Benj's Blog

Ava ceremony

2009-10-15T13:50:00.000-07:00

the samoan at the back is the orator who instructs me on who to give the ava to.

Rosie is the "taupo" or ceremonial virgin who prepares the ava. the guys on the side of her are protecting her and the ava.
I was the "tautu" or ava (kava) runner for group 82's welcome ceremony. Basically i fill up the cup and distribute the ava out to the ceremony's participants. this is done according to the orator's calling out of names. i was just glad i didn't drop the cup. thanks to other volunteers for the pics.

Tsunami

2009-10-05T14:55:00.000-07:00

This was her home. see the foundations in the background.

this is FaoFao beach fales where Peace Corps used to have conferences. The oceanside bar is completely gone. You would never know anything was there.

missing road by shane's house.

look how high the water rose. those little yellow things are people searching for bodies. they are about 100-150 yards from the ocean.

Shane's family's house across the street.

Shane's house used to be to the left of this foundation. The land isnt even there anymore.

Just a few pictures I took on Saturday. It's unreal the destruction that these waves caused.

Farewell to Neiafu

2009-08-22T12:58:00.000-07:00

Those "ulas" got really heavy. I had to take them off before i danced.

The school had a farewell for me last week where they brought gifts and sang songs for me. The women's committee in the village had one as well but i didnt take my camera to it. Saying goodbye for the most part was a bit awkward but there were some very heartfelt moments as well. But its not really goodbye b.c ill be visiting throughout the next year.

Father's Day at the Mormon Church

2009-08-22T12:36:00.000-07:00

My farewell dance. Longest 4 minutes of my life.

Pati and Vineta (host parents) (in black and red) dancing a couples dance. thats our dog Rover on the far right. always where he isnt supposed to be. he attends school and church as well.

On Saturday before (Samoan) Father's day they a dinner and talent show at the Mormon Church. Most families just do a dance to a Samoan or Western pop song. Thanks to Slumdog Millionaire and the Pussycat Dolls, Indian dance moves are getting popular.

Softball in Neiafu

2009-08-22T12:26:00.001-07:00

there are some future hall of famers in that bunch.

"for the hundredth time, stand beside the plate not on it!"

"look i dont want any crying out there ok? alright, lets go over signals."

see if you can spot the one with the glove on the wrong hand.

this was back a few months ago when another volunteer came by with some college softball players and we had a clinic in my village. the game grew exponentially as the day went on.

pics

2009-07-09T16:34:00.000-07:00

my repertoire... (for spear fishing)

my new spear. a fraction of the price and twice the distance as the three-prong pole spear. works like a sling-shot. still not easy to hunt with though. i feel like an underwater rambo with this thing.

this is the can crusher that was part of the recycling program. its bad ass if i may say so. not as easy to build as u may think. especially in a resource scarce area.

here is a catholic church in falealupo-tai that was destroyed by the hurricanes in the early 90s. very interesting inside, but my camera batteries died. theres also an open crypt full of human skulls and bones across the street because lots of graves were washed out and human bones washed up everywhere so they threw them all in this one place.

4th of july softball

2009-07-09T16:29:00.000-07:00

plain and simple we kicked navy's ass...

waiting an eternity for the ball to get there...

nice little 4th of july at the rl stevenson museum. the us navy is here doing medical clinics and we had a softball game, cookout, and dancing.

Dr. Niko and the diabetes workshop

2009-06-12T12:26:00.000-07:00

the troopers. nick did all of the diabetes testing, and spencer did most all of the blood pressure checking. couldnt have asked for more diligent workers. i weighed people, filled out their cards, and led them to the educational posters. Nick also preferred me to break the bad news to some of the patients who tested high on blood pressure or sugar.

the kids are playing on the scale in the background. Nick and I went the extra mile a the Mormon church.

this is me giving some diet tips to some Neiafu-Tai women. education is the key right?

this was actually back in april but i dont think i ever posted it. nick came with all his testing equipment and spencer came from Faleolupo village next door to help out with the testing. overall we tested about 150 people ages 20 to early 80s. the results were staggering, but i will not post them here.

Delilah's wedding

2009-06-11T12:24:00.000-07:00

Ever heard the Samoan version of the "Three Little Pigs?"

Presenting fine mats, cows and pigs at the Mormon church in Neiafu. Weird thing is most of the stuff was given to pastors and leaders of both villages instead of the two wedding families.

Mr. and Mrs. To'o. Yes those are "ulas" with money. American money actually. Somebody wanted to show off...

The wedding party in front of the Mormon Temple in Apia. The village ceremony was held the next day back in Neiafu.

My host sister got married last week to a young man from a few villages over. A wedding in Samoa turns out to be an affair for the whole village, not just the families involved. For me it was a chance to witness "fa'alavelave" at its greatest. (meaning any big deal or something out of the ordinary i.e. wedding, funeral, car accident, emergency) I can't count the number of cows and pigs that were slaughtered, and boy to i have some good video footage to show u guys when i get back home. To'o now lives with us in Neiafu.

Neiafu Recycles!

2009-06-11T12:12:00.000-07:00

aside from its obvious use, this is definately a trophy piece. no other village on the island has a bin like this.

it says. "Make/keep Neiafu beautiful." "empty cans" "empty bottles" "Other kinds of rubbish are forbidden."

I can hardly believe it myself. With some leftover fence material we were able to weld together this recycling bin here. Our goal is to stop throwing tin cans and plastic bottles behind our houses or near the sea. To kick things off we are having all the grade levels at the primary school compete to bring in the most recyclables. I have promised an ice cream party for the class who brings in the most by the conclusion of the competition. I have no idea how this is going to turn out. Will the kids lose interest once ice cream is no longer at stake? Will the collection agency honor their verbal agreement to pick up the recyclables? Will one large box of ice cream be enough? These answers and more next time. It is a considerable success that we have even gotten this far.

compost toilet hunt

2009-05-22T12:35:00.000-07:00

this was what i was searching for... not exactly what i had in mind. it was beneficial to see the design though.

on the boat ride over, this palagi baby would just lock up with this samoan baby for minutes at a time. just hugging. it was one of the cutest things ive ever seen.

well with nothing much going on since the school fence was finished i finally took the time to travel to manono island to check out a compost toilet that was built there sometime in this young century. my contact number was not working, so i just decided to wing it and find someone on the island to point me in the right direction. through a bit of jungle we come to a clearing where a lady tells me an old school used to be but it burnt down a few years ago. the compost toilet i was supposed to research reamains standing, but obviously not in working order. i wonder how this will help our compost toilet proposal sent in to the EU.

pics

2009-05-14T20:22:00.000-07:00

the Neiafu Mormon Church

all the mothers being honores with "ulas" (candy necklaces) on mothers day at the mormon church.

women (mostly mothers) doing their church plays on mothers day at the methodist church.

finishing up an amazing mother's day lunch with some ice cream. a real treat for our side of the island.

a Samoan standing fan. Im downloading Metallica's latest album to my ipod. yes im on a small island at the end of the earth.

me and koko, one of the few kids in the village whos not afraid of me. actually sometimes she wont leave me alone. isnt she adorable!

pics

2009-04-23T19:19:00.000-07:00

last sunset of the world everyday.

my host sister teaching class. these kids would be 5th graders in the states.

kid fishing for octopus and invertebrates.

Google Earth - Neiafu, Savaii

2009-03-28T14:07:00.000-07:00

thought this would be a good way to give u guys a better idea of where things are that i talk about in this blog. hopefully u can read the labels or blow up the picture. ok it would first be a good idea to be familiar with neaifu on a map of samoa. then you can look at this detail of neiafu. the scale in the bottom left is 2,985 ft. ive labeled the bathing pools where half of the village goes to bathe and do laundry. out past the waves there is where we do our spear fishing. i have been surfing lately right out in front of the bathing pools where the channel makes a bit of a wave. on the inner reef right in front of my house is where i take the village kids surfing. people also go down to vaoto beach for fishing. vaoto is a secluded beach that u actually have to scale down a cliff to get to, but it is well worth the dangerous climb. nobody lives there, only a few people even go there. it is the epitome of a private, isolated tropical beach. i go down there sometimes and pretend im tom hanks from castaway for a few hours. they say people used to live there long ago, but nobody has lived down there for a very long time. my g/f's house is across from the primary school where we just built the fence. all the churches are labeled. i want to say its about a mile and a half between my family's neiafu-tai house (my house) and their neiafu-uta house. from my house to the bus stop is all uphill. one hell of a hill. all of the land to the north and west out of view of this picture is still neiafu, but it wouldnt fit in view and theres no real landmarks that way. the road through neiafu tai does connect to another road which takes you down to tufutafoe village.

pictures

2009-03-27T15:26:00.001-07:00

nothing much going on since i got back from fiji. my host family is building a house for some relatives in new zealand that are coming back to stay sometime this year. here's some pics of building a house in Samoa. ill upload more when finished.

thats where the concrete is made. the sand is from the beach in neiafu-tai, and the water is from the (not-so)freshwater springs in tai as well. the cinderblocks are made in my family's garage in neiafu-uta using the neiafu sand and tank water. clearing down trees. we did have a chainsaw, but much if this type of work is done with hacking with machetes as well.

all the stones and rocks are brought from the surrounding woods by hand. usually lots of untitled men from the village come in an afternoon and pile up a bunch of rocks. for some laborers their whole job all week was to collect rocks to fill in the foundation

this will be an open-air front room where meetings can be held, but really this is where samoans choose to spend most of their time. eating,weaving, hanging out, even sleeping is usually done in an open room/house like this. this type of room can be totally detatched from the rest of the house. the back will be for bedrooms and maybe a bathroom and kitchen (the later two often detached from the house as well.) but bedrooms are mainly for storing belongings and changing clothes, not really for sleeping or sitting around in.

Fiji

2009-03-14T15:52:00.000-07:00

a fijian on a horse

a nice hostel we stayed at for about $20 american. free internet, kayaks, breakfast, horseboarding, etc. great place to stay.

yes that is me wakeboarding behind a horse. how about that for ecotourism!

hanging out with some volunteers from fiji. they drink together by placing drinks on the lazy susan and spinning it around the table.

just got back from a week in Fiji. awesome time. great to get out of Samoa for a little while. the landscape is very different. i think samoa beats them there. but fiji has a much nicer city and better options for backpackers and international travelers. great indian food.

random pics

2009-02-23T16:22:00.000-08:00

some volleyball at the Neiafu-uta Methodist church. the turn-off in the background takes you down to my house. the little hut is where we wait for the bus.

some kids jumping rope in front of the house. they are standing on the cement strip used for pitching the cricket ball.

this is the wharf at salelologa where the boat takes us to upolu island. im standing at the peace corps office.

school fence part 2

2009-02-19T14:26:00.000-08:00

Very close to the finished product. just some more pipe to go between the poles at the bottom and we will be done. Hopefully next we will plant some fruit trees on the school compound for the kids to eat for lunches. we'll see..... Oh yeah, these pics are with my new camera, so hopefully it wont take me two months to put up a new blog.

Neiafu Primary School Fence

2009-01-24T12:46:00.000-08:00

work around this gate took longer than expected and ate up more material than we budgeted for. but im sure it will look nice.
except for a few days when all the manpower in the village came out to cement poles and build up the stone fence, all the work has been done by a few dependable workers that u see in these pics. it hasnt been easy at times.
its actually a nice view when u are coming down the road and see the gate. the tree on the right there helps hide a few out-of-level posts.
im carrying the brick over to another area because we only have one grinder, and one electrical outlet, one hammer, one level, one hacksaw, one trawel, one measuring tape, and some days only one shovel. i bet you can guess how convenient that is.
this little gate and the steps we built for it kicked my ass. plain and simple.

i know it's been a while. sorry. my camera is broken so i dont really have any new pics of anything and im not really one to blog w/o pictures. but my buddy spencer from group 80 came down to help us with the fence last week and he took some pics. looks like we hit the foreign aid jackpot again and got a $32k (about $11.5k US) dollar grant from Australia to build a primary school fence. this project hit the ground even before our tank project was finished, so ive had no problem, or time for that matter, in finding another project to do. the purpose of this fence is to keep pigs, dogs, and cows off school property to provide a safer (animal shit-free) school ground. also to help beautification or agricultural projects now that animals wont be there to eat everything u plant. hopefully with the help of some villagers i will start planting fruit trees there in a few months. and with any luck and extra material, i will get enough people on board to build a recycling bin. (highly doubtful)

Deep Sea Fishing!

2008-11-12T11:04:00.000-08:00

a little slice of the good life. doesnt get much fresher than that.

check out that bad boy. 8 or 9 feet tip to tip. a sailfish caught off the southern coast of upolu. not sure about the weight. i guess this ends my fishing streak of bad luck, although charter fishing isnt really fishing. its more like just riding in a boat for a couple hours while the 1st mate sets the lines. you do have the option of reeling it in though.

Group 81 Fiafia

2008-11-12T10:41:00.000-08:00

the samoan "taupou" (ceremonial virgin)

quite possibly the last "man dance." the next group doesnt come till next october.

This was held right after midservice last month. Sorry I've been busy...

midservice

2008-10-20T12:41:00.000-07:00

this pig and dog (seeming to be the only of each kind on the island) were best friends. the pig also tried to get a little too friendly with most of us. if they only knew how different life was on the mainland.

Beach Fales...

Pretty small group huh? Niko was a no show. I left right after this picture.

Land!!!!

this was our middle of service break where we got to go stay at some beach fales on a tiny island off the eastern coast of upolu called namu'a. i only spent one night there b.c i had to go back to the village to do some filming for our project, but everybody said it was fun.

White Sunday

2008-10-13T19:39:00.000-07:00

This is basically xmas in samoa. this is the one day of the year where kids are given gifts (new church clothes) and treated special (first to eat, and maybe ice cream for desert!) they also run the show at church doing plays and songs and dances. samoans always look sharp on sundays, and this particular day even moreso. here are some shots...

my girl, her sis, and little cousin who i really want to adopt. haha. she loves to talk to me but is terrified to get near me. like most kids.

the girls are in costume. they normally dress way better than that.

the cutest kids in the world!

at least one of us is good looking. my sweetheart.

my girl's sister, brother and baby cousin. how cute is that baby!

some play about a king who had a dream and something happened. im fluent in samoan, but not bible samoan. kinda like my english.

octopus hunting

2008-10-13T19:29:00.000-07:00

one day while not catching fish with my fishing pole, i decided to go fishing for octopi with my neighbor. its actually quite interesting. just swim/wade around in the shallow reef and look down holes to see if anyone is home. it they are, fire at will. do ur best to spear it and pull it out of the hole by any means necessary. (some dont go all that willingly) once out, slam it on top of the water a few times to kill it good, and then loop it on ur belt and go looking for the next hole. my neighbor on the right is pretty good. im not that good. octopus taste really good.

Miss Samoa

2008-09-05T18:55:00.000-07:00

Another September, another Miss Samoa. Here are a few shots of this year's contestants. All in all there about 4 contestants that live in Samoa, and 3 abroad (NZ, Australia, and USA). Miss NZ is in red, Miss Aus. sitting down in lite purple. The other two pics are of local contestants. You gotta love the girl in the rugby ball. Miss USA is very pretty and looks very cool, but i didnt get a good pic of her b.c she was always movin and throwing candy (hence the coolness).