Time moves no slower here than in Los Angeles or any other major city on the planet. It’s just what you decide to do with your time that determines how fast you perceive time. This is Majuro Atoll in the little visited and very remote Marshall Islands.
Here are a few observations and notes from our time in the country:
– The Marshall Islands became a country in 1986.
– U.S. dollars are the accepted currency
– It takes over an hour to drive from one end of the main atoll to the other
– A cute little island bar in housed in the airport with an adjoining cafe where you can order a reasonably priced cut of tuna.
– Transportation around the island is by taxi with drivers stopping to pick up passengers until their vehicle is full.
– A sizable United States Embassy is located on the island
– There is an abnormal amount of people who have diabetes in the country
– There are no tall buildings in the Marshall Islands. Perhaps the tallest man-made object is the sizable garbage dump, some of which has been overtaken by a variety of shrubbery.
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My taxi ride from the airport to the Flame Tree Hostel was $7. We stopped several times to pick up passengers, including a policeman. The hostel most likely was named for the large flame tree growing in front. It appeared to have seen better days as it looked mostly dead.
The hostel features a bar and a restaurant. I’m not sure there were any other guests for the duration of my stay. Upon arriving, I asked one of the employees where I can go swimming. Obviously, a stupid question. She did not understand and upon further probing, she said anywhere.
I soon understood what she meant. I was on an atoll which isn’t much wider than the length of a football field in places. Water is literally everywhere and so is access to it.
The best food pricing I discovered was from the older ladies selling BBQ chicken combined with raw fish and rice for only 5$. And later I began to frequent roadside stalls for Boba tea, ordering from tiny openings.
I was pleasantly surprised to discover several massage places; the one’s I frequented had a fascination with Christmas music. During one two-hour massage I think I must have listened to every Christmas song ever recorded by man!
And for the first time in my life, I brought back fresh fish into the U.S. from an international destination. I did not even know that U.S. customs allowed this. While on the atoll I was introduced to a gentleman who said he would catch Ahi tuna at 5am (he even invited me to go with him), would cut up the fish, package it and then put it in a carry-on box with dry ice covered with insulation and even a duct tape a handle to the outside. True to his word he met me at the hostel with the box of fix the afternoon before my flight. And U.S. Customs breezily waived me through upon arrival after I told them I was carrying fish.
some good travel trivia with the fish back to the US!
Gaz – yes, I’ll have to take advantage of that again somewhere 😉