February 15, 2018 - Jabor

February 15, 2018

Today started well rested with memories of a tough crossing behind and jumping into copying curriculum for the Jabor grade school. I’d done the same for Assumption before I left Majuro and, in my haste, stupidly forgot to make a copy for myself. It actually worked out okay as there were some files that contained personal info on students that would have had to be found and deleted as well as the files being a bit confusing. I keep saying my unorganized files are a result of right brained thinking, but most often it’s time constraints of the moment, however, in the long run….

After five hours copying and organizing files for the elementary, we headed to shore in our kayaks, myself with one small memory stick containing 3 gigs of curriculum.  Pete walked me to the school where the kids were having a great time with a field day playing tug of war, musical chairs – without music, relay races, etc. As Pete later remarked, these kids are amazingly fast runners. Pete took off to find the chief of Emidj Island and ask permission to use the old WWll Japanese seaplane ramp, so we can put a coat of paint on the bottom of the boat. He was most gracious and welcomed us to stay on his island as long as needed.

I met with Tom the principal of the elementary school and copied all my files onto his computer then showed him around some of the curriculum. He was most interested in the English/Marshallese translations I’d done, and it made me feel sad for not scanning the early reading books that others had translated into Marshallese, so the kids could begin reading bilingually. Maybe if I can get the files from Pamela, they can be sent along later. Tom was very grateful and said he didn’t know how to repay me for the kindness. I told him sharing these files with the teachers, so the kids could use them was repayment enough and all I asked. Noticing that some files were missing and the teacher fonts didn’t open, I promised to be back tomorrow with the rest of the files.

On my way back to the dock, there were a lot of kids and a couple of adults walking along the road with blue school uniform shirts with a logo on them. Asking what school they attended, I found out it was St. Francis, the Catholic school on island that Sr. Barbara had mentioned was started by the Maryknoll sisters, but she wasn’t certain it was still up and running. After asking a couple of times for directions and on the second try, going the wrong way but still toward oceanside, one of the teachers picked up his young son and offered to show me the way to the school. It’s not by any means a large place, but it seems I still looked confused enough with wandering through peoples’ yards that he was kind enough to help.

It also took a couple of tries to find the sisters’ house after arriving at the school. When I did find the right building, it seems it was the wrong door as one child nicely pointed the way to the correct door. One of the sisters was already opening the door and invited me inside. It was a fairly good-sized house, though sparsely furnished and in desperate need of repair, but well kept and clean. After explaining my purpose, Sister explain that the principal was not there today, but would be back tomorrow morning. Sister taught music among other subjects and was excited to hear that my files contained many songs for the children.  After a promise to return in the morning to copy the files onto their computer and many greetings back and forth with the children hanging around, I walked back to the dock keeping track, so I could find the school easily the next day. 

Upon returning to the dock, I noticed the kayak had water in it again and Pete later told me that the man teaching his young son to swim there had asked if the boy could sit in it. Pete said he was sure I wouldn’t mind and obviously they spent some time enjoying the kayak. Had I known that at the time, I would have offered to take him for a ride, but Pete returned to the boat while I was still on island at Jabor Elementary.

After paddling back to the boat and a short snorkel/swim to cool off and relax, I sat down with Pete to go over plans for the next few days and figure out my timeline for cooking food ahead of time for the next passage as well as brace myself for the next journey. While we were doing this, there were shouts of ‘hello’ and three kids were paddling toward the boat in a very small inflatable raft. As I was downstairs retrieving some candy from the small stash and putting it in a bag, fingers and a small face appeared in the porthole calling to whoever was onboard. By the time I got outside they were at the bow asking if they could come aboard. Instead, I gave them the candy, we exchanged names and after finding out they went to St. Joseph’s told them I would see them tomorrow.

Pete was still quite hungry from not eating much during the passage here, so we cooked pork tenderloin and roasted potatoes on the grill with some warm garlic breadsticks I’d made a few days beforehand.  Then out on the tramp to lay down and watch the stars until it was time to come inside for an early bedtime as both of us were still a bit tired from our hard travels the day before.

Traditional canoes sailing in Jaluit lagoon

St. Joesph's

The dock at Jabor