The Waiting Game

This was my last weekend in Pohnpei, and a relatively quiet and anticlimactic one at that. Saturday morning I received a text message from some of my World Teach friends inviting me to go to Nahlap, a small “picnic” island off the coast of Kitti. I had never been, and figured I could use some fun in the sun before returning to a bleak, dismal NY winter. After running some errands and pick-ups, we finally reached the Nahlap dock around 2 in the afternoon. I was told a little late in the game to make such plans myself, but everyone else was banking on staying overnight. I was also told that it is only a 5 minute reliable boat ride to and from the island. I figured I would stay until about 6 or 7, giving me some good afternoon hours on the beach, and then leave after sunset to have a full night back on the main island.

As is too often the case here, we ended up waiting. And waiting. And waiting. We kept hearing and seeing boats, but none of them drifted our way. We called the owners of the island every half hour asking over and over again in broken Pohnpeian for them to send out a boat for us. They assured us, with growing impatience, that one was coming. And yet we waited. Not that it was a complete loss: we had some good conversation, shared some good gossip, and had a few good drinks. Still, I was itching to go. Waiting has never, ever been easy for me. Anyone who knows me well knows that despite my pipedreams of going to school in Hawaii or California, I am anything but a laid back, roll-with-the-punches kind of girl. I am a true New Yorker: always on the go, compulsively organized, persistently punctual, and planned out to the hilt. I am impatient because I value these qualities in myself, as inflexible as they often render me, and expect these qualities to be present in others. In Micronesia however, this is a tasteless recipe for disappointment. The Westerners that I’ve known, both here and in Chuuk, joke about “Micronesian time” (everything happens 2 hours late) and the carefree, come-you-are-whenever-you-want attitude. I’ve noticed that people here don’t like setting times or making concrete plans, preferring to let things crystallize at the very last possible moment. People don’t wait for invitations or abide by conventional formalities (for instance, at a feast we had last night for the arrival of the Bishop, tons of “uninvited” villagers came just for the food and left promptly after eating). To me, these characteristics indicate rudeness, and it’s hard to see them in any other light. Of course, locals here have their own ideas of what is rude, and I’m sure I’ve made many slip-ups in this regard during my stay here.

Finally, after 2 hours of waiting (perfectly on time for Micronesians), the boat arrived. By this time, it was a bit after 4pm, and I realized that I would have very little time to spend on this island. I was invited over and over by my friends to stay the night, welcomed to eat their food and use their soap, and I considered it. But I had been hoping to make it to the annual Bell Tower Christmas ceremony over by my house, and potentially go out for a few drinks afterwards. After much internal struggle, I decided to stick with my original plan: stay for the sunset, and leave shortly after that.

Nahlap was much different than I expected. I figured it would be something like Pisar, since that is really my only gauge for what constitutes a “resort island” in Micronesia. But Nahlap is much bigger, and unlike the bareness of Pisar, is overrun with mangroves. There is only a small portion of the island which is actually “beach,” leading out into very still, gray water. The owners stay on the island and operate a “front desk” where you have to sign in the members of your party and pay for the boatride. There is a small “café” where you can buy chips and water, a slide, and a few rope swings, making the island resemble a primitive version of Splash Down. When we arrived, there were a ton of people there. Pisar, Jeep, and other such islands in Chuuk are not at all popular with the locals, but at Nahlap, there were several Pohnpeian families spending the day picnicking. Small children drifted around the dock area in oversized floaties. Mother carried baskets of food, and strangely, huge Tupperware containers of extra clothing and thick, quilted blankets. Most people were leaving as we were arriving, however, and soon enough the island was quiet and largely empty. We took a walk to the other side of the island where we found a strange little out-of-place chapel, and a random stepladder in the middle of the water. We played a version of bocci with coconut husks (which I was terrible at! Surprising since I’m actually pretty good at regular bocci), swam around, and watched the sunset from a rocky part of the shoreline. We had our own nahs, and Will built a fire and cooked some hotdogs. It was pitch dark and I could hear some boats leaving. I decided to say my goodbyes and check out the ride situation, hoping there would be some available space on a departing boat.

It was about 7:30, and the owner told me there would be two boats leaving. Originally she said I could leave whenever I wanted, but perhaps now that it was growing later, somewhat changed her tune. She said I could take the earliest boat that came, but when it finally did arrive, told me instead to wait for the next one. My impatience began flaring up again. One thing that never ceases to aggravate me about living here is there are rarely any explanations offered for why things are or are not happening. When our electricity situation was bad and becoming less and less reliable, there were several different rumors about what was going on, but no formal clarification issued by the utilities company. Before leaving for Chuuk, I had to wait an extra hour for check-in to open for some reason still unbeknownst to me or any of the other visibly irritated travelers tapping their feet in the middle of a stuffy, unbearably hot airport. My project here at MicSem was cancelled. Why? Don’t ask me; no one thought it necessary to enlighten me as to the reasons despite my hours upon hours of dedicated work. It is more difficult to accept let-downs and unpleasant circumstances when you don’t know why you are being forced to endure them. Such was my situation waiting for a boat to come. Experience told me that regardless of this woman’s promise that I would get a ride, I somehow might not for a reason I would never know. I tried to ignore the bubbling aggravation within me as I sat on a narrow wooden bench in total darkness, listening to the owner and her family laugh over dinner inside their small house. I dutifully tried to convince myself I was not as frustrated as I felt, attempting instead to view this experience as another lesson to learn about myself. I tried to peer through the thatched roof I was sitting under and look up at the stars which were endless and inviting. Instead of thinking about everything I was missing (the bell tower ceremony), I tried to think about everything I was having: silence, peace, a spectacular view of the night. Finally, the woman came outside of her house and told me the boat was arriving. She pointed with her thick finger towards the long, shaky pier, “You wait for them there.”

I didn’t have a flashlight since I hadn’t been planning to stay so late, so I walked in darkness down the wobbly planks towards the dock. It felt like I was walking into a new dimension or some kind of strange eternity. I couldn’t see anything in front of me but shadows of shoddy structures and worlds and worlds of traveling stars. I walked slowly, unsure of my footing, along this narrow pathway towards an indiscernible blend of dark sky and dark water. The owner, finally realizing I had no light (and probably cursing my stupidity) followed me shortly after with hers, and waited with me at the open mouth at the edge of the dock. A few people departed off the boat, and I got in alone. I was accompanied only by the owner’s sons or nephews who were navigating with nothing but a small flashlight they periodically shone into the water to determine their route. As unfair as it probably is, I did not feel totally safe out in the water, in the dark, with two Pohnpeian men I didn’t know. I had my cell phone in one hand, and my pepper spray in the other. Perhaps another indicator of my New Yorkerness, I couldn’t just sit back and enjoy the slow ride and the magnificent view of the sky. Instead, I was wary and suspicious of the people alongside me, who were realistically doing me a big favor by driving all the way back just for me. Of course I arrived in safety, realizing to my embarrassment that they had even called me a taxi without asking me (though I had my own car). I thanked them, and drove home, relieved to be back safe and sound, but still housing that undercurrent of frustration that I had missed out on the rest of my night. I’m not sure when or if I will learn to accept things as they come. I have friends (one specifically comes to mind) who revel in spontaneity and are never satisfied with making plans or being on time because these systems are too rigid and do not allow for any outside influence to take them where they were perhaps meant to go all along. I can’t make value judgments on which behavior is better, but as much as I might want to, especially after a year and a half of living here, I’m not sure I can shake my need to have everything already decided, already organized because I want to be the one to plot my course. I’m not yet comfortable with anyone or anything else mapping out my roads.