Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Exciting News!


This seems a slightly strange forum for this but since it’s currently my primary form of communication and the easiest way to mass-disseminate information, I have some news… I’m engaged! Andrew, my fiancé, is a member of the same Peace Corps group that I came to Samoa with, and he is working here at the National University of Samoa teaching computer programming. He and I met in LA during staging to come here, started going out within the first week, and things have continued along to the point where we have decided we want our second year in country to be as a married couple. We’re planning on coming back to California in October for a couple of weeks and getting married there so that family and friends can be a part of our celebration and then we’ll return here and probably live in my house next year. It’s quite funny actually that we both grew up in southern California, probably a 45 minute drive apart, but we had to come halfway around the world to find each other here. We’re both really happy and excited to attempt to plan a wedding from a distance- should be an interesting challenge if nothing else. Fortunately family has proved willing to help us along stateside in the endeavor. We’re thrilled to be able to share our news with everyone and can’t express how excited we are to be coming home in six months for this occasion!

My Ring



Here are a couple of photos of the ring Andy bought me for our engagement. People here traditionally wear pearl jewelry so we liked the idea of having a ring that represents the place that brought us together. Plus it's purty :)

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Vacation



Since my mom was visiting and she isn’t paid in Samoan tala, we decided to take a vacation for the weekend while she was here and go stay at a posh resort on the south side of the island called Coconuts. It was absolutely beautiful and so much fun. We stayed in a cute little fale right on the beach with the most amazing shower I have ever seen in my entire life- it was all lava rocks and the water came spurting out of them like a fountain. It felt like you were standing under your own mini waterfall. There was also an adorable swimming pool shaped like a pili (gecko) overlooking the ocean. We could walk into the water from our house and go snorkeling and play with the starfish. We were also right near a mangrove that we rented kayaks and paddled around in. It was wonderful. We ate huge quantities of delicious food and hung out and played scrabble and relaxed a whole lot. It was quite fun seeing Samoa from the tourist/traveler perspective since it’s totally different from the experiences one has living here from day to day. It was also of course wonderful to have my mom here for a visit. It was much too short and makes me quite conscious of how far away I am from everyone. I love it here but I definitely miss everyone back home very much.

Alu Kele!


My mom was here visiting me this past week. It was so wonderful getting to see her and being able to show her what my life is like here. I try really hard to describe for everyone back home but some things defy explanation, so it’s nice to have her experience more than just tales of the Fa’aSamoa. On Thursday we went out to visit my family in Falevao so she could see the island and where our training took place and so that she could meet my surrogate Samoan family. The second we got there my grandmother scolded us for bringing cake and whipped out her sewing machine to shower both my mom and myself with all forms of fabric and clothing. We hung out for a while and then I decided to show my mom around the village. One of my little sisters in the village is very sick from infected boils on her legs and cannot walk right now so we decided we would drive through Falevao in our rental car so that she could accompany us since she’s been bed-ridden for quite some time. I carried her into the car and five of my other little siblings poured out of the woodwork and jumped in as well. We crammed into the car and drove through the village at about 2 miles per hour with all the kids jumping and screaming and pointing to people and places they knew and wanted to go. We drove past the far end of town and up the mountain where they were quite chagrined when we turned around and they insisted that we take another detour to the nearest village from the other end of town, which we did. Meanwhile in the backseat the kids are chanting at the top of their lungs “alu kele, alu kele, alu kele, ALU KELE!” Which directly translates into “go a lot.” They were having a blast and didn’t care where we went as long as we just kept going! We finally had to bribe them with coke and lollies to make them willing to return home. It was a great visit and a fabulous way to show mom around town.