Losing My Stuff

I’m the kind of person who’s always losing things. But here in the Marshall Islands, things have a way of coming back to you…

I did my laundry at a local laundromat with only one functioning washer, where the proprietor keeps an eye on your clothes and will put them into the machines for you if you have to leave. She even folds the clothes for no extra charge! Up until now I’ve been doing my laundry by hand, so I was very excited to get my big bag of clothing back, folding and smelling clean. Only one roblem: I put five sports bras into the wash, and I only got back one. I was starting to feel really creeped out: there’s some Marshallese man sifting through my underthings! But then our Baptist missionary friends told me sports bras are really in demand here: teenage girls call them “tops” and are known to steal them from unsuspecting Americans (such as the missionaries’ 14-year-old daughter).

A few days later I walked by the laundromat and started talking to Philine, one of the Filipino teachers at the high school. Suddenly one of our students walked by…wearing one of my sports bras! I could see the straps peeking out from under her Guam dress. I didn’t know what to do but Philine called her right over and demanded to know where she’d gotten the “top.” The girl denied it, of course, and I just ended up feeling awkward. But a few hours later I was sitting at home (in the dark, from one of our many power outages) when I heard a knock at the door and one of my students arrived, clutching a bag with two of my sports bras inside. She apologized and told me she’d wash the other two and bring them back, which she did the following day. The funny thing is, instead of being shy and awkward in class after this whole adventure, she is actually more friendly and talkative! I guess I should get stuff stolen by my students more often.

I’m getting pretty used to my students bringing things back to me, actually. I don’t have my own classroom and I’m always leaving my notebook in one of the rooms I “float” to as I teach. The notebook is always returned to me in the next hour by some student who realized it was mine.

The most miraculous recovery of a lost object happened today. I have a bright pink stainless-steel waterbottle that my mom sent me toward the beginning of the year. It says “I [heart] Lulu,” referring to a yoga store called LuluLemon, and a private joke with my mom because she and my sister call me “Lulu.” So I was pretty bummed when I lost it a few weeks ago on a trip to town. I figured it was gone forever, but today I saw it sitting on our kitchen counter! Heather explained that I had left it on the bus to town, and someone had handed it to Amanda, our landlady who is also Heather’s host-sister. Obviously I should get better at keeping track of my stuff…but it’s nice how everything gets back to you here!