Summer 1 '10

Jessee here. I know I haven't been doing a very good job of filling Brett's shoes as primary blogger lately, but I'll try now to catch you up a little.

Big shoes to fill (Brett left these here when he moved out)

Since Brett left the island about 3 weeks ago, quite a lot has happened here. First of all, we got a brand new batch of students for Summer session 1! We've also had a few staff changes, including losing our Site Manager, Tim, and gaining 3 new Interns, two of whom arrived just last week. Before they got here, I had been filling in for the waterfront staff quite a bit, and though it made for an extra busy schedule, I really enjoyed going out on the snorkels and driving the boat for the field research projects.

So far, the summer's been filled with lots of the usual activities and trips, such as camping, hikes along long cay, baking cookies, swimming at coast guard, and playing volleyball at High Point. On that note, we have some serious volleyball talent in the current group of students, and I think we may give the High Point guys a run for their money at our next face-off (probably tomorrow). Unfortunately though, I'm pretty sure I broke my toe at one of our practice sessions.

Pretty purple toe

There have been some new activities thrown into the mix this summer too. For example, there was a celebration of TCI culture at the Regatta the week before last, in honor of a gentleman who put a lot of energy into preserving local traditions and foods and music, and who passed away recently. The junkanoo band paraded through the streets, children performed on stage at the Regatta Village, and there was food and drink for sale thoroughout the night. (SFS contributed a big TCI flag that our students painted, and it served as a backdrop for the stage.)

Preparing decorations for the Junkanoo festival

In other news, our pool is currently out of commission. We loaned our pump to a guy in town that Tim was friends with, and he apparently loaned it (or sold it?) to someone else. So, we're working on tracking it down, but in the meantime our community swim lessons have been cancelled.

Algae-infested pool

The only bright side of having no pool is that we had to come up with a creative alternative activity for the kids who come to visit us every Saturday afternoon. We usually have arts and crafts projects available, and ping pong, volleyball, dominoes, cards, etc., but the swim lessons are by far the biggest draw, so I was prepared to have a lot of disspointed kids on my hands. We decided to set up a few touch tanks with sea creatures in them as a new and exciting attraction, and also as a way of teaching the kids about marine life and encouraging them to interact (gently) with their natural environment.

Touch tank

Two of the faculty members and I went out in the morning to collect creatures, and we came back with several west indian sea eggs, a pencil urchin, 2 crabs that had taken up residence in unoccupied shells, a few snails, 2 brittle stars, a milk conch, a queen conch, a few flamingo tongues, a few sand dollars, a sea biscuit, some sea marbles, a few different types of algae, and... a small lobster and a shrimp that were living together inside a knocked conch shell! It was a huge hit! Some of the kids were afraid to touch things at first, but most of them worked up the courage to at least pick up a conch shell and look inside. The cutest reaction belonged to a little boy, Elrico, who pointed to an item in the tank that I explained was called a "sand dollar". He thought for a second, and then said "What's that mean? You can buy stuff in the sea with it?"

The tanks kept the kids' interest for almost an hour... incredible!

Princeton makes a new friend

The current group of students took their final exam today, so there are no more lectures this session. In fact, they are only here for one more week. (The shorter summer sessions fly by!) This final week will be action-packed though. We had a frisbee game this evening, field research twice a day all week, a volleyball game tomorrow, the high school graduation ceremony to attend tomorrow evening at Regatta Village, a few recreational waterfront activities thrown in, the students' final research presentations on Saturday morning, some community engagement Saturday afternoon, the 4th of July, a day to pack and clean up the center and take a final field trip together, have a closure banquet and photo slideshow, and then I fly back to Provo with the students next Tuesday morning.

Our busy daily routine starts with a "morning meeting" and group activity

I'll be sad to see this group go... I'm enjoying them a lot. I'm also starting to feel a little sad about leaving myself. I gave notice to my supervisor a little while ago, and then last Friday at our weekly meeting she annouced to the rest of the staff that I will be leaving SFS in August. (And, as of this post, I suppose the news is accessible world-wide.) So it's official. As of the end of Summer 2, I'm moving on. To where, I don't know yet. Somewhere that Brett are I are both able to find work and meaningful community involvement, is the idea. Wish us luck! Given the status of the current job market, we need it!