Sunday, October 25, 2009

Photos from Wotje

Nauto is the vice principal of the Northern Islands High School. We were the postmen for the families of the kids. the boxes and letters on the table are what we brought. Nauto is from Kiribati and we talked a lot.
This is downtown Wotje Village on Wotje island in Wotje atoll. That is the just past President's house in the background ( he lost the vote of no confidence last week). Here they all complain about all the "Japanese cement" everywhere. They left lots of small generating stations all around too. I think I have photos of at least 10 sites of old rusty motors.
We were invited to a first birthday party. This is my plate. Turtle, chicken pork, pumpkin in leaves, doughnuts, breadfruit pudding in plastic bags, pumpkin in coconut cream sauce and bananas in the middle.
Getting the turtle out of the "in the ground oven". I was almost more thrilled to be able to see how they did it than to eat it, but not quite! They line the hole with pieces of coral and build a coconut husk fire. When it burns down and the coral is hot, they put in the cut up turtle and shell, cover it with banana leaves then palm fronds then plastic sheet and finally a layer of sand. Maybe 6 hours later, just before the party, they dig it up. It was dark so they had trouble finding all the feet and the heads.

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