Claude's Cafe

Hello from Kosrae! I will use this blog as a platform for sharing stories from the past couple weeks. I was able to upload a few photos to this blog, and I have more up on Facebook. Some stories... Last Saturday Matt, a couple of his buddies James and Scotty, and I went surfing. The tide was low and it was pretty shallow where the smaller waves were crashing, so I ended up going in early. Just as I neared the shore, I saw a guy walk over to a coconut tree and climb up it. He sat perched in the crown of the tree and kicked coconuts down to the ground. I watched him descend and then shifted my focus back to the sea. Moments later, Mitta, who lives right next to where we parked and also works at Green Banana Paper, brought me a coconut! We chatted for a while and she taught me a few Kosraean phrases. Afterwards, the guys decided on a whim to go to Bully’s, a restaurant at one of the island’s two resorts. While we were walking on the boardwalk to the restaurant, we passed Mark, th

Greetings from the beautiful island of Kosrae! Tu wo if it’s the morning, lwen wo if it’s the afternoon, and ke wo if it’s the evening. I am out in the Pacific Ocean with 6,600 people and a bunch of tropical fruit. The draw to Kosrae was my cousin Matt and his ecofactory, Green Banana Paper. He came out here for WorldTeach after college and never said goodbye to the island life. A few years ago he started a factory making wallets from the fibers of banana tree trunks that would otherwise rot. Now the factory is up and running with 25 employees and Matt is one of the largest private employers on the island. In addition to Green Banana Paper, he also runs Simpson’s Import Company, importing technology things to the island and also a very popular tshirt design and printing company. All of the tshirt happenings are here on site with Green Banana Paper. I left Massachusetts early Thursday morning and flew from Hartford, CT to Denver to Honolulu. I spent the night in Honolulu and was of