Today for our sunday adventure we traveled to the eastern side of Pohnpei to the city-ruins of Nan Madol. Nan Madol was basically the first place of human activity on Pohnpei, from around the early 1-2 century AD to about 1500 AD. It was the center of a large dynasty, and was the home for the leader, or chief. Funny thing is...Pohnpei still has a chief!! Well, Pohnpei actually has Kings. Five Kings, to be exact. One King for each municipality (Sokehs, Kitti, Nett, Uh, Kolonia, and Madolenihmw). To get to the Nan Madol ruins, you must ask permission and pay a fee to the King of Madolenihmw, who happens to be one of the most influential Kings on Pohnpei. Of course, Pohnpei is not a "monarchy" by any means. They have a "normal" legislative government, with a governor of pohnpei, a supreme court, and senate, etc. But the Kings do have some power in government. I guess once they wanted to build a casino here on Pohnpei, and the King's or one of them stopped that from happening.
Well, we traveled to Nan Madol and we were getting close when a man lounging in his nice black car honked at our two trucks full of American teachers. He then proceeded to talk to us, told us to give him three dollars each, all while clearly being totally wasted. We all figured out cash, but we were very hesitant to give this drunk man our money! Well, he for some reason drove off. Then we were talking to some of the locals, but no one really knew what was going on. He drove back, totally acting strange. Then he let one of the trucks pass, but not ours. So, he was talking to one of the teachers here, and then some guy came up, or rather, some cop (apparently...? he didn't look like one). The cop took out handcuffs and cuffed him, so we just drove off. Of course, this just happened to be the King's SON! We really have no idea what was actually going on. It was all crazy.
Then trying to get to the ruins was just a complex mess of people trying to take more of our money. Haha. Finally we were there! I'm glad we made it somehow, and also glad none of the SMs got punched in the face.
Both pictures by Stacey :)
After that we went to Keproi waterfall again, the huge, gorgeous, beautiful one. Ahh. Sitting inside that waterfall is definitely one of my top five favorite places on this earth. I could sit there all day. We just got back from a wonderful birthday part in a crammed apartment. It was a Filipino dinner for one of the lovely teachers here, Mrs. V :) Tomorrow begins the last week of the quarter! Finals week anyone? Good luck students. (they'll need it ;D)
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