The Road Less Traveled : I am not the only one

In the course of this blog, I have so far mentioned two embarrassing stories that both happen to revolve around me inappropriately using the apparently numerous Tongan words for “vagina,” in front of small children and old women. Judging from the feedback I have received from many of you, it seems like you particularly enjoyed these posts. Thus, for both your enjoyment and to show you that I am not the only pcv who has had their share of embarrassing moments, I give you three embarrassing incidents that have happened to three guys in my group so far in Tonga.

One of the male volunteers, who is 28 and married, heard a weird sound outside of his bedroom at 4 in the morning. Getting out of bed – it is also important to note that since there are not many lights, Tonga is pitch black at night – he walked to the kitchen towards the source of the sound. Shining his flashlight onto the table, he saw a large pig on top of one of the chairs devouring the leftover food.

The pig, startled, rushed at the light and the volunteer, who freely admitted that he let out a high-pitched girlish scream at this porky attack. He rushed to the bathroom hoping to escape the onslaught of the hungry pig. Feeling safe in the bathroom, though it was completely dark besides his flashlight, a lizard fell from the ceiling onto his head and he screeched another self described unmanly scream and, momentarily forgetting the pig, ran back into his room. Embarrassed and having woken up his host family and wife, he had to explain in his limited Tongan that he had just ran for his life from an attacking pig.

As may be evidenced from my previous posts, the food in Tonga can be kind of tough. I have been one of the lucky ones so far, as though I may not love the food, I have not gotten sick from it. One of the male volunteers, however, who is also a recent college graduate, was not so lucky.

Living on the second floor of his house – a rare thing in Tonga – the volunteer felt himself getting nauseous and sick. Having only been at our home stay for a few days at this point, the volunteer did not want to alienate his entire family by throwing up in the house on the way to the bathroom. Making a split second decision to not risk this embarrassment, the volunteer decided to projectile vomit out of his second floor window into the yard below, to which his host family came outside to observe the pigs enjoying a tasty feast. Trying to learn the Tongan language as quickly as possible, the volunteer soon discovered, rather ironically, that the Tongan word for being sick, though pronounced quite differently, is puke.

The last embarrassing story I’m particularly partial too as it is quite similar to my own “vagina” story, and it happened to one of the guys I am good friends with. This week in class we have learned the names of all the vegetables and fruit. Trying to show off his knowledge, the volunteer was pointing too and talking about various fruits and vegetables using his newly acquired Tongan.

He pointed to a pepper and sad, “Potu.” His host mom began to laugh, but like me before, he thought nothing of it and kept saying it. When his host father came home his host mom told him about “potu,” and he began to crack up as well. At this point the volunteer thought something was off, but he still did not realize it was about potu.

The next day the volunteer was talking to the head of our language training, Lose, who is really cool and fun to talk too, and casually mentioned the word potu while discussing what he learned the day before in class. Lose turned to him and said, “Do you know what that means?” to which the volunteer replied, “Of course. Potu means pepper.” Lose laughed and explained to the volunteer that the Tongan word for pepper is polo and that potu means penis. Thus the volunteer realized that he had been repeatedly using the Tongan word for penis in class and at home all day yesterday, and therefore unwittingly joining me as the only volunteers to mistakenly reference male and female private parts while tying to say the Tongan word for a fruit.

These are the embarrassing stories that have occurred so far. I am sure more will come, which I will try to relate to you, so that you can rest assured that this stuff does not only happen to me.