That means "Hello" in the local tongue. It sounds like "Half a day," and they joke about that becuse people here are...ummm...lazy.
They also really like spam. There are spam barbeques, etc. You can buy "I love spam" t-shirts all over the place. I want one.
Wuall, I had a bit 'o trouble getting into the flow of this email, so it might be a little 'slow.' Don't say I didn't warn ye.
Well, hello there!
and welcome to what would formally be labeled as Robbies' mass travel email.
In this day and age we can call it a blog, and in fact, maybe no one will get mad at me for these
anymore: When I was in Italy I got a ton of angry emails from people who don't like my mass emails.
Some complaints I recieved were:
"they're not personal enough,"
"they're invasive and not even concerned with me,"
"I have sand in my vagina and am deeply offended by many things."
And so on.
But with Blogs, heck, you already asked to read something that isn't directly addressed to you!
Moving on...
I now live on the Island of Saipan. I work at the Pacific Islands Club (PIC), which is a
hotel/resort on the beach near the South Side of the Island.
I work 60 hours a week. This is one of the two sort of hard things to deal with here. We only get one day off a week (I'm on my day off now) and sometimes work up to 12 hours a day.
My technical position is called a "Clubmate." I think I'm the only person who thinks this name is funny. It makes us sound like...ummm...Cabana boys....ummm...I AM NOT A CABANA BOY! (sound of quiet weeping).
What I do:
Anyways...The Clubmates work as Lifeguards all around the resort. We have like 6 huge pools, there are lifeguards at the beach, lifeguards that just have to float around our huge man-made river (by far my favorite shift...floating around is great), etc.
We also have this huge wave machine called Point break, which simulates a gigantic wave that you can ride on like a boogie board thing. When you have a point break shift, you are required to demonstrate for the guests, which means you spend three hours surfing. That's a great shift too. Yesterday some of the other employees taught me how to 360 on the board.
Clubmates also run the Kids Klub (hideously spelled with a second 'k'), where we get a group of 30 kids for the day (so their parents don't have to deal with them) and take them on the water slides, play water basketball with them, etc. It's like the summer camp I worked at last summer, except I can't actually speak to most of the kids (Korean and Japanese kids)
yet.
I'm starting to lean Japanese, but damn I remember this now. Learning languages is a bitch.
They taught me to windsurf in two days, and now I guess I'm qualified to teach windsurfing lessons, 'cause I do a lot of that too.
I also lead snorkeling tours. This is funny 'cause I don't know the names of any of the fish. I just
point at the kind of fish that Nemo was and shout "NEMO!" and the Japanese tourists squeal and take lots of pictures with their very expensive underwater cameras.
...you should see the cameras that the japanese
have. I'd mate with like half of them. (Sorry mom)
I just finished training with a local named Kurt, who is 18. He keeps trying to tell me that sea cucumbers can violently attack you and suck blood out of your leg, but I'm going to remain skeptical on account of the fact that they are called SEA CUCUMBERS. I say if they were
deadly, someone would have given them a different name.
"Look out, Jim!"
"What's that, Ted?"
"It's....(gasp)...it's..."
"What Ted? a Great White Shark? a Parrhana? a Giant Squid!?"
"No Jim! Its...A SEA CUCUMBER!"
"AIEEEEEEEEEgaaaaaaaarrrgle (sound of bloody massacre)
You should see them, too. Like foot-long worms that just lie there. (wow, am I really setting myself up to be attacked by a sea cucumber. I'll let you know)
Ummm...sorry about the sea cucumber digression.
To finish up the job description, ('cause I think I need to move on), I also teach archery lessons,
play ultimate frisbee and basketball and soccer with guests, and wrestle sea cucumbers.
The hotel paid to fly me out here, pay for a hotel room that I live in, pay for three meals a day,
and health insurance. They also pay me 3 dollars an hour. This is the second bummer of the job. I'm going to save most of it (in theory) though.
Oh, I guess a third bummer of the job is that we have to eat dinner at tables with the guests and
interact with them. Yeah, it's in the nicest restraunt in the hotel (it's the most amazing buffet I've ever seen and the food changes every night), but after a 10 hour shift, the last damn thing you want to do is try to make small talk with people that you can barely even really communicate with. The Clubmates (shut up) who have been here a long time can speak Japanese, so it's not so bad for them, but for me Dinner usally constitutes of grunting, smiling, bad jokes in simple english, and break dance-offs, which I usually win.
The kids here are cool. Tonight's the full moon party/beer pong tournament. They tell me I'll get better at working hung over.
Ummm...I'm getting scuba cerified for 180 bucks here, and we're going to do some deep cave dives one we all get checked out. the island is as tropical as you can imagine. Sort of generically, actually. The ocean sparkles, people smile a lot, there's too much reggae music and drinks with little umbrellas in them. I haven't worn anything heavier than a long sleeved shirt since I got here, and even that was hot. I tried to put on one of my sweatshirts once, but had to take it off immediately...because it was infested with sea cucumbers.
That's all I can think of for now. Sorry if this blog was a little 'slow,' I've been speaking a lot of
"ME TEACH ARCHERY NOW" english these last few days, and I think it's affecting my ability to write (Speaking of archery, I'm getting all good at that, too. Man am i learning some useless skills out here)...
Peace
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