Yellowstone in October

My travels continued, which brought me next to the first National Park in the United States, Yellowstone. My friend Connor Tremelling Giorgi was working in the park for the fisheries department shocking various streams and rivers to see what species floated to the top. Exciting stuff. While he was out committing genocide in remote corners of the park, I did several day hikes out where the buffalo roam and the skies remained partially forecast all day. Being the end of October the mornings were a bit brisk reaching down to the low 20's but that didn't stop me. The above picture is Osprey Falls and below is the always abundant Lamar Valley.
Bison are an incredible creature. Absolutely massive and always on the move. They block the roadways in the park and move for no one. The Lamar Valley blew me away everyday. Herds of buffalo and elk graze through this wide depression with packs of wolves always watching from nearby. Connor and I were lucky enough to see one of these packs just before dust moving over the rolling hills on the fringe of the valley. Seventeen in all not more than 150 yards away. Even a park ranger who also happened to be there said that it was the best sighting he had seen all summer.

Just an example of what was following the same trail I was.

NYC

Second stop in my little jaunt across the country was to New York to visit my friend Zeke and again because I had never been. I remember hearing a New Yorker say that people who live in other cities must really be joking when they compare it to living in the big apple. Again, I agree. It is sort of like entering the twilight zone after living in a Samoan village and Northern Idaho. The sheer scale of how many blocks of skyscrapers and square feet of concrete that has been torn up and rebuilt over the life of the city is hard for the mind to get around. Since I'm not one of those people who goes on bus tours or to Broadway shows but enjoys walking around and taking in all the cityscape, people, sounds and smells (there are quite a few different smells) I ended up walking a lot, maybe 8-10 miles a day. When I wanted to get across town I rode the subway, maybe the best in the world I've ever been on. You can literally get within a few blocks of anything if you know what you are doing.
The shot above is from Katz's Delicatessan. I'm told the most famous deli in New York (where Meg Ryan does the fake orgasm in 'When Harry Met Sally') but I'm sure that would be debated depending on what neighborhood you were asking in. This is the best pastrami sandwich I've ever eaten and those who know me well know that I have a love affair with pastrami. The best $15 I ever spent.
I don't know why I thought this banner was so funny. The irony of finding a driving school in the heart of China town was just too much for me. I have to say this is one of the cooler neighborhoods I went to in Manhattan, with its old buildings and seafood in baskets all over the sidewalk. The diversity of New York is no secret but what struck me was how different all the different neighborhoods are. Just in Manhattan there are dozens all with their own feel and that isn't including the Bronx, Brooklyn, or Staten Island. It affects New Yorkers vocabulary too. Every conversation includes street numbers and subway routes, something like this;

"Why didn't you take the NRQW up to West 56th street?"
"Because I had to get cross town from Brooklyn and the L ends at Union Square and 3rd Ave!"
"Listen to this freakin' guy, heh. Take the bus you schmo."
"Hey! Oh!"

Ok just my own perception. Thanks again to Zeke and Sean for putting me up.

The Windy City

I started a little trip over in Chicago to see my friend Josh and also because I had never been to the Midwest (beyond an airport). Someone told me that Chicago is great because of its working class roots. I would definitely agree. The city has a great night life, lots of younger people and not too heavy of a big city vibe. The highlight of the trip was going to see a Cubs game at Wrigley field. Josh, two of his friends and I barbecued a few blocks away then made our way to the outfield bleachers where we scored some great seats four rows above the ivy in left center field. I came to understand why Josh got so mad at me when I referred to Wrigley as a baseball stadium, it's not a stadium, it's a ballpark. The old style ballpark is so small and intimate that we could yell at the center fielder of the Pirates and he would laugh and nod his head. He even threw us a ball, at least we thought that he threw it to us. The toss was a little high and the ensuing scramble resulted in several beverages being spilled. But who can complain about a ballpark that sells tall cans of Pabst?

Viva la North Idaho!

Coming back from Western Samoa in the summer with nothing to start till fall my Peace Corps friend Josh and I decided that it would be a good idea to have fun in the sun for a couple months. Luckily my family has an amazing cabin on pristine Priest Lake in the Idaho panhandle that had our names written all over it. We quickly snagged jobs as bartenders at a local resort called Hill's and bought some fishing licenses. The summer has been nothing but fun. Fishing, boating, hiking, partying, water sporting, etc. Many articles have been lost to the lake gods (cellphones, sunglasses, cash, etc.).
John and Bob made a brief appearance. The madness that ensued was to be expected. A couple detours through British Columbia, Vancouver, and Seattle aside we've been enjoying the lake and all the cool people we get to work with.

The hikes in the surrounding area are some of the best I've ever done because they are so few people who come here. View from Mt. Roothan over to Chimney Rock. Doesn't that pose just smack of genuine spontaneity?

Saying goodbyes

Well my service has been brought to an end, saying goodbye was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. That is another reason for the long time between posts. It's been hard even to talk about it let alone write it down. Luckily it was a motivator for my family to finally get a picture with everyone. I'd been trying for at least three months for this picture.I left on a Monday so on the final Sunday my village chiefs had a To'onai (Sunday feast) for me and gave me all kinds of gifts that I really didn't expect. I gave a farewell speech and tried to hold back my tears, I was unsuccessful. Afegogo just put his head back and closed his eyes for a few minutes so he wouldn't cry. He did tell me that he broke down in the plantation. It's amazing how close you get to people here both because so much time is spent in close quarters and lots of time to just chat. Here is another picture I tried to get of the whole village but only about a quarter of them stayed. I'm that big tall white thing in the back in case you were wondering.
When the Peace Corps vehicle came to pick me up in the morning it was almost a euphoric feeling, like a dream. It didn't feel real that I was leaving this place that had come to feel like my home. The whole village came over to my house and they stopped school so all the kids came over to see me off. It was the most emotional experience of my life to see all the love that these people are capable of giving. My young host sisters didn't really understand that I was leaving for good and the boys couldn't even look at me they were so sad. But by far my host parents were the most emotional. I was absolutely bawling when I hugged them goodbye. They kept telling me to come back. Driving away the kids ran after the car and I looked over a village of Samoans that had come to be like my second family.

Final Garden Update

This looks like my final garden update, I'm passing the torch to my host family and the women's committee to carry on my hard work and nutritional expertise. Tapu and Ma'anima will do the weeding and maintenance and Afegogo will work on the crops. I've never seen cucumber grow so fast, it has run up the fence I made over it (below). I am writing about this from back in the states with some lag time because the last thing I wanted to do as I was getting ready to leave was update my blog. I tried to take it all in. Recently, I talked to my host-family and they told me that the cucumbers are already coming in large. Hopefully my host brothers will continue to work on it, actually I'm hoping that my host parents make them maintain it. Once they see what yield they can get I think it will motivate them more.

Check out that bok-choy! It grows like a weed! The only downside is that the bugs like it as much as I do. Left of center is some heady cabbage that is coming in nicely, although I may have stunted it's growth by not transfering it soon enough. Only time will tell.

Career Day 07'

I am part of an NGO called Avanoa Tutusa (Equal Opportunities) a group of Peace Corps volunteers started a few years ago with the aim to hold an annual career day for the students of Samoa. We raised funds through selling funnel cakes during the Teuila Festival (cultural event) and through donations from private companies and from the Ministry of Women division of youth. This year was by far the biggest career day to date and we got a lot of good press for it. We coordinated 1,500 students, 50 businesses, and several ministries. We worked together with the National University of Samoa to hold both the career day and their open day in unison, which showed not only job but also higher education opportunities. The response from students was really encouraging. We wanted to show them that there is a future for them to be successful in Samoa without having to go overseas, which is a commonly held belief.

This is an example of one of the booths. Students seemed to be really attracted to idea of being a Police officer.

Bingo!

One of my latest endeavors has been to build a computer lab in the Primary School not only for the kids and teachers but also for everyone in the village who wants to learn how to use a computer. My initial attempts to motivate the leadership in the village weren’t all that successful. So I used the carrot of two donated computers (my old laptop and a old desktop from my parent’s office, thanks again rents) if they would raise the money to prepare the room. It needs a desk, chairs, surge protector, fan, and needs to be sealed because in Samoa if you don’t have air conditioning the next best thing is to seal the room with cardboard and keep a fan on max speed whenever the computer is on because the humidity does bad voodoo to electronics. That was my offer and suggested that they do some sort of fund-raising to acquire those few things, not that it was a big deal but I was trying to find a way for the community to have ownership of the project.

To my surprise, during the meeting of parents (almost like a PTA) and the school committee they decided to have a Bingo to raise the money. Bingo here is like a national past time. It is played almost bi-weekly by people of all ages. They then debated about how many, what kind of games, what the prizes would be, and which families would be responsible to bring which prizes. I am basically a Bingo virgin. They went on about 4 ons, 6 ons, Specials, Jackpots, Bonuses for over an hour. I was confused the whole time. But it all worked out as you can see from the pictures. Because the school draws kids from my village and the next it was deceptively large. It was during this afternoon that I lost my Bingo virginity.

The normal prizes consist of laundry powder soap, laundry bar soap, body soap, Top Ramen packets, rice, sugar, mosquito coils, etc. And the Specials, Jackpots, Bonuses have the stuff mentioned above plus boxes of cup o noodles, eggs, big bags of rice, and someone was supposed to bring a teapot but they dropped the ball. Exciting stuff.

All in all we raised 850 Samoan tala or about $220. I have to say I was blown away. It’s way more than a few of the things we need cost. To add to that I just got a grant approved from the Australian High Commission for school furniture that I was unsure about. So there has already been some rumors about wanting to buy some other computers and I have a contact through other Peace Corps Volunteers of a computer store owner in New Zealand who will ship us deeply discounted computers. If that happens it would work out better than I ever thought it would.

My plan is to have different classes during the week mostly for school age children but also for kids my age and adults. If anyone is interested in donating any computer related equipment or software it would be much appreciated and well used. Please contact me by email first and I will give you my mailing address here.

Village matais (chiefs) counting the bread. My host-father is on the right. Nothing like Bingo and Pall Mall Menthols.

Pe'a Samoa

So I got a little tatoo the other day... I went to see a tatoo artist named Suluape who is known in international tatoo circles as one of the better traditional style Samoan tatooists. I went out to his house and brought a case of beer with me as a gift before we started (part of the culture and the man likes to drink Vailima), we talked for awhile then went back into an open fale with a couple of his boys, and before I knew it I was laying down with the guys stretching the skin while he tapped a stick with sharpened boars teeth (that he also raises in the back) on the end with another stick to inject the ink in a series of tiny dots.

All in all it took about four hours with one break halfway through. It was a really good experience and to be honest the actual tapping didn't hurt very much. Afterwards I had a fever until I went to sleep but now I feel good. It's really swollen today and sore as you maybe can tell from the pictures.

Going up to his place and seeing him it is hard to believe that he goes around the world to give tatoos. While he works he has kids lite cigarettes for him and he smokes no handed. Dogs were running in and out of the open house, kids playing everywhere, all while I was laying there watching coconut and breadfruit trees sway in the wind; it made it all that more fun and rewarding to have a real Samoan experience. Mom, dad, please don't be mad at me and Mor Fa please don't disown me.

The tatoo is actually the upper portion of the Samoan naval to knees tatoo that men get when they finish puberty. The star-like symbol sitting by itself on the front of my bicep is where the bellybutton would be and the back of my arm would be the lower back. It had to be stretched a little differently because my arm isn't exactly in proportion to a waist. All the lines of symbols mean different things but Suluape isn't much of a talker so I'll ask someone else who knows.

My host-family's reaction has been entertaining. They of course love it, as Samoans are into tatoos in general. They couldn't believe that I had it done the traditional way and not with a gun. My host-father has been showing me how to take care of it. He gave me a fofo which is like a heavy massage on it. It hurt like hell but is good because the ink tends to bleed if you don't work it out because I'm told that with the tapping technique it gets under the plasma when a normal tatoo does not. When I tried to go to sleep with a bandage around it so that the ink didn't bleed all over my sheets my host-parents about freaked out. Apparently your not supposed to do that. They kept telling me "no, no, you'll get sores, you'll get sores!" So I just threw down a lavalava on my bed and let it run. I am going to go with local knowledge with this one.

Garden Update

Alright so the garden is beoming half way respectable. It took a lot of work constructing a fence that can keep the zoo of chickens and pigs from coming in and feasting on my little seedlings. My host brothers and I collected coconut frawns that had fallen down and dried and stuck them in the ground vertically. Chickens being the highly intelligent animals that they are don't try to get in if they can't see what is inside. I am also using coconut husks around the small plants to keep the soil in place during heavy rain and to keep weeds down. So the current crops are pole beans, tomatoes, chinese cabbage, head cabbage, carrots, cucumber, corn, melons, lemon grass, lau pele, kang kong, mint, basil, sweet potato, and a couple little experiments. We'll see what can survive the insects, floods, locusts, fire and brimstone that will probably conspire against me. The whole village has been coming behind my house to have a look so the buzz has been good. The women's committee is setting up their own fence and now the next village wants to make a cabbage garden.

A day in the life

Me learning how to weave a coconut palm around a fish so that it can be put in an umu (hot rock oven).

Typical meal after church on Sunday. That's palusami, breadfruit, taro, beef, chicken, and cream soup. My host-mother said she is trying to get me fat. Me playing Samoan cricket. The bat is like a primitive club. MORE TO COME!

Baby Tana!

This last weekend I went back to our training village of Vaie'e to visit my host family and to visit the new baby my host-parents had. They chose to name him Tana (my Samoan name). Me with the new bundle of joy.

Garden Party

As part of a secondary project that I am trying to pursue I asked my host-father Afegogo, who is also the village mayor, if I could start a garden. At first he and the rest of my host-family were a little skeptical. They told me that I wouldn’t want to do that because I would get dirty. They tend to have a specific idea on how Westerners are. After reassuring them my host-brother Ma’anima and I went into the jungle, machetes in hand to cut us down some trees to make fence posts. Even at the tender age of 14 Ma’anima can embarrass me with machete wielding technique. When the rest of the family saw us, hands dirtied, they assumed that I was serious and really got into it. The next day I saw Afegogo back on the proposed area chopping down everything he could make posts out of and cutting off branches to let in more light. He told me that we will grow lots of cabbage and other assorted vegetable, we will make it big, and it will be an example for the whole village. So this has got me excited with the possibility of getting other families to start gardens and hopefully getting the school involved with one complemented by nutrition classes. Also, I’m looking forward to eating some vegetables myself.

I thought it would be fun to have a quarterly garden report for the blog with a photo to show progress and set backs. So here is the first one. I know currently it may not yet be a garden party so much as a small gathering of friends but give it time and we’ll see in three months.

Samoan Maliu (Funeral)

I went to my second Samoan wedding last week in the neighboring village of Utulaelae. Actually, I went to the last day of the multi-day affair. On this day the family of the deceased who was an older matai (village chief) began cooking in the early morning hours in preparation of the several hundred meals consumed throughout the day by family, relatives, and fellow villagers on site, as well as, taken by visitors to their own villages to be given out to their families and friends. As part of the customs this day relatives from outside the village come to exchange gifts. This exchange (usually fine mats, boxes of tin fish and corned beef, slaughtered pigs and cattle, cash, or any combination of these that you can imagine) I think is a real hallmark of the Samoan culture. I just now have enough understanding of the language and culture to comprehend the ins and outs of this highly formalized affair. For example, the deceased’s cousin from a village across the island comes with thirty boxes of canned corned beef and five fine mats, usually presented like the picture above. They all sit in a group at the very front of the yard with the orator (a specific kind of high chief) standing in front with his staff and whisk. The orator then presents their gifts to a similar group of the deceased’s family also lead by an orator. This is very formal respectful language that I sometimes don’t understand. The gifts are accepted then the orator (to continue my above example) may give back the equivalent of %120 to 150 of the amount received, such as a cow, pig, six different fine mats, and 200 Samoan tala. Of course this can very widely but just to give an idea. Throughout the day many groups of relatives may come by to show their respects depending on the size of the family and if you do the math this can be a large burden on the family. From what I’ve been told, funerals are a common time for relatives to send financial help from abroad (usually New Zealand, Australia, and the U.S.) and/or make the trip back themselves.

The day I attended there is much more than just an exchange of gifts. The entire day the ‘daughters if the village’ (girls born in the village) sit around the body in an open fale and sing together. Matais of the village come in a formal offering of palms (pictured above). Around a dozen people are cooking food in huge pots and pans constantly. There is really no somber feelings the whole day like I imagine an American funeral. People are laughing and joking around, visiting with friends and above all eating a lot. *Footnote on the last comment, the time I did see solemn faces was when the proceedings are done and the body is moved from the house to the grave in front (pictured below).

Samoans love to talk to me about the differences between the palangi life and the fa’asamoa life. It’s interesting to hear how some people react when I tell them that American funerals last maybe an afternoon and it is a relatively straightforward ordeal. I can tell that some of them are a little envious of the simplicity we have but some just act nonchalant and say “well this is just our culture.” I’m glad that they have kept their old ways even in the light of Western influence and Christianity.