An eventful weekend

After my last blog post my life seemed to get kind of crazy. Early on Friday morning about one a.m I got a call saying that Lusi’s grandma had passed away. I quickly got up and headed down the mountain. Seeing the way Samoan’s doing funerals is quite different than we do it in the states.  When we arrived at the house we had a short family service. Since we do not have a hospital on our island. The men in the family helped carry the body. They put the body into the back of the truck and then we headed to the wharf. We then all piled on the boat and headed across to meet the ambulance. We then took the forty-minute drive over to the hospital. At the hospital we had a service at the chapel. After that we headed for home for the day by the time I arrived back on island it was six thirty and time for me to get ready and go to school. While I was walking through the village my students were already walking to school. It was a long day at school but I survived. After school I headed over to Lusi’s house for another family service to discuss the funeral. Since a lot of people fly in for the funeral they usually wait a month to hold the funeral. On Sunday after church his family had another meeting at the house. When attending the meetings we have to sit on the floor of the house cross-legged. For Samoan’s they grew up doing this but my body is not quite used of sitting like that for a long period of time.

            With all of this going on the events just continued to roll on in. On Friday night I fell asleep very early because I was so tired from the day. I then got a phone call at about eleven from a panicked friend. She was a world teacher last year and is now a contract teacher just like me. She asked me if I felt the earthquake. I was like no I was sleeping. She continued to tell me that we just had a 6.8 earthquake about 50 miles from the island. We were put into a Tsunami watch. Me never experiencing a tsunami or earthquake, I was a little nervous. I had no idea what to expect and there is really no way to prepare for one. Luckily, we had no Tsunami and only a few after shocks, which I also did not feel. I must have been really tired.

            After all of the commotion over the weekend I was ready to head back to school and have some normal in my life. Little did I know I was in for a treat. I got to school on Sunday morning and I was informed that on Tuesday I was getting observed by the DOE, on Wednesday we had parent teacher conferences and on Thursday we were having more people from the DOE coming in. So much for a nice relaxing week, I am really hoping that this weekend will be nice and calm.

Halloween, Puppies, and More

I can’t even believe that it is already November already. Time has truly been flying by since school has started. I apologize for not getting a blog up sooner but I am soon realizing there is a slight difference between being a contract teacher and a volunteer. As I am now a veteran teacher at the school more jobs have been laid on me. By all means I love staying busy, I just don’t get nearly as much free time. My big projects right now are geography bee and history day projects. Being as I may not have paid attention as much as I should have in high school I have been doing a little bit of re-teaching on my knowledge of geography.  

            My students always seem to keep me on my toes too. I have loved every minute of teaching level five and usually enjoy all the energy they bring to the classroom. Though last week one of my students decided to bring five hermit crabs into the classroom. The student had hid the crabs in her pocket and I was in the middle of teaching and I saw hermit crabs crawling all over the classroom. At the moment I was not very happy but now that it is over I find it kind of humorous. I just never know what they are going to bring into the classroom.

            On the past Monday we received what I would call torrential rains. I woke up around five and I have never heard it rain so hard for so long in my life. I went into my kitchen to find my floors all wet and everything in the house just felt damp. I was a little nervous about walking to school since the school bus can’t make it up the mountain. Luckily, the principal came with the truck to save me from the rain. On my way home from school I had to walk through ankle deep puddles of water to get to my house. I also had mini waterfalls outside of my house.

            We got puppies. I always vowed that I would never be that person that bragged about dogs. I got two puppies for my protection as I tell the locals. They seem to think puppies will protect people. The dogs on island are not so friendly. My puppies may be a little friendly because I like to sit and play with them after school. Though the other morning one of the puppies tried to rip my skirt. The other day we decided to bring the dogs down to the ocean for a little swim. On our walk down it started to down pour so here we are walking through the village with puppies and its completely pouring outside. We then took the puppies to the water. Lusi just threw them into the water. I then asked do you think they can swim. His response. I hope so. Luckily they learned how to swim pretty quickly.

            On Halloween I decided to have a little party for my kids. I bought them some snacks and juice and we watched a movie. The perk of giving Samoan kids food they bring you your favorite food the next day. So the following day my desk was filled with snacks. Easy to say the kids really do appreciate everything I get for them. On Halloween we also had Milton’s birthday party. Milton is Lusi’s nephew that was born last year. They had the party all day but I missed most of it because I was busy at school. They decided to have the party without most of kids because otherwise it gets too loud. Which is fine because they still saved some food for me J While I was getting ready for the birthday party I got a nice little surprise. Lusi’s niece and nephew came up to the house to get me. I was in the shower and they were outside the house making noises. They also found where the water pipe is. All the water pipes are above ground here because it never gets cold. Well, they decided to turn the water on and off while I was in the shower. They seemed to think it was really funny to hear me yell at them in Samoan. Even on the top of the mountain my kids find ways to pick on me.

With Love,

Abby

Back to the Island Life

After months of waiting to see if I would get offered the position of being a contract teacher on Aunu’u I finally got the news in August. Two weeks after receiving the news I was on a plane on my way to American Samoa. Spending two months home with family and friends was amazing and I truly enjoyed every moment of being around the people I love. I was also excited to get back to the island and see all people and start teaching again. I was super excited for the school year to start because I felt so much more prepared for this year than I was for last year.

            When I arrived on island I stayed at a hotel for a little over a week. Staying in the hotel was nice but I was itching to get back to the island. During my week stay on the main island I was busy getting all the paperwork completed for my contract. Getting paperwork completed here takes forever compared to the states. Slowly but surely I am starting to get it all completed. It only took a month and a half. I also made my first big girl purchase and bought a car. To make my life a little easier over the next two years I figured this would be a smart choice. My car is nice and I love having the ability to go off island whenever I want.

            Another big hurdle I had to tackle upon arriving on the island was finding a house. I was unable to stay at the house I was at last year because the new WorldTeachers were going to be housed in that house. So my principal and I were house hunting once I had gotten back. We finally found a house that was located in the “mountain”. The mountains on this island are not nearly as big as the ones on the main island. My house is located after the taro plantation. All the other locals live in front of the plantation. The plantation is about the size of a small field and it has a cement pathway through the middle of it. Which leads you to my house. I enjoy the small walk it talks because it’s very peaceful and reminds me of living in the country. The plantation at night is FULL of frogs. You are literally dodging frogs the whole time you are walking through. Luckily I am not scared of frogs but I always feel bad because Lusi is super scared of frogs.  The locals were a little bit concerned about me being placed here due to the location. At night if I am walking up towards my house usually people will walk up just to make sure I arrive safely. I told them it would be fine because I am used to living in the country. It took me three weeks of being here before I was able to move in. The house is a perfect size for me and contains everything I need.

            I was fortunate enough to get three new girl volunteers with me on island. I got the chance to really get to know them the first couple of weeks I was here. I ended up sleeping on their couch since my house wasn’t quite ready. It was nice being able to help them figure out the island and teach them about the culture of the island. It’s also nice to have them to hang out and chat with them after school. Most days I end going to their house after school to hang out with them.

            I was more than excited for school to finally start so I could finally get into routine again. This year I am teaching level five and I really enjoy teaching this grade. My students are great and I feel more comfortable in this grade level. Our school year has been off to a great start and cant wait to see what happens throughout the rest of the year.

            I also have the goal of trying to learn Samoan before the end of the school year. I am definitely getting better at understanding the language but speaking it has been a process. I am just really scared that I am going to mispronounce something. So at night Lusi is always helping me learn some new words. I really want to learn it so that I hang at with locals and I can understand what they are talking about. It also helps me with teaching also because sometimes I get frustrated when my students don’t understand what I am saying but I can guarantee if someone was teaching me in Samoan language I would have no idea what is going on. So this year I try to find the Samoan meaning of words to help my students. This also helps me learn the language. Win/win for me! I spend most of my Sundays searching through the dictionary looking up words for the next week but if it helps my students I don’t care!

With Love,

Abby

Highlights from the year

As I am finally packed up and sitting in my room so many memories are flooding through my mind so I am going to share a few of the highlights of my year with you. My first one will be “Just Play”. “Just Play” is a program that my students were involved in for the second half of the school year. This program focused on getting students eating right and excercising daily. Something my students are not very good at. For example I rarely see my kids doing any sort of exercise and after lunch most of my students have a can of soda and uncooked ramen noodles with some kind of BBQ flavoring. One day I was curious and read the label on these ramen noodles and they contain over 400 calories in each bag. That’s insane! Anyway just play had the students do three different games in twenty minute time period. Which means my kids really had to hustle through the activities to get it completed in this time frame. We spent over a month preparing these activities and perfecting our transitions before the judges came to judge us on our performance. If you do well on the first round you move on to the championship, which takes place on the main island. We blew the judges away and moved on to the championship. The championship was so much fun. We took around forty students across the channel on boats and then on about a forty minute bus ride. The bus was so full. We had kids sitting on each other’s laps and people sitting on the floor but the best part of it all is the kids were singing the whole way to town. I have never seen my kids so excited for something. After all ten schools do their performance it was time to announce the winners. We slowly were getting closer to first place and you could feel and see how nervous all the kids were about this. When they announced that we won the feeling was similar to when our high school won the state championship. The kids were jumping and screaming and chanting. I was so proud and excited for them at that moment.

            The next memorable moment would be Lucifer. We have had a rat in our house for over three months and this is the smartest rat I have ever met. Somehow Lucifer can take a peanut off of the trap without setting it off. He can also lick the peanut butter off the trap without setting it off. He is one smart, little rat. We have tried all kinds of ways of trying to kill him and have been unsuccessful. At this point we have just given up. He has made his appearance known in the house. He has taught me to put every single piece of food away or he will destroy it in the middle of the night. He also likes to make an appearance once and a while. For instance when we are watching a movie he decided to come out and join us. He ran under our feet and we screamed for dear life. We also got a nice little surprise that night because we found out he has a little friend too. Yes, we have two rats in the house now. There might be more we are not sure because I can hear them crawling through the walls in the middle of the night and lets just say it is similar to the sounds of cats fighting. I can hear them hissing too. It is a very comforting sound when you are trying to sleep. Lastly, going to the bathroom in the middle of the night is terrifying. You never know where that stupid rat is and you don’t dare want to encounter it. So you take a mad dash for the bathroom and pray that you don’t run into the rat. Props to Lucifer because he has gotten Dana and I standing and screaming on top of the furniture multiple times.

            Saturday drives around the island is something I am really going to miss. On Saturdays we always wake up early and head over to the main island. The best part of riding in the car was the fact that we could sit in the bed of truck for the whole day. On one of our last days on island we decided to go to hidden cove that only the locals know about. Locals rarely go to these places because the drive/hike to these places are not usually the best kept. We had to drive about four miles on this “gravel road” and then hike for about twenty minutes to reach the beach. This beach was absolutely breath taking. I love how clear the water is here. Like always the beach was completely empty because locals rarely go to the beach. We found a very tall rock and were jumping into the deep part of water into the ocean. It was a lot of fun swimming in a new place and seeing new things.

            I am also going to miss the sense of community I feel on the island. This island is more like a big family to me. Everyone knows everyone. Everyone helps out everyone. I also see a lot of people every day. I may not know the names of all the people on the island but I can recognize them and know that they are from the island. I am going to miss when I walk outside I have multiple people yelling my name and coming up to me and seeing how I am doing. I am going to miss the little parade of kids that always follows me around.

            Alright I finally made it back home and I some what adjusting to the cold weather we are having here and the time difference. I wanted to share with you about our crazy ride to the airport. Last Wednesday I was dreading leaving the island so bad because it was going to be my last time being there for a long time. I remember the moment Lusi looked at me and said you have to put your stuff on this boat or we are not going to get a boat across. Every time that I saw a boat I would be like I am not ready to leave lets just wait for the next boat to come back. We had Tupperware’s and suitcases full of all of our stuff all sitting in our front porch. We had told the kids that were waiting around that we had to go. As soon as we said that they all grabbed our stuff and carried it down to the boat for us. I did not have to carry a single thing, which was a good thing because I was too busy giving people hugs and saying goodbye to everyone. I was sad to say goodbye but I had to keep telling myself that I am going to be back someday. Once we got into the back of the truck we had to face yet another problem. It started to rain. It was no light rain. Luckily my coat was water resistant so I put that over my head and just ducked down in the back of the truck waiting for the rain to pass. I had gotten fairly wet and Dana and Lusi were soaked from the rain. Despite the rain and getting our entire luggage wet it was a nice distraction from the fact that we were leaving. Getting to the airport put an instant pit in my stomach because the worst part was approaching. The goodbyes. We had like a group of 15 of us to say goodbye and we were the last ones through security. I literally had gotten through security and boarded the plane and twenty minutes later I was flying over the island with tears in my eyes.

            It was a great year and I would not have changed a thing! I can’t wait to see everyone back home!

With Love,

Abby

One Last Time

At the beginning of the year I remember looking at the calendar and thinking this year is going to take forever. I was thinking how am I ever going to make it through this year time is going to go by so slow. As I started making friends and getting a feel for the culture the time started to pick up. This place that once felt nothing like home soon began to feel like my new home. It was a slow process getting to know people and to feel welcome but over time we started to build up friendships and a new home.

            I can’t even begin to describe to people how this year was for me. I can honestly say that this was one of my hardest and most rewarding years. Going through your first year of teaching in a new country where English is not the first language was not always an easy thing. I remember times where I would get so frustrated at my students for speaking in Samoan during class. As my Samoan improved I slowly understood that my students were just translating for the students who did not understand what I was saying. They also chose to have little side conversations that had nothing to do with class and got mad when I would explain in English that I know the basics of what they are talking about and it has nothing to do with your math homework. My students at the beginning of the year were complete strangers but by the end of the year turned into my family. They know so much about me and I know so much about them. I wouldn’t have changed that either I am really going to miss seeing them all the time. Even though school has been out for almost a week I still get to see my student outside at some point throughout the day.

            The feeling that I have right now I wish upon no one. The only way that I can describe it is as a rollercoaster of emotions. I feel like my heart is getting torn out. I have to say goodbye to my students who have had my back all year and when I really needed them they were always there to help me. I have to say goodbye to the people of this village who have been so helpful towards. People have brought food over multiple times, given us rides to town and simply just came over to the house to check on us and chat with us. I remember at the beginning of the year I felt like such a stranger here. Now I never get that feeling. When I am walking through the village people are always saying hello or when we go to town all the people from the village always wave and talk to us. This is what I am going to miss seeing all these people all the time. Finally I have to say goodbye to the two people who helped me get through this year. I would have never survived this year without Dana. She is the only one the truly understands the struggle of this year we have been through so much together. We have both heard each other just screaming at our students and we have stood on the counters screaming because we have had two rats running around our house. I also wouldn’t have survived the year without my boyfriend Lusi. He helped me in so many ways possible when I needed to stuff from town or simply just someone to vent to on bad days. I have gone almost this whole year without spending a full twenty-four hours away from these people. I am not real sure how I am going to survive leaving. Every time that I hear that plane take off I get tears in my eyes because I know soon that I will be on that plane. I am not even emotionally ready to go down to the boat and watch all my students and friends slowly drift away. Then comes my next feeling excitement. I have not seen my friends and family from back home in over ten months. I cannot wait to see them and hug them. I can’t believe that I have gone this long without them.

            One of the big things that I have taken away from this year is that we really have no control over what is going to happen next in our lives. We can plan and prepare as much as we want but God always sends us a curveball that always seems to catch us off guard. I also learned that everything happens for a reason and you just have to trust the process and believe that everything is going to work out. So even though I am leaving here brokenhearted I know that God brought me hear to make me stronger and a better person. He also taught me to trust him. As I have so much fear in my mind about what is going to happen next with me I also have peace because I know its going to work out it always does. As of right now I still have not heard about my contract with the DOE. As much as I would love to know before I leave I have my doubts that I will know. Everything here happens at a slow pace and so I just have to be patient. I have also talked to multiple people about this and they said not to worry about it you will be back. So hoping that all goes smoothly and I find out somewhat soon that I will be coming back next year!

With Love,

Abby 

P.S. I have one more blog coming I am not quite finished with it!