Mardi Gras and Ebeye Again

The past few weeks have been an interesting time here on Kwaj. We had a Mardi Gras celebration put on by MWR (Morale, Welfare, and Recreation). It included a parade and beach celebration. They even spruced up some golf carts, and the school marching band performed. It was a lot of fun, and I collected enough beaded necklaces to last a lifetime.

I snapped a few photos of the parade, which included a variety of organizations on-island, the school, emergency services, and a smattering of other groups. I included a photo of the marching band as well, but blacked out the faces of the students - so that picture will look a bit bizarre.

Black spots on faces to protect student privacy. 

We also took another trip to Ebeye during these past few weeks, this time to go out to dinner. There are no sit-down restaurants on Kwajalein, and so any desire to "eat out" is pretty much a non-starter unless you go to Ebeye. So we took the ferry over to Ebeye one evening, and found ourselves at La Bojie - one of the small local restaurants.

I'll admit, it didn't look like much, and I was a bit worried about how my stomach would hold up after eating there. I ordered the teriyaki chicken with garlic rice, and it was actually pretty tasty. I felt fine afterwards too, so no health or cleanliness issues to speak of.

Evening on Ebeye - from the dock

La Bojie

From our table, while eating - it was a bit of a slow night for them

Otherwise, life is pretty routine on Kwaj at the moment, with school in full swing for the second semester. I'm teaching a few new classes this semester and the kids seem to be really enjoying them. One of them is Business Law, and the class discussions have been really quite fun. The other is Web Design, with the kids ultimately learning how to design web pages and hopefully taking responsibility for part of the school website when they're done.

I'll leave you with a few neat pictures to close out this post. We recently had a full moon out here, which is not all that weird of course... but it looked incredible. Being where we are on the earth, the full moon ends up being incredibly bright. It's almost unreal. Check it out:

Full moon on Kwaj

Full moon on Kwaj

A visit to Roi Namur

Wow, it's been awhile since my last post. I apologize for the huge delay, but it's just been a busy time. School has been in full swing, and then winter break arrived where I returned to Chicago for a few weeks. But that has already come and gone, and I've been back on island for a few months.

During the last few months, I got to take a trip up to the island of Roi-Namur. It's a smaller island where only about 100 or so people live and work. The main operations on the island involve radar, and so we took a tour of the island and some of the facilities. The trip there involved a smaller plane than I'd ever been on though, so that was... interesting. But ultimately a problem-free experience.

Interior of the plane

Right outside the airport on Roi

Roi Namur is also the site of a major battle against the Japanese, and some incredible WWII ruins. It was a quick battle, and US forces bombarded the heck out of the island in advance. But the Marines did land on the island and had a fierce fight to take every yard of land. The pieces of that battle still litter the island. Take a look...

After the Roi trip, life mostly settled down into pretty normal daily routines of school and island life. There was a big holiday celebration on island, but since it took place after dark - I don't really have any pictures to show for it. But there have been a few other neat events and excursions that I'll try to update on later. For now, it's back to work, as parent-teacher conferences are this week.

Here are a few additional random pictures to give a flavor of the last few months on island...

Remains of an old pier

An evening walk

Island police hanging out outside my building. Hiding perhaps?