Homer's Odyssey Chapter 2: Tom Visits and Homer Gets Tempermental

When Tom visited, we had a great time out on the Rock Islands, swimming at PPR, hiking to the waterfall, and rubbing elbows with the President (aka, seeing him nearby at a restaurant). But that doesn't mean he was pampered the whole time--he was driving Homer after all.

One day, I went to work and planned to give Tom the car over my lunch hour so he could explore Koror a little if he wanted. About 20 minutes after I got into work, the marshals called to let me know that one of my back tires was completely flat. Oy! So I took my errand time and headed to a nearby gas station to fill it up, hoping that the tire would make it through the day. I let Tom know that he should keep an eye on it, but that he'd be able to drive around town without too much trouble. So I was relieved when at the end of the day Tom picked me up and the tire was in tact! But then I saw the expression on poor Tom's face. He informed me that the folks at PPR had to fill up Homer's completely flat tire. Way to take care of your little bro Island Girl!

Hearing this, I thought OK, it's almost 5 and all the auto repair shops will be closing...and I told Tom we'd go out for dinner. And obviously we didn't want to spend the night walking back to my apartment. What to do?? Then I remembered a small shop on the route back to my apartment with the sign reading "Fix Tire Available Here."

We pulled up, and the shop lived up to the hype...after 20 minutes and $4 (woohoo!), the tire was fixed. So Tom and I hopped back into Homer, happy to head to dinner. But apparently Homer wasn't in the mood for sashimi because he wouldn't start. Arrgh! And because the sign described the entirety of that shop's services, they didn't have jumper cables or a booster to get Homer up and running. And of course the auto shop next door closed 5 minutes before we realized Homer had died, and no mechanics I knew were answering their phones. To add insult to Homer's injury, Tom was nursing a sunburn that only a Wisconsin boy on the equator could manage, and the flies were starting to bite.

I looked around helplessly at the men at the repair shop, and one of them, who'd just stopped by to pick up a few tires for himself--and didn't actually work there--grabbed a set of jumper cables from his nearby car. I figured we were saved once he volunteered to help out, but when he tried to start the car, Homer wasn't budging. He took a look at my battery and announced it was "too small for the car." Hmmm...not a question I thought of asking when I bought Homer...lesson learned I guess!

So now what? Well, isn't it obvious? Our good Samaritan promptly walked over to his car, took the battery out, walked it back to Homer, took out Homer's battery, put his battery in Homer, my battery in his (smaller) car, and successfully jumped Homer.

Whaaa?? Now, I've mentioned that I have little to no car expertise, but this isn't a run of the mill tactic in car starting, right? I mean he was basically juggling batteries back and forth between the cars. I was half expecting an explosion...but I really wanted to get Homer up and running so I just kept my distance and crossed my fingers.

Given that we were able to juice up Homer's mini-battery, our friend switched the batteries back, but Homer was just being stubborn and still refused to start. And that's when Tom and I learned just how fantastic folks in Palau are. This man offered to switch the batteries back, follow us to my apartment, and then switch them back so that Tom and I could get home together and I could have a mechanic come to my apartment the next morning instead of the side of the road.

I'm going to guess that it wasn't part of his evening's plans, but he insisted and we gratefully accepted. So we performed the battery switch-a-roo once again, Tom and I ended up enjoying a large amount of poke sashimi, and I tallied yet another time I've been helped out by complete strangers. I guess I have Homer to thank for making me appreciate Palau in a way I wouldn't have otherwise!

Palau Half Marathon: My Quest for T-shirts Continues

I'm still in Palau and haven't forgotten about the blog! Sorry about the silence over the past month, I've gotten a bit caught up in diving, running, basketball-ing, zip lining, playing in treehouses, swimming, and (of course) car repairing. The silver lining is that all my running around has provided excellent blogging material. So let's start with running!

The Palau Half Marathon took place on April 2, 2011, just a week after I returned from visiting Jesse in Hawaii. After almost two weeks where I consumed only macadamia nuts, coconut syrup, and waffles, and my training consisted of boogie boarding and playing about 20 games of foosball a day, I wasn't feeling all that confident in my half marathoning abilities. But...

Yup! Somehow I managed to win for the women. And a picture made it into the Island Times...a picture that was immediately post-race and will never leave Palau if I have anything to say about it. So you'll just have to settle on a few of the photos that I had editorial control over...

(A post-race photo with all the participants. The last 100 yards or so were across the beach at PPR. Hopping into the ocean after finishing the race wasn't half bad!)

(Some of the ladies from the judiciary raced too!)

Overall, the race was a ton of fun. But man, there were some low points! The race started in the state of Aimeliik, which is on the west side of Babeldaob about six miles away from the bridge to Koror.

(Aimeliik is the light green state on the west side of Babeldaob. We started there and ran south over the Japan-Palau Friendship bridge into Koror, then onto Arakabesang, where PPR, the finish line, is located.)

It was scheduled to start at 5:30 in the morning, so participants met in downtown Koror at about 5 am and drove up to Aimeliik. We started on a gravel road about a mile and a half off the main road, in complete darkness. It was pretty funny to see everyone standing around waiting to start the race...or, I guess to not see everyone waiting around to start the race. But we had a few trucks to guide us, and a few runners had lights on their hats or shirts, so we were able to start running without running into each other. The first 1/2 mile or so was a lot of fun...I felt the great surge of adrenaline and excitement that I usually feel at the start of the race.

And then it started raining. And I started kicking myself. Now, the day before, I'd been trying to figure out whether I wanted to wear sunglasses or a hat, and bored various people with my thought process (much like I'm boring you now!). Ultimately I decided on sunglasses only, thinking that the sunglasses were lighter and I could deal with the rain with just sunglasses, so they'd serve me better in the long run. What I didn't think about was that it would start raining when the sun wasn't up yet. So...once it started pouring, I had put on my sunglasses in the pitch dark. Nice planning Anna!

As I ran through the darker dark, I tried my best to protect my ipod, but there really wasn't much that could be done because I was drenched to the bone after about 15 seconds of the rain. There was no tree coverage on the side of the road, so I stuffed it inside my already soaked shirt and hoped that I wasn't breaking my ipod for the second time.

The heavy rain came down for about the first 30 minutes of the race, and then settled into a sprinkle, which was quite pleasant despite the fact that my shoes weighed about 3 times their normal weight. And thankfully the sun started rising so I could actually see where I was going. So from about mile 3 to 7, I was content running through Aimeliik on the compact road. The route was smooth, there were relaxing rolling hills along the way, and the rain made for a cool sunrise.

But then we hit the halfway point, and we had to climb the K-B (Koror-Babeldaob) bridge, the "friendship bridge" funded by the Japanese in 2002.

It looks so picturesque right? Well it's also steep and painful, and after finishing it, we had to deal with a steady incline over the next 2 miles or so. That was particularly painful. About a mile and a half into the incline, I was ready to walk. But as luck would have it, I passed by a water station, and lo and behold, the President of Palau was standing there, cheering on the runners! I refused to look like a wimp in front of him, so I plugged on, and finally got into downtown Koror, where I was able to glide downhill for almost about 15 minutes and get some encouragement from Holly and Veronica, who'd woken up at about 4 am to man water stations. They even made me a sign!

The last mile or so of the race on Arakabesang involved 2 steep climbs and some powerful sunshine, but because I live on Arakabesang, I'd run the hills before and knew what to expect. And of course, finishing the race running along the beach looking out on the Pacific made me completely forget all those hills. Despite the rain, pain, and subsequent limping, I'd say that I'd do it again--not just for the t-shirt.

(Boom.)

Kryptonite!

Even though most of the activities I report on involve the water in some way, the biggest sport here is clearly basketball. At any given time there are three difference leagues competing at the Palau National Gymnasium, there are basketball hoops in every hamlet (that's what they call neighborhoods here), and the last page of every issue of the Island Times includes at least two articles about that week's games.

Palauan basketball is impressive too. What may be lost in the height that the best players in the states have is easily made up for in three-point shooting, ball handling, and speed.

My sisters will tell you that basketball...well it's just not my sport. I played in grade school and for a bit in high school, where I promptly got cut at the the beginning of my junior year. So it's not that I choose not to play, it's that I've been asked not to play. And although the Schumaker fam has been known to play some pretty intense games of lightning, when I get involved it inevitably becomes a chance for Lisa and Kelly to play "tackle Anna." I get the impression that I serve more of a comedic than athletic role when we play. And to top it off, it's been literally over a decade since I've played in an actual game, so the little skill I have is rusty.

Given my spotty history, when Veronica asked me whether I wanted to join the Palau Women's League and play for a team called Sam's Kryptonite, it was a good thing I hesitated. But Veronica, Holly, and Justice Foster were all playing, so I decided to give it a whirl as well. After all, Kryptonite is coached by Jubilee, who's been coaching and playing in Palau for years, and is basically the go-to person for all things basketball as far as I'm concerned.

We started practicing in the beginning of December. I've figured out how to shoot and handle the ball again, but I'm definitely not playing point guard any time soon. And I've come to the sad realization that I'm getting old because my ankles are killing me! Thankfully, my sister Lisa has some fancy-pants basketball shoes that she was willing to send me. I've been told that wearing her "And 1's" made me legit. So even though my 5 foot 4 inch frame doesn't look like that of a basketball player, and I don't really play like one, from below the knee I'm [insert really good basketball player's name here].

Practice takes place on an outdoor court near one of the schools here. It's not too shabby, our court is on a cleared field surrounded by coconut trees, and it's somewhat high up. So we play until the sun sets, or until it rains to the point where we're slipping and sliding all over the court. I've had a few not so gracious falls during practice. Like I said, I provide comic relief!

During practice we split the court with some of the kids from the neighborhoods, and Jubilee and our tough-as-nails assistant coach Ryan (Holly's fiance) run us through some drills. And then we attempt to scrimmage the neighborhood kids--they consistently trounce us in bare feet. Turns out, the And 1's don't carry much weight here. Despite the fact that Veronica, Holly, and Justice Foster are all very tall and athletic, these kids weave around us and make shots--more often than not 3 pointers--every time. So before the league officially started, our confidence was pretty low.

But thankfully we've got a bunch of other really talented ladies with experience playing Palauan ball. So we pressed on, kept on practicing, and we're going into the playoffs with a record of 5 and 5 (if memory serve). We've had some tough losses, and learned the hard way the "take no prisoners" attitude. The teams to beat are Money and Bring It On. Team Money (and I thought we had the perfect team name) has at least four women that played on the national team during the Micronesian games this past August, so they were tough. We stuck with them during the first half, but they pulled away in the end, beating us by 8. And when we attempted to take on Bring It On, we failed pretty miserably. We don't need to go into the score...let's just say we lost by more than 8. It wouldn't be that bit of a pride issue, but as I mentioned before, the Island Times reports the scores, making a 30-point loss sting a bit more. But lately we've been making some great ground, including a 90 to 42 victory! Put that score in the newspaper!

This coming week we head into play-offs. I'll keep you all posted on how we do. I'll do my best not to trip over my own two feet, throw airballs, and get beat on defense--not that any of that has happened...

Let's go Kryptonite!

Here are the girls!

Homer's Odyssey. Chapter 1: Babeldaob Debacle

Hey folks! Sorry about the silence lately. I just got back from a two-week long trip to Hawaii. Jesse and I met up there over his spring break from law school. We had a great time. Extremely uneventful, with the exception of some amazing basketball, which is exactly what we wanted. But more on that later. As we lazily drove around the Big Island in our electric blue rented mustang (feel free to judge), we thought back on our last road trip together, leading us into the first chapter of Homer's Odyssey through Palau...

Now, after I got Homer back in October, the first time he wouldn't start for me was when I was heading out of the PPR parking lot on a rainy Saturday afternoon. I had been helping out with a triathlon since about 4 am, so I was, to say the least, a bit cranky when my "new" car wouldn't start. A few incredibly helpful employees called and truck and jumped Homer back to life.

After Homer got back in action, I drove him straight to the auto shop, demanding (in the most "Anna" way possible) that they check all the fluids and fix whatever went wrong. This led to an education about auto care in Palau. Angie told me that, yes, I was low on fluids...the battery needed more water! Now, my chemistry is definitely rusty, but if I've learned anything from my ipod/rain experience, it's that water and batteries typically don't combine well. But I've learned that that's the first question everyone asks when you have a problem with your battery here. OK. Noted. Keep water in battery.

Now, I thought that with this new kernel of knowledge under my belt, I could head off any future car problems with the motto "Just add water!" Homer had other plans though.

When Jesse was in Palau about a month later, we decided to take a day trip up to Babeldaob to see the capitol and check out some of the sites, possibly the waterfall and monoliths. And so Homer, Jesse, and I optimistically headed out of Koror on what should have been a three hour tour.

As I've mentioned, Babeldaob is the largest of Palau's islands, and most Palauan states are located on this island. Because the commercial center of Palau is in Koror, there are very few businesses or residences up there, and many of the roads aren't paved and are extremely rocky. Thanks to U.S. financial support, Palau recently finished completing the compact road, which is a nice, smooth 85 km long paved road that outlines Babeldaob. Here's my map of Babeldaob. If you look closely, you can see the red lines showing the compact road:

Because all our planned stops were along the compact road, Jesse and I weren't concerned that Homer's undercarriage is about 5 inches off the ground. We were so sure of ourselves that we got overly-adventurous and decided to take the "scenic route" to visit the capital building in Melekeok state. As we took a right off the main road onto a gravel road, I assured Jesse that Ben had once taken this route to the capital too. Apparently my memory isn't as sharp as I'd thought, because Ben reminded me later that, sure, he'd started on that road, but then quickly realized his mistake, and turned back. Probably a detail that would have been useful for me to remember.

Well, as we drove down the gravel road, it quickly narrowed to the point where Homer was as wide as the road, and the gravel turned into rocky clay. We drove along just fine for a few minutes, just taking the increasingly abrupt ups and downs as slowly as possible. But the sound of rock scraping metal wasn't pretty. After about 15 minutes of constant scraping and inching along at about 5 mph, Jesse and I looked at each other. This would have been the most logical time for us to turn back. But for whatever reason, we were both feeling adventurous, and so I justified continuing on by saying "We'll be fine. I've got my phone!" Had I taken the time to look at my phone, I would have realized that it didn't have service, but clearly we'd left behind logic at this point.

And so we inched forward, and the road turned from rocky to just rocks. And our 5 miles per hour turned into stopping every ten feet or so, saying that Homer just wouldn't make it over the rocks, and inching forward, hearing clanking and scraping as the rocks tore poor Homer apart. At one point, we had to drive down a hill and Jesse tried to insist that I get out of the car, so that if Homer's brakes had gone out, at least one of us was safe. Although I was touched by his chivalry, I stayed in the car and we made it down unscathed.

But Homer didn't. By the time we finally made it into a town with paved roads in Melekeok--about an hour an a half after turning off the main road--Jesse announced that the power steering was shot. To avoid getting stranded up on Babeldaob, we decided to head straight back to Koror. And, to add insult to injury, we learned that had we simply stayed on compact road, it would have taken us about 5 minutes to Melekeok! Nice work Anna!

Poor Homer. He's just not cut out for off-roading. After that day, I decided it was time to treat Homer to some TLC with my mechanic, to fix up the power steering and anything else I may have broken. Leading us to Chapter 2: Auto Mechanic Fail!

This Just In!

It happened. I can't believe it. This week two of my lifelong dreams came true...

That's right. I won the women's division of a 5K race last weekend. And I managed to getting a headline in the Island Times, one of Palau's two newpapers.

Sure, it's true that this is a monthly race, that the race had been rescheduled and not widely advertised, that it was scheduled up against a biathlon that the "real" athletes didn't want to miss, and that it was 5:30 on a Saturday morning, resulting in a grand total of about six woman runners. All that matters is that it happened and the Island Times reported it...

"Anna Shumaker and Habib shared the limelight as they took the top places in their respective categories in Saturday's Walk for Life event dubbed as 'Love Yourself' with an in and out course at the Palau National Track and Field."

We don't need to discuss the actual winning time, the misspelling, or how much Habib beat Shumaker by. All that matters is that it happened and was newsworthy.

I'll be signing autographs upon my return to the states.

The pool is open!

You're probably wondering why I haven't posted about diving. And the reason why is because...well...I've been diving. But it's high time that I write about the newest love of my life.

There are times when I tell you all about living in Palau that I try to downplay how great things are in comparison to living in the Midwest. I "complain" about the heat and humidity because I just don't want everyone in Milwaukee and Chicago to fashwash me next winter. I say that it's tough not having a lot of shopping choices here, but that's just my excuse to wear shorts and a t-shirt all the time. But diving...that's a completely different matter. To put it lightly, diving here is about a gazillion times better than swimming in Lake Michigan.

A little background about me will help you understand why. I grew up in Milwaukee and from an early age learned to swim, participated on the local swim team and water ballet (that's right), and eventually became a lifeguard throughout high school and college. Probably about 60% of my life was spent with wet/frozen hair.

The Schumaker family summer vacations only added to my water baby-ness. Every year we packed up the 15-seater Ford Econoline, a U-Haul, an endless assortment of water toys and gear, and headed Up North (aka northern Wisconsin). Everyone in my family knew how to swim, fish, waterski, and tube at about 2 years old. It was a blast, and it's pretty safe to say that we were comfortable in the lake.

The only problem with it was that once we were in a pool or lake, there wasn't much to look at. We preferred activities that kept our faces above water. It made sense. In a lake, where the bottom is rock and mud, you can't see anything. Even if we could see underwater, the fish...well, they're just downright ugly and scary. A family swim across the lake was never complete without someone yelling "A northern is biting my toes!" or "What did I just feel on my leg?!?" And for good reason, because these are the critters that were surrounding us...

Not very friendly, right?

Grrrrr......

And this one's just downright unattractive!

Here in Palau, it's a completely different story. I get to swim within mere feet of some of the most beautiful creatures I've ever seen. Forget about mud and rocks. Here we have some of the most amazing coral in the world...

(Big Drop off, referred to by Jaques Cousteau as one of the best dive walls in the world...not bad, right?)

After being underwater for about 5 minutes of my very first dive, I knew that I was hooked to the sport, and I've never been more comfortable or happy under water.

Sure, there are sharks, and sure, they can at times be as close as a few feet away, but there are literally millions of other sea creatures to keep the sharks well fed, and to keep new and excited divers like me immensely entertained. I've gotten about 30 dives in, and with 3 months left in Palau, I'm planning to use every opportunity I can to get underwater. For now, here's an overview of a few of my favorite fish, with some short anecdotes from my dive log of my close encounters with them.

Humphead Parrotfish

I don't really know why I love these guys so much, but I do. They're a little like the manatee--ugly and endearing. When I've been diving, I've seen them in a variety of sizes, from about a foot long, to as large as about 5 feet long and probably about 2 feet high. One of the popular dive sites here is near the island of Peleliu. It's a great place to dive because it is just off of what is called the Mariana Trech, which is the deepest portion of the Pacific Ocean, and apparently the world (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariana_Trench). As a result, these dive sites often include bigger fish and quick currents. I've been lucky enough to head out to these sites twice so far, and on both occasions I've seen a school of 5-7 huge humphead parrotfish. But these guys don't stick to deep areas. When Tom was here, we saw a school of them as well when we were snorkeling in about 15 feet of water!

Maml/Napoleon Fish

These guys have been labeled the national fish of Palau. They are also a really funny looking--I mean, how often do you see lips like that on a fish? Plus, they have huge eyes that follow you like a creepy portrait's eyes. For a long time the Napoleon was a favorite fish for Palauans to catch and eat, but its recently been banned to protect them.

I'm glad they're protected because they're a beautiful and interesting fish. One moment you see one swimming along incredibly peacefully, hanging out by diving and snorkeling boats hoping for scraps of food. They'll let us get within about 5 feet of them without batting a humungous eye. But then you head down 50 feet for a dive and you can see about 5 Napoleon fighting off reef sharks to feed on some fish. So I have to imagine that these guys are pretty crafty and resourceful. There is actually a story about an old, huge Napoleon who was friendly enough that snorkelers could feed him (her?) eggs out of their hands. Apparently one diver's piece of equipment resembled an egg, and the Napoleon swam up to her, chomped it right off, realized that it certainly wasn't an egg, and spit it out. I believe it because there have been times when we've fed whole rolls of sushi to Napoleon hanging around our dive boat, and they've been picky enough eaters to spit out the seaweed wrapping! I get to see these guys almost every time I go out diving, and because they're a rarity among other popular dive destinations, I really appreciate it.

Spotted Eagle Ray

The spotted eagle ray is another one of the venerated fish in Palau. I haven't seen them as often as I've seen the Napoleons or sharks, so it's exciting to catch a glimpse of one. Usually it just sits in one place, as though it's suspended by wire in one place. And I've been able to get pretty close to them when I've seen them...the ones I've seen at the dive sites (usually Blue Corner) have been small--only about a few feet wide, but apparently they can grow up to 30 feet wide!

Manta Ray

Mantas, on the other hand, are a completely different story size-wise. I can honestly say without a doubt that the times I've seen mantas have felt almost magical. They ones I've seen have been huge--sometimes up to 25 feet across--so they're the biggest type of creature I've seen so far.

To see mantas takes a little bit of planning because there are certain times of year when mantas simply aren't around Palau. And we don't see them along reef walls, which are the typical dive sites. Instead, they hang out near sandy bottoms, or "cleaning stations," where smaller fish swim through their gills to clean off parasites and dead skin. There are a number of dive spots here in Palau where you can spot them, the two I'v been to being German Channel and Devilfish City. So far I've been lucky enough to see them once while snorkeling and twice while diving. It's an amazing experience to see them while diving because these huge creatures gracefully appear out of no where and simply glide through the water with little or no movement. When we see them, we typically stop at a certain point during the dive and sit on the bottom, watching the mantas glide in a small circle nearby, sometimes as close as 10 feet away. And when it decides it wants to get away, one flap of its huge wings sends it flying away. To quote my incredibly articulate dive log...."WOW."

Sea Turtle

There's a reason why several of the pictures my nieces and nephews have sent me include a sea turtle. I just love these guys! They absolutely have the attitude of the Finding Nemo sea turtles...very cool and disinterested. While they're munching away on coral, they have no problem with me swimming as close as five feet away to say hi and just hang out. Knock on wood, but almost every time I dive I end up seeing one or two of these guys. It's gotten to the point where I feel guilty wearing tortoise shall sunglasses!

That's just a few of the big ticket items I get while diving here. There's more though--huge schools of colorful fish, World War II wrecks, and occasional dolphin sightings to name just a few. And the best part about diving here is that every single dive is different. So it goes without saying that I'll be taking every chance I can to "soak" it up!

Homer's Odyssey: The Prologue

It's come to my attention that I don't have enough postings. This is the first time in my life that someone's complained that I don't talk enough, so I'm happy to remedy this problem. I've decided to start a miniseries entitled "Homer's Odyssey: Island Girl's Vehicular Mishaps." As you may have noticed, several of my prior posts refer to car problems I've had from time to time here. Well, it's a result of me not being particularly savvy with cars, and because the car care/repair business here is just different. At this point I've accumulated enough entertaining stories that I'll share a few of them with you. Don't worry, I'll still tell you all about my under and above sea adventures here in Palau. But I've found that through my car problems, I've actually learned a lot about "real life" in Palau. Hopefully there stories will highlight that as much as my apparent inability to avoid weekly car debacles.

Prologue: The Old Lady

So far I've owned two cars in Palau. The first was the Old Lady, and the second was Homer. Homer's Odyssey would never have begun if it weren't for my brief stint as the Old Lady's owner.

I definitely miss the Old Lady. She was a 1990 white Toyota Mark II. The interior sported cute Hello Kitty stickers, an AM radio, a cute floral steering wheel cover, and air conditioning that worked. All in all, a pretty sweet situation.

She had her problems though. For one, she was over 20 years old, and for another, she was missing the guard protecting the undercarriage of the car.* As a result, every speed bump, driveway entrance, and pothole were extremely painful for both of us. I found myself coaching her out loud as we went over speed bumps. She also had a lot of trouble starting. I developed a routine of getting into the Old Lady, trying to start it, and then sitting and coaching her for about ten minutes at a time...."Please, Old Lady, I'm really hot and I need to get to work...just start!" And up until she died, it worked every time. We had a nice little system, the Old Lady and I.

But I pushed my luck. I should have known better than to fill her up with gas completely. It was just tempting fate. I put $50 of gas in her, and of course, she died the next day. After work, I headed up to the public pool to teach swim lessons with Veronica, and the Old Lady stopped running twice on my way to the pool. And the pool is about 1.5 miles from the courthouse. Somehow I managed to restart her both times by turning the key and immediately putting her in drive and slamming on the gas. Definitely a stop-gap to say the least. I made it to the pool, we taught swim lessons, and I headed out of the pool lot, just hoping to make it the 1/2 mile to my apartment where I could call a mechanic. Nope! The Old Lady puttered out on the side of the road, about 50 yards away from the pool. The sun had set, but the street lights weren't on, and I had no emergency or parking lights to help me out. What to do?

Turns out, there's an unwritten rule that Palauans just help each other out in these situations. Four Palauan guys that live in my neighborhood came over to my car without batting an eye or saying a word, and pushed my car to the side of the road. Out of nowhere came jumper cables and a second car. That didn't work, and so I got really worried about what I'd do with my car overnight. Not a problem! The guys had pushed the Old Lady to one of their houses, and they just told me not to worry about it and come get it whenever I could. Sweet! So I left it there, headed home, and most likely consumed a large quantity of ice cream.

The next day, after mooching rides from both Ben and Veronica, I called Surangel's Auto Shop--the only place I knew with a tow truck on hand. They picked me up from work and drove to my car. After another unsuccessful jump attempt, they towed her to their repair shop to see if there was any hope. Following a half hour of serious prayer, I learned that her engine was completely "seized up" and fixing it would cost over half of what I'd paid for her. No thanks! But I got lucky. A salesman from Surangel's knew a woman who had a car like mine with a working engine. All she needed was a decent car frame. She was willing to pay me $100 (minus the towing fee, of course). Given that my next best offer was $100 from the junk yard and I'd be responsible for towing it there, I decided to sell my Old Lady to the old lady. Sounds a little off right? But as you'll learn after a few more stories like this, swapping parts--even entire car frames--is par for the course. I like to think that somewhere on this island the Old Ladies are happy together!

After saying goodbye, I set out shopping to find my next victim. I didn't want to pay an arm and a leg, but I wanted something reliable, so I did some shopping around. Meaning I talked to 3 or 4 people and test drove one car. I heard from several people that the owner of a Mobile station's auto shop was reliable and sold cars. So I stopped by one afternoon, and saw him...Homer, a 1996 Honda Odyssey.

(Cue low-pitched whistles.)

I was immediately interested. Do I need a minivan? Absolutely not. Is 1996 pretty old? You bet. Did I really want to get the car buying process over with quickly and avoid paying over $2,000? Absolutely. Obviously, my impatience won out, after some confusing negotiations (Angie doesn't speak English particularly well, and I speak barely any Palauan) and an unconvincing attempt at playing hardball with Ben (I literally kicked the tires at one point), I drove Homer home. And that's where his Odyssey begins....

*This is the first of what will be countless errors in car lingo. I could look up all the proper terminology, but to get an accurate feel of my level of car knowledge, I feel complete honesty will be necessary.