A little bit of Dengue, School, and just life!

Excuse the delay in a post. I was dying of Dengue Fever. Dengue Fever is a terrible virus you get from a mosquito bite. And let me tell you, IT IS TERRIBLE. To my friends back in America land most of you have probably had a fever. But when you have a fever you have air conditioning and heat and really anything you need that can help make you more comfortable. Here in Tonga as we are right in the middle of the hottest month in Tonga we have 88 degree weather with 90% humidity and no air conditioning to accompany the fever. Along with the fever comes body aches like nobodies business. A nickname for Dengue is ‘Breaking Bone Syndrome’. It felt what I imagine it would feel like to turn 95 the day after running 5 marathons. Headache, rash, vomiting, bleeding of the gums also come on the side. Luckily, I only got the headache and rash. And there is absolutely nothing you can do but sleep, drink water, and take Tylenol. Dengue fever is definitely most likely in Dante’s 10^th level of Hell. Moral of the story, wear your bug spray, friends! And while my immune system was in recovery, Tonga went a head and threw some more Strep Throat at me…again…for the third time since I have been here.

Anyways, the third week of school just came to an end. The first two weeks I spent observing and making different resources and materials for the students. Then this past Monday I was supposed to start teaching, but ya know, Dengue Fever. It was really hard to be in my house, which is 20 feet from the school while all the kids were at school. It made me feel even crummier. Luckily, I have very understanding counterparts and we will just have to try again this Monday.

Anyways, I am so incredibly excited to start teaching. Before coming to Tonga I didn’t think that there would be such a big language barrier between the students and I because I was under the impression that their English would be close to if not fluent. Well, I was wrong. I think it would be fair to say that I know more Tongan than most of my student’s know English. Which means they know very little English. It just makes the challenge that were exhilarating and in turn of helping them with their English they are really making me study up on my Tongan. The good part is that there is always a Tongan teacher in the classroom with me as a counterpart so if I am every really struggling with speaking to the students the teacher is there to translate.

My school is still very small. We have 38 students in the school this year; class one through class six. It is so nice having small classes, makes learning so much more productive. Meleongo is the only teacher that stayed at my school. I got a new principal, Moana and a new 5/6 teacher, ‘Aleki. They are both great people and I already enjoy working with them. This week while I was sick they brought me my two favorite foods in Tonga. Moana brought ‘Ota ‘Ika and ‘Aleki brought a lobster fresh from the ocean.

First week of school

As promised, pictures of the inside of my house!

My bedroom

Living room/classroom area!

Tribute to home

A map a made of my village, Tufuvai

Kitchen/Living room

Kitchen

*Current Events on ‘Eua

1.     Nila is an elderly lady in my village who is 72 years full of sass! Well, a couple of weeks ago at church she was sitting towards the front on the left side of the church and I was sitting one row behind her, but on the right side. She was sitting close to the side door. Then, mid sermon a dog starts to come into the church through the door she was sitting by. Before I knew what was happening homegirl whipped her croc (yea, crocs are also her shoe of choice. She is a gem.) off and chucked it at the dog. Nobody flinched. I on the other hand had to look away and take a minute to compose.

2.     The second story may be funny to you or may not be depending on your personality. My sister I am going to go ahead and say will find it terrifying, but say someone like Sarah Beard will find it funny. Last week I went to Meleongo’s house around dinnertime. The whole family had just sat down to eat dinner, so of course they invited me to come eat (the timing was planned by the way, possibly what happened next was karma). Ongo’s sister gives me a plate of food. I eat over at their house a lot so I really don’t every question what I am eating if I do not know because they always have good food. Anyways, I thought I was eating some chicken, some very flavorful chicken at that. We finish eating and I step outside to check that Faina (my puppy) was still there and I notice that one of their dogs is missing. It was very weird not to see him because this is a crack dog. He is always acting a fool. So I asked, “Where is Miko?”. They all look at each other then down at their plate then at me and Ongo’s dad says, “Mate. Kovi aupito kuli.” (Dead. He was a very bad dog). In case you are in denial I will spell it out for you. I ate dog. It would have been nice to maybe know before it happened, but it maybe and by maybe definitely would not have happened had I known. But to their defense he was a very bad dog.

3.     It’s avocado, guava, and passion fruit season in Tonga. #blessed

Miss and love you all!

‘Ofa Atu!

2015 KI AI!

Tongatapu is kind of like going to Disney World after living on a remote island for a couple of months. There are restaurants, public transportation, and wheat bread. It’s the little things. I got to indulge in a lot of delicious foods (thai, pizza, hamburgers, ICED COFFEE) and did not have to eat root crops for a whole week.  Also, a group of us went to the Land Bridge on Tongatapu. It is this amazing creation of Earth where there is a literal bridge made of rock and dirt going over the ocean. It was beautiful and amazing and I climbed part way up a coconut tree there! It was nice to be in a big city for a couple weeks, but by the end of the two weeks I was ready to get back to my small remote island of root crops and more root crops. 

Luckily, our flight home was right on time and getting back to ‘Eua was a lot easier than getting to Tongatapu. I got home around 7:30am with plans of soaking some laundry and catching up on my sleep. I open my front door and walk into a house covered in mold. The last two weeks had been very rainy and humid leaving all fifteen of us coming home to moldy house. Thankfully my mold was isolated to the front of my house and mainly my kitchen area, which was easy(er) to clean because some people had moldy clothes and sheets. As it turns out living in the middle of the Pacific Ocean isn’t all sunshine and palm trees.

With this past week being the last week of summer break I started working on stuff to use in the classroom and squeezed in a few more adventures. I went to Fangatave twice. I first went on Thursday with Sammy B and three palangis that were vacationing in ‘Eua. I just happened to meet them the day before because I was walking past the wharf when they got off the boat. They were very confused and asked me for help. I gave them a little tour of ‘Eua and told them some different adventures that would be exciting for them to go on the following day, which is how we all ended up going to Fangatave together. Then Sami L’s mom was here and so we took her to Fangatave on Saturday. So much fun and I do not think I will ever get tired of the pure beauty Fangatave has to offer. 

Pictures compliments of Sammy! 

There has also been a funeral going on in my village this past week. It is something really incredible to see my whole village come together and celebrate a life. It is a week of feasting and honoring the deceased. I did not know the lady who passed away very well, but she is my Town Officer’s sister.

Cooking cake for the whole village! 

 

And my sweet kitty, Maka died a few days after Christmas, potentially from an infection after getting spayed. It was really sad and hard on me. Then this week a boy in my village who happens to be named Maka brought me a puppy. He told me I could name the puppy Maka too. I ended up naming the puppy Faina (fine-uh), which means pineapple. The next day Maka asked me what I named the puppy and was disappointed to hear that is was not Maka, so Faina’s full name is now Faina Maka Fosita (Maka’s last name). We all know that I am really not an animal person and I honestly think I could be more productive with a human child than a puppy, but it is nice to have someone to talk to and interact with since I live alone. And she is super hard to get mad at because she just looks at me with one ear up and one ear down and I can’t handle the cuteness.

Also, in other news I have been plagued with strep throat again. It is miserable.

‘Ofa atu! And it is my main boo thing’s birthday. Send Katja some special birthday love!

Ps. My next blog post will feature pictures of the inside of my house and a report on the first week of school. Stay tuned!

Uatolu

Today is my birthday and I am 23. Feels odd to be the age described as 23. I have heard from friends and have even read articles about the 23^rd year of life being a hard one. It is not necessarily an exciting year and it can be a stressful time for many young people. However, I get to spend my 23^rd year of life on a tropical island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean so I have pretty high hopes for this year of life.

My wonderful friends and co-volunteers spoiled me today for my birthday! They are the best. They sang me happy birthday, made me cookies, got me a cake, and even went out for a birthday dinner and drinks! My fabulous island mates and my girl Kay Kay from my language group/first roommate/first Peace Corps friend got me the most incredible birthday present. I have had my eye on these journals that are covered and bound using tapa and decorated with Tongan art for a while now to use as a journal/scrapbook of my time here, but hadn’t gotten one yet because they are a little pricey. Well, what do you know…these three beautiful people got me one for my birthday. I could not stop smiling. I was cheesing hard. I cannot wait to use and then have it as memory of my time in Tonga for the rest of my life.

It was just a really happy day surrounded by really wonderful people. And luckily for me my birthday is officially over in Tonga, but It has just begun in America. Birthday celebration round TWO!

Vakapuna Si’isi’i

On Saturday the Sams and I flew to Tongatapu for a two week training with the Peace Corps. Our flight was supposed to leave ‘Eua at 8:30am, but we did not arrive to Tongatapu until 6:30pm. Now in a normally that honestly would not be the world’s worst day of travel, but our flight was only eight minutes long. The flight from ‘Eua to Tongatapu and vise versa in the world’s shortest commercial flight in the world. The flight only take between seven and eight minutes, seats 18 people, and doesn’t even get high enough in the air for your ears to pop. And most importantly it is 100 times better than the three hour ferry ride it normally takes. Anyways, the night before we left we were told our flight got delayed until 12:30, no big deal. So around 12:30 we show up at the airport, cause well checking in takes about 10 seconds and there is literally nobody at the airport. Finally, around 1 people start to appear and we are informed that the flight will now not be leaving until four. At this point it is not worth going home, especially because you never know the plane could always show up earlier and leave without us. We settle in to a three hour wait and then four o’clock roles around and still no plane. Long story short the plane finally arrives around 5:45pm. We board the plane around 6:20 and by 6:30 we are in Tongatapu.

In terms of the airport, most people would not think it was an airport upon seeing it. The ‘Eua airport is literally a cement road with a chain link fence blocking it off and small house, with a sign haning on the fence reading, “Do not cross if unauthorized” and a sign hanging in the house reading, “These items should not be brought on to the plane because they are dangerous.” Never once though were our bags looked through or was a person guarding the fence. Also, when checking in the lady weighed my carry on, weighed my check bag, and then said, “Your turn”. I looked at her confused and she repeated, “Your turn to be weighed”. It was a weird, weird day.

Kilisimisi Fiefia moe Fo’ou Ta’u

Merry Christmas Friends and a very Happy New Year!

Spending Christmas without my family and specifically in a different country was very weird feeling. In some ways it feels like Christmas hasn’t even happened and it is insane that it is already January (birthday month!). The Tongan culture is even all about Christmas. Christmas music has been playing since October, there are Christmas trees, and feasting, but not having your family there takes away from the holiday spirit a lot. Lucky for me I have a family here in Tonga and I got to spend my favorite holiday with my counterpart, Meleongo’s family. It was so fun to stay with them for a couple of nights and spend the holiday together. On Christmas I got to eat my favorite Tongan food, ota ika (raw fish in coconut milk) and I even got some earrings from Meleongo’s family; a true blessing to have them to spend the holiday with. The next day we spent the whole day at the beach. Blessed.

After Christmas some fun Peace Corps from the main island, Tongatapu came to visit the Sams and I and spend the New Year with us. We took the friends on an almost 10 mile hike to Fangatave, which is a cliff and beach area at the North end of ‘Eua. In order to get to the beach you have to very closely follow directions from a tour book with have, otherwise it is almost impossible to safely make it down to the beach. The directions go like: climb over the locked fence, stay within 10 feet from the edge of the cliffs, look for the tree that looks like a whale tail; once at the whale tale look to your right and you will find a blue rope. It took us a minute to find the whale tree, but I will say that the tree really does look like a whale tail. Once you get to the rope you then have to do some small rock climbing down a couple of cliffs, but conveniently there are ropes along the way for support. Once going down about four or five cliff edges you get to the most INCREDIBLE beach I think that you can even really imagine. This beach is on the side of the island where nobody lives and since it isn’t the easiesit beach to get to it is deserted and absolutely breath taking. We immediately ran into the ocean for a swim. After cooling off in the water we had hot dogs and some other snacks and a couple of Tongan guys with us even climbed a coconut tree for us so we could enjoy a fresh coconut. YUMM! I can even open my own coconut now in three hits and without spilling any of the water #boom and I am currently in training (training as serious as training can get with the Sams to be able to climb a coconut tree to get coconuts for ourselves).

The following day was New Year’s Eve. We brought in the New Year by going to church that night at 10pm until about 1am. It is one way that I never imagined I would spend a New Year’s Eve. During this church service there were four sermons and a whole lot of singing and bell ringing. After church the Sams and I introduced our friends to the wonders of Maxis (the dance house mentioned in a previous post). It was a wild night of dancing and eating ice cream that didn’t end until about 5am. Worth every memory!

With that being said I hope you all had such a wonderful Christmas and New Year because I sure did.

New Year’s Resolutions

1.     Be able to climb a coconut tree.

2.     Improve my Tongan.

3.     Become more receptive.

4.     Take a morning walk for some meditation and reflection time at least three days a week.

5.     Live in every moment.