So its been a while.....5-30-17

I surfed.  Friday night for 1.5 hours.  Saturday night for 2 hours.  Sunday morning starting at 6 am for 2 hours.  Sunday evening, after sailing in the Hobie for 6 hours, 2.5 hours.  Monday morning at 6 am for 2 more hours.

Learning to surf was so far off my radar for so long.  I just never thought of being in a place to learn.  Never thought of being so fortunate.  Not only now am I in this place where I can learn, I'm in good enough shape to learn, and if you've read any of the rest of this journal/blog you would know its the hardest thing I've ever done.

On a side note....when I came back from surfing Saturday evening in the work truck in my shorts around 6:30pm,  I parked the work truck at the man camp.  When I got out to walk to my miniature apartment two Marshallese guys were leaving someone else's apartment and saw me.  They asked me for a ride to the dock/ checkpoint.  It was raining and had been since 3pm.  The safety guy came out and said he couldn't take them because he had been drinking.  Abi and the other guy whose name I can't remember had been drinking too.  Abi kept saying stuff like "Ben ...you are batch plant boss, bring me to batch plant, I want to work for you, I respect you" to which I replied "I'm not the batch plant boss, I'm just putting it together for James" Abi denies me that I am the boss several times and tells me to promise him I will bring him out there.

On Kwaj, especially lately, you are not allowed to use work (government property) vehicles for personal use.  So I knew taking them up there would probably earn me a ticket and possibly a driving suspension from San Juan, but it was raining, and I love the Marshallese guys.

Halfway back near dusk the rear view mirror showed headlights.  It had to be the cops.  I was only a half mile from the man camp where I could hide truck amongst the others and duck into my place before they would know who was driving.  A half mile at fifteen miles an hour, the islands top speed limit, is an eternity to get thru.  I sped up to 40mph.  It was risky.  I made it.  I saw the little square cop suv drive past.....

Next time copper....next time!!


Ok, so that was a long side note..

The thought that originally started this thought was Guiness, the great dane I had the pleasure of being best friends with for 11 years.  When she was 4 she would run like a gazelle for an hour, then rest for half a day.  When she was12 she would run like a gazelle for two minutes then rest for several days.  I seem to be her at 12.  The surfing wiped me out.  I spent much of the latter half of Memorial Day weekend chilling like Guiness.

I started wearing the high visibility orange shirts after the 4 or 5 guys got lost Oceanside for 5 hours.

Apparently, I'm not worried about the advertising space of my forehead getting sunburnt.  This picture was taken by Chris Rice...thank you

This is a church on Ebeye.  Bilwa told me it took 3 guys seven years to build it.

so we can get pretty close to things with my Hobie....I do love sailing by Ebeye with it

Patrick and Tom's boat ...the Geneva.

This picture taken by Steve Davis....shows the size of waves I love out here.  Too much bigger and its scary.  I didn't really catch this one right and ended up riding the white water as opposed to turning right.and heading down the face of the wave

Kiteboarding at Bigej......beautiful place...

Bigej....around 40 folks live here.  great people.  

Bilwa has the best laugh

Bilba......and that's not his name.....

Today, he starts telling me about how one of our new safety guys approached one of the guys (not sure if he was "rebelle" (white guy) or Marshallese.  It's probably not important to the story any how.  The important part is that he was a KRS employee.  KRS is the "king" on Kwaj as Bilba put it.  They are the military contractor that runs the island, and has run the island for quite a while.  KRS = Kwajalein Range Services.  They may be based out of Georgia.

So to set this up better, there are 10 or so San Juan guys working downwind of some old Kwaj housing units.  At the industrial boat dock on the industrial side of the island. They are basically mobile homes, made in the fifties or sixties.  They called them at the time "Silver City" because there were a slew of them together located lagoon side on Kwaj, and they are covered in galvanized/silver tin. They are now kind of dispersed on Kwaj, and a few are halfway up the "causeway" .  The "Causeway" is the 5 or so islands north of Ebeye.  Shell, North Shell, Loi, and a few other islands I can't remember make up the "Causeway" that extends ten miles north of Ebeye.

The San Juan guys, working "hard" to get things together for the next barge at the more industrial boat ramp that has some acronym name that I can't recall, are doing their thing when the KRS guys start doing something to the "silver city" trailers.

I wasn't personally there for this, and it may be totally a moment where you "had to be there", but Bilba's laugh, as he finished the story has led me to this post.  So Bilba (still not his real name, and not sure why I feel I need to protect his real name, except that his laugh  was soo loud and so extended it deserves to get him fired...not really...but it was great).  A friend told me "that's all the Marshallese have left is to laugh".  That part is kind of sad, but its true, and they certainly do laugh.

So Bilso explains to me how the safety guy approaches the KRS workers, chest puffed, and declares "hey you guys can't do that while we are here working, those things are full of asbestos and we are downwind working"...."I'm the safety guy for San Juan, you have to stop doing that".  So the guy says "ok, I'll be back".  He comes back a bit later with the bigger KRS guy who says "you're absolutely right, these trailers do have asbestos in them and you are down wind, YOU guys have to move................

I've got the most beautiful life!

May 6th, 2017.

Its been too windy to think about going camping.  The wind forecasts every weekend for a month or two show the wind slowing down the following weekend. Every week for four weeks its been wrong, but this weekend we are going to ignore it.  It nearly takes a week to pull off a camping trip to another island on this Atoll (as opposed to all the other atolls' I've been on :)).  First, willing people have to be found, then paperwork has to be taken care of.  You go to the RMI office on Kwaj, and the very friendly Marshallese people stamp your trip request as "approved".  Its a big round official deal, and they just don't really care much where you are going.  Next is passing their approved trip request out to the required powers that be out here.  The RMI office is only open during the hours that we work....well ok not quite as extended as our ten hour days.  So I have to sneak off a little during lunch, even though I scarf down two plates really quickly.  5 copies are made and you have to distribute them yourself, so that has to happen during my working hours.  Its a 3 day deal.  The people you invite have no clue, so they randomly renege.

I have the best life!!  Pictures to follow