It's time to clean the office ..................

It’s a few months since I started at this small community organisation and one of the successes in the first month was tackling the office and seeing the wood for the trees.

It’s a nice office, louvre windows on three sides, a door and a space that measures about 11 x 8 feet. Maybe not state of the art or designer built but it does have selective stunning views and fresh breezes. My favourite view is about 15 feet away onto the beautifully coloured lagoon which doubles as the locals bath house, another is to the mwanaba, a meeting place and home to a dozen or so people with disabilities and their families and the back view is over the dusty road to the ocean about 70 meters away.

The fittings, er, there’s none of them, the furniture, they are simple and do the job. Most days I would secure one of the three chairs and I balance my laptop on my knees or on the empty guitar cardboard boxes, that’s after I’d brush away the mouse/rat poo and wipe the gecko wee away. There is a good wooden desk and two smaller ones that have found there way from KIT (that’s what painted on them - Kiribati Institute of Technology) and a low small wooded structure that is complete with some rusted binders and home to a rather large ant population. Sitting proud and dusty is a printer/fax/phone that’s waiting to be bought back to life and a laptop that’s had more experience with social media than I have had hot roasts.

I spent weeks graciously accepting whatever space is available, carrying out poo identification exercises, tying the flapping curtains back, learning how to unlock the door without the lost key and wondering what I am actually doing here. Of course playing with the children who don’t actually care what I do, and laugh beautifully at my attempt to speak the local language take up a good slice of the day. 

The staff here are two local women, the formal line is that one works full time and the other part time. There are days that they just don’t seem to turn up or do arrive at some stage of the day. I have had moments worrying that this “I-matang” (foreigner) asks too many questions and I have scared them away. The chairperson for the organisation works out of the office a couple of days a week and several other members pop in to access the net, so some days it can be a bit like musical chairs complete with walking aids and artificial legs.

Leading up to “clean up” day I started making enquiries about the office, asking how it may feel with a bit more space, given a sweep and the like. For the most, polite responses were echoed and I was feeling encouraged, but I have now gleaned why the idea of sweeping the concrete floor wasn’t such a hit. To sweep the floor and displace the extended ant family actually meant moving the chairs and desks about and using cleaning tools, this really was work.

Agreement is sort of made on the “clean up day”, as in, “OK let’s tackle it tomorrow”. Knowing this is going to be a hot and sweaty job I dress accordingly and get on the bus with my bucket of cleaning goodies. Happy that I don’t get charged for my extra luggage and constantly juggling my bag and bucket I proudly arrive at work carrying my trophy and knowledge of what to do for the day. I arrive to an empty office and busy myself with checking emails thinking I should wait until my work buddies arrive. They arrived, it was before lunchtime, they too checked emails and the Pacific version of the RSVP, agreed it was a good day to clean the office, and that was the last I saw of them !

 The see through office complete with rice bag

My cleaning angel !

My resolve was high and I was prepared to go it alone, in my mind I’d mapped out what needed to be done and dreamt of the result. The door was opened and out went the three chairs, one which fell apart, next was moving out the many binders with their faded letters identifying their mostly empty contents. This is when my cleaning angel arrived, a local woman and member of the organisation who lives right across from the office. She is the mother of one of the children whose name I can pronounce. This woman is a born organiser and decorator, no dreaming, scheming and pussy footing around here, she tucked in, new exactly what to do.

I gently relocated a bucket of ants and sand to the beach secretly hoping I’ve taken them far enough away that they wouldn’t return and she’s busy washing out the ant holes, with kero ! 

Om Mani Padme Hum

I’m thinking an ants life in Kiribati wouldn’t be too bad, but my cleaning angel knows this land and it’s harsh environment, she know what needs to be done and does it. 

 Getting into the corners

By end of day I have successfully introduced “office makeover ” to the activities this I-Matang likes to do. Maybe a rain check in a few months will be the telling of mine, theirs and the ants resolve, but I have a sneaky suspicion as to that answer, and I don't think it will be mine. The occasion does call for celebration and a photographic record takes place to sit happily along side a dusty memory and my dry throat.

 Some delightful little helpers

Next up - a canoe needs fixing

Transportation

Moving around Tarawa is not really difficult it’s just how it is. There always seems to be people needing to go somewhere for some reason and not at a specific time. The main form of transport is privately owned, loved and often battered 15 seater mini buses and a few larger ones.  The buses run along the one main road the width of the atoll, about 28 miles. Displayed in the buses front window is a sign indicating one of two destinations, both are to the East end of the atoll, just one village is a little further and doesn’t have to travel across the airstrip. Once the destination is reached the bus simply turns around to the other side of the road and heads West. With nowhere but the one road to travel blinkers/indicators are not really required, but lights are, they are used day and night and flashed to tell passengers that the bus is full. The buses with a working horn use their “peep peep” to indicate a full load and provides another opportunity in patience as the waiting may be a while. Luckily my longest wait of 90 minutes hasn’t been repeated ! All in all it’s a pretty basic system and given there are no timetables you simply wait for another bus.

This is a developing country and the idea of capacity building is no more evident in the numbers of passengers and what can be transported on a bus. Simple activities can be life enhancing and one that has me chuckling is doing a bus passenger head count, that’s so long as I’m on the bus not just being peeped or flashed at. One occasion saw 12 persons travelling in 6 seats, including the driver and a plastic tub of food, I was starting to wonder if i was in some sort of Guinness book of records project. On another occasion I kindly thanked the I-Kiribati gods or dogs the day I shared a trip with 28 other passengers and felt like I’d won bingo as didn’t have to sit in the back row. 

Opps, forgot to take photos of mini buses so here's a picture of a passenger boat.

The bus drivers are often young and male and are accompanied by the important conductor who are generally older and female. She collects the fares and tells the driver when to stop along with holding the role of allocating seats when the local system breaks down.  Knowing what to do as far as where to sit and when to move in an I-Kiribati bus is equivalent to most Westerners being conscious of what to do in a lift, where to stand, look etc. If you are lucky enough to catch a bus with spare seats you have moments to make the strategic decision as to where to sit. Each time a new passenger gets on the bus you are required to move further back, if you end up in the back row by the time you get off it’s likely that every seat has had several bottoms on it, the isle is filled with more people, fish or bags and everyone has to get off to let you out. If only the driver could synchronise the loud love songs or Christmas carols blasting out of the speakers with seat swapping then maybe I-Kiribati “musical chairs” could be the next big thing.

It’s hard to know why designated bus stops don’t exist with lovely neat lines showing who has been waiting the longest. It could mean a job for a roadside bus conductor and I wouldn’t be so peeved when waiting 30 minutes for a bus and a person comes out and stands 10 meters back down the road and they get collected and I get the flashing lights. I guess such a scheme could upset the “island time” apple cart or fit the game of luck on the bus system. This is a system that works, doesn’t appear to have road rage, gets people somewhere sometime, sees bus doors open and close more than these people have had hot baths and provides entertainment to at least this I-matang.  

 This is one very flash bike, and a not so flash nite club !

At least the airbags went off ! This car body (and many, many others) make adventure playgrounds for the kids.

 Next up - it's time to clean the office

 

It's off to work I go............

A week of small group orientation and one night in my new “home” and the time had come to rejoin the workforce, I was feeling like a baby bird being tossed out of the nest into a new world.  I had had one visit to my workplace and was quietly confident that I knew where I was going and that at least one person was expecting my arrival, even if I couldn’t pronounce her name. We had agreed on what day to start but didn’t worry about details such as a time, I had heard of “Pacific time “ so I though a 10/10.30am arrival seemed about right.

I packed a water bottle, toilet paper, laptop and my job description. The organisation I was going to had good experiences with volunteers last year but I am the first one actually contacted to them.  They are a strong rights based organisation and were keen for their volunteer to be a person with disability,  I am one of a few non-disabled people involved with them and I sensed that they were as prepared for me as I was for whatever it was I was here to do.  After spending half the morning practising the local language for “stop the bus” I headed off shyly with map in hand to wave down my first bus. For a bus system that has no timetables, no bus stops, and no set fares I was pretty chuffed with my efforts and arrive safely and before lunchtime !

There is one staff member and the organisations chairperson in the office and I’m welcomed in. A few things are cleared away and I’m offered one of three seats in the small office. The space is too small to actually walk around in but I note a couple of desks, a printer/phone which I’m informed doesn’t actually work, a yearly planer without any identifiable days or events and a few piles of folders. There are glass louvre windows on three sides, one view is to the beautiful coloured lagoon some 18 feet away, one into the Mwaneaba (meeting place and where people live) and the other across the road about 60 meters to the ocean. We chat away, well I chatted away and they ask me if I have "my workplan" ! Just getting to work that day was about as planned as I was and I was starting to  feel that I was keeping them from their work and their laptops. Seems Monday morning work is finding out what’s happening in the world via email and social media, turns out this is everyday work and sometimes all day work. Enquiries and questions about the agency flow from my lips and I sense a touch of relief when I informed them that I do have my own laptop.

 Since arriving in Kiribati Internet access has been pretty difficult to come by so holding back my excitement I casually enquiry about getting access. “No worries” just log on. After three days of “maybe this is the password, or “try this one” I did crack it and became a team player with the world of email and social media.

  My co-workers  

My first week consisted of learning how to unlock the door via a louvre window as the key had been lost, how to balance my laptop on my knees or on top of a couple of empty cardboard guitar boxes and how to enter and exit the mwaneaba without banging my head. I spent time meeting the people who live here, people with disabilities, their husbands, wives, children, brothers or sisters and a couple of lovely little pups. The I-Kiribati people here are very welcoming, warm, happy and very forgiving in my attempts at the local language, the universal language of laughter was loud and accepting.    

The week went by with me often getting to work before my co-worker and one day being there alone, I don’t know what happened, I’m just hoping all my questions hadn’t scared her off but that I may never know. I worked on an action plan for a funding application done by a student here last year, remembered to bring my 2 saos and a banana for lunch and more importantly learnt that unless I wanted to go the “local” way I needed to keep my fluids to a minimum as it was a bus ride away to a western toilet ! 

This is my land mark for getting off the bus, if I pass these I've gone too far !

Next up : Transportation

The nuts and bolts: otherwise known as orientation

Over the next few days we hang off our gurus every word and get driven by our capable young driver in the Nissan I’m learning to love. These days are a crash course to the who does what and where everything is, especially for the things that we don’t actually know we need yet !

Setting up a bank account required taking up residence in the bank for several hours a day for at least 4 days. Yes, the air con and filtered water were an attraction but the plastic chair queueing system was something to be seen. On one occasion I sat on 10 different chairs as I got closer to my goal of a plastic card, it felt like musical chairs without music as we all stood and moved on a seat when each person got served.

Next it’s off to get a drivers licence and another lesson of local ways. First visit, “sorry no film” (for what ended up being a digital camera), next visit, “sorry the photo man is at lunch” then moments later, “oh, look he’s just come back”. How lucky are we. This day the heat and humidity is having it’s way with me and I’m pretty tired, a photo shoot was not my ideal activity. The back of an office door makes the back drop as I stand for my mug shoot, next the photographer is looking at his screen, he looks worried, something’s wrong, then comes the announcement that I look ‘very untidy” !   

God forbid this heat wasn’t really on my life's agenda, this was my year to move to Tasmania now I’ve found myself on the equator and “he” wants another another photo shoot. So down comes the hair, tears of laughter streaming down my already red face and my Elle moment arrives. Lights, action and I now have a licence with a worst photo but I am permitted to drive almost any vehicle in Kiribati including plant !

 I took this photo of the Kiribati electricity company so I'd know where to go to pay the bill. It's just sitting in the middle of a empty block of land that you'd never find unless shown and that's after climbing through a fence ! But it's got A/C and at least 3 people working there.

 

Not quite in the orientation plan but next comes attending the swearing in of the new president. He is a gentle speaking man elected back for a 3^rd term. The event calls for an attire more than we have become use to, so a trip to the op shop is needed for ties and long pants for the men in our group. Thank you Mr President, it’s only week one and I’m in op shop heaven already.

Next it’s house shopping, minus the flash cars and clothes of a Sydney real estate agent or the hoards willing to pay top dollar for a place cats would prefer not to be swung in. Westerns generally live in besser brick houses with some mod cons and fitted out with an assortment of home accessories. Two of us settle on a modest place on the ocean side that has new appliances, sea breeze, nice neighbours and is well located for work. 

Living right on the ocean is normally a dream for many but here we are almost in it. By the first high tide we had a spa just out our front door complete with elderly neighbour sitting on a plastic chair with the waves washing him down. As for the house the fridge worked well, albeit eating without cutlery was interesting then came the challenges of no gas, no water and no electricity. Having lots of needs is one way of meeting all the neighbours and by the time several electricians visited including one with no less that 12 kids on the back of his truck we could have filled a guest book.   

With no water the front yard spa was looking good, so on went the reef shoes, a good eye out for whatever may be floating about, a bar of soap in hand and I took to the “local way”. 

After some days, gas, water and electricity all came together and home is taking on it’s own Kiribati Op shop flair.

 This is the view out the front door with the tide coming in, it will get to the red & white posts and chain. Sorry about the face washer drying!

PS that's a pig just by behind the tree & chain.

The next door neighbours dog doing a bit of DIY. Yes, it's a boy ! 

 My bed and the curtain that doesn't quite work ! 

As part of orientation we spent a couple of nights at North Tarawa at this resort (Kiribati style) where we could swim and relax away from the density of South Tarawa. This is lazy photography, a shot of the sunrise whilst laying in my bed !

Next week it’s off to work.

Mauri Mauri

 

With two-hand navigation my luggage squeezed through the esky wide exit of Bonriki International airport I was greeted to smiling faces and to the Kiribati welcome of “Mauri Mauri”. I could still remember my name and announced it to someone that looked like she knew a thing or two about this country and it’s visitors. Yes, this was our Guru our "in country" manager,  I had been assured she was the one who knew everything that a volunteer in this developing country would need to know.
With a fresh flower garland crown placed on my head I knew my body and soul had arrived, I still had my bags but had managed to loose the duty free.

I’m sure it had been some years since some in my group had worn flowers in their hair and no amount of jiggling or slugging back the chilled water or cola being handed out was going to take away that “new arrival” look. As for the duty free, G&Ts without the gin in a country that doesn’t really have tonic water keeps the choices pretty simple !

No taxi rank here or hustlers for the best back packers in a town. Tourist are light on the ground, but an add on fare from Fiji appear to have attracted one couple, an elderly brother and sister from the United States. She’s bought along five books to read and has offered to pass them on, so the only known physical address is passed on. Anyone who has had the need to research Kiribati knows "Mary’s motel", stars may not have been given here but it’s handful of rooms with Western loos have made it on to trip adviser.   

We piled onto a rusty Nissan 26 seater that I thought had seen better days and was secretly hoping that this wasn’t going to be it’s last. The airport exit is past a few stalls selling handicrafts, bananas, packets of noodles and little else, but seems to provide activity for more people than were actually on the plane. Our guru announces the plan for the day, first off was the suggestion that she’d phone ahead for lunch and the promise of café lattés and smoothies. This woman is smart, straight to the growling tummies and coffee withdrawals of a bunch of middle class westerners. "Hands up for tuna or egg sandwiches". Smoothies and sandwiches on sweet bread is what’s on offer at the cafe and no doubt would be at any other sandwich shop if there was another one on South Tarawa !

Postcards, very artistic ones were bought up and stamped as evidence of arrival, and to provide an activity when the need arises.  

The colour of the lagoon was nothing short of stunning, an aqua that only nature can produce and it’s high tide gently ebbing and flowing onto it’s own coral beach. The clarity of the sky, the glare of the coral and the beauty of the water called for the camera. The coconut smashed and glued front window of the Nissan, it's rusted out steps and flesh wounded body with it’s proud young driver called to be recorded, and this was the perfect back drop. I think it may be a few years since the “gift from Japan” (as written on the bus) had started it’s life on the pot holed roads of South Tarawa, they have been hard years and no doubt this bus has carried many bottoms, large and small, and the not so odd yellow fin tuna, rooster and pig.

Off to our guesthouse and the last lugging of bags for a few days, it’s comfortable, very welcoming and has air con and a shower. 

She's a beauty with a few tales to tell and lot's of pollyfilla

 The stunning lagoon, and bath house to 40,000 people ! 

Sign for the government run hotel, which is about as touristy as it gets

Up next : The nuts & bolts, otherwise known as "orientation".

It's touch down to Bonriki International airport

Five and a half months in the making and a world away from Sydney life it was touch down to Bonrki International airport on South Tarawa. 

The hundreds and hundreds of dollars paid in excess luggage and customs confiscation of “goods” (read “expensive”) were starting to seem insignificant as the airstrip came into view. There seemed to be as many kids using the airstrip as a playground as were on our full plane made up mostly of locals returning home. The airstrip makes use of the widest point on this atoll, 400 meters if you are lucky, maybe low tide offers some confidence to those who think a dose of worry or concern is going to be of any help.

I was starting to wonder if any of the smiling flight crew who confidently demonstrated the use of inflatable life vests could tell me how comfortable they were or if the whistles were tuned! Air traffic control were terrific, no kids, dogs or pigs appeared to be injured by our arrival, no waiting for a landing bay and we were soon on the lands of the I-Kiribati people. Given there are only 2 flights a week from the big smoke (Fiji) this provides an occasion for the kids on school holidays and locals to meet and greet returning family and friends and check out the rest of us. As we pile off the plane we are requested to collect an “arrival form” from someone on the ground. Great, paper work to collect while carrying on board luggage that far exceeds the weight allowance, scrambling for sunglasses and being hit with a blanket of moist heat !

Forms completed and into the international airport terminal. We were greeted with two visa lines, a baggage handling system that would see Aussie baggage handlers keel over with a crook back before  lifting an esky, and a customs desk that I initially thought was a coffin ! Yes, it was hot and muggy and I had had one glass of wine on the plane but whoever made those thigh high desks from which bags are opened and checked has probably made resting boxes for the deceased at some stage. 

The chaos appeared normal and comfortable. 

Locals opened eskys big enough to hold a school of fish for the customs folks to check, no fish inside, but yes that is what they are mostly used for.

I had 40 plus kilo of stuff including almonds and legumes, hmm, food or seeds, they will be which ever is the quickest and easiest to get through customs. I’m sure the customs folks really didn’t want to see what I-matang (foreigner) brings to this country of fish and rice, and I for one was happy for them to be having an easy day. The well travelled couple in our group were right, see what’s happening for the locals, wait at the end of the queue and send our very chatty group member to test the waters. Bingo, we told customs what we had to declare, they didn’t want to see or taste my almonds or chocolate, all our bags remained unopened and they are probably still wondering what all those words were that the “chatter box” was carrying on about.

We were given a visa for 11 days, albeit all of us are here for a year or more.  “You’re working where &  why ? OK, take your documents to (god knows where) and you’ll get a visa for a longer period. Maybe the 11 day stamp was the only one they had or was just their favourite.

Several in our group took this waiting around opportunity to use the local facilities, or maybe better put, who had forgotten to use the aircraft bathroom when available. The toilets had a wonderful pictorial sign that included a woman with the best calves I have seen, a year of squatting and I’m reckoning mine will look like that too. Ok it’s off to the loo. The ladies bathroom door is locked, not sure if someone is locked in or we are locked out, no problems use the other one suggests the customs fellow. With a buddy on watch I find the men's bathroom, it has a western toilet and no paper, and yes it flushes, you get to see where it all goes as you leave the bathroom along with the waving kids who are still hanging on the fence long after the plane had arrived.   

Mauri Mauri.

More water that land, more coconuts than land, but wait there is an airstrip to come.

 Can I have that waistline too ! 

Happy I didn't need to explain what my  yoga mat was  !

 Next it's : Mauri Mauri

What job, where.................

The skills required by AVI for this Community Education and Advocacy role for a Disabled Peoples Organisation seem to match what I had to offer, that was the start of my Kiribati adventure back in August last year.  First up was where the hell is this place? Hitting modern technology and the zoom button it didn’t take too long to realise that South Tarawa is a very small place and a long way from anywhere else.  South Tarawa sits just above the equator and is a three hour flight to Fiji it's closest neighbour. Research into this country informed me that the average temperature for every month of the year was 28 degrees. The temp range sits between 24-31 degrees and with South Tarawa added to my smart arse phone weather app this was my first experience of such heat, albeit virtual it was a good introduction to one of this countries constants.

An intense recruitment process took place mostly looking at ones ability to cope in a developing country, being in an isolated destination and working with little resources including limited access to fresh food. The interviews went well and one of my referees reassured them that I wasn’t having a mid life crises, was a nice person but to watch out as I didn’t like the heat and may go mad and kill everyone !

 AVI have a long history of placing volunteers here to I knew I was on a well trodden path. Iit was hard to know what my job would be and what I was actually going to do, but with 20 odd years experience in the community sector I wasn't feeling too fazed about that.  The 5 months from applying to having a departure ticket this was a good amount of time to raise a million questions, sort out what it was I thought I couldn't live without and get rid of any notion of going to an island Paradise.

Will I need my extra large knitting needles, my hair cutting scissors, a years supply of chocolate and coffee............... Email contact with other volunteers informed me that Internet access was available most times and was a  life line, make sure to pack "a sense of humour"and yes there were a few statues to "tag", statues that appear to all look the same,  the story goes that the (short arse) male artist modelled them on himself !

In the  months before heading off on this adventure I packed up my stall in an antique centre, became best buddies with the 82 year old at the storage facility as I squeezed more "stuff" in and managed to drive over 5,000ks across 4 states of Australia and played netball in another "masters games".  I reckoned it was worth getting any travel out of my blood and spend time with my family and friends as Kiribati didn't seem to be on anyones "bucket list" or make more than a few pages in any Lonely Planet publications. This was going to be the last of my wide open spaces before hitting an atoll.  

 The oh so simple & delightful Christmas lunch

LovLeigh Treasures @ Balmain Road Antique Centre

Making it through 9 games in 6 days - thanks Adelaide, thanks girls and thanks umprires

 Next: it's touch down at Bonriki International Airport

From the beginning................

January 2012 saw the start of a new adventure, one that has seen me settle in an amazing outpost in the middle of the Pacific Ocean in a country called "Kiribati". A vast (and little) known country made up of 33 atolls with a population of about 100,000 people know as the I-Kiribati.

South Tarawa is the main atoll and where I have settled for this year as a volunteer with Australian Volunteer International (AVI). It is home to more than 40,000 people on a very thin and fragile piece of land measuring 25 miles x 60/400 meters which makes it the most densely populated bit of land in the world.

This is a slow start to this idea of sharing my observations, but a start non the less. It's Easter, an ideal time for new beginnings and getting this story up to real time, so welcome to my journey which will no doubt include laughter, tears, what the F... moments, and likely to pose more questions than answers as this very present life is anything but black and white.