Estimated Prophet

So i found some pics from all sorts of random things that i thought everyone might enjoy. Life is pretty swell here. I am starting to get really excited about going back to america for a visit at the end of april...vacation from vacation is good.
One of the peace corps girls in the group that came a few months before me is getting married to a samoan guy next month so we have bachlorette things to look forward to in the next month. Other than that, school has been keeping me the opposite of busy, but Ella (malaki's mom) is now a full time and paid teacher's assistant to help in malaki's class. This is very exciting because samoa has never had paid teacher's assistants before. Sustainable development! That is what i do!

My little pal Sina and I playing with a plate at the wedding. Lets hear it for the bright organge puletasi eh? Do i have style or what?

Meghan and I went to a wedding in my village...like 3 months ago, but whatever. It was our friend Tina and it was at the mormon church. So this is what a wedding in samoa looks like. Check out the cake on the right! Too bad only important people get the cake...luckily since the palagis (i.e. white people i.e. meg and i) were a package deal that apparently made us important. So we got half a round of cake. We were pretty siked.

Dylan, me, meghan. There is no time for fun in peace corps....

This is me and "baby dan" at meghan's house in siumu. Ok i know i say that i love every samoan kid, but baby dan is a pretty cool dude. He really wanted to wear my helmet even though it was all sweaty from my bike ride over. So i thought i would just give him a little practice run on my bike...in meghan's house. Im not really sure why she puts up withme...

This is Luisa and Malaki at school in apia. We made life-size cut outs of them that day and painted them the color of their school uniforms.

My boy Malaki playin with his new christmas toys on the beach.

Santa does come to samoa! He even came to Tafatafa beach...along with the rest of the special ed class of Senese school in Apia. Senese is the school that Malaki goes to on Fridays. He is in a class with 2 other little girls who live in villages and have hearing disablities. The whole crew joined us out at our beach last december. I am playing the part of santa's helper behind the picnic table.

Santa and Malaki

Im not so smart

Look what I did on the first day of school! Yes, I’m a moron. Last Monday was our first day of the first term (school is on New Zealand system so we start in Feb instead of Sept). I started the day like any other, rolled out of bed, made coffee, put on my spankin new outfit that I purchased in Thailand and set off for Peace Corps round 2. I got about 10 feet from my front door when I stepped on a rock and turned my ankle quite painfully causing me to crash to the ground. My bag flew over my head and my precious coffee spilled everywhere. Well this was a predicament! I tried to gather myself and survey the damage and found a few cuts on my legs and a pool of blood in my right flip-flop (I turned my left ankle). Then I felt the pain in my toe and saw that I had a scrapped most of the skin off the bottom of it (see pic if you can’t remember what it looked like).
So I did what any self-respecting foreign volunteer would do, I sat there feeling sorry for myself. Eventually Tina, friend and teacher, came down and scooped my off the ground, picked up my scattered belongings and said, “I think maybe you should go home.” But, I was determined to get further than 10 feet from my front door on the first day of school. Together we hobbled up the hill to school. I cleaned my foot off at the spigot (same one the kids drink from...) and stumbled into the office.
Ana (our principal) was talking with parents so I didn’t get too much attention initially. Tina, meanwhile, went to get the school “medical kit” which turned out to be a metal box with a ½ full bottle of iodine, a couple of cotton balls, and a mystery ointment. I decided to go with my gut and sent one of the kids to get my Peace Corps issued medical kit from my house. I felt a little snotty, but the pain won out. Tina told me to put my feet up on a chair which I was thankful for because usually that would have been a major culture faux-pas. She then went to work snipping off all the dead skin which may or may not have been the right thing to do, but she was doing it so lovingly and cracking jokes the whole time about being my nurse. How could I stop her?
Later that afternoon when I was limping home on the road I went by my neighbor/protector/samoan father figure Leapaga who was sitting on his porch staring at nothing (a favorite pass time of samoans). He yelled in Samoan if I had hurt my lef and I said yeah, because I was a stupid palagi (whiteperson). Then he suggested that I should just go back to sleep. I thought that was the best idea I had heard all day.

WOHOO!! This is my computer lab/library...just not quite put together yet. But it is all there and ready to go. I hear the computers will be in country any day now...

This is my counterpart and bff Sina. Her 25th birthday was on 4 days before my 25th birthday (that would mean christmas day). I was deteremined to celebrate my birthday this year because Samoans don't usually celebrate their birthdays (most dont even know their birthdays). So I made a brownie/chocolate cake and put in some american flags from grandma so Sina and I could have a b-day party on christmas. That is my boy Leapaga behind us (also sina's father).