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.