Friday, August 21, 2009

COS Snapshot #3 BIG

It is a Friday night in July, early evening. We sit communing upon an outdoor porch, enjoying the sea breeze, the sunset, afterglow from an excellent day of wreck diving, and muchomucho-extra-cheese-pizza. To the detached, untrained observer, surreptitiously gazing in at our cozy party of twenty, our converse embodies the perfect stereotype of crunchyhippiefeelgood Peace Corps bonding time: we are, in turns, standing up and sharing with the table at large how much we love them, how PC has changed our lives, how much luck we wish one another, how we will all go on to do great things. Perhaps, to this casual, slightly cynical observer, it's an exercise in generalities, clichés. But to us, it is all true. Holy.

As I munch my pizza and listen to the ruminations of these happy shiny idealist people (who just so happen to be some of my best friends on the planet), my wanders, strangely to that oh-so-classic-80s-childhood-Tom-Hanks venture: BIG.

Thinking back upon my initial entrance into the Peace Corps, I like to think of myself as the movie protagonist upon that first night in the amusement park. Evening's on its way~darkness gathering fast~it's raining, and I'm fed up [in my case, with the world at large]. And so, boldly, I seize matters into my own hands.

I approach a mysterious (yet promising-looking) contraption, stare thoughtfully at it a moment. We size each other up, Zordan and I.
-Can this mechanical fortuneteller in a box really fulfill my every wish?
-It's worth a shot.

Holding our breaths, we Micro 74s insert our collective nickels, squeeze our eyes shut...under our breath (or, perhaps, in our minds) we utter our secret sacred long-hoped-for prayers.
-I wish to save the world to grow up spread my wings stetch them fulfill my lifelong dream learn seek know (myself?) venture to LIVE BIG
Sharply suddenly we intake our breath yet tighter, (earnest anticipation!) open our eyes, and...nothing happened. We walk off through the rain, discouraged.

And yet, in the morning, we wake up to find...WE HAVE BEEN TRANSFORMED INTO GIANT COCKROACHES. (Just kidding. Thanks, Kaf.) [Take 2] WE'RE IN THE PEACE CORPS!!
Oh joy!
[Oh no!]
~to have a long-held wish so suddenly granted is simultaneously wonderful and profoundly disconcerting.

We are dogs tails-a-wag. Will it be the wondrous, long-planned for adventure of marvel, of delight, of benificence?

Full of coffee and vigor, we pack our bags and head off to the glittering, imposing, pleace-of-hopes-and-dreams, success & failure...MICRONESIA!!!

Our first day-of coconuts, smiles, and sunshine-holds all the hoped-for wonder and more. On our first night [think Tom Hanks pushing his bureau up against the door in the fleabag motel room in the slums here], reality sets in. Roaches scuttle across the floor, mosquitoes (hordes of them!) hover ominously DIRECTLY OUTSIDE the opening to your mosquito net [they're certainly disease-ridden, you can just FEEL it], voices uncomfortably close distance from your window [did you remember to lock it after all?], and, after your long, harrowing, sleepless night, to "awake" to the crowing of THE ENTIRE F***ING ROOSTER POPULATION OF THE PLANET EARTH??? AAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHH! Was this really what I wanted yesterday from the magic fortunetelling machine? you wonder.

Groggily, you rub your eyes, make your way outside into the brand-spankin' new reality you've proudly acquired for yourself. Head up Madison Ave until you reach...FAO Schwartz! [FAO Schwartz, in our case, being Nan Madol.] As, after ten minutes or so of walking, the unspeakably amazing, beautiful ruins come into view, your jaw drops. This is what you wished to be BIG for.

After exploring awhile inside this incredible labyrinthine wonderland, you suddenly emerge out into the bright warm daylight, gaze out toward the sea. You're suddenly looking into...a desktop background. Cool crystal azure waters fringe a tiny, white sand island housing a stand of leisurely-looking palm trees. "This can't be real!" Yet it is.

And not only are you living in it, this masterwork of perfection, but you notice a bump out on the horizon. Halfway between the ruins and Robinson Crusoe's island, a tall rock juts straight out of the deep water--a perfect natural diving board! Only when you climb the warm rock, barefoot, do you truly discover its perfection. At ten feet up, it's just high enough to be daring, just low enough to be moderately safe. You step to the edge of the rock, breathe deeply, look down into the churning sea below. [It looks like a hundred foot drop now.] You breathe again and leap. Perfection. You spend the laughing afternoon with your friends, flying through the air into the aquamarine sea as the sun and the sea and the universe smile down upon you, and you are happy, happier than you'd ever contemplated being, than you knew possible.

There will be, of course, further (alternately amusing and tragic) missteps/learnings/lessons/difficulties in this alien universe.

(Anyone who has ever learned a second language, for instance, has undoubtedly carried on a conversation as unintentionally humorous as Tom & friend's:
she: (coy) Should I come up?
he: (excited) Oh, like a sleepover?
[she laughs nervously as he waits in eager anticipation]
he: Okay, well I get to be on top! )

One instance that springs immediately to mind occurred while making coffee, of all things. I was making myself a cup one morning, and asked my host mom if she'd like one too. She would.

Anyway, my host mom goes outside; when she comes back in, I tell her that I'm fixing her cup.
-No, no, she says. You fix yours first.
I want to explain that I've already made mine, this is her cup.
Me: Don't worry. Nga orek tari!

She and my host father burst into uncontrollable laughter. Minutes later, once the belly laughs subsided and I finally coaxed an explanation out of them, it turned out that--in carelessly omitting the object of my "doing"--I had just matter-of-factly told my host parents, "Don't worry. I already had sex!" Oh, Megan.

And so, as we--my fellow M74s and I--have travelled along in our own little Brave New World (really as foreign to our former selves as was adulthood in NYC to Little Tom Hanks), we feared and laughed and stumbled yet, ultimately, triumphed.

My eyes sweep fondly across the familiar laughing, crying, happy faces around me again. I'm back from my trip down memory lane. "Well," I think to myself, "that day, in the rain, we knew not for what we asked." But damn are we glad we did.

Sunday, August 2, 2009

COS Snapshot #2 BEING JOHN MALKOVICH (OR MEGAN McCREA)

the entrance.
After our oh-so-strenuous day of...sitting in (very cramped) chairs, eating, and...sitting in chairs some more, we're exhausted. We deserve a nap.
My roommate C and I have been asleep for an hour(?) two(?)~impossible to tell in the mid-afternoon shadows of our hotel room~when I hear familiar voices tramping by our room. It's M and R!!!! I'm so excited I nearly bolt out the door when I realize--"oh, hey...I'm only wearing underwear!" Now, I'm not THAT familiar with Chuuk, but my (killer) instinct tells me that this may be, somehow, culturally inappropriate.
Seeing that I'm sitting up (and, hence, awake), C does the most rational thing in the circumstances: hops onto my bed and starts beating me senseless with a pillow. Now, I'm generally a pretty peace-loving individual (um, hence the PEACE Corps), but I was not about to let C get away with THAT lying down (well, or sitting up, as it were). I hop to my knees and rebut.
Soon, things have escalated--she's now standing over me, beating down upon me like some kind of fluffy downpour. "Oh yeah?" I think, "I'll show YOU."
I jump up and wind up for the superhuge pillow smack of all time. (BeWARE, C.) Unfortunately, doing both of these things simultaneous proves not such a wise decision--my (impeccably yoga-trained balance supahstar) body plummets off the bed onto the ground, smashing table, wall, and floor all nearly at once.
All conversation outside ceases.

C: Omigod!! Are you okay???
Me: [still half-realizing that I am on the floor] Uh, yeah. Yeah, I'm fine.
Voices from outside/above: Is everything all right in there?

I triumphantlysheepishly emerge in a towel. "No worries."

N: I KNEW it was you! I heard a crash against my wall and was like, 'What? Oh, Megan must be my neighbor!

I give hello hugs all around. Guess you could say that, the consummate theater major, I always know how to make an entrance.

*************************************************************************************
megan mccrea, queen of the high seas.
Now, given that the last two times I piloted a kayak, I:

*1: Palau, October: (at first, unbeknownst to me) took on so much water that my boat was suddenly travelling along at a seesaw-like angle, all my possessions floating in a miniature (quickly-growing) pond behind me, the boat travelling at approximately the speed of a dying snail until finally, mercifully, B & I got the badboy beached.

*2: Pohnpei, December: on this illustrious occasion, four friends ane I were out on kayaks. ONCE AGAIN the back plug was jacked-up (what's that saying again? 'Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on...?'). Only this time, when it was pointed out to me that I was taking on water, we were:
-300 yards from the island
-in a strong current
-at sunset.
And so, of course, when my friend G pointed out my situation to me, I did the only rational thing, in the circumstances~panicked and flipped my boat, throwing all my possessions into the water and all my friends into a state of terror. Only through their support, ingenuity, McGyverness, bandana, and wicked strong arm muscles did we (and the boats) somehow miraculously reach shore safely.

How J (she of the wicked strong arm muscles mentioned above) had persuaded me back out on a sea kayak in Chuuk I HAVE NO IDEA. (Temporary amnesia, mayhaps?)
Nonetheless, there we were: she with her handsome red kayak and shapely paddle, me with my handsome blue kayak and...two foot-long plastic child's canoe paddle. (What can I say? I'd checked out the last equipment on the lot.)
So, I'm Fisher-Pricing along as we behold the sunset and mull a sundry of topics. The problem, however? I keep falling further and further behind.
"Wait up!" I'm yelling, cursing and spitting and muttering obsenities under my breath at my stupid children's paddle.
J watches me from afar. Her lips curl into a smile. She starts to laugh.
"What?" I ask, through slightly gritted teeth.
"You're paddling backwards."
"What?" I'm befuddled. [My boat seems to be going forward...I don't get it.]
"You're sitting the wrong way."
And so I am. So THAT'S why my boat's steering like a drunken sailor. It all makes sense.
Amused by her discovery, J calls over to our friend N, "Hey, N! Megan's paddling backwards!!"
She (and I) await the expected laugh. Silence. N is unimpressed(?).
"Hey," she calls, "it's MEGAN. She's not bleeding all over the place--she's doing good."

*************************************************************************************
alanis morrissette and japanese fine dining.
Guess you could say that I've always been susceptible to contests involving food. You see once, as a kid, we were eating a dish with white rice on the side. The (full) pot was passed to my brother first, and he took (what I thought was) more than his fare share.
"K!!" I whined,"leave some for the rest of us!!"
"Megan," my dad turned to me, you-are-absolutely-ridiculous look splashed across his face, "I'll bet you FIVE DOLLARS you can't eat that whole pot of white rice."
"Oh yeah?" I motion for the rice to be sent down to me. Two hours (and a healthy stomachache) later, I was rich.

A few years later, I purchased my first CD: Alanis Morrissette's JAGGED LITTLE PILL. I memorized all the tracks, wholeheartedly adopting Alanis' own particularly screamy, angry brand of feminism as my own.

Little did I know that these two (seemingly unrelated) events would come into play on the same fateful night, in order to burn my tongue off.

As we're sitting around one evening, drinking beer and exchanging stories, JG has a great idea: WASABI-EATING CONTEST!!
Somehow, though he brought up the idea, he talks R and C into actually DOING it. As they prepare to face off, they exchange verbal jabs.
"You really think you can take me?"
"Oh, so you're gonna man up and challenge me?"
etc. etc.
Well, as soon as I hear the phrase, "man up," my Alanis genes kick in. "What's that?" I ask, poised to pounce. "Are you saying girls can't eat wasabi??"
The two exchange a look, meaning, "oh boy--we've got a live one!"
They shrug. "What do you think?

Me: Because women can do ANYthing men can do.
They: Oh really?

And so began a triumphant night for feminism, a losing night for my GI tract.

Oh, Megan. You [you you] oughta know.