You know you are in Samoa when...

The last three weeks have been amazing! It seems like I have been in Samoa for months, but it also seems crazy a month has already gone by! I love being here. Every day I literally look around in awe at all of the beauty and say at least once, “Are you FREAKING kidding me??? DO I REALLY LIVE HERE?”  Our little village is tiny and everyone knows where you are going, what you are doing, and who you are doing it with, EVERY second of the day.  But the people are so kind. They really love us. We all felt really emotional when we left to come on our site visits this weekend because our families came to see us off and they were all crying and kissing us goodbye.  We have already formed really tight relationships with our families, so it’s going to be hard to leave next month.

So basically, we are in this training village all together for 9 weeks before we swear in as PCVs next month.  We are living with different families, but pretty much everyone is related.  I live with a family that has three teenage girls and three little kids living there.  It’s nice. I have a little house of my own about ten feet from their main house. It’s only big enough to have my suitcase and a bed on the floor of the room, but there is a porch that I like to sit on and study/read/get ready/talk etc.   I eat all of my meals with my family, which is nice.   They feed me enough food for the entire village, but I don’t feel the pressure to eat everything because I know that there will always be someone waiting in line to eat whatever I don’t eat.  I eat a lot of taro. And I mean A LOT. Every meal.  But really, I’ve learned not to complain about that because when I don’t eat taro I find myself feeling hungry more…that’s what the Samoans say at least. They also tell me that I’m going to be sick because I walk in the sun too much (even though I’m only outside for like two hours a day).  I’m also going to be sick because I text too much. But DON’T WORRY! As long as I shower good, that will cure my sickness!  I really do love the Samoans and all of the differences that we have! My family takes such good care of me! I am never in need of anything. It’s funny because it’s like they are always watching me and if they see me looking like I might be thinking about possibly slightly needing something any time in the near future, they are right there checking on me! It truly is the best feeling. 

Besides my family, I pretty much just go to school for `10 hours a day.  We have been having intense language sessions every day, so my samoan is getting much better. It’s still pathetic, but improving!! After school I usually go home and talk with my family for a little bit, before I go watch or play volleyball or Frisbee or just go hang out on the beach.  About five times a week we have church choir practice, which is long, but sounds pretty.  I have to be home by 7:45 everyday because that’s the time everyone in the village has prayer and dinner.  After prayer, I take a shower.  During which my family asks me four times if I am going to shower. Converstaion always goes like this:   “Alu ta’ele?” (go shower?)  “Ioe, alu ta’ele.” “Ioe, Alu ta’ele.”  “alu ta’ele.” (I shower, and walk back towards my house).  “Uma ta’ele?” (finish shower?) “ioe, uma ta’ele.” “uma ta’ele” “lelei tele” (good job!).  “Vave tele oe” (You shower fast). It never strays from this dialogue.  I love it though, I really do. The rest of my night is spent studying or writing in my journal, or going to bed early.   WE went to tosua trench last Saturday and swam, it was very beautiful.  You should google it.  It’s this deep trench that was like a blown up blow hole or something, it’s really awesome. The Saturday before that we had culture day. We did a lot of traditional culture stuff that day, including killing a chicken!! I killed a chicken. There are pictures on facebook, it looks like I’m smiling but that was just the shock on my face of the fact that I was strangling a chicken!!   I won’t give all the details, but I’ll just say it was kind of crazy.   We went to the plantation and brought firewood and then made the taro and peeled unripe bananas to boil (which was the hardest thing we did that day) and then killed and plucked feathers out of the chicken.  We just sat around singing while we waited for the food to cook and then we had a big meal in which we got to serve the matais of the village. It was pretty cool!

Honestly, I don’t have a lot to report. I feel so grateful every single day to be here.  It’s kind of like being in a seriously intense school course because we are in class so much (even Saturdays for a few hours!) but it really is so nice to feel like I’m learning a lot already.  We start technical and educational training next week, so I’m really excited about that.  There is so much to teach and so many responsibilities, I feel like I really need the training to help me feel more prepared.  Even though I’m not doing much service right now, I just feel like I’m learning so much and like everything I’m learning is not only applicable to Samoa but to the rest of my life.   I can’t say it enough times, but the people are so happy here.  The children may not have clothes and they may have a very limited variety of food, but they laugh all of the time. They may walk around covered in sores, but they will bend over backwards to take care of anyone, even strangers.  I love it! The culture is so strong and giving, it’s beautiful.  I really don’t feel like I deserve to be here, but I am so grateful that I am.  They may call us the “Beach Corps” or “Posh Corps” but we are here to meet the needs of the people, and we will do all that we can to do that.  One of the guys in the group said, “You know, we applied to the PC not having any idea where they were going to send us and telling them we will go where they need us to go.  But they sent us here because they need help here, and I’m not going to feel bad that I’m living in paradise while I’m serving in the Peace Corps. “   I remind myself about that when I find myself feeling guilty that I’m not living the hardcore PC experience that I could be if I were in Africa, but again, you go where they ask you to go and do what needs to be done.  We just happen to be doing that in the most beautiful place on earth!!!  But I think the most important thing is not what you are doing or where you are doing it, but just that you ARE doing SOMETHING to try and help where help is needed.  

Our group has  a lot of "You know you are in Samoa" moments since we have been here, I will share a few now:

You know you are in Samoa when:

-You have everyone in your family wakes up to follow you to the bathroom in the middle of the night.

-People ask you where you are going when you are walking towards the shower with only your towel on.

-You find entertainment in watching the ants walk along their paths…and then you almost pee your pants when they keep running into each other. (But seriously, they have a whole wall to walk on, why do they only go on one little path and continue to bump into each other??).

-You get seven pieces of taro, a bowl of rice, spaghetti sandwiches, ramen noodles, orange milk tea, two apples, an orange, and whole papaya for breakfast.

-You consider it a cool day when you only have sweat stains with a 3 inch radius rather than a 12 inch radius.

-You hear the words Pisikoa and palagi over 100 times a day.

-You could win a gestures tournament because you have become so accustomed to acting things out to explain things you can’t communicate with the 10 Samoan words you know.

-You can name all of the songs that the chipmunks have covered, including but not limited to My Heart will Go On and every Christmas song imagined.

-A chicken lays an egg in your classroom.

-A chicken runs around in your classroom and no one notices.

-Sand comes out of your clean clothes.

-The word “Friend” means you are making out without that person.

-You don’t mind eating ants, because they are the much preferred alternative to cock roaches.

-You get excited to just eat a salad for lunch.

-You realize why the samoans eat taro after you feel hungry two hours after eating a salad.

-You get excited about only having to go to church for five hours on Sunday rather than seven.

-You only know when church is going to start based on the bells ringing thirty minutes before the actual service starts.

-Only showering twice a day seems like a small number.

-You feel hot as soon as you turn the cold water from your shower.

-Cigarettes are lit up in church to show what not to do.

-The life of Jesus is acted out with the soundtrack of lion king.

-You get called “Cheeky” on a daily basis,  but no one can actually define it for you.

-When it’s not ok to hang out with actual friends of the opposite sex, but the pastor can talk about marrying you off and make sexual jokes in church.

-Your house has sea shells and coral rocks in the grass in the yard.

-You start to complain about something and then you shut up long enough to hear the waves crashing on the sand and look at the palm trees and then can’t remember what you were upset about.

-You walk around every day looking at your surroundings and thinking “I’m the luckiest person alive.”

-You REALLY are the luckiest person alive.