by Tom Wright
As I entered the building, the rush of heat and humidity typically found in unconditioned buildings on Ebeye curiously failed to materialize. The market was uncharacteristically well-stocked with fish, all packed in ice. In addition to chilling the fish, the ice served to keep the room cool and discourage bugs. The incorrigible obviously existed in the insect world as well, evidenced by the many that struggled to free themselves from strips of fly paper dangling from beams and doorways.
The market segregated fish by grade—highly prized Yellowfin, Mahi Mahi, and Ono on one row and all manner of lower grade fish and edible sea creatures on another row. Marshallese peoples jammed the lower grade row, bargaining for the cheaper foodstuffs, while the high-grade row sat empty waiting for Americans to arrive.
Americans frequented the high-grade row more often not due to a lack of delicacies on the other side—on the contrary, some of the strange looking tropical fishes were said to be quite delicious—but because the fish from the tuna family were the ones least likely to infect the diner with a nasty case of ciguatera. Ciguatera is a flu-like poisoning that comes from eating tropical reef fish contaminated with ciguatoxin. The Marshallese, who were mostly immune to its effects, called ciguatera “beep beep” which was almost certainly onomatopoeic given the fact that diarrhea and other gastrointestinal disturbances were the most common symptoms.
I approached the person who seemed to be in charge of the market and asked him if he knew Denver. He stared at me blankly. I asked the men assembled behind him if they spoke English and they too just stared.
The higher than normal stocks of fish produced a higher than normal odor, and my stomach had not yet settled from the boat ride over, so I headed back out into the street. I passed the security booth and then turned back remembering that, as a noncitizen, I was supposed to sign into at the booth. I was, after all, technically on foreign soil as soon as I set foot on the island.
When I stepped up to the window, the startled guard jumped to his feet.
“Yokwe,” he said. Then, realizing he was staring at an American, repeated in English: “Hello.”
He grabbed a clipboard and a pen and pretended to have something important to write down all of a sudden. Then he asked: “May I help you?”
“I just wanted to sign in, and I’m looking for Denver,” I said, suddenly realizing that I didn’t know his last name.
“Ok, just fill this out and sign here.”
I penciled in a fake name and social security number. They never checked ID, and in the age of identity theft, I had no intention of putting down my actual social security number. The guard studied my inputs and then said: “Komol tata. And please remember to check out when you leave.”
“Denver?” I questioned.
“Yes, Denver. Maybe church,” he said pointing down the street.
I walked along the main street toward Lagoon Road, which did not run along the lagoon. Its name derived from the fact that, of the two roads that ran the length of the island, it was simply the closest to the lagoon. Ocean road, by contrast, did actually run right along the ocean. I walked past the only grocery store on the island with its barred windows and chain-adorned doors. I passed a makeshift restaurant with women lined up to buy entrees. Their children milled about the candy case, a longing look on their faces, green sleepers in the corners of their eyes, and fluid oozing from their noses and down their upper lips. It was all I could do not to swat at the flies that crawled, seemingly unnoticed, over their faces.
I passed a blue building labeled with the word “school.” A poorly dressed Marshallese kid of maybe eighteen studied me carefully as I passed. I greeted him, but he responded with a frown.
I reached Lagoon Road and turned right. I walked past dozens of plywood and cinder-block houses, some with corrugated metal roofs, others with plastic covered plywood, others a combination of the two, and still others with something altogether unidentifiable making up the roof—or even some with no roof at all, its rafters having rotted through and its occupants, too poor to replace it, having moved on. I found it amazing how fast they were able to resurrect the tenements after Typhoon Ele. There was hardly any indication that anything had happened.
The gutters in front of the residences contained a visually offensive fluid—not exactly water but containing water and not exactly sewage but containing sewage. I couldn’t smell it, but its appearance strongly deterred me from stepping in it. The odors emanating from the structures were generally offensive but were interspersed with the occasional sweet smell—laundry soap or Pine-Sol—and one house even gave off a pleasant smell of wood smoke and barbecuing chicken. A pang of hunger rose in my belly but quickly gave way to the thought of the flies that probably crawled all over the meat, or at the very least, hovered patiently just above, waiting for it to be removed from the fire. It never ceased to amaze me how uninterested flies were in fire or smoke until a piece of dead flesh appeared. They’d come from miles around just to throw up on it.
I stopped at the intersection of Lagoon road and a side street and looked up the length of the side street. Midway up the street, several children stood in line next to a blank plywood wall along the sidewalk. The first child in line stood on a wooden box and waited. Shortly, a hand holding a can of soda extended from a small hole in the wall. The child took the soda and placed an amount of money in the hand. He stepped down, and the next child stepped up to the hand. The hand provided the next child with some sort of candy. And on it continued—a human vending machine.
I walked a little further and came to the church that I thought the guard must have been pointing toward.
The church was the tallest and most well maintained structure around. It was painted entirely white and had ocean blue trim. The windows contained no glass but were framed in with approximately three-foot squares of wood stacked three high and two wide. Each square was divided further by wood slats from top to bottom and side to side in the middle, as well as from corner to corner, forming eight right triangles within each square in an obvious attempt to make it difficult to see in, but at the same time allowing free flow of air. Above the windows sat half-circle-shaped wooden awnings painted in the likeness of a rising sun. There was a steeple on top with a cross on top of that. A large main door in the middle, supplemented by two subordinate doors on each side, provided entrance to the building. The courtyard before the church was level and covered in coral gravel, some pieces large enough to cause an ankle to roll over if stepped on askew.
In the courtyard, hundreds of Marshallese stood in lines waiting quietly. A sea of white dresses, shirts, and slacks was punctuated only by the thin, red ties on the men and red ribbons in the hair of the females. Most stood stoically, but a few of the younger performers swayed back and forth as if thinking through their moves or humming in their heads the tune of the song to which they would soon dance. One boy leaned over to rub a spot on his shoes and was immediately admonished by the boys in his vicinity and erected himself. None of them looked the least bit uncomfortable despite the blaring heat and lack of wind in the protected courtyard.
I had apparently arrived just in time for the start of some event. I made my way through the crowd of white and into a seating area off to the side of the church. Inside the church, thousands of mostly women parishioners sat respectfully stiff-backed in the pews. Young women held infants while old and fat women sat fanning themselves with any contrivance capable of moving air. Men, dressed in their best, sat in the back of the church or stood against the wall as if they had just happened in. Perhaps they were unsure of what to expect and desired an easy escape should they find whatever was to come unpleasant.
I scanned the back rows and walls and did not notice Denver. Although a lot of people thought it a sign of racism to say so, I had a hard time distinguishing among the Marshallese—the truth is what it is. I took a seat so that I could search the hundreds of faces without being obvious about it.
A preacher took the pulpit and began to speak in Marshalle
se. I recognized it as a prayer only because of the sudden bowing of heads. I did not bow my head because I already knew no one was listening. My own beliefs notwithstanding, one didn’t have to spend much time in the deprivation, squalor, and suffering of Ebeye to recognize that the prayers of all those people went largely unanswered. But I understood that religion offered such people a ray of hope in spite of the obvious hopelessness. Ignorance is bliss, as they say. As usual, I felt self-conscious about not bowing, but only until the prayer ended.
The preacher then told a story that went on for some time. I scanned the faces. No one made a sound. When the preacher stopped talking everyone looked to the door. An explosion followed causing a banner to unfurl from the ceiling. To the delight of the crowd, it came down backwards and upside down. The Marshallese words written on the other side were barely visible through the fabric. Everyone laughed. This remained a distraction for some time among the parishioners, especially the children, whose attention could only be drawn from the banner with much prodding. Even well after the event, people nudged their neighbors, pointed to the sign, and recounted what had happened—as if the neighbor had somehow since forgotten. I watched one man scowl and nod impatiently, annoyed at his neighbor for telling him that which he already knew.
Everyone clapped as music began and the dancers in white streamed into the church. As they entered, the dancers performed a routine that consisted of a forward shuffle followed by a slightly shorter backward shuffle. At the pace of three steps forward and two steps back, it took them the better part of ten minutes to assemble entirely in the church. In unison, the performers shouted a word and stomped their feet, which signaled the end of the song.
I became very hot and began to perspire, but I knew that leaving in the middle of a performance, especially a sacred one as this appeared to be, would be offensive nearly anywhere. I thought it better to try to leave than to pass out, so I attempted to extricate myself from the church without drawing attention. But as does naturally occur in those situations, I bumped into a small planter that refused to give way quietly. No one looked at me but rather remained fixed on the performers, as if afraid to look away lest they miss the very thing for which they waited. I managed to withdraw to an exterior foyer that gave me a different angle from which to search and also provided access to a light breeze. Hot air moving is always better than hot air standing still.
I was now seated in the front row of a posterior section where the faithful with less dependably quiet children and those wishing to freely come and go were seated. In front of me was a walkway between the sections. Children skittered up and down aisle to the disapproving looks of adults. The ancillary activity provided an interesting diversion since I had no idea what was going on.
I stood out in the crowd, and nearly every child who passed looked at me curiously. Some smiled, some frowned, and some looked away feigning ambivalence, as I looked at them. I decided that children are the same in every culture.
Suddenly, the performers broke into a more vigorous dance and song. I could not understand the song, but it was obviously well known as many of the onlookers sang along. Separated by sex, men on one side, and women on the other, the performers danced in unison. The men made a rowing motion as they danced and sang. At periodic intervals, they shouted a word at which point the women stopped dancing and swooned while the crowd laughed. This performance continued until the group made three complete circles around the church.
For all I knew, perhaps Denver was among the performers. So I sat through a few songs and observed.
For the next performance, the sexes intermingled. It was a much more somber sounding song, and no one laughed. The sea of white swayed to and fro, singing in unison, acting like a single organism, much like a school of fish. Two rows of people shuffled slowly in one direction while a single row of men moved swiftly between them in the opposite direction, much like a current on the open sea opposes the water surrounding it. Denver was not among the people.
A girl of not more than sixteen walked in front of me, carrying one infant child with three others of increasing age in tow. The youngest child ignored me, but the two older boys held up a hand for me to slap as they went by. I obliged, and they smiled. Another girl saw this and began to walk my way. She stared at me as she approached but began to look apprehensive as she drew nearer. I considered that my squinting in the bright light might have made me look angry, so I forced a smile. She sat down next to me and tapped my hand as one’s own child might when wishing to ask a question in a quiet place.
She was no more than eight years old and dressed in a thin yellow dress with white flowers printed on it. She wore only flip flops on her feet, but she was clean, and her hair was tied up with a bow. Her teeth were unusually white and straight, although she was too young to have had braces.
“Do you live on Kwaj?” she asked, in perfect English.
“Yes I do.”
“Why?”
“Because I work there, so I have to live there.”
“My daddy works on Kwaj, but they won’t let him live there.”
“Hmm,” was the only response I could manage.
“Why?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I replied.
She got up and walked back to where she had been sitting. I felt a sudden pang of sadness that my new friend had already left—a sort of regret that I now had no one to talk to and, once again, stood out as the American with no friends.
She picked up her backpack and came back and sat down next to me again. Relieved, I smiled.
“Do you understand Marshallese?” she asked.
“No.”
“Why are you sitting here if you don’t know what they are saying?”
“I was looking for a friend. I thought I might find him here.”
“Who is your friend?”
“Denver. Do you know him?”
“Yes. He does not go to this church. Do you want me to tell you what they are saying? What these dances mean?”
“Please,” I said, curious to find out why such an elaborate ceremony took place on a Wednesday.
“Today is Gospel Day,” she informed me. “This is our celebration of when the missionaries brought the Bible and Christianity to the Marshall Islands.”
She proceeded to explain each of three consecutive dances to me. One was about the importance of community, another about the significance of fishing, and yet another was a tribute to the wind, swells, and currents that provided them with abundance. The girl spoke so rapidly that I couldn’t get a word in.
Just as I began to grow impatient, she asked me if I wanted her to show me to Denver’s church.
“Shouldn’t you stay here with your family?” I said. “Just tell me the way.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Aren’t your parents here?”
“No. My uncle and auntie are here. My parents go to another church.”
I didn’t bother to continue the line of questioning.
I followed her out of the church and up the street to Ocean Road. We walked a quarter mile to a large, two-story, blue, cinderblock building. A courtyard on the north side of the building held a basketball court enclosed by chain link fence. I heard music inside.
She led me through a side door, and into a foyer next to the large room in which services were being conducted. We walked to the entrance to the room and looked in. Everyone turned to look. Denver, seated across the room, smiled and gave me the standard Marshallese upward head nod and got up to make his way over. Several men suddenly noticed Denver’s importance and patted him on the back as he passed. He smiled and nodded to the men as if to confirm that he was indeed, suddenly, very important.
I thanked the girl and offered her a dollar for her trouble. She initially refused but acquiesced, possibly in embarrassment, as nearby children looked jealously at her, then me, then the dollar, then her again.
“Yokwe, my friend!” Denver exclaimed with great excitement.
I turned to say good bye to the girl, but she was gone.
“Who was that girl?” I asked.
“A cousin,” replied Denver. “Do you want something to drink?”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Why are you here, Matt?”
“I need a favor,” I said, knowing that it was beyond him to refuse. He would do anything for me by nature.
“I will be pleased to help. Can you wait? It will only be a few minutes more. Here, sit down,” Denver said rapidly.
Before I could refuse, he had pushed a small boy out of a cafeteria style chair and pulled it over in front of me. The boy looked hesitantly at me as he stood next to his mother and rubbed his pride. His mother seemed not to notice, or perhaps found it a perfectly normal way to treat a child. Denver subsequently found a can of some sort of fruit juice, so I sat in a chair I didn’t wish for and drank juice I neither liked nor wanted. At least the juice was cold.
Afraid to offend anyone by not appearing to enjoy the proceedings, I feigned interest. Luckily, some natural type of break in the service coincided with my finishing the juice, and I got up and walked toward the door. Denver had managed to slip out unnoticed and was already outside talking to some men.
As I entered the group, Denver proudly introduced me as his good friend.
The men all nodded in unison and then stood silently as if waiting for me to say something profound. I failed them.
“I need to speak to you in private, Denver.”
“Yes, yes, ok. Let’s go.”
Denver hurried me out onto the street.
“Can you come to my house? I have something important to do.”
There were still people around within earshot, and I knew it was going to be very difficult to change his mind. So I agreed.
We passed a restaurant called Litake Fast Food. During my first trip to Ebeye, I saw the mayor eat there and reasoned that it must be ok. I had never eaten anywhere else since. Incidentally, it actually had good food, food that was different than what we had on Kwaj, and given the lack of choice on Kwaj, different was good.