Yup, It's Yap...

Of the islands that I cover for my job, Yap is one that I was wondering if I would never go to. So, I finally got to go there.

The worst thing about going to Yap is the time. It seems that Continental Airlines and Yap have some differences, so to stick it to them, Continental only has flights to Yap at 5am. Therefore, you have to go to the airport at 3am. You can imagine how perspective tourists would be apprehensive about going there.

I was only on the island of Yap for 24 hours, so I had to make the time count. First I had to make sure that I accomplished what I came there for. I landed at the airport and later realized that I got a picture of a tourist taking a picture of a tourist. I hate that...

If you’ve seen one of the Micronesian Airports, you’ve seen them all.

After getting your rental car, make sure you fill your car up. They often do not come with a full tank of gas. And you just need to return it filled to the same level as when you got it. Also, since the return flight is also at 5am, you have to fill your car at the local gas station the night before since it will be closed. If the car is half full when you get it, fill it up right away and you’ll never need to put more in. Yap isn’t that big.

I forgot to get gas in time, and these gas stations are not like the ones that you are used to. They are not exactly the 24 hour operations that we have in the U.S.

If Johnny Lingo had a car, this is probably where he’d gas up.

The car rental place had to charge me for the gas. Luckily, I didn’t travel far.

But I did travel far enough to see some of what you’d expect in Yap. People who know nothing about Yap seem to know one of two things. Either that the women often walk around bare breasted or that Yap uses (or used) stone money. Being a somewhat family friendly site, I'll talk more about the stone money instead.

When I mentioned stone money to my sister, Lacey, she suggested that I try to get some and maybe give some to my nieces and nephews. First of all, they are not all over the place. They are considered artifacts, and you are not supposed to take the off the island. And second, well, this is a sample of what stone money looks like:

This is family fortune of this household…showoffs…

The above is not the largest either. Some is as tall or taller than a human. Somehow, I imagine that it would be hard to fit that in my kangaroo scrotum change purse. Maybe if I used a whale’s…do they make those?

Anyway, the stone money is more of a cultural thing, there isn’t much actual cash value to them today. And even if there was, it’s awfully hard to conclude the value. The size or weight is not the determining factor. The stone material is always from other islands. And the hardship it took to bring it, the people that died getting it there, the hardship and amazing story of the origin is the sum of it’s worth. You know how old people can be. They always tell stories and embellishment is the norm. Who knows the true story? So, don’t invest in the stone money banks, you might not get much of a yield on that.

After working on the computer that brought me out, rebuilding it from the ground up and finishing my job, I decided to get home. On a small island, it’s hard to get lost. And luckily I didn’t, thanks to the cool street signs.

Now that’s a street sign!

What I wasn’t aware of was how hard those signs are to read at night. Yap is dark at night, very dark. And waking up before the sun rises to find an airport that you’ve only driven away from is more difficult than it sounds. I know Yap isn’t rich, but a street light or two isn’t too much to ask for, is it?

I “Forrest Gumped” my way to the airport only to find that I woke up at 2:30am unnecessarily. And I drove around in the dark worrying about the time only to find out that my plane would be delayed. I wouldn’t be leaving until 9am anyway. Luckily for me, the three seats in the waiting area were full the old grandmas which didn’t have any shirts, and the beetlenut spit all over kept me in the Yapese spirit for just a few more hours.

I arrived home much later than expected and very tired. It’s times like that when you regret getting an apartment on the third floor with no elevator. Maybe I should have left that 300-pound stone coin in Yap.