australian's drink pineapple juice..really me;0
in the pics: Our PC medical officer doing a presentation during our early service conference at FaoFao beach fales...nice; a boy collecting water at faofao; some masina shells..I collected about 60 of them at the beach.
6/21
Another Saturday. Another day to travel to Apia. Here is the rundown of what I did. I’m pretty much in a routine now when I go there.
I take the last morning bus from my Samoan family’s fale in Tafagamanu. I arrive at Apia after the bumpy 1.5 hour bus ride and get off at the fish market. Breakfast consists of keke pua’a (a pastry with cooked pig inside) and an orange inside the large flea market/craft shop. Walking on the sea wall I spy a huge cruise ship (P&O from London) and talk to some of it’s visitors—on a 28 day whirlwind tour of islands. I stop at a small market and get a warm cinnamon roll and bottle of pineapple juice (yum). I would check my email and have posted this blog stuff today, but the internet at the PC office was down, or broken, or choosing not to work
. So I did non-internet related things—picked up three books, poetry, GMAT (cause I still have visions of attending UW sometime in the future), exchanged some CDs and DVDs, and relaxed in the semi air conditioned office. I had lunch at Sydney’s café—the local palagi hangout (i.e. lots of white people). The samoan kids know where to try and sell fans, matches, and apples. I bought a bag. I ate spicy tomato soup and a ham and cheese sandwich. Pa le manava (very full). I headed to the vegi market to get cucumbers and tomatoes, but stopped on the way to pick up black beans and baby powder. I get a niu lapo’a (large chilled coconut) for $2 tala. I couldn’t even finish it all. I sat and observed the wildlife at the veggie market. Samoans will test your samoan. I guess I didn’t impress, we had a few sentences, and then they stopped talking to me. Have you ever seen a Samoan in an afro? I mean a big ass afro, at least 6 inches thick it was. I wonder what movie he watched. I walked to Farmer Joe—a New Zealand company that is reor
ganizing the Samoan branch up to standards…Standards! What are those? We don’t have those here in Samoa. I got cheese, nachos, cooking oil, a 40pound bag of rice (which has seen a $14 tala increase in a very short time). So I dropped $100 tala pretty easily in the palagi store. It was 3:00pm when I sat down at the veggie market bus stop. The lady selling chips told me ‘oh, the Lefaga bus doesn’t come to this bus stop.’ Well, I decided to wait for a while. No bus. So then I took a taxi to the fish market bus stop, and waited some more. Only one bus was waiting, it was 4:30pm. Someone said no Lefaga bus. I guess the “schedule” was changed because of the large boat docked at harbor in Apia. So a girl comes up to me and says I should take the Safata bus because it passes through Lefaga. Good idea I said. I got in. waited another 30 minutes. We were off. We arrived in Lefaga at the four corners well after dark, with my heavy food. There was a samoan man that also got off the bus. He carried the bag of rice on the LONG walk down to my village. I got home, had some whiskey, coke, and lime with my Samoan father. It’s his cherished tradition with Mataio—drink some alcohol before dinner, and laugh when I say I need to eat some food before I drink more. We watched some rugby while we ate—Japan and Fiji. Japan was kicking behind. Leaga Fiti. After eating I had the intention of readin
g for half an hour, but I laid down and fell asleep within 5 minutes. Usually happens; alcohol is a great muscle relaxer for me.
6/15
I was visiting Ross and Maria, who are “visiting” from Austrailia. I say “visiting” because they brought over a shipping container filled with stuff, and they are totally remodeling Maria’s brother’s fale. And tell me that they are going to “keep” it when they are done. Maria was watching a DVD (part of a 6 DVD! set…I guess she’s been around a while) of some highlights of the Opera show. I didn’t watch Opera in America because I don’t like talk shows, but she is a very interesting person, and does a lot of cool stuff. She keeps a gratitude journal that she showed. Well, here is my 10 minute reflection on gratitude: I’m grateful for: 1) my health 2) the ability to do cool things and help other people 3) being in Samoa doing PC 4) my mom still here and that I have a good relationship with her 5) still having my curiosity. She also said “when you have judgment, you cannot feel/find the truth; to prepare for the marriage.”
Another Saturday. Another day to travel to Apia. Here is the rundown of what I did. I’m pretty much in a routine now when I go there.
I take the last morning bus from my Samoan family’s fale in Tafagamanu. I arrive at Apia after the bumpy 1.5 hour bus ride and get off at the fish market. Breakfast consists of keke pua’a (a pastry with cooked pig inside) and an orange inside the large flea market/craft shop. Walking on the sea wall I spy a huge cruise ship (P&O from London) and talk to some of it’s visitors—on a 28 day whirlwind tour of islands. I stop at a small market and get a warm cinnamon roll and bottle of pineapple juice (yum). I would check my email and have posted this blog stuff today, but the internet at the PC office was down, or broken, or choosing not to work
. So I did non-internet related things—picked up three books, poetry, GMAT (cause I still have visions of attending UW sometime in the future), exchanged some CDs and DVDs, and relaxed in the semi air conditioned office. I had lunch at Sydney’s café—the local palagi hangout (i.e. lots of white people). The samoan kids know where to try and sell fans, matches, and apples. I bought a bag. I ate spicy tomato soup and a ham and cheese sandwich. Pa le manava (very full). I headed to the vegi market to get cucumbers and tomatoes, but stopped on the way to pick up black beans and baby powder. I get a niu lapo’a (large chilled coconut) for $2 tala. I couldn’t even finish it all. I sat and observed the wildlife at the veggie market. Samoans will test your samoan. I guess I didn’t impress, we had a few sentences, and then they stopped talking to me. Have you ever seen a Samoan in an afro? I mean a big ass afro, at least 6 inches thick it was. I wonder what movie he watched. I walked to Farmer Joe—a New Zealand company that is reor
ganizing the Samoan branch up to standards…Standards! What are those? We don’t have those here in Samoa. I got cheese, nachos, cooking oil, a 40pound bag of rice (which has seen a $14 tala increase in a very short time). So I dropped $100 tala pretty easily in the palagi store. It was 3:00pm when I sat down at the veggie market bus stop. The lady selling chips told me ‘oh, the Lefaga bus doesn’t come to this bus stop.’ Well, I decided to wait for a while. No bus. So then I took a taxi to the fish market bus stop, and waited some more. Only one bus was waiting, it was 4:30pm. Someone said no Lefaga bus. I guess the “schedule” was changed because of the large boat docked at harbor in Apia. So a girl comes up to me and says I should take the Safata bus because it passes through Lefaga. Good idea I said. I got in. waited another 30 minutes. We were off. We arrived in Lefaga at the four corners well after dark, with my heavy food. There was a samoan man that also got off the bus. He carried the bag of rice on the LONG walk down to my village. I got home, had some whiskey, coke, and lime with my Samoan father. It’s his cherished tradition with Mataio—drink some alcohol before dinner, and laugh when I say I need to eat some food before I drink more. We watched some rugby while we ate—Japan and Fiji. Japan was kicking behind. Leaga Fiti. After eating I had the intention of readin
g for half an hour, but I laid down and fell asleep within 5 minutes. Usually happens; alcohol is a great muscle relaxer for me.6/15
I was visiting Ross and Maria, who are “visiting” from Austrailia. I say “visiting” because they brought over a shipping container filled with stuff, and they are totally remodeling Maria’s brother’s fale. And tell me that they are going to “keep” it when they are done. Maria was watching a DVD (part of a 6 DVD! set…I guess she’s been around a while) of some highlights of the Opera show. I didn’t watch Opera in America because I don’t like talk shows, but she is a very interesting person, and does a lot of cool stuff. She keeps a gratitude journal that she showed. Well, here is my 10 minute reflection on gratitude: I’m grateful for: 1) my health 2) the ability to do cool things and help other people 3) being in Samoa doing PC 4) my mom still here and that I have a good relationship with her 5) still having my curiosity. She also said “when you have judgment, you cannot feel/find the truth; to prepare for the marriage.”
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