I'm in the Volunteer lounge on our last night in Nuku'alofa before we head out to Vava'u and our homestays for the next 6 weeks. Since the scary boat is missing an engine and not running this week we're flyingout tomorrow morning (yay!) around 7am and starting our homestays a bit early.
I am definitely a bit nervous for homestay given mycomplete lack of Tongan language skills. But I'm excited to learn and,with any luck, I'll be conversational at the end of 6 weeks. I'm also really excited to learn about how basic household tasks are carried out in a Tongan village- everything from washing clothes, to bucket showers, to making coconut cream, and I really hope my host family will be able to teach me all of this. Plus, a little basket weaving orcoconut husking would come in handy too.
Saturday we had water safety training, directly after learning about the pages and pages of deadly and dangerous water creatures thatpopulate the south Pacific- everything from sharks to stonefish...awesome. Regardless, it was really fun- we went down to the naval base and a few Tongan navy personel conducted the training, which was honestly a glorified swim class. We had to jump of a ship, swim around a lot, tow people (they neveractually taught us how to do this properly...), tread water, and boarda boat from the water. The ocean was beautiful- warm and turquoise-but very very salty. Some people definitely could not swim, including Carole, a 66 year old volunteer, but she got her lifevest and was a great sport! Lots of bonding and team support between all of us trainees, so that was a definite plus as well.
Yesterday (Sunday) was probably one of the best days. We had to meetup and go to church in the morning, and I wasn't too excited about that, obvi. I went with 3 other volunteers to the Catholic church, partially so Robin would be happy (kidding!), but mostly because I wanted to see if it was any different from a Catholic mass back home. Itwasn't at all- only difference was that they spoke in Tongan. Also, the choir was amazingly beautiful. Singing is a huge part of Tongan culture, and this local church sounded incredible- I can't even describe it. Then it was time for the other two staples of Sunday-food and naps! (Seriously, that's all people do on Sunday: go to church, eat a huge feast, and nap- it's wonderful) We went over to the Country Director's house located right on the ocean and had a very boring hour of training and then pig roast feast! Seriously, roasted pig backed in an underground oven that's dug into a hill. Didn't have any of the pig, but there were at least 5 different fish dishes, all of which we delicious (ifo), and tons of fresh mango, papaya, banana, watermelon, and coconut. The CD, Jeffery, opened up his house and his photo albums for us, and a handful of us spent a few hours on his porch overlooking tropical paradise.
The next time I write, I'll be in Vava'u: reputedly the friendliest of the "friendly islands" and the hottest!
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