Seedy Thoughts and Liberation Day

2-12-09 We haven't been able to go diving yet. Driving downpours at what's supposedly the beginning of rainy season has stopped us (so far) before we've started. It's a little irritating, but hey, that's what life is without the Weather Channel. Some of my kids did fantastically well on their midterms, while others weren't so fantastic. In fact, I'm compiling my sophomores' midterm grades, and it's starting to be a bit depressing. What's frustrating is that I see their potential--and yet I also see them waste their potential by not doing their work or completely skipping my class most every day (as one sophomore has done).

There are days here on Ebeye when it feels like the group of us are accomplishing nothing (well, except getting hot, sticky, and frustrated). Those are usually the days when we come back to the house, flop onto the table chairs or the one sofa-ish chair we have and just sit there, feeling like we've been drained. Every single one of us (myself very much included) has had those days, although some people have those days more frequently than others.

I was contemplating this the other day, while I was trying to figure out what I was doing for staff worship. Then I remembered Emily's plants. She had told her mom that she missed greenery (we all do), and her mom had responded by sending these little plants that you can grow in a tiny pot. We all watched as the seeds were planted and water applied. We even set it on the windowsill so that it would get the benefit of the crazy amounts of sunshine we get. Then we waited. And waited. And waited. Nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch. Zero. It looked as if it was ended before it had even started. The poor tiny pot even got knocked over and rummaged through by our not-so-friendly mouse who lives in our apartment, and we set it back up and hoped. One day, little green sprouts began poking up out of the soil. All of a sudden there was a sudden rush of tiny plants in the tiny pot. It was truly exciting to watch, and I was egging the little plants on, hoping that they would keep growing.

Unfortunately, they grew too fast and haven't done too well, but that's beside the point I want to make. What I realized is that those little potted plants are sort of like the mission here on Ebeye. Sure, there's some mighty good scientific explanation on why seeds sprout, but we still don't really understand how it works. So the thought that came to me was that being here on Ebeye is like planting seeds--we may not see what's happening, and it may look like nothing's happening, but something is. We just may not see the results during our time here. 2nd Thessalonians 3:13 also came into my head: "But as for you, brethren, do not grow weary in doing good."

Monday was Kwajalein Liberation Day, celebrated in remembrance of the United States winning the atoll during World War II. I had breakfast at about 7:30 or so, then showed up to school at eight, where there were staff and a few parents working on creating our school's truck-float. Kids began showing up at 8:30, toting the sandwiches, water and soda that they had been told to bring, (but I'm quite sure that most of the high school students did not show up until 10:00 or so). Around that time, we walked to the place where they had us line up in order to have a "parade." We waited for an hour in the hot sun before we got moving, and in all actuality, the parade was a turn around the corner and into the main event ground. A group of people (which included the RMI president and the US ambassador to the Marshall Islands) spoke for two hours or so, even though all of the kids couldn't hear them because of the wind and the ill placement of the speakers. I was lucky enough to be in the tent's shade (although some of my fellow teachers weren't so lucky), but I still developed a terrible headache (despite drinking water when I could). The ceremony did not finish until 1:45, and then we were able to partake of the food the kids had brought earlier. I ate four sandwiches and tried to cool down. I was feeling better, and went back to the apartments to change. Walking home almost wiped me out. I had to sit in our nicely air-conditioned apartment, cool off, and sip water slowly.

I eventually made it to Beach Park, where races for the school kids were being held. I still felt pretty poorly, and so I ended up sitting on the bench under our tent, watching people's bags and telling kids to stay away from the ocean (which started to lap onto Beach Park while we were there). Eventually, I felt a little better and ended up watching Lorraine finish her race in first place, with Emily taking second place, having run all the way from near Shell Island. I'm sure that was one long hot run, and even though I had wanted to do it, I was glad I hadn't.

I walked with Emily back to the apartments because we wanted to drop our things off before going to see the boys play in the championship basketball game. Unfortunately, we missed it, but the guys won, narrowly beating the team from the high school on Kwajalein. We walked to the school and Emily kept trying to cool off and stretch. We talked to some of the girls and then went back home, where we took showers, watched a movie on Emily's laptop, and then went to bed. There was no school on Tuesday, due to the desperate need for recovery from Liberation Day. I slept in, went to school and checked my e-mail, and basically hung out the whole day.

Then we went back to school on Wednesday, and now it's Thursday. I'll hopefully post this on Friday, barring power outages. More later.