Meeting and Eating

Today is the first Monday of the month. The village counsel meets every first Monday of the month. This is were all major decisions are made by the chiefs. Everyone sits Indian style around the outside of the “fale” (open house). It can be killer on your legs. If I want to do a project or have a program of some sorts, I have to go through them. Meetings start with an ava ceremony. For those who don’t know ava is the drink of choice in the South Pacific. It is a combination of water and mashed up roots from the ava plant. It tastes like dirt. But, I will say it has a nice tingly aftertaste. It numbs your mouth a bit and has a calming after effect. The older more esteemed chiefs do a lot of talking about things I don’t understand. They aren’t discussing anything. It’s more like a sermon. Then we eat. After eating issues are brought to light. Then we eat again. If there are more issues we will talk about those and depending on how long, we will eat again.

Today I had an issue. The pastor and his wife have decided to leave the village. This news came a week ago and has been a big bummer for me. Laila, the pastors wife, was fluent in English and helped me understand many things about the Samoan way of life. As many of you know I was working with them on a homework and resource center. But without their support I had to get permission from the village. As I expected, they said “fiafia”, which means happy, excited, enjoy, and party. I took that as a yes.

Following this meeting I had another meeting with the Primary School Committee. They want to do something about the condition of the primary school. It is in awful shape, even compared to the other schools in surrounding villages. I told them a few options with aid agencies and they liked what I had to say. We then walked down to the school into the hall where there were 70-80 parents, the principle, and vice principle. I was not expecting this. The school committee is under some heat because apparently they haven’t done a whole lot of upkeep. I was asked by the principle to talk about the possibility of receiving funds from overseas. So here I go again with my spiel. Before I knew it they were pleading for a brand new school.

The bar has been raised here in Samoa. The village has expectations now, and I have a big project to accomplish. Wish me luck.