbed onto a rock and was fine. Possibly not my brightest idea ever J all very fun though. Then it started pouring rain, which just made everything better. I decided to run back in the mud and rain, everyone probably thought I was crazy but I was just loving life haha. Then the next day we went out to breakfast at this place and had macadamia banana pancakes, followed by an outing all day. They took us on the big school boat out to these ruins that were so fun to climb and explore! I guess no one knows much about them, it’s like a mystery. But it used to be like a city and civilization. And it’s all made out of rock, so climbing up the walls were really fun! Then, we went to this little island and explored it. There was actually SAND at this island and the water was unbelievably clear. So we just sat like in the water or leaning up against a palm tree eating out packed lunches. Pretty awesome. I still can’t believe how beautiful it is here. Then yesterday after church (oh haha I did Sabbath school and gave like a miniature sermon, it was actually kind of fun. I kind of enjoyed it! Still haven’t sang for church yet, like special music that is, man I’m going crazy I’m really missing singing..) Amy and I and Joel and Barbie (two Australian guys) went on a picnic with the phillipianos to this amazing like little open hut at the end of a dock type of a thing. It was beautiful (of course). It was for Noli’s birthday (he’s the maintenance guy at school and is awesome, we live right next door to him :) we ate AMAZING Pilipino food AND had icecream!! We played bible games with them, it was so funny they are wonderfully happy people lol laughing at everything! It was great. And then we met up with some youth from the church at climbed to this ridge that looks over the whole island to watch the sunset. Man, was it a hike! I’m not sure if I’ve ever hiked up something quite so steep! It was fun though, I was sweating like crazy, I felt so good after haha it was a great workout J and on the way there were like old war bunkers and an old rusted tank, and really cool stuff like that. That was fun to explore. Then when we got to the top there is like a phone tour thing that I climbed up part way to be even higher. Pretty cool J when we got back down it was completely dark and we still had to drive back, so about 25 of us all climbed into the back of our faithful truck and drove through pohnpei. We went through a side of the island I hadn’t seen yet, at it was so cool just soaking in the island and their culture at night time. Really enjoying being here. it is so different at home.

            Which all leads me to right now! Typing and flicking off the annoying ants that have decided to share my bed with me haha. This morning has been a cleaning day for the school. So I got to go clean my classroom, and wait for it….drum roll…my little fourth graders DISGUSTING bathroom. Oh. my. Goodness. There is NO way my dad would have cleaned that thing lol. I kept thinking about that and laughing. Anyway, I’ll spare you the details but lets just say it’s as clean as it’s going to get now! Then there is some party tonight for someone leaving the school or something which means lots of rice and fish and bananas and fruit for free! Actually, I’m rather surprised with myself but, I’m ENJOYING cooking. Like, we have to get fairly creative here but my dad and gramma have sent me quite a bit of cooking stuff and I’m having fun with it. Amy and I make beakfast burritos, French toast, and like fruit parfaits for breakfast. And then for dinner I’ve been cooking like sautéed veggies, and rice, and veggie meat cooked with spices and sauces and baked beans etc. it’s been great. Oh, and apparently soymilk, frozen bananas, honey, ice, and dried apricots make for the greatest smoothies of all time. Haha, so I’ve finally gotten the food thing figured out. I’ve finally been able to exercise too! It is so awesome, this last week I went to the track every day but one. I have been power walking and doing sprints (trying not to kill my knee) regardless its great. You can get away from the school, and there is such a cool atmosphere there. Like all the people from the community come out. It’s awesome. Haha I want to join one of their track teams! I think it would be super cool J and I just realized how long this is getting! Sorry my faithful readers! J I guess I’d just like to conclude this blog once again with prayer requests. Pohnpei SDA school is going through a difficult transition time right now. There is a lot of drama going on, we don’t exactly have a principal, and may not have our sm coordinator now too. I’m not exactly sure. We don’t know everything as sm’s but there are some fairly big problems going on right now. Also we lost one of our SM’s last week. Rian went back home. That was pretty hard for the school too, I think a few of the administrators and island teachers took it personally. I hear that we’re getting two other girl sm’s now, but I don’t think anyone knows exactly whats going on haha. I think that would be great! So I’m praying for that to work out J anyway, thanks to everyone, miss you lots and can’t stress enough how much I appreciate all of your support! 

yogurt covered raisins!

At this moment I am sitting on my couch eating yogurt covered raisins from my father, and a granola bar from Walla Walla University. Boy are care packages the best. I’ve decided that besides Jesus, they are officially the most comforting things ever! And the rollercoaster of my life continues. Yesterday was awful. Probably the worst day since I’ve been here, yet now as I write today there is a smile in my heart and consequently there has been one on my face for most of the day, AND I’m about to go jump off a buildings and swim J Yesterday class was really hard, my kids were not listening and crazy. And then I stumbled back to the apartment to try and use our bathroom. Didn’t exactly work. Our toilet flooded like our entire apartment. It took Amy and I like almost two hours of work cleaning up, moping, sweeping, etc. And then I had to do laundry to have the washing machine broken. Anyway, I didn’t even get to sit down until like 7 something at night and was so fed up. But this morning I woke up renewed. J Today was a great day of class. My kids all like aced their social studies test, and we talked about Jesus and sin and heaven in bible for two class periods. The kids got really into it and were asking so many questions. It was great! AND its over half way through the week! Meaning another INCREDIBLE weekend is almost here J haha this one boy draws me a picture like every day (its always the same picture haha its so cute.) And he usually drives me slightly crazy cuz he asks the stupidest questions literally every thirty seconds. He’s growing on me though haha I don’t know how he couldn’t! yesterday he wrote me a little note (accompanied with the same picture as always) that said “Miss Breann is the best teacher. I love her.” Those are the things that get me through the day and keep me from losing my temper! These kids just need to be loved (along with learning how to count and minor things like that) and I’m doing my very best to do exactly that. Oh, and did I blog about my amazing weekend yet? Hm…I’ll have to do that J

An interesting day.

It’s amazing how many emotions you can go through in one day. Earlier today I was playing football in the middle of a gym with (120 little kids running around playing every game all on top of eachother, no seriously volley ball, basketball, tag, jump rope, soccer, CHAOS) a group of my boys and loving life. I was Qbing telling them all plays and they were SO excited. It was amazing, I was having so much fun. Haha I made them huddle up, and acted all serious and they got so in to it. It was crazy, with no rules, or anything but quite fun. I went from that to a terrible lunch period where everyone was yelling and screaming. (barely got to eat) then trying to make my kids understand science for like a full hour, helping each one individually do a stupid (easy) worksheet. To get them prepared for a Test tomorrow.  Then, I surprised them by making cupcakes and having a surprise birthday party for the kids with august birthdays. This was chaos until we went outside to play duck duck goose. I made the kids pretend they were ninjas so they would be quite for the other classes that were still in class. This made me laugh because here all my kids were running around campus jumping and being ninjas. (myself included of course) BUT then it started raining all of a sudden so we had to run back to the classroom. (didn’t even get to finish a session of duck duck goose) This led to everyone all loud and disruptive. Finally school was over and I had six or seven kids stay to work on their math assignment for the day, (it was just review over stuff we had already learned and they hadn’t gotten like half way through it) I was tutoring them and going through every problem individually but some of them wouldn’t even pay attention, and I was SO tired and trying to help them. Finally I only had three left. I was trying to explain rounding. For instance a problem was the number 59. the assignment was to round it. So I would tell my kids ok, is this number closer to 100 or closer to 0? And they would look at me like I was a crazy person. So I said. Alright, when you have a number 50 or higher, you round up so it would be 100. but if you have a number 49 or lower then you round down to 0. So is the number 59 bigger or less than 50? And they all looked at me and said “less?”  I didn’t know what to say. So I would repeat the question like five times. I did this with every problem. This is COUNTING. I kept saying, well lets count. Do you count up to 59 from 50? And they’d say “um…no?” I felt SO helpless. When kids left and I was on the verge of tears. I felt so over my head today. I don’t’ know how I’m supposed to teach kids like that anything that’s remotely close to 4^th grade. and I’m putting everything I can into it. I didn’t even know I was this patient. And yet today I was seriously about to yell at a girl, “are you THAT stupid?!?!”  So I’d really appreciate prayers. I need it. My days are kind of like roller coasters here. either absolutely amazing, or frustrating and exhausting. Last night I read a text in Isaiah 58 that said “The Lord will guide you always, He will satisfy your needs..you will be like a well-watered garden. Like a spring whose waters never fail.”  Sunday I felt like a spring that just had a flash flood and was erupting everywhere haha but today I felt like my spring was drying up pretty quickly. I had to keep reminding myself of the promise that God made to me. I have a lot of needs right now, but I know that he will meet all of them and fill me completely. I just didn’t’ feel like that today. I felt like my garden was dying and withering right in front of my eyes. Not to depress anyone J I really wish I could have music time with just me and God here. like have access to a piano and room, just for myself. It’s so healing to me. Sigh…

Anyway thank you so much for being supportive at home. I just received  my first package (thanks Gramma Haskins!) and it made my heart smile J Its nice to know I’m not so far from home when I feel lost! And most of all I can’t thank you enough for your prayers, I need them now more than ever!

Lots of love, Courtney  

An Awesome Day

I woke up this morning hurting everywhere. My skin was burning, my wrists and joints were aching, my stomach was churning, I had a full week of 23 attention consuming children ahead of me, and yet I got out of bed rejuvenated. Ok, so my body  was most definitely not rejuvenated, but my longing for adventure was. I had been aching for an exploration all last week, and did I get one Sunday!

            I woke up Sunday morning at six o clock, and by seven there were sixteen of us (amy and I were the only girls) and fifteen surf boards climbing into our faithful read truck ready for a day out on the water. I was AMAZING. The driver for Pohnpei Surf Club graciously took all of us out for the entire day on his boat for only the cost of gas. It would have normally cost $500 to go out with a group, but we only had to pay $20 each J  First of all, I can not even begin to explain how breath takingly gorgeous seeing the island from the water was, and what was even more incredible was seeing the water in stunning shades of blue I could have never imagined. I’d never seen such beautiful colors in my life. Hmmm J Amy, Matt, and I sat up at the front of the boat hanging over, with the wind blowing in our faces, it reminded me of the lake but even better. We started off the day with stopping at a surf spot. We all grabbed our boards and started surfing. The waves here are definitely different (and slightly more intimidating than at home), but I braved them anyway. Getting an obscene amount of salt water up my nose (my sinuses have never been so thoroughly cleaned), being held under water for a good amount of time, getting scratched up by coral, but enjoying myself the entire time. Some of our guys are seriously REALLY good surfers. Like I’m not sure if I’ve ever surfed with guys this good, the surf is really like the reason they came haha so my surfing capabilities looked rather sad compared to them. However, there were a few other boys who never even caught any waves, so I was feeling ok with myself J I then decided to catch my breath so paddled over to amy (who was of course snorkeling to her hearts content) where we held on to my surf board and floated, watched the guys, took in our beautiful surroundings, and talked about life. We then hopped into the boat, and our driver continued around the island stopping at another spot. Some of the boys continued surfing but I decided it was time for snorkeling, so we jumped into the water to explore! This carried on for like three more stops. It was soo fun! We’d either surf or snorkel, each spot being a little different. Then when I felt tired I’d lay at the front of the boat and close my eyes feeling the boat gently rock and listening to the islander music our driver was playing. This enjoyment had dire consequences however, I haven’t been this sunburned since I was Puerto Rico (Laura it made me miss you!!) Yes parents, I put on sunscreen (two or three times!) but apparently the Pohnpein sun has a mind of its own. My goodness! I am sunburned inside of my ears! Its crazy! Haha Lets see, ok back to snorkeling! I saw a shark! I was super excited, we had been looking for one all day, and I saw the most BEAUTIFUL fish! They were poka dotted, and striped, the most amazing colors, I can’t even explain them in words, there were so many! I think my favorite one might have been a bright turqoisish blue one with black zebra stripes. It was so me. Ha. Oh, and well…the beautiful parrot fish…um…well about that. So, we were taking turns spear fishing (I ‘tried’ but didn’t catch anything, I think I just subconsciously didn’t WANT to catch anything haha), when Eric (one of the guys, who’s obsessed with spear fishing) climbed into the boat with a parrot fish. He killed it and began scaling it right there. I would have been sad but I was just so curious! This new explorative, culture side of me has been quickly immerging. Anyway, he cuts it in squares (like you do with a mango) and pours soy sauce and lime juice on it. I was like you’re just going to bite into it RAW?! And the boat driver explained to me that its like everyone’s favorite food here, and like a real treat. To eat a fresh and raw parrot fish. Suddenly I turned to Eric and was like, can I have some? Next thing I know I was biting into a raw fish, sitting on a boat in the middle of the ocean just off a gorgeous island, and surprisingly it was actually yummy! I went back for a second bite haha I couldn’t believe it! Lets see here…talking about spearing fish. The FUNNIEST moment of the trip happened yesterday too. Amy had been swimming around with the spear for like half an hour or more trying to catch a fish, when I see here swimming towards me with the spear in the air. She goes, “Courtney, I caught one!” I smiled really big and was like “Great Amy! That’s Awesome the guys are going to be so jealous!” When she took of her goggles and I realized that she was crying. No wait, not crying, SOBBING. It. Was. Hilarious. I about died. Here she is floating in the ocean holding here fish that she had tried to catch for almost an hour, crying her little heart out because she felt so terrible. I was dying laughing! She just kept saying “It started twitching! I didn’t think it would twitch! I hurt it!” and this would send me into a fit of histarics once again. Lol. Ok, so lets see, what else. Oh, as we were heading back to the island we stopped at a few more places to snorkel and we saw a manaray! They are HUGE! I couldn’t believe it! I wanted to swim with it but only got to see it from the boat. Still was super cool though J Then after being exhausted in the most remarkable way, I drifted off to sleep as we took the enjoyable and lengthy trip back to the dock. Followed by a delicious dinner of rice and grilled veggies, and watching ‘how I met your mother’ with the roomies. 

Some how that trip made all the hardships, stressful class periods, and exhausting days worth it. As of today I’m back in the classroom for a week, but its nice to know that another weekend adventure is on its way. I must admit, Friday and today have already been getting better. I think my kids are starting to get a better feel for the type of teacher I will be, and some of them are really trying to do there best, like in everything. I have about four boys that I can tell just adore me, and man do I adore them. They all have tons of energy, but are smart and when I tell the class to be quiet, try to help and get everyone quiet too. Also, I took some extra time to read to my kids Friday, and they all crowded around me, sitting on the floor and even standing next to my chair. It was soo funny because one of my boys named Burt (who I thought was going to be a problem at first, cuz he kind of acts like he thinks he’s super cool) started giggling in the middle of the story and couldn’t stop. This led my entire class to start giggling, followed by myself. When I tried to get them to quiet down Burt went into a fit of giggles once again, and I just could not for the life of me tell them to be quiet without giggling myself. So we all just stopped at laughed, it was great.

Today I was just really tired from yesterday, but not as much exhausted as sleepy and sunburnt, which in my book is much better. J I think Wednesday I’m going to throw a little birthday party for my class, for the kids who have birthdays in August that is. Also because they have two tests this week (plus a spelling test), so I figure they deserve a break! Doing this once a month for the birthdays in that month will get slightly costy, (from making them cookies, or cupcakes or whatever) but I figure that it will give the kids something to look forward too, and will make them feel special. I don’t’ exactly know what they all get from home on their birthdays. This leads me to something else. I was reading one of my girl’s papers today and she mentioned that her dad died this weekend. I’m not sure if this is true (I just read the paper tonight, and she went home early today, plus she doesn’t have very good writing so I’m not entirely sure if that’s exactly what she meant) but it has me very concerned. So I’ll find out what’s going on tomorrow, but if you guys could really keep that in your prayers I’d greatly appreciate it. Also, I have a girl who has been bullying this adorable sweet girl named Zara (she’s from Australia) and it has been very hard for me to be as sweet to her because it makes me so mad. I just found out though that her father died last year, so I’m worried about her. Clearly she doesn’t know how to deal with her feelings in a positive way. (as you can see my social work side is kicking in) So if you guys could pray for her too, I’d also appreciate it. Besides that, prayers for my energy and stomach would be great! I’ve been having some problems with my stomach and it just adds to the stress of being a brand new teacher. Anyway, love everyone at home, sorry this blog was so long, I just had so much to tell! J   

So…the last two days have been EXHAUSTING, and no, not in the amazing I just wakeboarded all day on a wonderful lake way. Wow. I just keep telling myself that these first few weeks are the worst. I don’t even know where to start. I love the kids here so much but I just feel like I’m over my head. Like I’m wearing myself out too thin already and its only been two full days! I just got another girl in my class Monday (that makes 23 with no aid) and she doesn’t speak ONE word of English. I was like, what?! What am I supposed to do?! So I talked to her father and am trying to arrange for her to get tutoring from one of the teachers aids for the other classes that speaks pohnpeian. Also I have these two twin boys in my class that LITERALLY ask thirty questions a day. It is actually quite amazing. Lol its only been two days and I’m pretty sure my patience has never been tested so very much. Also I don’t think my voice has ever been so tired! And I’m used to talking a lot! Its actually sad. My kids are struggling so much academically. It is very frustrating because the school wants us to use the books we have for their grade but they aren’t ready for it. Some of my kids can’t even really read. Like maybe a sentence. For instance I’m supposed to be teaching my fourth graders multiplication and long division etc. but they can’t even add. I went over some adding with them out loud, went over problems with the class, and then was on my feet going from desk to desk helping every kid the rest of the period. Then I reviewed every single problem and answer with the class again all together. It was exhausting, and when I just graded my papers I was slapped in the face with the fact that most of them failed the assignment. Like only a few kids got anything higher than an 80% like maybe three. And it was just adding! This is all supposed to be easy review. Also, when I went to teach bible and passed out the bibles my class has (I only had like 12) the kids couldn’t even all use them because most of them were missing so many pages. Plus, my class doesn’t have bible books cuz there aren’t enough. Haha just many challenges like that. It’s just so hard because I have like four brilliant boys that are so excited about learning and want to do everything and move on, and the rest of class is just struggling so much. I seriously don’t think I ever sit down in my chair for more than twenty seconds at a time no exattuaration. Its crazy. However, there is something that MADE MY DAY today. My kids were working on a social studies sheet, and one of my boys raised his hand very concerned. The students were supposed to match a resource from a specific state with a job someone living in that state might have. Haha one of the answers was “cotton” (with the matching answer being a clothes factory or something) and this little boy looks at me with the most earnest eyes and asks, “Miss, are they talking about cotton candy, or the cotton that you make clothes with?”  I had to look away after I answered so he wouldn’t see me laughing.

 

After grading papers, and being depressed I headed back to my apartment just in time to grab my snorkel and jump on our faithful red truck. My grumpy mood soon brightened with a trip to the ocean. Amy and I swam out to this reef through open water where people go fishing. One of my buddies, named Zack he’s in sixth grade, who I love to death told me has lots of sharks, so one of the guys lent us a spear cuz they were going spear fishing. We decided that this was a more frightening experience than an enjoyable one. Haha it was really murky for some reason where we were and you couldn’t see anything below you for a long time while you swam out. I was like huh, there could totally be sharks right under us and we’d have NO idea. Then, the coral wasn’t too great, saw some pretty little fish, but nothing amazing. Still waiting to do some awesome snorkeling at an actual place for snorkeling. Hopefully we’ll be going this weekend J So after we swam back there we were all jumping off the roof of this building thing into the ocean (its about fifteen feet up, maybe a little more?). The guys were all doing gainers etc. and I was suddenly inspired to try a front flip. Haha I have no idea why considering that I’ve NEVER done a front flip off anything before. Like not even into a swimming pool haha my friends know that I can barely manage one on a trampoline. But I just went for it, and totally landed it. Didn’t over rotate or anything. It was pretty cool, now the guys want me to do a back flip haha so we’ll see. J Its so nice to have a support group, like all of us going through the same thing. It seems like we’re all struggling with the same things and are all exhausted, and its nice to be able to all leave after a frustrating day and just have fun together. I’m really enjoying getting to know everyone better here, and am looking forward to getting closer through the year.

Oh, and last night Amy and I made an amazing original dessert! Her dad had just sent her tortillas in the mail, so we fried bananas and rolled them in tortillas with butter and brown sugar and then baked them in the oven. They were SO good, and well…quite unhealthy. Haha but the boys really enjoyed them. I’m quickly realizing that this is going to be my crash course in cooking year! Anyway, I need to try to catch some sleep and grade some more papers. I don’t think there will ever be enough hours in the day! Miss everyone at home, thank you so much for your prayers, I really need them right now!

God truly is so good. One of my friends said, “There is no where better to be than where God wants you to be.”  I can honestly say that I feel like Pohnpei is exactly where God wants me to be this year, and it is a great feeling. J