Huh? Where does the time go? 1 month from today...a trip to America!

Well, I wish I had been bitten by a pig or had been climbing up a coconut tree…some crazy story to tell… So on Thursday, my lava lava was rubbing against my leg and ended up creating a little scratch, nothing crazy. Friday, comes and the foot is better named elephant foot, definitely quite swollen and pretty red. Hence, I am sitting on the couch today, Monday, although it is a school day. The weird wacky thing is definitely the fact that this happened due to a piece of fabric huh??? I am confused. Anyway, all is good because the medical officer certainly takes good care of us all.

Let me tell you though, that although I had bad timing on this one (Independence Day Friday, lots of cool stuff went on all weekend, parades—I saw my Samoan brothers and sisters from Ma’asina on TV marching in the parade!, Samoan dancing, fire dancing), it has been a very good month overall. Went on the bike ride with Laura for 4 days---beautiful views in Savai’i although unfortunately didn’t get any pictures. We were just moving too fast to be able to stop…haha…yeah right…we definitely walked a few of the hills and decided it wasn’t cheating if we took a guy up on his offer to give us a ride on up and over one of the hills to the next village. We stayed with 2 volunteers and also stayed at Falealupo beach fales, where we saw the last sunset of May 8th. (Same place we had stayed for New Years). Next came Mother’s Day in the village. Awesome program put on by the mothers in the church. They did a bunch of dances and singing as well as a skit. At the end, all of the mothers lined up in the front of the church and were given candy necklaces. (different from the candy necklaces that you are thinking of). Then was Early Service Training, where we had language/ cross cultural seminars and stayed in beach fales. This was cut short however by the passing of Malietoa, the longest running head of state in the world. So Thursday and Friday were both holidays for his funeral. Definitely a very significant event in the lives of Samoans and people around the world.

Then Term 2 began…we are trying to get a ton books into Samoa and to create a lot of libraries in the Primary Schools. So I met with Ministry of Education, spoke with Rotary, and other volunteers. Lots of good ideas, so hopefully they will all work out. Continuing working on reading at school, have changed the program for 7 and 8, so far so good, and was also able to do a little pen pal thing with my friend who just graduated from the literacy program at Geneseo. Really cool to teach the kids about different cultures…pretty funny for me also, to try to explain the things in the students’ letters, like what a cafeteria and gymnasium are. Also, one of my other friends, who teaches in NYC, has been having his students write me letters all year. He has them research Samoa on the computer and then the students ask me more questions. Really good for the students and the letters always put me in a great mood! Created a big book from a Dr. Seuss for the students at school. Definitely cannot take the credit for this at all though. I did write the words on posterboard, but then 2 of the guys from the village, 24/25 years old, came over and drew the pictures. Wow! They are incredible too! One guy drew the pictures, and the other one colored. What they probably do not know now is that I will probably be recruiting them for many of these! They did seem to have a really great time with it though! Started piano lessons again for the one guy in the other village. He is a really quick learner and has a really good ear- definitely fun to teach him, of course that also means he will probably be better than me pretty soon and I will have to recruit another volunteer to teach him.

Then was the Manu Samoa/Junior All Blacks rugby game. Went with 2 girls and a guy from my village who go to the same church as me. Not a great game for the Manu but an awesome day of hanging out, which ended with a trip to Scoops, the ice cream place in Apia. Ton of fun, everyone in blue, some people with face paint, people running around with Samoan flags…good fun. Definitely made a few of my rugby playing cousins in America jealous going to that one!

Well, 1 month from today, I will be in Fishkill, NY how crazy! Celebrating another Independence Day. This month will definitely fly by too, as the new group comes in on Wednesday, so we have a fiafia for them on Saturday, followed by a librarian training program next weekend for teachers in my school (YEAH!..we will turn all these great books you have sent from the States into a library  ), followed by a trip back to Ma’asina with 2 other volunteers, followed by a half marathon in Apia (haha, that could be pretty comical considering I haven’t run 13 miles probably since running at Geneseo!), followed by a nice long nap only to be interrupted by meals, also known as a plane ride, but hey, should be fun because now I will be able to talk to the people on the plane with me , followed by a great wedding and 2 weeks of hanging out with all of my awesome family and friends in America!

Love you all. See you soon.

Your daughter, sister, granddaughter, niece, cousin, friend in Samoa,
Sally