September 22, 2012
My friend Mandy and I had made plans earlier in the week to meet up on Saturday to use the internet in my village and then she would show me how to blog (her blog is amazing and if you want a better account of the day by day life here or are looking for really amazing pictures check out her blog!). We meet up around 8:15 and went to the center. After spending a very frustraiting few hours with the internet I realized that internet is too overwhelming here, it is patchy and slow and is more trouble than it is worth. I like being connected to people but I think I could learn to be happy with limited internet access at post. After finally getting an offline blogger app to download I had had enough and the language group walked Mandy to Ha’asini (the next village over) and then jogged back. After getting back I was invited my by host brothers to visit the uta (the word translate to bush but is what we would call farm land almost). Another guy in my house quickly (I mean like maybe 5 minutes tops) weaved a basket out of a coconut tree branch and then we took the walk. Tonga was wielding a machete and wasn’t even wearing shoes. I was being the palangi in the chacos and rain jacket trying not to fall on my ass from the slippery mud. We walked to the way back of the village and eventually got to my family’s land. There were rows of taro and yams with the occasional coconut tree. As we picked that taro leaves for the lu we would be having on Sunday Tonga, Koni and the kid we picked up on the way took turns making fun of each other and trying to get me to say dirty words in Tongan. When we filled the basket with leaves Koni pulled up about 20 yams. We all gathered some coconuts that had fallen and then started heading back. On our way out of the ‘uta we passed a women with a machete and her own basket. This women was probably about 65 and jokingly threaten to sliced up Koni as we passed by. Here it is a wet and stormy Saturday afternoon and there is a elderly women walking into the uta, knife in hand, to gather up dinner….
This is what the basket looks like and it is filled with the taro leaves for the Lu
Saturdays are also normally Kava drinking nights, so after dinner we were going to go to the kava party but discovered there wasn’t a to’ua (female kava server) so Tonga took me to a near by hut instead. Side note here: The hut was actually a guys separated room because in Tonga when siblings of the opposite sex are in their adolescences until about 21 they are not allowed to share the same house. I spent the rest of the night hanging out with the village youth learning dirty Tongan words. It is funny that no matter what country you are in, hanging out with the guys is the same, they all want one of my friend’s (most likely because they are white) numbers and they all make fun of each other constantly. All in all, a pretty good Tongan Saturday…
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