The ants come marching one by one... US Navy has arrived!!

It's been a busy couple of days here in Ha'apai, the US Navy has arrived for their humanitarian Pacific aid mission. There are about 200 of them, US, Australian and New Zealand navy, and some civilians they recruited as doctors or different specialists. They are doing construction on some of the government schools in Ha'apai, doing medical, dental, and optometry clinics and giving away hundreds of eyeglasses and toothebrushes, doing clinics on first aid, CPR, nutrition, food sanitation, and they also have a team of veterinarians. So it's crazy with all these things going on here, and they're here for two whole weeks in Ha'apai! They also have smaller teams going out to three of the outer islands.They came on Monday, it was storming and rainy out and they just unloaded equipment. Then yesterday we had the big opening ceremony at the high school, with the commadore of the US Navy as the special guest along with one other navy official, and a few Tongans on stage in chairs covered in tapa cloths. It was reallly well decorated with lots of mats and tapa cloths covering the stage and floor, and chairs set up on the sides, the middle was covered in mats for the school kids to sit on. They had some opening speeches, the commadore spoke about their pacific aid mission, and two schools did ta'alunga dances with Sara and Alicia, peace corps volunteers. At the end they had the navy band playing and all the kids were dancing around with them.

For these next couple of weeks the navy is here I'm going to mostly be helping out at MAFFF (ministry of agriculture, forestry, food and fisheries) where I work. The navy is holding clinics there for the veterinarians and for food sanitation and nutrition with the local farmers and women's groups in different villages. I'll help with any cultural information and a little translation if needed. I had to explain some things to the navy this morning - they had all our Tongan staff together and asked for their input and what they wanted to learn right away. And of course, in group settings and with foreigners Tongans are shy to speak up on their opinions and defer to the eldest or person of the highest level. So they were all quiet and deffered to the officer in charge of MAFFF. We'll also get our dog Lucky fixed so she won't have puppies, she followed me there this morning to the informational meeting and the US navy people loved her and were playing with her and Simba (neighbor's dog).

After my meeting at MAFFF today I went to Brett's school, the navy was doing their first visit to his school today so they had a whole program planned to welcome them and thank them for doing construction on the school - a new roof and walls, basically a new building! They had flower leis for all the navy people who were there, and tents set up in the rugby field, and a dj/music system. There were some speeches - including Brett giving a thank you speech, tongan music and dancing, and the US Navy band. When the band played all the kids got up and started dancing, then were joined by a lot of the navy so it turned into a big dance party! Then the navy had a helicopter land on the rugby field, and the kids all got to take turns getting into the helicopter and looking around in it! They loved it.

The other huge news is that we've opened the Internet cafe at the Ha'apai Training Center I've been working at!! It's amazing that we got this accomplished, and the Internet's running fast. Today was the first day we put up a big painted sign and opened, we've had about ten customers already and a lot of the navy wants to use it. We also have wireless so people can bring in laptops, which is what I'm doing.

So it has been a busy couple of days, and will be busy until the end of next week!! But it's really exciting seeing all the work being done and being able to be a part of it all helping out where we can. It's really crazy seeing so many palangis - foreign people in our little town of Pangai. Our local restaurant/bar was packed last night with uniformed navy men and a few women.

A Day with the Women

I usually don't spend all day at my job at MAFFF (ministry of agriculture, forestry, fisheries and food), but since there usually isn't much going on that they need my help with I decided to stay longer this time and help with whatever they were doing. And it's almost always just the women in the office, the men are usually out in the bush or fixing machinery or vehicles. So when Elaise, the women-in-development manager, went out front and started weeding and gardening I offered to help. But of course, since I'm a palangi (white person) and Tongans don't think palangis do any type of labor work or don't think they can, they told me to sit and have a rest. I knew I'd have to fight this, I knew that if I tried to do more of this type of work or whatever they were doing they'd respect me more and it might break some of the stereotypes they have about foreign women. It gets old hearing them telling us to always just have a rest or offering us chairs to sit on when everyone else is sitting on the floor. I don't want to be held up above others. So when the other two women in the office went out with Elaise to do weeding as well, I just followed them, watched for a few seconds, and mimicked what they were doing. And of course the women laughed at me, made jokes, and asked if I'd ever weeded before, all in good fun. And so our long, hot morning began weeding and gardening, and talking and laughing. Tongans laugh a lot and like to share stories or gossip, and they often make fun of each other joking around. So I felt like I was getting closer to these women. A lot of the conversation was in Tongan so I was pretty lost, but once in awhile I'd catch some words or phrases and figure out what the conversation was about, and contribute what I could. Other times one of the women would translate to me what they'd just talked about and we'd then talk about it in English. Then for lunch one of them went and got chicken, another person had brought over some huge cooked yams, we had coconuts cut open for drinks, and I went and got the banana bread I'd made earlier. While we were waiting for the food to be done they were saying how much they like Americans because they always try the Tongan food, and don't make fun of the Tongan people - they said people from some other countries won't try the food and make fun of the island people here. Then before I had a chance, they'd already piled tons of food on my plate, more than I could ever eat. I protested saying I'd never eat it all, but they told me to bring some back to Brett for lunch. One of the women, Lola, said she was trying to loose some weight, and that's why she wasn't eating the chicken skin or fat. Another woman then grabbed all the chicken fat and skin off Lola's plate and soaked up all the fatty juice while she ate it all - for many Tongans the fat is the best part. And all the eating as always was done with our hands, leaving them all greasy. I left that day with dirt-filled fingernails and greasy hands, but a feeling of accomplishment.

Independence Day

We celebrated the 4th of July here with a bonfire, roasting hot dogs on our beach, with people from five different countries including a few of the US Navy. I'd gotten some of those pop-me's in Nuku'alofa, where you pull the string and it shoots out confetti . (I was just there for a few days for a PC volunteer meeting). So that was our fireworks. The neighbor kids loved them, and we had them draw some flags for decorations, combinations of Tongan and US flags. When we explained it was our American Independence Day they kept thinking we were talking about the movie - Independence Day. I also spent part of the day floating out on the ocean from our beach on the new air mattresses my parents brought over when they visited, it's very relaxing!

Winter Birthday

It was my birthday on Friday, the first time I've had a "winter" birthday!! But it was still probably in the 70's and sunny, and we spent the afternoon on the beach by our house. Then met up with friends at Mariner's for dinner and drinks, the staff sang happy birthday for me, and we had cake later back at the house. It was a fun night, but different to be in another country away from family and friends back home. For my birthday present Brett wrote a song for me on his guitar. And the most unique present, in the photo below, was a huge ufi (yam) from our neighbors!!
We also had some visitors stay with us for a few nights this last week, two volunteers from Vava'u and one from Eua here on vacation during the school break. It's always fun to hear from volunteers in different parts of Tonga, the island groups are all so unique from each other. These volunteers were surprised at the lack of things available here in Ha'apai, but really enjoyed our beaches.

Yesterday we ran into one of the US Navy people here getting things ready for their July humanitarian visit (13th - 25th). There will be about 100 US Navy people here, they're doing a tour of different countries in the Pacific helping with different projects, medical, and dental. In Tonga they decided to focus on Ha'apai (maybe we're seen as the most needy or most isolated), and they're going to renovate and fix different government schools and water tanks, and they're bringing in doctors, dentists and optometrists to set up clinics and workshops. I heard they're bringing in thousands of pairs of glasses, and toothbrushes. They also have a veterinarian so we'll get Lucky our dog fixed. It will be crazy having so many palangis (foreigners) in our small islands here, the town will be crawling! It will be fun to see what they're doing and to be able to help out. I like that the US Navy is sending in people to these types of countries to help out, and that they're not giving out ANY money. Everything is brought in for doing medical and dental clinics, and all the equipment and everything for the projects at the schools. And all the projects they're doing with medical, food sanitation, dental, etc. they want to be sustainable. Which is a great idea, but will be hard to do. The guy we talked to said that here and in most of the countries they've been to, the local people always ask for money or say they need money to do these kinds of projects or workshops. They're so used to getting foreign aid, and used to this aid just being in the form of money and not service. So it's good to be doing these types of tours/projects to start changing the locals' perceptions on foreign aid.

Brett and I are just having another relaxing Sunday, not doing anything. It's a little overcast and cool out today. I have a few days of work this week, then go to Nuku'alofa on the main island for a volunteer advisory meeting for a few days. And it's almost the 4th of July, we'll have to figure out how to celebrate here.

Economy in Tonga

With all the economic hardship elsewhere in the world, I decided to write a little about how it's effecting Tonga, or could effect Tonga. The main source of income in Tonga is from overseas remittences from relatives - people sending money home to family in Tonga. They feel pressure to do this, in Tonga everything is shared, nothing is looked at as your own. (which creates some problems- with no sense of ownership things are never taken care of). Especially in the smaller islands. If fishermen go out and catch a lot, they come back the village and divide it up between everyone. If kids have some kind of treat, they share it with any other kids around them. And if there's a huge feast everyone in town will help contribute, even if they don't belong to the church that is having the feast. So the hopes of many families is for their children to move overseas, so that they can make more money and support the family in Tonga. The main export of Tonga is in fact people. I believe about one-third of the Tongan population lives overseas mostly in the US, New Zealand and Australia. And now with the economic situation overseas, many people are getting laid off and a lot of these start at the bottom with things like gardening or laborers etc. which are the kind of jobs many overseas Tongans have. So they aren't able to send as much money back home. Or they are getting deported back to Tonga - things like crime or visa issues that are getting looked at more closely now since other governments don't want to pay for illegal immigrants in prisons. So there are many more deportees in Tonga (some of which have never really lived in Tonga, they moved overseas as children). And in Tonga there aren't many jobs, not enough to support everyone. There are many unemployed youth.

But with all these points against Tonga, it's unlike many other countries. People can live and survive here without a job. Because of the community aspect no one is ever homeless, someone will always take that person in. There aren't even any nursing homes, family members take care of their elderly parents until the end. There are no orphanages, in fact kids often get passed between families - to aunts and uncles or grandparents. And there is definately not a shortage of food, you could never starve in Tonga. They do have a lot of imported food now, but even without that there's an abundance of fish and food in the sea, they grow lots of root crops, and have many different kinds of fruit growing (bananas, papaya, passion fruit, guava, etc). At least that's how it's usually been, but with the younger generation things are changing. This younger generation isn't following the community aspect as much, they don't want the same responsibilities and may also change the reliance on remittences from overseas- some of them aren't sending money home. This is probably somewhat from overseas influence. They all want cars, dvd's, new music, cell phones, and things like that. Which means they need money, and want to own their own things and not have to share everything. But can Tonga support all of this growth, with so little jobs? Which brings up the point of globalization - a good thing or a bad thing? It's creating problems, changing cultures, but do we have the right to say no you can't have cars or TV's?

But so much of the overseas influence is still so new, and the Tongans have lived self-reliantly on the land and sea for so long. I think that if overseas remittences stopped coming in and there wasn't much money here in Tonga things would still be fine. They all take care of eachother and have enough food. And there are so many conveniencies that people see as needs now. You don't really need electricity or running water - although everyone wants it. And many of these conveniencies have created more problems - such as imports to Tonga creating garbage they can't handle. You can't have a landfill on an island a mile by a mile in size, you can't export the garbage, so it either gets burned or thrown into the bush or sea.

What puzzles me the most is what happens to all this money coming into Tonga from overseas relatives. It's a HUGE amount that comes in, and sometimes they just send things like TV's or supplies. Western Union and other moneygram companies here are probably making a killing. But Tongans are always saying they have no money. So where does it all go? To the church, possibly. So many organizations and communities here apply for foreign aid, but they have so much money already coming into the country, and the government itself has a lot of money. Being here has really changed my views on foreign aid, seeing the dependency it creates within a population. And they don't need it, they can do things here themselves but don't want to, they expect to get handouts. You even see it with tourists that come to Tonga, people approach them asking for money or school supplies because they think every overseas tourist is rich. (probably because we get a lot of yachties that have money). In Tonga they always go for the easiest way to do things, which in this case is getting money instead of doing the work themselves. Or trying to get a volunteer to do the work for them.

Anyways, I'm rambling on so this is probably enough, it's a complex situation. All I know is you don't need much money to survive in Tonga, peace corps gives every volunteer a salary that's locally comparable and just enough to live off. Our salary is about $300 US a month, or $3600 US a year per person. And it's more than enough to survive on.

Vegetables, Piglets, and other Ha'apai news

Several things changed here in Ha'apai while we were on vacation. When we left there were no vegetables, and hadn't been almost the entire time we've been here. Now there are tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, cabbage, and white raddish for sale at the market, it's amazing! Some not so great news - when we left our sima vie (giant cement tank) where we get all our rain water for drinking was almost completely full, and now it's completely empty! The pigs got into it in the middle of the night while we were gone, we usually would hear it since it's right outside our bedroom window. But the neighbors didn't hear the water rushing out, and it was empty by morning. So now we share our neighbor's drinking water, and it's dry season so there won't be much more rain to fill our tank. The pigs actually chewed through the pvc pipe where the water comes out of our tank.

More pig news - we found out that our dog, Lucky, and the neighbor's dog, Simba killed one of the neighbor's baby piglets!! That's a horrible crime here in Tonga, if a dog kills a pig they'll usually kill the dog. But Lucky was doing fine when we got back, the neighbor kid even fed and played with her while we were gone. We offered to pay for the killed piglet, but of course our neighbors wouldn't accept any money and said the dogs were playing with the piglet and didn't know what they were doing. And like they said they were going to do since we moved here, they gave us one of the new piglets. Brett picked out a little black girl piglet with a white tail, and when the neighbor kids asked if he named her he said the name is "ifo" which means delicious. They thought that was pretty funny, but really that's what you do with piglets unless you want them to grow and have more piglets.

We also came home to no Internet - the modem is broken in the Fisheries office where we had our home Internet connected to. I wasn't too surprised that it was somehow broken since the Fisheries had managed to ruin a whole computer and needed a new hard drive put in. I'm pretty sure it has to do with the Internet - they just got it a few months ago and don't really know much about viruses and such. I went into the office and one of the workers asked me to look at a form online they were filling out. I scrolled through and it was junk email saying you could win a million dollars and asked for the person's credit card number!! I told them NOT to fill it out and never to give their credit card on a form like that if they didn't know the sender. And the Peace Corps office Internet was down for a few days as well - the bill hadn't been paid again. The power was also out again in my computer center so I'm trying to get that sorted out. But these kind of issues just keep happening here, nothing new.

We had a two day Peace Corps workshop/training on service learning with our counterparts. We'd asked someone to come before vacation, then the day before the workshop found out she was in Nuku'alofa on the main island. Oh well. It was fun though to see the outer island volunteers - Eric and Melanie, and Monica, they leave to go back to their islands today on the boat.

It's also a lot colder here than when we left! It's the winter season now, and it's mostly down in the 70's now which feels really cold when we're used to high humidity and temps in the high 80's.

New photos!

New photos are posted in the picassa photo link to the left of new zealand, and some new photos in tonga.