Good Bye Pohnpei

Our time in Pohnpei has come to an end, how time flies and it has been 2 years since we arrived in the Garden Island of Micronesia or famous for Pohnpei.

It's time to pack our stuff and move on to the next journey, going back to Australia where I called second home. My first home still Indonesia, a place where I was born and grew up until 2009 when I decided to leave everything and follow Mr. Husband to his homeland.

When I married Mr. Husband I knew that my life won't be boring, we can move to anywhere in this globe where his office reside.

Pohnpei is my first posting but fourth postings for Mr. Husband. When I said yes, he can apply for Pohnpei I don't know what to expect, as not much information I can get from google but one thing strike me was the island remind me of my first home, Indonesia, the tropical weather, the green scenery and the people, well Micronesian and Indonesian are quite similar, dark brown skin and brown eyes.

We arrived in 9 September 2010 and yes the island reminds me of my home town (5 hours drive from Jakarta), I saw familiar trees along the road and in the compound.
I see sugar cane, casava, breadfruit, lemongrass, pineapple, coconut, papaya, soursap, banana, tumeric and even jambu or sour apple as Pohnpean called it, the main difference is rice/padi field, I don't see a single of rice field in Pohnpei, in fact there is no rice field anymore in Pohnpei not like in my home town where you will see rice field pretty much everywhere you look.

Last week the removalist have come and packed our stuff, the house is empty now. We live out of settling in kit and 3 suitcases among the 3 of us. The house feels different, mind you the physic still the same but the heart is different. Everywhere I look, I see empty shelves and empty cupboard, it feels weird and cold, it doesn't feel home anymore, it just feels empty.

Trip to Nah Island

Last weekend was our turn to take the boat out, after got confirmation from 3 other couples, we booked Francisco as the boat driver and prepare stuff to bring include food for the picnic and snorkling gear.

We decided to go to Nah island because it's not as far as Ant atoll but it has same sandy beach like Ant which is a rare treat in Pohnpei. Trip to Nah island took about 45 minutes to one hour by our boat because we have to go really slow in some shallow area especially during the low tide. Nah Island located inside the lagoon across from Nan Madol but since we're using big boat so we have to go outside the lagoon to reach it. I'm not too fancy going out the lagoon as the sea can be really choppy and rough, but this time it wasn't too bad and it's not too long so I'm fine.


The view on the way to Nah island

Nan Madol

Go Local: Coconut Jam

I have been living in Pohnpei for 7 months but I haven't found local food that I really like. Some of the local food are similar with Indonesia like: breadfruit, taro, yam, casava, the difference is we don't eat those food as main course but more to snack. Oh maybe in some parts of Indonesia they still eat it as main course but from where I come from we eat it as snack.

Everytime I go to Yoshie for groceries shopping I always see jars of Coconut Jam near the cashier, but the package doesn't look appealing to me, yeah I know it's not easy to make a good packaging that really appealing and scream BUY ME I've been there done that with my previous work as an advertising slave. Until Keira & Sky invited us to have dinner at their place.

My First Camping Trip

If you find yourself trapped in the middle of the woods without electricity, running water, or a car you would likely describe that situation as a “nightmare” or “a worse case scenario like after plane crash or something.” Some people refer to it as “camping.”

I've never been camping before and the idea of camping no shower never amuse me. Mr. husband has been trying to persuaded me to camping since we were back in Canberra but no luck so far, as I always have good excuses to bail from it. But last weekend I was running out of excuses and also it was his birthday, he wants to celebrate his birthday by camping in Ant atoll. It was a good plan since he got 5 days weekend for Easter and Anzac Day. Yeah among many other things that he can do, he chooses camping. Suck big time for me, no toilet for 2 days, how can I survive?. This time I can't say NO, it's his birthday. As a good wife *cough*... I respect his choice so off we go camping then.

Mr. Husband is doing his best to tell me that it’s very easy and it allows us to escape the pressures and troubles of the urban lifestyle for a more natural, simplified, relaxing time. Nothing could be further from the truth. In theory camping should be a very inexpensive activity since you are literally sleeping on the ground. But  the more simple it appears the more expensive it actually is.


The first stage is to buy a tent and a matress. Our new tent and matress arrived weeks before the day and we even had a trial at home on how to build the tent, yeah he was so determined to educate me about camping and the FUN of it. 

Here is our tent and matress:

Ant Atoll

We went out on the boat last month for a day trip to Ant Atoll, I heard people say that it's a gorgeous place and a must visit atoll if you live in Pohnpei. Ant atoll is about 1.5 to 2 hours trip by boat depends on the sea, if the sea really rough it might be longer than 2 hours and also if you always chase the school for fishing than it will be more than 3 hours for sure.

This time we used the Navy boat called True Blue, it's one of the safest boat in this island, thank God for that. Since I'm the biggest wuss in the world, there is no way I will take the small boat with 1 engine to go to Ant. I was freaking out big time just doing trip from mainland Pohnpei to Nahlap which took only 10-15 minutes by small boat, can you imagine 1.5-2 hours? I will be passed out.

I don't do scuba diving and I don't have any intention to do it anyway, but you can see soo much just from snorkling, so why bother go deep down.

Anyhow... here is Ant atoll captured on my camera, but mind you photos didn't do any justice, the real one even more beautiful...

Amateur Farmer

Alright, so far I have harvested dwarf bean not long ago, and today I proudly harvested my first lettuce. The lettuce is a bit different with what you find in the shops but it's not too bad. 

Maybe I should wait a little bit longer so it will grow beautifully like the ones you find in the shops, but maybe this is the best that the lettuce can do in the steamy, humid, hot and very wet weather like Pohnpei.

Lights in Pohnpei

This is my first Christmas in Pohnpei and I am impressed with how the shops and some of the houses decorated their splace with lots of lights. 

I have to admit that trips to downtown Kolonia at night time became very joyful, you can feel that the Christmas spirit is here. And I know some parents are using this opportunity to treat their children, yes a trip to down town with full of lights can be amusing even for adult like me.

So, on Thursday I decided to take some photos of the Chirstmas lights downtown, but I choose the wrong date because ACE Hardware & ACE Offices decided to have midnight shopping from 7pm - 12am, hence there were alot of people doing shopping and also some of the shops were doing final SALE too.

One thing for sure that their electricity bill for this month must cost them a fortune with all those lights, but hey it's just one month a year event, so why not?

Btw, I used the wrong lens 50mm so I can not capture the whole ambiance as I have limitation on the focal point.

 Palm Terrrace shop

 Super Savers, second hand clothing shop

Walk to Nett Point

It was the easiest hike of all, that's why I called it walk not hike :)

It has been pouring rain on Sunday morning but since it's an easy hike/walk to Nett Point a man made beach popular swim destination for locals we decided to give it go anyway.

We were car pooling at PCR hotel and meet the others there before we walk down the street. The road is paved and just a little bit of dirt around the Nett Point it self. It was a good walk with a good length and little bit of hills but no steep at all like our last hike, so I still got the sweat on this walk.

We pretty much just follow the road until we reach Nett Point.

My first harvest

My veggie garden is not the spectacular ones like some of the garden in Pohnpei, after seeing two awesome veggie gardens at the US residence compound I feel ashame about my veggie garden which just contain of  eight pots and two small patch gardens.

But anyhow I just harvest my first beans last week, well it actually force harvest because the trees look dying from the bleach's smell the workers used to clean up the outside part of the house.

not bad from just one tree eh

Just one lettuce looks promising and the rest look sad, it won't grow tall I don't know why. But my brocolli, capsicum, parsley and mint look promising. I try to grow more basil by cut the stem and grow it in different places. And since I got more seeds from Louise so I have decided to be more serious in gardening, I just need to get more pots or maybe even utilize available patches and spots around the house.


Wish me luck.

Potluck or Bring a plate

According to uncle Wiki, a potluck is a gathering of people where each person or group of people contributes a dish of food to be shared among the group.

 

The word pot-luck appears in 16th century England, in the work of Thomas Nashe, and was there used to mean "food provided for an unexpected or uninvited guest, the luck of the pot". The sense "communal meal, where guests bring their own food", appears to have originated in the late 19th century or early 20th century US, particularly in the Western United States, either by influence from potlatch or possibly by extension of traditional sense of "luck of the pot".

You can read further explanation about Potluck here

The term potluck is quite common in Indonesia and sometimes we have potluck dinner at a friend's house. Potluck makes the host's life easier because the host doesn't have to cook the whole dishes for everyone. 

In Australia there is a common expression called "Bring a plate". When you got an invite with note bring a plate doesn't mean that the host doesn't have enough plate hence they want you to bring a plate from home. 

Bring a plate means to bring a dish of food to share with your host and other guests. Take the food to the party in any type of dish, not just a plate, and it is usually ready to serve. This is common for communal gatherings such as for school, work or a club. If you are unsure what to bring, you can ask the host.

You can find more common Australian expressions here

Waterfall hike in Madolenihmw, Pahn Sile

This hike labeled as "easy to moderate", and is about a mile in each direction.  The swimming is supposed to be good.

Well, the information is right it was not a hard hike but since the pathway really muddy we have to concentrate and looking down all the time to see if there are any rocks that we can use instead of stepping out feet into the mud. Someone was saying  that eventhough Monalisa passing by we won't notice her as we all so busy looking down lol. So by the time we got home we were really tired, yeah all those concentration really took its toll.

But the view was worth it. It's a beautiful waterfall and there is somekind of wall that you can climb, Sam was trying to climb it up but I guess it is too slippery so he settled just swim. It was a good day for swim especially to get rid off the sweat from walking to the waterfall, so everyone except me and 2 others jumped in and swim. Me happy just to watch and take photos :)

Hike to Sokeh's Ridge (Pohndollap)

There are 2 types of hiking to Sokeh's island, one is a moderate 1.5 hours not include the exploring and one is strenuous. Since we are new to this hiking club so yeah we choose to do the moderate ridge of course :).

Here is what Emily said on the hiking club blog: The ridge is a very convenient hike for people in Kolonia. It's walkable from anywhere in town and offers both a good workout and a good view. You'll walk along a paved road, then along a dirt road, and come to a first scenic overlook. This is a good place to stop if you're looking for a very easy trip, but if you continue up up up you'll have even better views.


Following the steep section after the first overlook, the trail will head to your right, becoming very flat for a while. If you walk straight past a small building instead of following the trail to the right, there are at least two WWII-era guns and bunkers to visit. Following the trail will lead you to a final steep push, at the end of which you'll find a weather station platform and a nice view of Kolonia town and the airport.

Up until the first overlook is an easy hike, and yes the view is amazing. This is what I see:

Tour to the Pohnrakiet Nahs village

Two weeks ago Saturday, October 2nd, We were invited to attend and ovserve the cultural weaving, carving and ivory nut jewelry making at the Pohnrakiet Nahs village with the FSM Vice President's wife and other diplomatic corps. It was an interesting experience to know their culture as We are new to this island.
The Polynesian moved to Pohnpei in 1918 brought by the Japanesse administrator because the island that they used to live in experience drought. Now the Polynesian live side by side with the Micronesian in Pohnpei.

Saying goodbye in Pohnpei

This post triggered by my book club reading last night about the Grief Ministry, so We shared about what We know about death and how we handle the funeral as the last effort to say good bye to the deceased.

In Pohnpei, the funeral feast is the largest and most important form of feast held on the island today. Interment usually takes place within twenty-four hours of death. The funeral feast lasts for four days. Family members, fellow clanmembers, and close friends remain together for an additional three days of feasting.

One good example of Pohnpeian culture is funeral or "mehla" in their language. When a person dies, the family has a lot of responsibility to do. The family with some members of the community will get together to set up their place before the big crowd comes in. They will clean their place, set up the cooking place, etc,etc. In the meantime, somebody representing the immediate family will go to the radio station and put up an announcement of the deceased. Some men will go to the king or "nahnmwarki" for invitation or "luhk". This invitation goes to the nahnmwarki of the place the funeral will be held at. For example, if the funeral will be held at U municepality, the invitation will be given to the nahnmwarki of U.

My Project

As you know from my previous post that finding fresh produce is a challenge in Pohnpei, so I decided to start veggies garden.

I have brought over the seeds from Australia: cucumber, capsicum, iceberg lettuce, cos lettuce, italian parsley, curled parsley, tomato, oregano, corriander, thai chilli, broccoli & dwarf beans.

The gardener has cleaned up the 6 unused pots I found in the garden, what I need to do is to buy the soil and the potting mix from Ace Hardware and it ready to go. The soil around the compound isn't good for growing things as it full of rocks, well maybe if I go to the drive way and get the soil from there it could be work but I'm too lazy to do it so I will settle with buy the soil instead. Another thing I need to buy is the glove for gardening, mind you that I don't like my hands to get dirty with soil :)

I have succesfully grown chilli and basil back in Canberra but no luck with the tomato, I don't know what went wrong with the tomato. The basil and chilli has grown beautifully, but when the Winter is approaching I have to give up my basil and chilli before it all freeze and dead from the cold.

Let see how it goes this time, hopefully I will be success with my veggies garden. I will keep you posted on the progress.

Wish me luck!

My First Book Club

I went to my first book club tonight and it was fun eventhough I haven't read the story but the ladies were welcome and nice.

The Book club started in February this year if I'm not mistaken and become regular activity for some women who like to read and interested to get together and discuss about the reading. The book club is a regular meeting every week on Wednesday night. Since we would like to meet more often than once a month so the administrator choose short story instead of a book for the reading material. But usually in every book club meeting we are not only discuss about the reading but we also talk about anything. Mind you we are women, we like to talk!

Tonight's story is about Cactus. Don't ask me about the story because I haven't read it yet, because PW told me about the book club at 4pm when I was in the middle of my exercise and since we're going tonight so I have to cook dinner earlier. Yeah that was my excuse :)

Mr. Husband and I have different interests in what kind of book we read, yeah of course I like to read girly book (his nick name for my books) because there are no car chasing or fighting or blast or whatever men like to read. So this book club is a good opportunity for me to meet new people, share thoughts about the reading itself and about any things related to living in Pohnpei since I'm the newbie.

So who said that living in Pohnpei is boring?

It's so far than boring, there are a lot of stuff that I can do. Book club every Wednesday night, volunteer at the public library every Thursday, tennis lesson every Saturday, hiking every Sunday and functions yes lots of functions.

I will write more about my other activities in the coming posting, it's my bed time now. Ciao!

Week 3 in Pohnpei

Time flies and it's week 3 already, We have moved to our house for 2 or 3 years and our personal affects have arrived from Australia.

I worked really hard for 3 days to unpack and arrange our stuff so We will feel at home at last. With our stuff inside this house We defenitely feel at home. Before come to Pohnpei I have printed and framed some Canberra photos I took, those photos will remind us on our home in Australia.

I'm still adjusting and settling in but so far I can say that it's been good. Although there are compromises and sacrafices that We have to make, well it's a small island in the North Pacific after all it's not developed country like Australia.

Fresh produce is a bit hard to find, the supply depends on the shipment came to this island which is every 2 weeks. Sometimes the shipment didn't bring any fresh produce but something else like canned food and other stuff, then We have to wait until the next shipment comes. There are local produces like cabbage, eggplants, banana, cucumber, papaya, kedondong (I don't know what you call it in English but the locals call it toys) that We can find all year long. Apples have steady supply so usually in the big shops you can find it everyday, but with variety quality some are good some are bad. Good tomato is really hard to find even after the shipment came, usually the tomatoes are moldy when it gets here. After the fresh produce shipment came the shops will be full with fruit & veggie like lettuces, capsicums, red cabbages, broccoli, nectarines, peacheas, carrots, celery and bakchoy and etc. I went to the shops last Tuesday after heard the news that shipment came on Sunday, and when I walk in to the shop I was in panic mode seeing all those fresh produce, I want to buy it all :D. Easily available doesn't mean the price is cheap, some are bloody expensive some about the same price with Australia. A big and beautiful looking nectarine cost $5.75/pounds so when I pay at the cashier I was in shock to find that 4 nectarines cost me $14.70. Sometimes I just don't care about the price and just buy it because I really want it and I don't know when that stuff will be on the shelves again.

Meat & chicken supplies mostly frozen, so there is a special trick to see which one has good quality and edible. The fish mostly fresh and the best place to get fresh fish is Simon market. We can not scale & gutted the fish so when I go for fish shopping I always ask Simon to do it for me, I miss fish fillet like in Australia. I bought yellow fin tuna once and ask him to fillet it but when I got home I find that he cut it in big cube. Canned fish like tuna sardine and mackarel are everywhere, so we stock that up too for alternative of fresh fish.

Most food in this island came from America which I find it too sweet for my liking. All the cereals are American products with full of sugar, even the baked bean is sweet. Good thing We brought over 12kg of weet-bix from Australia. Even the bread is sweet here, but the good thing is we can go to Grace's bakery and order wheat bread without sugar, although you have to buy more than one for special order like that.

There is no fresh milk here, but there are heaps of long live milk. There is an Australian and New Zealand brands like Pauls and Anchor milk. We have 2 cartons of Anchor milk to stock up because people keep saying that stuff can dissapear and won't be back until God knows when.

Doing the groceries shopping is an adventure because you will not find everything you want in one shop, usually I have to go to 4 different shops for every groceries shopping, it's fun hey. The trick is grab and stock up. When you see something you like just grab it and stock it up, because if you think that it still be on the shelves next time you go to the shop you are wrong. Well you might be lucky if they're still there but mostly they won't be there. I was looking for canned mushroom the other day and can not find it in 3 shops, so I have to go to every shops just to get canned mushroom.

Good cheese is really hard to find and really expensive too. Like other stuff most cheese are American's product, the cheddar is in orange color which we're not used to. And no blue cheese :((.

There is one asian store called Yoshie, but they sell mostly Japanese products.

It takes time but I am sure that we will used to this stuff eventually, bear with us.