Holiday Recap

Hi Folks!

While many of you had a White Christmas, I was enjoying the experience of my first Christmas and New Year’s in Pohnpei. How was it? Busy and wonderful.

First of all, school ended with finals on December 17th and 18th. Then we decorated the school on the 21st and had our “Christmas in school” celebration on the 22nd. I don’t know about you, but in the U.S. I was accustomed to maybe a small class party in the afternoon on the last day before Christmas break. But Pohnpei seems to buy into the Christmas spirit even more than the U.S.—people begin decorating at the end of November, and they literally have a week and a half to two weeks of Christmas parties. (Of our own Christmas decorations on our house, Nohno says they’re going to stay up forever!)

So this commitment to the Christmas season could not be contained to simply a half-day party. Instead, the whole school has a big day of revelry. Each class decided a month in advance how they were going to do their gift exchange and who would bring what kind of sweet treat to share. So on the day of, soda, ice cream, cookies, chips, and candy abounded. Also, the kids here don’t just buy a pencil case for the class gift exchange. People go all out, bringing in huge (and fairly pricey) Christmas packages for their classmates. After each class has an hour or so to itself, everyone comes out to celebrate on the front lawn in front of the school. A popular local band—keyboard and singers—came to perform, and we all danced for hours. I spent so much time on the sunny dance floor that when I came back inside one of my fellow teachers exclaimed: “You’re so red! You look like a crab that’s just been boiled!” Apart from my weak, overexposed skin, I really enjoyed being festive with all the students, teachers, and parents. Little kids point at me and start calling me “li en kalik” (dancing lady) on campus now. And even the local dogs got into the action—every time the dance floor cleared between songs, they nosed the grass for trampled donuts and other goodies on which to snack.

I took a breather from parties on the 23rd, but that’s mostly because I went to back-to-back-to-back birthday parties for the matriarchs and patriarchs of my families. On Christmas Eve, my pahpa’s pahpa turned 90-something. Then on Christmas my nohno’s nohno had a birthday party in Kitti, on the other side of the island. Then I went to visit my training host family in time to celebrate that nohno’s nohno’s birthday party in Temwan on the 26th. At each of these parties there was an uhm (big oven of hot rocks on which you cook pigs and dogs), baskets of food, gifts and sakau. I got to take in all the festive camaraderie, and I even got to share a bit of it with my family in the U.S.—we had a phone date in the middle of the Christmas Eve gathering; it was a fun challenge to try to relate everything I was seeing to them as they were gathered around the skyping computer in our friends’ kitchen.

Then, from the 27th through the 30th, I got to visit with some of the other PCVs around the island. I spent an afternoon being very nicely entertained by Nate and Kerry in their home near PATS, our training site. And then I trekked up the mountains to visit Ruthanne in Salapwuk, a lovely and remote community without electricity but with plenty of welcoming family—and a few other holiday gatherings to attend, except this time I got to hike over the meadows and through the jungle to get there.

I made it back to my site by the afternoon of New Year’s Eve, in time to start a 24-hour+ celebration of the turning of the years. I missed another holiday party in our community while I was away, which was quickly made up for by drinking sakau and wandering the street (singular) awaiting midnight. When midnight did strike, those who went to church came out in a candy-seeking hoard (Pohnpeian New Year’s is like American Halloween), and we all met on the street to exchange greetings and handshakes. Then the mingling and candy-eating continued pretty much all night. A few houses had music set up so that revelers could dance, but I found that most just wanted to visit with each other and laugh in the new year. I pooped out some time around 3am, but then was roused again in the morning to come to a barbecue at a neighbor’s house. It was a less formal affair than the other holiday parties—only a few families, and an oil-drum grille to cook marinated chicken, rather than an uhm to roast bigger meat. But it was still a source of delicious food and of useful Christmas gifts—mostly Tupperware and machetes. Then later in the day I had the good fortune to ring in the New Year again—celebrating in California time with my parents over the phone.

And although school started (too) soon after that, my community had an unexpected opportunity to gather again only a week later—my uncle (my father’s brother, who lives the village next to ours and who is the grandfather to a few of my students) unexpectedly passed away. I had been to his house only once before, to celebrate his 59th birthday in mid-December. (In fact, it was there that I ate dog for the first time.) He apparently had been having medical problems for a while, but I had no idea he was sick. The sedentary lifestyle and the influx of imported food have made diabetes, heart problems, and cancer very serious problems for people much younger than him, even. Although it was incredibly sad to see his immediate family mourning on the day of the burial, a Pohnpeian funeral does not end with the mourning. After the burial, a funeral will continue for several more days of feasting and sakau, full of laughter and visiting to honor the dead, much like an Irish wake. I was lucky enough to have many good conversations with community members during this time—often with parents of my students. So, while my holidays took me celebrating all around the island, the funeral gave me a unique opportunity to draw closer to my immediate community, for which I am very grateful.

While you, dear reader, are preparing to celebrate MLK and the births of presidents over the next month, I’m looking at a January and February that is holiday-free and as “business as usual” as we can get. But after the huge quantity of celebrating and feasting that happened over the past month, I’m really okay with refocusing on school and taking it easy for now.

With love from Pohnpei,
Mollie