Welcome to Majuro-do you have your visa? Er no...

Landing at Majuro airport is literally like landing in the sea. The strip of land which houses the airport is super thin and looking out the window we got our first glimpse of what would be our home for at least the next 12 months. We'd obviously googled it before leaving but looking out of the window was a mixture of crapping my pants and extreme excitement. Kinda like being on a roller coaster but without the ability for it all to be over in the next 2 minutes if you can just close your eyes and hang on a little longer. We'd filled in our customs declarations on the plane with Jay as a 'dependant adult' a title which led him to imagine he was some kind of play-thing for a rich mistress rather than the partner of a charity worker!

About 2 minutes before we landed I got a horrible sinking feeling - the kind where you know you have done something really stupid (again) and now have to pay the price for it... no it wasn't moving away silly...it was flying into Majuro with a vest-top on! We'd been warned that you have to cover your shoulders and knees at all times, and my only option was to stick my hoodie on and get off the plane to 30degrees heat and sweat, sweat, sweat. Well it did look kinda cold and rainy out of the window...it was definitely a bit drizzly but the heat and humidity were intense.

The baggage was taken off the plane by hand and practically given to you. No conveyor belts or x-ray machines in this airport! We made our way through customs really easily as there was no way the Marshallese guy was going to go through each and every item we had with us but then got to the desk. Do you have your visas? the guy asked. Urm no I replied, apparently there's someone at the other side who has them... I don't think he believed us. We were holding up the queue. The young Americans looked fidgety. They wanted to get on. Who were these people with strange accents delaying their adventure? I don't really think he knew what to do with us so made a couple of phone calls while my heart was in my mouth thinking surely we can't get turned away? Not now... Phew it was okay he was sending us through. Then some woman jumped out in front of me with a camera... 'You World Teach or WAM?' 'er WAM' I replied 'oh Jess is through there...you want your photo taken?' No I most certainly do not!

So off we went to find Jess, a woman we'd never met before who held our lives in her hands.