The UAE, a Mormon Feast, and an Exam

This past week was oddly eventful so I’m just going to discuss a myriad of thoughts and ideas as they come up in this post.

To start, international and foreign aid is fascinating, whether you’re from a country that gives a lot of aid (The US) or receives it (Tonga). I know there is a lot of controversy regarding how much aid is spent and where it goes, but I am not going to talk about that at this juncture. Instead, I am going to look at foreign aid through the guise of Tonga. Tonga receives significant amounts of money from New Zealand, Australia, the US, China, Japan, and formerly, the EU. The reasons New Zealand and Australia send aid to Tonga is fairly simple, as both countries receive large numbers of seasonal workers from Tonga and Tonga is relatively in their backyards. Similarly, China courts Tonga because of their UN vote and their aggressiveness in acquiring access to fisheries all over South East Asia and the South Pacific. The United States and Japan send money to help combat China’s influence, and for the latter to also gain the rights to Tonga’s fisheries. The EU, which no longer sends money to Tonga, is currently holding a climate change conference in the Cook Islands where 15 South Pacific countries are being represented. My counterpart, Paea, is there now as a representative of Vava’u. (Again, as a further disclaimer, these views are solely my own and do not reflect the views of Peace Corps or the US government.)

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is different. About a few months ago, the UAE funded and built a vast network of solar panels on the main island of Vava’u. The panels are not finished yet, but they will eventually power half of Vava’u and make electricity significantly cheaper. For a long time I was racking my brain trying to figure out why a country from the Middle East would send money to Tonga. I knew they were rich in oil and looking for foreign investments, but Tonga is not a place you expect to make money let alone a percentage return. Last week, however, my questions were answered. In the harbor, was a beautiful yacht with a massive blue sail that read Dubai EXPO 2020. I spoke to one of the boat’s employees, and apparently Dubai is one of the four cities that has a chance to hold the World’s Fair in 2020. Every country, including Tonga, has a vote, so the UAE has sent their boat to many of world’s islands, traveling through the Caribbean and the South Pacific, promising the islands projects in renewable and sustainable energy if they vote for Dubai. Clearly, Tonga happily capitulated to that demand.

Now, it’s feast time. I haven’t mentioned a feast in a while, as the feast season has been a little slow the past few months. It picked up in a big way last week, however, when the Mormon Church invited all of my village and important Mormons from the neighboring villages to fill our stomachs. The food at the feast was as plentiful as I have ever seen it, and in Tonga that is saying something. There was so much food that there was not even room for a plate for people to eat on. Trays of food were stacked on each other. To eat, you simply attacked the mountain of food like an onion, layer after layer. No plate, and to be honest, silverware was needed. I gorged on clams, pig, raw fish, chicken, fillet of fish, beef, noodles, cake, and so much more.

Though I try my best to remember proper eating etiquette, I must confess my eating has become decidedly Tongan. My hands flew from left to right, shoveling food into that hole in the center of my face. Forks were a nuisance, not a tool. I drove my hand into the pig like the bad guy in the second Indiana Jones movie, ripping a man’s heart out with his bare hand. To give myself credit, however, I was probably the only person using my napkin. So…you win some, you lose some.

After the feast, the Tongans moved as fast as you will ever see a Tongan move to snag the leftovers, of which there were plenty. I’ve gotten better at asserting myself into the leftover mix – meaning I no longer wait for someone to make me a plate and try to grab a little of what I like – but I still have a ways to go in this regard and I was hopelessly outweighed if any struggle ensued. I did however, after asking permission, grab a massive crab that made for a delicious dinner the next night.

As I mentioned early, my counterpart and class 6 and 5 teacher, Paea, is currently in the Cook Islands, so I taught his class all week. This is certainly challenging, as one can only teach so much English in a day, but it’s kind of fun to try my hand at teaching them math and geography or just playing rugby on the field. Also, with a school break of two weeks starting today, I had to give my students an exam that would go on their report card to their parents. While a few of my kids did exceptionally well, the rest scored pretty low, which was certainly disappointing. There English was very low when I arrived and I know it has improved, so if anything this just gives me more determination to work even harder next term to get my students ready for the Secondary School Entrance exam in October.

Finally, this will probably be my last post for about two weeks. On Monday, my first visitor to Tonga, Katherine, is coming to Vava’u, so I will be m.i.a while she is here. I am incredibly excited to share my experience here with another person and were also doing a bit of the tourist thing, so I hope to supply my next post with some cool stories and even better pictures.

As always, thank you for reading.

Not the best picture, but this is Dubai's boat

The harbor on another beautiful day

My delicious left over crab from the Mormon Feast

The Land and the Sea

With nothing of merit having occurred this past week to relate to all of you, I have instead decided to dust off the cobwebs of a post that has been sitting in my back pocket for the past few months. I hope it will captivate you at least enough to want to read another post next week.

Before I arrived in Tonga a little over 9 months ago, I knew very little about the country and the culture, and therefore I tried to begin my service with as few preconceived notions as possible so that I wouldn’t be excited or disappointed about something that simply wasn’t true. One of the few facts about Tonga that I did know was that it was an island nation with a total combined landmass of the 5 island groups equal to that of Memphis or Dallas. With such little land and so much access to open ocean, I could not help but think that fishing was a huge staple of the Tongan diet and economy. As has usually proven to be the case, I was wrong.

In the unseen battle of land and sea in the tiny island nation of Tonga, land has undoubtedly won. There can be no dispute. Out of two, Sea placed second in Tonga’s hierarchy. Fishing exists in Tonga, but it is nowhere as prevalent as one would think it would in an island nation, especially on the main island. Very few people own boats or fish. The village I lived in during my home stay on the main island did not possess a single fisherman even though it was only a five-minute walk from the ocean. People may walk out to the ocean and spearfish for tiny fish and collect clams at low tide, but I didn’t know a single person who went out on the water and fished in a boat. There are villages that specialize in fishing and have many fishermen, but considering that almost every village boarders the ocean the number is surprisingly small. Further, the price of fish on the main island is shockingly high, making it unaffordable for most Tongan families.

In Vava’u, my present home, fishing is certainly more prevalent than Tongatapu, the main island. Here, many more people have boats, especially those who live or have family on the numerous outer islands. Fish is cheaper than on the main island, however it is still more expensive than beef of lamb, which are considered luxuries themselves in most Tongan families, and is triple the cost of chicken, which is itself still a rare treat for most Tongans. Tongans instead mostly survive off bread, root crops, canned food, and anything else they may grow on their land. Fish may be more present in Vava’u, especially in the delicious ‘ota ika (raw fish and think of ceviche) but it is still in short supply for an island that when I told people from my home stay village that I was moving to Vava’u joked that they hoped I liked fish as that was all I was going to eat once I arrived there.

The winner of the battle that exists only in my mind, land, is of course a much different story. Every single Tongan family has their own ‘uta or bush. This bush, consisting of a few acres, is farmland where Tongans raise pigs, cows, and chickens and grow root crops and vegetables for personal consumption and to sell in town. Farming is the very backbone of Tongan life and the economy as it is the only source of income, other than family members from overseas sending back money, for many Tongans and supplies nearly all of their food. Interestingly, Tongan farms were never turned into large properties that employed workers on wages, and instead practically every Tongan owns their own land and decides how to best use it. To give you some idea of how prevalent the bush is in Tonga, every person in my village, even the few who have jobs in town, works in the bush every day besides Sunday. For the vast majority of people in my village, their only occupation is their bush. Every morning when I walk to school, I have the same conversation with the men I see.

Them: ‘Alu ki ako? (Going to school?)

Me: Io. ‘Alu ki ‘uta? (Yes. Going to the bush?)

Them: Io. Nofo ‘a (Yes. Good-bye)

Me: Toki Sio. (See you later)

This conversation almost runs like clockwork, with very few deviations from the above discussion.

Therefore, land 1 sea 0. 9 months in, I am still amazed how expensive fish is in Tonga and how important farming is to the people, especially considering that while Tongans have been farming for centuries, growing vegetables has only become popular and prevalent for the past decade. As for me, I just try to enjoy to the fish when I do eat it and try not to get overwhelmed by the abundance of root crop at my disposal.

In my life, I only have one new thing to report. With the “winter” school break next week, my school is sending the report cards of all the students to their parents. This means that I have to give midterms in English to all my students. Though I am testing my Class 6 and 5 students next week, I assessed my Class 3 and 4 kids and while their English is still low, I was happy to see that they have made some improvements. It is nice to know that at the very least I am having some positive effect on the kids and I’m curious to see how well my older students do. As for my grant proposal, I have heard nothing yet so once again I am cautiously optimistic that I will have more to discuss on that front next week.

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend.

Some kids from my village during our picnic last month

The 21st Century meets the the 20th. The new solar power on the island of Kapa.

Pecha Kucha

My days of prognosticating are over. Once again I was unable to travel to the outer island, this time on account of strong winds throughout the South Pacific that made small boat travel impossible. I will eventually make it out to the island but at this point your guess is as good as mine as to when that may happen. So, with the weather throwing me an unexpected curve ball, I find myself stepping up to the plate with a new bat (blog post in this analogy – work with me here please) hoping to still knock the ball (new story) out of the park.

This past Wednesday, I took part in a Pecha Kucha. You are probably asking yourself what in the world is a Pecha Kucha and how can it be Tongan when the Tongan alphabet does not have the letter “c” – well…maybe you were not asking yourself the latter part of that statement. Pecha Kucha is in fact Japanese slang for chitchat. The term refers to a style of power point presentation where, to combat the sometime tediousness of reading off a slide, Pecha Kucha’s consist of 20 slides that are 20 seconds long each. This means that you have just over 6 minutes to make your presentation with the hope that you don’t bore your audience to tears.

The owners of a restaurant I frequent in town and who I know well at this point asked me if I could help out with their Pecha Kucha last week. The goal was to attract a large audience, have 8 speakers give presentations on whatever topic they chose, and collect donations for VEPA – Vava’u Environment Protection Agency. VEPA is a NGO based in Tonga that does great work protecting the beautiful but delicate environment of Vava’u with projects such as raising environmental awareness in the schools, organizing recycling campaigns, protecting sea turtle habitats, mangrove swamps, and coral reefs as well as many others worthwhile programs. VEPA is the only group trying to protect the environment here in Vava’u (environmental awareness is still very low in Tonga) so I said that I would be happy to help.

I chose a random topic, the weirdest festivals in the world, and went to work preparing my presentation. I, very much thanks to Google, easily found 20 ridiculous festivals ranging from a baby jumping festival in Spain to a moose dropping festival in Alaska. On the night of the Pecha Kucha, I presented to around 50 people, many of who were a group of 40 yachts called the Oyster Club that had recently arrived in Vava’u. I know very little about the group besides the fact that they travel as a unit in their own private yachts throughout the world and the harbor is currently as full as I have ever seen it, as you can see in the picture below. They have a website and you can Google the club if you are curious and want more information. Going back to the Pecha Kucha, I was a little bit nervous but a definite side benefit of teaching in the Peace Corps is that I it gives me a lot of public speaking practice so it seemed to go all right. At the very lest people laughed at the parts that were meant to be funny, and didn’t at the parts that were not meant to inspire humor. I think that is a decent gauge of a good presentation.

The night was a lot of fun, and I was happy to help the environment of Vava’u in my own very small way. In terms of my life at this moment, this past Wednesday was a holiday so I had the day off. It was Emancipation Day, which is very interesting considering that Tonga was only a protectorate of Great Britain and as I mentioned last week was never conquered nor colonized, so there was never really any emancipation and thus the presence of an Emancipation day is somewhat odd. Regardless, this is Tonga and I was happy to have a day off, whatever the actual reason was.

I spent the days swimming in a fresh water cave and at a beach in a nearby village with some other volunteers. We went swimming with a bunch of Tongan kids so we swam the Tongan way, in shorts and a t-shirt. It was a great day, and a really nice way to start off the week.

To finish, I am hopefully meeting with all of the principals of Vava’u’s high schools on Friday, which is the last step in finishing my grant proposal. I am cautiously optimistic that in two weeks or so I will have more information on my blog regarding my camp project and possibly a link to donate.

As always, thanks for reading.

The election materials, as mentioned last week.

Yacht Season in Vava'u

Waiting for the boat on my trip to Kapa

One of the Tongan boats in Kapa. They are very different from the tourist boats as you can see.

Death and an Election

I was supposed to go to another island this past weekend, but that did not happen. Plans change. As usual, the reason I could not go was that there was a funeral on the island, and I will be taking a boat out there this coming weekend.

In the past two posts, I have frequently mentioned funerals, and how important they are in Tongan culture. I also mentioned that I had never been part of the body unveiling ceremony at a funeral up to this point. Well, that did not last long. This past Sunday, an elderly woman passed away in my village. She lived a few houses down from me, and I knew her a little bit. We had not spoken much beyond the occasional, “Hello, how are you,” in Tongan, but she was the grandmother of one of my class 6 students and of several of the kids I teach in night class.

The funeral was held in the church on Sunday instead of the normal service. The grief was palpable. The woman’s daughter was hysterically crying by the body as she continually bent down to kiss and pray to it. It was pretty overwhelming, and I found myself unable to refrain from tearing up from time to time. The body was wrapped in white cloth at the front of the church.

About 30 minutes into the service, people starting lining up to pay their respects to the deceased. Not wanting to be disrespectful or make a mistake, I made sure to find someone in the crowd who I knew spoke English and asked him if I should go up to pay my respects. He said it was up to me. I slowly walked up and placed myself in the line waiting to kneel before the body. Around me everyone was crying. After a few minutes of waiting, it was my turn. The woman was completely covered in cloth, except for her head, which was bare. It was the first time I had seen a dead body, and I was struck by how peaceful she seemed. As if she could just wake up any second and ask why everyone was crying. I walked up to the woman, knelt down, put my face inches from her face, and gave her the traditional Tongan sniff that one performs in such instances. As I left, I whispered condolences to the family, and made sure my student was ok.

Sorry to depress all those of you reading out there. It was a poignant moment, and I wanted to do the ceremony and my feelings justice. Now for a somewhat happier topic. Several weeks ago Tonga held elections throughout the country to vote for the town officers (basically the mayors of the each village) and the district representatives (members of the lower house of parliament). The elections took place in the church hall in my village, and as any event in Tonga is paired with food, I was invited to eat a hearty meal with the government elections officials, which was quite enjoyable.

Since I am discussing the election, I believe now is as good a time as any to explain the system of government in Tonga. Tonga is a kingdom. It is ruled by the last and longest standing Polynesian monarchy and there is a king who holds the power. Tonga was the only nation in the South Pacific that was never conquered nor colonized, but it was a made protectorate of Great Britain in 1900. The government is therefore based off the British system of government, however, it is based upon the time when the King held the power, the prime minister advised, and the upper house of parliament were appointed by the king and were all nobles.

These elections, therefore, are a big deal in Tonga, as very few members of parliament were elected by the people prior to the riots in Tonga in 2006, when the people clamored for greater democracy. The country is still very much a monarchy, but it the past few years Tonga has passed several democratic reforms bringing change into the traditional government of the Kingdom of Tonga.

And now to end with information that no one will probably care about other than me, but I will still write about it anyway – I watched my first Heat game of the season on Saturday. Many of you may be rolling your eyes, probably rightfully so, but this was rather a big deal for me. Though I have followed the season closely, I may be the only person who cares about basketball in this part of the world – I explain it to Tongans as netball for men – and the games are rarely shown on tv. With the start of the playoffs, I asked one of the restaurants if they would mind showing the game during lunch and they were generous enough to oblige me. The Heat sadly lost, but I have to admit it made my day and it all felt very American of me, which is a rare feeling here.

Thank you for reading. I brought my camera to school one day so please enjoy the photos of my students at work. You can imagine how nervous they were when I started taking photos, but I explained that they were “action” shots to ensure they wouldn’t pose with gang signals.

Teaching my Class 6 and 5 together. I normally teach them separately, but the class 5 and 6 teacher was absent this day so I taught them for the whole day. They are working on a grammar worksheet on the board,  and I let them read English books when they finish to wait for the rest of the class.

Kapa

My plan for this post was to discuss the weekend I just spent on the outer island of Kapa with my school’s principal and her family. I will do this, but as I was enjoying myself over the weekend, I realized that my current experience was more than just an adventure, it was representative of two core features of Tonga. Nothing happens as it is planned and nothing happens how you – or at least I – expect it.

My principal, Selu, had told me to meet her in town at 12 pm Saturday, and then we would drive together South to ‘Ano beach on Pangaimotu, which is a separate island connected to the main island of Vava’u by a causeway, and take a boat to her village. For reference sake, Kapa is the name of a large island that has 3 villages on it, Kapa, Falevai, and ‘Otea, each several kilometers away from each other. Selu lives in the village of Kapa on the island of Kapa.

As I have mentioned before, nothing happens on time in Tonga. Life here very much exists on island time or as we say in Tongan, taimi faka-Tonga. At 11:30 I was hanging out with one of the other volunteers in town, preparing to meet at the prearranged spot at 12, but assuming that she probably would not pick me up until 1 at the earliest. I was therefore shocked to see my principle calling at 11:30, and telling me that she was waiting for me at the bank. Also, as another point of information, my principal does not speak great English but understands it well so we often speak in Tongan, Tonglish, or she speaks in Tongan and I reply in English.

Not wanting to be late, I rushed to the bank. I looked around for a few minutes, did not see her, and sat down to wait. In hindsight I should have realized, “I am already here,” in Tongan actually means I am leaving my house in 45 minutes, and I was picked up by one of her relatives at 12:30. Much to my surprise we did not drive towards ‘Ano beach, but instead drove for a few minutes to another part of town, and parked outside a house. My principal walked out of the house, wearing all black, and beckoned me to come.

I entered the backyard and was immediately immersed in swarms of Tongans wearing black. My first realization was that I was at a funeral and my second that I was quite inappropriately dressed – I was wearing shorts and a button down shirt. I sat down in the back with Selu, and watched as people entered the house and exited crying, which I assumed meant that people were paying their respects to the dead body, as is done in Tonga. For 30 minutes, nothing much really happened. Selu explained that the deceased woman was from Kapa, and kept saying osi vave pe, which means it will be finished quickly. As is also done in Tonga, I was offered a lot of food, so I simply sat back, ate, and accepted the reality that I was in Tonga and we would leave when we left.

Around 1 p.m., Selu told me to follow her. We hopped into a van, and drove to the Catholic Church on the other side of town, which to be fair is not very far. I asked Selu what we were doing and she responded that we were waiting, in Tongan. Seizing the moment, I put on my tupenu and my tao’vala (In American terms my skirt and mat) and waited. At 2 p.m. a huge procession, with a police escort in front, followed by the band from Keilana the Catholic high school, the body wrapped in Tongan mats and cloth, and the guests of the funeral, approached the church. The men lifted the mats, carrying the woman inside as if it was a casket and they were pallbearers. I followed them into the church, and for the next hour I observed my very first Catholic service.

The service ended at 3 and I finally thought we were finished. Of course I was wrong. The men picked up the body, and carried it back to the car. The procession then winded its way towards the Catholic cemetery. For the next hour I watched a woman whom I had never met be buried, feeling entirely out of place and somewhat disrespectful for taking part in such an emotional ceremony. No one else seemed to care however. At 4, the funeral was over, and as Selu guided me back to her car I finally thought we would be on our way.

Nope. Her husband, Ini, did not come back to the car until 4:30. We then headed back to their house to collect the rest of the family and the food. There is more to this saga, but as this post is already reaching essay-like proportions and I haven’t even reached the island, I will simply mention that it was not until 6 pm, 6 hours behind schedule, that we stepped on the boat and headed to Kapa.

The boat ride only took 20 minutes and we arrived at the wharf in Kapa in the darkness. The village is at the top of a hill, so we hiked up, using our flash lights to guide us, and headed towards Selu’s house. On arrival, Ini, took off his shirt, grabbed a pillow, placed a mat on the floor, and fell instantly asleep snoring louder than any person I have ever heard. The rest of the night was spent eating a dinner, which they called Tongan tea, of bread and butter, crackers, and cookies. After we ate I helped Selu’s high school aged daughter with her biology homework – I was glad to see my 1/3 of a year’s biology instruction in high school really paying off! All of this, of course, was only possible because of the solar power the Japanese government had installed just several weeks earlier, flooding the house with light. I went to bed at the early hour of ten, failing to fall asleep only because I was 3 feet from Ini and the snores were deafening.

The next morning, Sunday, was quintessential Tonga. Selu graciously let me sleep in and avoid the 5 am Wesleyan Church service. I woke up at 7, got ready, and then went to the hall with Ini to drink kava until the 10 O’clock service started. We drank kava for 2 hours, joking in Tongan as I struggled to hold my own and follow the conversation, with the only interruption being a 10-minute break to eat crackers and cake that I assumed was for the Father’s Day that Tonga celebrated last Sunday.

The rest of the day followed in typical Tongan fashion. The 10 am service ended at 11. Afterwards, I drank kava until one of the men asked me if I wanted to travel with him to one of the other villages, Falevai, and I hopped in the back of his cart.  Though he drove a new looking red tractor, the cart was so old and wooden I kept imagining myself riding on top of a potato cart being pulled by a sturdy horse in 18^th century Europe. The tropical scenery, however, did not match my imagination.

At Falevai, I toured around, walked to the beach, and was amazed by the beauty. From Falevai, I could see maybe 6 of Vava’u’s many islands. The water was the beautiful blue turquoise that I only believe exists in the South Pacific and maybe the Caribbean. Several yachts, parked just off the island, were there, having arrived early for the Vava’u tourist and yacht season, which is just beginning now. The scene was breathtaking. It was like looking at a traveling magazine. Since in my day-to-day life I do not see the ocean or other islands and I do live in a poor and developing country, I sometimes forget that I also live in a tropical paradise. I forgot how physically stunning Vava’u truly is. On this day, I was quickly reminded.

To end this essay, I spent the rest of the day eating, attending the 3 pm church service, and drinking kava before heading back the main island at 6 pm. It was a great trip, and I am incredibly grateful to Selu for inviting me to her island. She has also welcomed me to come back whenever I want to, which is extremely generous.

Thanks for reading. I apologize for the length of this post, but I just had too much to say this week! 

To prove I was actually there. This is the view from Falevai. You can see several different islands in the background, including the small, uninhabited, and beautiful island of Nuku in the back left. The boats that are close to me are the Tongan village boats, and the boats in the distance are the yachts/sail boats.

Leaving Kapa. The village of Kapa is right next to the tower sticking out on top of the right side of the island. Ini is driving the boat, my principal Selu is on the right, and their daughter's back is towards us in the middle.

Hauling the boat in to begin our trip to Kapa.

The beach at Falevai

The view from Kapa of a nearby island

The Coconut Wireless

Tongans love to gossip. This should not come as much of a surprise, as gossip seems to play a prevalent role in almost every culture. Without television or internet to captivate them, and very little desire to exercise or read, gossip is one of the few affordable, sustainable, and exciting activities that the men, women, boys, and girls have left to them. As such, stories and rumors spread like wildfire in Vava’u. A man caught cheating on his wife four villages away, that might take 20 minutes to reach my village. The son of the church minister is flying to America in a few weeks. The entire island knows that before the flight is booked. I could come up with more examples but I think you understand the point. With or without phones, the spread of gossip in Tonga is incredible. There is also a name for it. Here, the Tongans and palangis call it, the coconut wireless.

The gossip is rarely mean spirited. It is merely a person repeating what they heard. Then another person repeating their version of what was told to them. And onward and onward it goes. My life is a perfect parallel to this. My village, and to be honest, probably the entire east side of the island knows who I am and what I do. My life is in some ways familiar to a fish bowl. I will come back from town on a Friday to hear, “Hey Soni, how was town?” Only to of course find out that their 3^rd cousin’s brother’s friend’s wife saw me buying bread at the bakery. On that note, in an island of roughly 12,000 people everyone is related which makes the gossip that much more potent and rapid.

I don’t mind it. It is simply a facet of life. Sometimes, however, it can lead to interesting conversations. A few months ago there was a strange rumor going around Vava’u that someone must have read on the Internet regarding President Obama. On a Monday, one of my neighbors came over to my house to ask me a question. He looked somewhat distraught so I was a little worried. He hesitantly looked at the floor, avoiding eye contact, until after a long pause his eyes slowly drifted up towards and asked, “Did Obama make a deal with the devil? Why would he do that? I don’t understand that.”

Quick Note  - Fear of the devil is strong component of Tongan culture, dating back to pre-Christian Tongan society and remaining strong today. When children are misbehaving, their parents will often say you better behave or the devil will come and get you.

Now, unaware of any recent political news that could serve as a even a remote metaphor for the devil, and carefully assuming that Obama did not in fact make a deal with the devil, I assured my neighbor that it was not true and that, “President Obama would never do that.” I decided it was easier not to tackle the impossibility of the claim, and save that issue for another day.

The next day, I was just coming back from a run when a different neighbor’s high school aged daughter waved me down. She asked, barely waiting for me to take off my headphones, “Did the President of America get a 666 tattoo on his forehead….um, that’s what my friends told me.” Once again I assured her that no it was not true, and as I finished she flashed a triumphant smile and in a tone that would have made any teenager anywhere in the world proud, said, “I knew it. I told them they were being dumb.” I would not have wanted to be her friends the next day at school.

After two such requests, I decided to investigate and see if this was a rumor all over Tonga or if my village had gone crazy. I texted the other volunteers and found out that yes, they all received questions concerning Obama and the devil, and no, they had no clue why. Our only guess to this day is that someone saw a rumor on the Internet, and that rumor spread through the communicating marvel that is the Coconut Wireless.

Thanks for reading. Tomorrow I am heading out to the island of Kapa with my principal and her family, and next week I am returning to the outer island where the two pcvs live. I promise to come equipped in the next two posts with outer island adventures. Enjoy the photos of the evolution of my classroom below and have a great weekend.

       

My class room Day 1 - this was actually after it was cleaned. It was far worse before

The first week of school was spent white papering my classroom - think glueing a lot of white, computer type paper to the wall - and putting up the map I brought from the US. I also had the kids color strips of paper and used the paper to boarder the blackboards and windows.

The desks came a week later. The carpet did not come until March, but has made a huge difference as the kids no longer have to sit on the dirt floor.

As of yesterday, with posters from town glued to the wall.

The front of the classroom, with posters made by your humble protagonist

What I'm Doing

8 months in, I believe it is finally a good time to fully explain what I am doing as a Peace Corps volunteer in Tonga. Yes, I know I have mentioned that I am a teacher at a primary school, but now I hope to provide a little bit more information regarding my work, and actually prove that within the adventures of this blog lies a somewhat productive teacher/volunteer/palangi.

To reiterate my primary assignment – speaking in Peace Corps terminology (every government agency loves their acronyms and titles, Peace Corps being no exception) – is teaching English in a primary school. I teach all of the school’s English, and am responsible for making sure the hopefully graduating Class 6 students do well enough on the English section of their final exams to move on to the next level.

Within the school, I also play several odd roles, taking care of the positions that otherwise may fall through the cracks. One of these roles, quite simply, is being a male version of the Tooth Fairy, albeit with far less money.

Within Tonga, the ministry of health runs the Malimali (smile) program. In its simplest form, a Japanese (JYCA) volunteer and a Tongan hygienist visit my school once a week to brush the kids teeth, but they are unable to provide extra toothbrushes or toothpaste to the school. To fill this void, my counterpart Paea and I have been able to acquire toothpaste and brushes from the Red Cross, and I brush the kids teeth every morning before school starts. It is actually pretty fun, and as you can see in the pictures below the toothpaste gets all over the kids’ faces. With a few exceptions, the days I brush their teeth at school are the only times of the week their teeth get cleaned.

In the village, my town officer asked me to teach a night class to the older youth. The village was donated 3 computers in January, and he wanted me to teach English and computer classes to the middle and high school students. Hoping to make good on their investment in me, I of course agreed.  Havea announced the beginning of the night classes to the community in church, and the parents all promised to send their kids.

As tends to happen in Tonga, what was supposed to happen did not. Instead of sending their older kids, the parents sent their primary school children, happy to acquire an unexpected break. The older kids, inevitably, rarely came, if they showed up at all. After weeks of fighting the onslaught of children, I decided to run with this new program and now one of my night classes is aimed for the primary students while the other is geared for my invisible high school students.

Now, I finally get to the point of my post. With the hope of putting an emphasis on my service in Tonga and contribute something I believe will be meaningful and lasting, I have been working on developing a boys camp – named Camp Grow, Guys Reshaping Our World by your humble narrator – to run parallel to the internationally renowned Camp Glow – Girls Leading Our World. Camp Glow is run by pcvs all over the world and focuses on the empowerment of women.

I, along with several other volunteers, am helping to organize Camp Glow and am in the process of developing Camp Grow. Shameless plug alert! due to changes within Peace Corps, it is now much harder to request donations to fund projects, something I had already hoped to have accomplished by now. As such, we are currently in the process of partnering with a Tongan organization or forming a committee of influential Tongans to take ownership of the projects and hopefully ensure the camps’ sustainability. To conclude, in the event this is successful, I will be posting a link on this blog in the next few weeks, where people can send donations to help us run the girl’s camp this year and usher in the inaugural boy’s camp. I will provide more information when the link is ready, but I am hoping that a shameless plug with a little bit of warning is somewhat less shameless.

The above, for the most part, is my life in Tonga. I hope you found this somewhat interesting, as I figured I should actually reveal to the masses that I don’t only attend picnics, eat feasts, travel to islands, and go camping. I am, however, hoping to do some island hopping in the next few weeks – I didn’t say I never do those things - and can only hope to return with a fresh breath of tales and adventures.

Thanks for reading!

All of my students brushing their teeth. This is their school uniform.

Some of the boys of Class 5 and 6

Very excited to have their picture taken