Farewell Home Stay

October 30, 2012

The last day of home stay went really well. I got to spend a lot of time with my family because class ended early to give us time to pack. I got to help make kava and my host mom made me made me a huge dinner with all my favorite foods here. The Mormon youth had a session for us, which was a bit awkward at first because they were praying for us and then said how much they loved us but they didn’t really know me all that well since my family is Ba’hai and I didn’t go to their church (like the others did who were staying with Mormon families)… It was really nice of them though and they gave us little gifts which was thoughtful. When I went back home my host brother Tonga presented me with an amazing woodcarving he made for me! He also painted it and my family wrote a little note on the back, it is one of the coolest gifts I have ever gotten and I was so overwhelmed that he went through so much effort for me, he is the coolest and nicest guy in the world (he still calls me to check up and he met me at the airport the following day to say goodbye) The last kava party was great as well, Katy was the tou’a and our Tongan was on point. We were making jokes and talking with all the guys and one of them even bought us snacks and a drink. We were able to hold out until after 1 (we were being picked up the next morning at 6:30 to fly to our sites) before finally having to say goodbye to everyone. We went around and shook hands with all the guys and got our Tongan kisses (a sniff on the cheek), it was awkward because I assumed my host dad was going to give me a Tongan kiss, because he did the first day we met, so I leaned down after shaking his hand and he didn’t do it! I quickly made for my sandals to try and act as if that was my plan the whole time and then I bolted out of there with Katy; oh awkward cultural mishaps…

my home stay room

me and Tonga with his cool gift

this is the carving. He drew it, colored it and cut it and then my family wrote a note on the back

Katy with a kava guy

this is a shot from the inside of the falekalapu (kava house)

Cooking Day and Farewell Dinner

October 29, 2012

Today was cooking day! Before they send us off to live on our own they decided we should have a day where we try and actually cook. We got to go into town and cook at the PC office. We separated into our language groups (plus Wren from Ha’asini) and we were given 30 pa’anga. We went to the market and bargained (using our extensive tongan vocab...) to get all the food we needed to make our meal. We bought root crops and lai’pele (a leave vegetable) and carrots and onions and lamb. We also found pineapple! I was so stoked, my first Tongan pineapple- everyone here knows I am dying to eat all the pineapple Tonga has to offer so they were all very excited for me… Our meal turned out great, and even though one of the groups didn’t get the memo that we were all going to eat together, the Futu’mu group did and we had a nice lunch, especially with their addition of their group's cabbage wraps (-:

our cooking group plus Nemo (the fat dog Chiara is holding)

After lunch we all did some business in town, I took the chance to splurge on an ice coffee, which even though I knew was expensive, almost worth it. We rode back into the villages and Nakolo decided to take a detour before going home and we all went to our little library to finish the last of our teatime supplies (did I mention that we are the fat group?)… Chiara and I have been making it a routine to hang out at Katy’s house after class and today was no exception. We were over at Katy’s watching her take in her laundry (because village life is just that exciting) when we saw a group of baby chicks. I went over because I thought it would be fun to try and hold one, well they all went right through the fence but their fat mother couldn’t fit through. She knew I was trying to pick up the babies and was not pleased; she turned from the fence and with a evil look in her eye she flew directly at my face! That’s right, an angry chicken attacked me, and I will be honest, it was one of the more scary moments of my life.

In order to say goodbye to us Chiara’s host family decided to throw us a going away dinner. Because her family, along with Steph’s and Katy’s, are all Mormon we had it at the Mormon church. I felt really bad because my host mom couldn’t come because she is really sick, I often feel like we are outsiders because my family is not Mormon so it was a bummer not being able to fully participate. I felt as if the families almost felt bad for me, which is sad because my home stay family rocks and I was sad I couldn’t show up with them to show the other families. Regardless the dinner was really awesome and extravagant. There was tons of food and the kids performed Tongan dances for us. The kids were awesome but of course we all had to dance and the Tongans loved when we get up to groove with them, they especially loved all my moves of course…. Steph’s host mom was dancing with us at one point and felt it necessary to pick me up in the midst of dancing (I don’t know who decided I should always be picked up but I am a bit sad that it made it all the way to Tonga). The families each spoke and said really nice things (from what I could understand) about us. We also got up and said a little something that we prepared in Tongan. We felt really honored that they did so much for us even after hosting us and we are all excited to come back and visit everyone once we get established in our site communities.

this is Dorthy doing a traditional tauolunga

Havili and Paula (Chiara's host brother) doing a tongan war dance

Katy and Chiara dancing with Chiara's host mom

the kids doing some more dancing for us

Steph shaking it with her host mom

Final Week of Home Stay

October 26, 2012

It has been a great final week of home stay. We have been just practice teaching at the primary school and then having language class outside under the mango tree in the afternoons. Everyone is pretty much checking out of training now that we all know our sites and we are so close to becoming actual volunteers. Since we don’t all get together during practice teaching weeks, the Nakolo crew is trying to soak up our last bits of time in our communities together before we are all separated and sent off to start integrating all over again (by ourselves this time).

Practice teaching has been going really great. All the kids still love us and the lessons have been super successful (even though the kids are significantly behind where the curriculum thinks they should be…). I was the only one in our group who taught all three days, and did not observe a day but it was fine because we only taught for 1 hour so it wasn’t any extra work really. One of the lessons was just doing reader’s theatre with class 6. We did The Very Hungry Caterpillar; it was awesome hearing their accents and trying to put different emphasis on each word (most of the time they accomplished this by just yelling the lines).

Having language class outside has so many advantages, not only do we get the wonderful breeze (which is the only way to survive the heat) but we also get to watch the community goings on. We get to watch people coming to and fro work, kids to and fro their lunch break from school, pig migrations, cows being walked to the bush, dogs fornicating and then being stuck together and try to free themselves (yes we have all heard it happens, but I can assure you it is a real thing and it is painful to watch)…. After class we eva (wonder around the village) around or we just lay on our mat and eat random snacks. Yesterday we were a bit more active and we played with some village kids. We played duck duck goose, spelling games andwe made them sing for us, the best part though was when the kids pointed to Katy and called her fatty, like a melon! Katy is super awesome about this and we all laughed, she is deemed the fat peace corps in the village and we always make jokes about her sino fakatonga (Tongan body) but this was priceless, the kid was maybe 9 and was very clear about how we (Chiara, me and Steph) were pakau (thin) and Katy was fatty. If you are not secure with your body, Tonga would be a really hard place to live.

Lau (my home stay nephew)

me with some of the Nakolo boys

Attachment Day 2: Site Visits and Quiz Night

November 2nd

The next day I got to go and see my site! I got to see my house and my school (literally 3 steps away from my house), I got to meet my principal (who is super nice) and counter part (who is super crazy and used to work for PC as a language trainer at one point) and I also got to meet most of the kids! The school was awesome and I know it is perfect for me because they grow pineapple in the back of it! The house is huge, the biggest PC house they have and I have no idea what I am going to do with all the space but it is nice to have I guess. There is a big yard and there will be lots of space to garden and grow coffee; I think I will also build a chicken coop for fresh eggs. My principal's husband was also there and I got to talk with him about working in the 'uta and he said he has 20 chickens that I can take care of and get eggs, he sounded like he was very willing to help be start up some of these small projects. The principal and my counterpart and I had a big lunch after I met the kids and looked around the school. The lunch was extensive with lobster and chicken and fish and a dish called ota ika (raw fish with peppers and onions and coconut milk). The meal was great and I got to talk to my principal a bit, I found out they were really confused because they thought they were getting a volunteer named Joe so they kept asking me what happened, I didn't really understand at first but then it sort of clicked and I explained to them that Joe, Joseph, Joey is my name in fakapalangi (english) and Sifa is my name in tongan. They laughed after that and my counter part told me it is good I go by Sifa because apparently one of the most famous fakaleitis in Tonga goes by Joey. Overall I am really excited, the only thing is the house is on the school compound which is a little isolated from the community so it might be hard to meet people at first. I also didn't get to see much of the actual village but I have two years to do that so I am not too worried about it.

the kids in front of my new school

this is my new house, literally right next to the school

more of the kids

After site visits we all just hung out until dinner, we went to this place that serves actual hamburgers! We also went back to Tongan Bobs for trivia night! It was really fun because since it is such a small island everyone on the different teams knew each other and was talking crap back and forth the whole game. We got to meet some of the local palangis and we got free drinks by winning the joker rounds (-: It is cool to know that there is also a small community of white people that live in Vava'u as well, it seems that it would be nice to find a balance of living in my community and also being able to join the palangi community on the island as well.

at Tongan Bobs, the tall kid is and the girl to the right of Jason (the one in the blue shirt) are not PCVs and but they a part of the small palangi community

Mormon Dances

October 19, 2012 (continued)

When the Nakolo crew got back to our village after being in town, it was bumpin’. All the Mormons were out and shaking it at the Mormon dance, which was held at the Mormon church’s tennis court right next to my house. We started walking toward the noise seeing all the dressed up people we immediately questioned our dress- I had thrown on my Tupenu in the car and Katy’s dress had some chocolate on it that she spilled during lunch- it just happened to look like poop and we were all sweaty and sticky from being in the hot car all day…When we walked up to the dance, I am sure you could imagine the awkwardness that we were in the presence of, mostly parents sitting around the court with a few people in the middle, arms distance apart, moving back and forth. My group was at a loss for what to do until Chiara’s host sister called us on the dance floor, from there it was madness. The kids started to come up to us and they are the craziest dancers I have ever seen- they kind of convulse and have epileptic seizers in circles. They move their bodies in ways I didn’t know little kids could and the boys dance on the boys so that also took a second to get used to. Only the little kids where dancing and the older youth that was there were more swaying. Us palagies joined in with the younger ones and danced until the final slow song when I was asked to dance by a young Tongan girl (don't worry we still had to keep it arms distance apart). The dance was actually really fun and made me hope I will have an active Mormon church in my new village.

this was the dances dj

the dance floor pre palangi invasion

some of the kids being gangster

The dance was for seminary graduates and all graduates get lays by their family and friends so it ends up getting ridiculous. They give out the lays after awhile to different people, but for a good amount of time this is how all the graduates looked

me with the girl who asked me to dance the final slpw song with her

Penis bananas, Site Announcements and Blowholes

October 19, 2012

Yesterday was a huge day for us, we got our site announcements, we got to tour the island of Tongatapu, and we got to go to a Mormon dance!

Yesterday was the day we have all been waiting for for some time now. We got to find out where we would be spending the next two years of our lives… The day started of with some talk of STDs and very emotional stories of past volunteers who contracted HIV during their service. To lighten the mood we got to practice putting a condom on a magic banana- when you peeled it a penis was on the inside. Once we felt proficient enough at condom use the moment came- site announcements. They had all our names with our sites in a little box at the front of the room and one person at a time went up and drew a name and read it aloud. It was crazy as one by one people found out their sites, when I got up it was a little anti-climatic because I drew my own name… But I got what I wanted! An outer village on the island of Vava’u! My school is relatively small (67 kids) and they are also looking for someone to do some cooking classes as well as library work along with teaching and teacher training. I will also get to run community events to increase healthy life style choices, basically I am pretty stoked. It was rad because after the announcements they knew we wouldn’t be able to pay attention so the planned a big lunch and a tour of the island and the volunteers sites who would be staying on Tongatapu, it was cool seeing the sites of our friend's new lives. Our lunch was prepared by the country director, Ruth, we got to eat a bean salad and chicken lasagna with a chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting (-:

Peter and Doctor Sam. Peter is Holding the banana If you look closely the banana has been peeled and now Peter is hold a penis

This is all of us who will be on Vava'u, I am the furthest north

After our filling lunch, we loaded into our van and hit up some of the cool cultural spots around the island. We got to the Tongan Stonehenge, Captain Cook’s landing site and probably one of the coolest things I have ever seen- the blow holes. The blowholes are these seeming endless geyser type things that are at the edge of the island meeting the beech. Waves crash into these crazy tide pools and the water shoots out maybe 40 ft! I could have stayed there and watched it for hours, the amazingly blue/ turquoise waves crashing down upon living pools and then exploding with force to the sky. We went into town when the tour was finished and we all went to the one pizza place in the country, bringing some beers with us, and had a great dinner. We picked up ice cream on our way back to the office for our ride back to villages, we got there early so we put on an episode of Seinfeld (that we found among the books in the volunteer resource room). It was almost like being back in America for a second but of course our ride came no more then 20 mins later and it was off to our villages.

All of us at Tongan Stonehenge

Wren and me at the King's burial

Nakolo group at Cpt Cook's landing site

The guys at the blow holes

Walking Across Low Tide

October 20, 2012

Perhaps the coolest thing I have ever done occurred yesterday afternoon with my host brothers, Katy and Wren. We got to walk across the ocean about 100 yards out because the tide was so low. It was a spur of the moment adventure when our afternoon walk took us to an amazing beach at the perfect time. The Tongans were without sandals the whole time (walking across coral and through patches of sea grass that could have contained any number of weird animals or sharp objects) and they would stop periodically to pick up different sea creatures and eat the occasional ouster. I guess it is Tongan legend that sea horses used to live in the beach’s water so you would whistle to bring them forth so my host brothers would stand as far out as possible and whistle at the waves. The whole time we were out on the water eating different sea creatures the sun was setting and the sky was crazy colors. We found seaweed that were like little balls of salt and we (my host brothers) broke open this spiky sea creature, poured out its contents and then we ate some of the left over- it tasted like sandy sea food. As we were walking back in the dark with the only light being from Tonga’s cell phone, Koni and Tonga started catching the crabs running along the beach- Koni even started eating one after he pulled off its pinchers and broke of a leg or two. Unfortunately, we had to hike through the bush to get back; the bush at night is frightening. We step over crabs and walked through spider webs, the whole time listening to the bug chorus accompanied by the bats as their backup. Hiking through the bush at night was never an experience I ever thought I would be brave enough to do before the Peace Corps and now I am just thinking I wasn't man enough because i still had shoes on (unlike my host brothers).

Tonga and Koni made it to the reef before us

at the reef

me, Koni and Tonga

The sunset asd we left the beech

a starfish and this weird sea creature we found that moved in the water like it was dancing, we picked it up and it was like holding warm jelly