(s)election day

I wasn't expecting election day in American Samoa to be much different than election day everywhere else. I don't know what I was thinking. Everything is different here!

Most residents here are U.S. nationals as opposed to U.S. citizens so they don't get to vote in the presidential election. And in order to vote in the local election, a person has to have lived here for 2 years. Most palagis don't make it that long on our little island paradise since the typical government contract is two years total. So we voted via absentee ballot. This is my favorite part about mine:

Anyway, the local races are very different than a typical U.S. campaign. I heard almost no mud-slinging, heard just a few ads, and most campaigning tended to revolve around free food: have a bbq and talk to the people! It seems very wholesome and old-fashionedy to me. Even though I didn't participate and some see it as a way for the guy with the most money to buy votes by feeding people, I liked it.

On election day, the feeding of the masses was still happening. Our street has a bunch of fales on it. Coming from my house, the first fale on the street was the polling place. They had caution tape around the outside edge to prevent people from coming in the wrong area. And the voting booths were sections separated by fabric wrapped around a few posts of the fale.

Right next to that fale were seven or eight tents set up in front of the other fales with barbeques and sytrofoam containers full of food.

On my way to work (at 7:30am), I turned down at least 5 plates of food, but one place was so insistent I ended up with one. Not that I'm complaining; Samoans definitely know how to barbeque. I've never had better barbequed chicken than the stuff you can get on the side of the road here (and the best part is that when you do have to pay for it, it's only $3 for a plate big enough to feed 2 adults). But I've never seen anything like this in the U.S. In fact, coming from a traditionally red state, I never saw much campaigning at all outside of TV and radio ads. And I was definitely never given a free lunch for breakfast.


Other random tidbits about election day:

- In AS, every government employee who is eligible to vote, gets 2 hours off of work, either at the beginning or ending of the work day so that they can. Cool.

- Simon thinks it's not fair to make the candidates race to become president. Because the fastest will always win and don't we want the smartest?

- Go Obama! I wasn't the biggest Obama fan in the beginning, favoring Hilary to win the Democratic slot, but he grew on me. Even in spite of the fact that every picture of him is shot from below and shows him staring dreamily out into the distance. And I think that even though he has his work cut out for him, there's a great deal of hope resting on his presidency. Which is much more than I can say for the other guy.

ARRRRRG!

On Halloween we hosted a pirate party. Simon, Clif, and I were pirates.

Everett insisted on being the Avatar instead of a pirate. Silly kid thinks he can make his own decisions - pffft. Being the Avatar and getting the arrow right required a fairly drastic move: a hair cut. He was willing to go completely bald to get it right, but I found some of that spray-in hair dye at the last minute.

I went a little overboard with the pirate party preparations. I wrote a pirate invitation poem and sent it out on International Talk Like a Pirate Day. I spent months collecting pirate accessories, and sometimes those accessories just had to be upgraded when I found better things later on. I spent all kinds of time sewing knickers and waistcoats and old fashioned shirts with lace cuffs. The excellent thing is that this island is absolutely full of crazy fabric. Where else can you find black velvet with gold and silver glitter flowers?

So many pirates showed up to the party!

And to top it all off, Alden brought a Tongan fruit bat. I think it was just a diversion so we wouldn't make him walk the plank for not wearing a costume, but it totally worked. The bat was just a few months old so it couldn't fly yet and spent all evening hanging out on everyone. It was definitely the perfect addition to a Halloween party.

Not enough piratey pictures for you? Find more here and here and here and here.

Tisa's Tattoo Fest 2008

Tisa's Tattoo Fest is an annual October event hosted by Tisa's Barefoot Bar. I'm sure her choice of events has nothing to do with the fact that her brother, Wilson, is a big tattoo artist here. :) Regardless of her reason, it's always fun to get out to Tisa's. The tattoos and entertainment are just an added bonus. I'm fascinated by the traditional tap tap tap of boar tusks. The designs that tattoo artists can create out of those tiny carved combs is pretty amazing.

This is Wilson doing a traditional tattoo. The little piece pointing toward the leg is a tiny comb carved out of boar tusk. It's attached to a stick that he taps with another stick. Two assistants strectch the skin straight. If the skin stretchers don't hold still, the lines are crooked and that's no good!

And, of course, the modern method is also available.

Simon chillin' in the rope swing on Alega beach.

Everett started dancing on the stage as the entertainment calmed down and the stage emptied It took a while (nearly an hour), but eventually others joined him. He was so proud of himself and kept telling everyone he had started a dance party!

gotta love this logic

Simon: You think my mom has make-up?

Friend: Yeah, all moms do.

Simon: Are you sure my mom does?

Friend: She does. Otherwise she wouldn't have a husband.

when I grow up, I'm going to ___________.

Everett and Simon love the Avatar - love, LOVE the Avatar. So I wasn't surprised to hear that Everett had plans for becoming more like the Avatar in the future. I was surprised to hear just how that's going to happen. On the way to school the other day I overheard, "When I grow up, and get all hairy, I'm going to shave my hair into patterns like the Avatar."

Absolutely awesome. It's way better than the goals that I had at that age for when I grew up, which were something along the lines of, "When I grow up, I'm never going to do the dishes again."

In case you're wondering, the dishes thing hasn't worked out too well for me.

and we're back!

Finally! We're connected to the rest of the world at the lightning-fast speed of -oh, I don't even know, it's abysmally slow. I'm just glad to have something. And my first order of business is to attract visitors... so the new house is amazing. It's on a peninsula so we're steps away from the water in any direction - I love it!

Just past the palm trees is a 4 or 5 foot drop-off and then, the beach.

The back of the house has a mangrove forest leading into a lagoon, which will be perfect for kayaking when or if we eventually have kayaks.

And did I mention that it has walls? It does. It's my favorite part of the whole house. I can't even explain how happy I am to have walls again. I didn't realize how much I missed them. The old house only had screens from floor to ceiling. It had interior walls, but it's so nice to know that a strong breeze won't blow the curtains straight out so I flash the neighbors when I'm changing. Walls are pretty cool.

And now I need to get to work on those old Arts Festival posts. It was probably the coolest thing I've ever gone to so I have tons of photos to dig through.

no internet connection = grrrrrr

It's been a long time... we moved, I got a new job, and lots of other blog-worthy stuff. But we still don't have internet at home. It's Samoa. Life is slooooow here. For the most part, I like it. But I'm kind of addicted to the internet so I'm not too fond of this slowness. After many conversations of one company not having coverage at our new location (seriously? the island is less than 55 square miles and probably less than 1/2 is populated. is it that hard to cover?) and the other company not having modems or possibly having modems but not being sure (hard to check. I understand), I just paid and I'm waiting and hoping that eventually, in the next decade or so, a modem will find its way to the island and then to my house and then I can blog again.

But while I'm posting, the new house is great. We have a resident crab in the bathroom. Not a hermit crab, a "eats the gunk on the bathroom floor" crab. I don't have picture proof. He's camera shy. But I do have picture proof of the beautiful view! It will make you all want to visit!

This weekend we went to Tisa's. It was one of those beautiful days when the water is calm and the snorkeling is gorgeous. Our friend Matt was getting a traditional tattoo up at the bar, we were watching the whales out in the distance, and we ended the day with pina coladas made with fresh coconut cream. It was one of those days when I couldn't help but wonder how I lucked into the island life.

Last weekend, Clif and I went diving in Fagatele Bay with a group of friends. The water was clear and beautiful, although murky for Fagatele. We saw tons of giant clams. The best thing about this dive trip didn't happen on the dive though. During our surface interval on the boat we saw a pod of spinner dolphins and two humpbacks! One didn't come out of the water, but we saw its back and its spout. The other one (a smallish one) breached over and over, slapped its tail on the water, and just generally showed off for us. It was incredible! Until then, the coolest thing I'd seen in the ocean was a Tahitian ray. The humpbacks definitely outdid that.

Just so you don't think that life is all too perfect in paradise, Clif has dengue fever. He'll be fine since it's generally only fatal to people who are very old or very young, but the kids and I are dousing ourselves in deet and hoping that any mosquitos that get to him, don't find us.

I think that's about it for now, hopefully we'll have internet sometime soon and we can post more regularly!