Rowanda sadness commands siva

in the pics: some girls from the Christmas party (fiafia), two girls and baby from our family's church and dancing celebration, woman and child taken in my church in the village.

1/6/08
Went to my school building (faleaoga) to get a few things. One of these was my planner. I thought I would not have to use a planner or cell phone when I was in PC. No such luck. Found a few things bringing back memories in my planner: a 10 class card from Baptiste Yoga Studio—only 2 punches—that means I have some yoga left when I visit boston; yeah; a few of my business cards from the YMCA; a few random notes; the massage school clinic schedule—when the school was in session, I went for a massage once a week; “selected phone numbers” from University of Portland…waaaaaay back to before 2000 (when I graduated). That was a long time ago. But I remember it in a blink of the eye.

The Christmas/new years time is big on family reunions (mafutaga fa’aleaiga) in Samoa. Yesterday, my family had a family church service (lotu aiga) that was like a family reunion. Many many people came to our fale (house), well our front house. There are three our four houses in my family’s compound. It was decorated with coconut leaves and some flowers. I’m told it happens 5-6 times each year. The process was simple: church service, eat, dance. There were two family groups performing, skits, singing, dancing. The choreographed song is big in samoa. It seems whenever there is a (party) fiafia, for each song or dance there is a bowl put out in the front of the performers. People can put money in the bowl. Bowl is emptied after each performance. I’m not so sure what this is about, but I got to listen to my samoan dad talk after the dancing. I think he was saying what each family got. Redistributing the money among the families. We were told in training that this would be happening: give a lot of money to the big event (fa’alavelave), then get some money—or gifts—back at the end.


It’s interesting to me the reactions I get when I tell people my name is Mataio. A lot of them say “ah..matthew..in the bible” I’m like, yeah, what does that mean? I don’t think of my name and the bible a lot.

Samoan language is very command oriented. Ave means give. Aumai means bring. It doesn’t seem to be very asking oriented..please. well, maybe this is only when dealing with (school) children. Which is who I have been around for most of the time I’ve been in samoa. Training village(5 kids), and now my permanent village(5 kids).

I’m still getting used to the way samoan language works. One samoan word has many American words. Example: Samoan word “ma’i” means sick. I am sick, my athlete’s foot is sick

It’s like samoan language hasn’t started segmenting everything—having a separate word for everything…makes me think of business (segmenting your consumer groups), or science (segmenting and segmenting and segmenting until you can’t segment anymore and then see what you got).


1/04/08
I watched the movie “hotel rowanda” made me sad to see so much killing…1 million bodies it said at the end of the movie. I don’t understand why Hutu and Tutsi could hate each other so much. “cockroaches” a man said on the radio. Will people believe? It made me feel ashamed when the “whites” were getting on the UN(?) bus but the “blacks” had to stay at the hotel. The Americans didn’t care, especially when someone said “yeah a person hears about us on the radio, say that’s bad, and then they go back to eating their dinner.” But the courage, creativity, and improvisation shown by the main character paul was very cool.


1/4
Bus adventures… Each person has a place where they are supposed to sit. The PCVs and older/matai people always sit in the front. PCVs are told to sit in the front. My bus ride into Apia is about one hour. Pretty simple, pick up passengers along the way, stop at the fish market and veggie market to let people off. The trip back to my village (Tafagamanu vai), is a lot more interesting. On the way back, we stopped at the gas stand. Then we stopped at a store to get lumber for someone. We also stopped at two different stores along the way so people could get stuff. Not going to happen in the States. The trip back today took about two hours.

Dating in Samoa is also an interesting adventure. Although from what the trainers instilled in us, I have said no twice to nice girls who asked me to be their “uo.” A few unique characteristics of Samoan dating. Girls like to lie (pepelo) about their age, so it’s wise to ask other people about the person. A boy and a girl alone together means they are dating. I just want to be around a girl and get to know them before I date them. I guess that won’t happen in Samoa. “na’o lea uo” means just friends. I’ve tried saying this, no work. I get the leai malamalama (no understand) look/body language. If you do date a Samoan, you date not only them, but also their whole family. Family ties run very deep. I’m not really sure of the particulars of this yet. Is it the real thing, or are you just a status symbol, a competition head of sport? Well, I guess this happens in the USA too, but if I sense that, I’m out. I’m just trying to get my main goal straight—the work I’m here to do.