suffixes soris and sneezes

My Anti Yvonne next door has a granddaughter who she on and off cares for while her daughter teaches in south Ambae. Dorina has been featured on here as the January photo of my future babies with knives calendar. If you've forgotten, here's another one of her and a bui biti (small knife in language, one of Dorina's favorite phrases)

Dorina's mama just had a baby and now the whole gang is staying on school grounds for a couple of weeks. I love little Dorina and miss her when she's back with her mama, so her presence trumps the new ever-crying 2 week old baby sister. This brings me to one of the funny things going on in Vanuatu - Dorina's little sister's name is Dorinette! 

When they told me, I wasn't even surprised. Simply sisters sharing everything but a suffix. People love doing that here, giving their kids far too similar-sounding names! And it usually starts with the same letter as the papa's name (Donald in this case) which makes it fun to guess the variations possible for offspring. A couple examples close to home:

The headmaster at my school, Mr. Brent, is the brother of Braun, Brenton, Braunel, Braunson, and Belinda!

My uncle Colin is proud father of Clifton, Clinton, Clara, Clemson, and Coliamson  

My uncle Edmonson is papa to Edinson, Edrino, Edriano, Ediano, and Jonas. Poor Jonas! Or lucky Jonas? I can't decide. 

Dorina's grandparents, Yvonne and Uncle Dimas have Denson, Dixon, Dennison, Dinickson, Densley, and Daphne

My aunt Hemilton (Mama Green Thumb) and her husband Fred are the parents of Florinda, Flonette, and Flonickson (who goes by Vira and lives with my mama and papa while the girls live in West Ambae)

It cracks me up! But I guess they could say the same about a culture that names their children directly after the parents. We've got enough juniors and treys and the fourths at home to match the population of Vanuatu! 

When I first met Dorina in march, she cried at the sight of me - I'm the first tuturani or white man she's ever seen. But slowly she's warming up to bumbu Alison. Bumbu (boom-boo) is the term used for grandparent, great aunt, great uncle, all the greats and grands, including grandchildren! So Dorina is my bumbu, too!

happy go lucky

No more crying and running away with complete terror on her face and now, four months later, we're almost to the point of her allowing me to hold her! Slow progress is better than none. She loves saying my name, al-son, and even likes my animals from a distance. She'll come sit on my porch singing out to them and running away when they try to play. She affectionately calls all of them "lava" now... "all" as in all animals - not just lava, kwen, and mus. Whoops!

Dorina's language is a mix of local, Bislama, and baby toktok. She'll blabber something off and everyone will laugh. I'll ask them what she said and half the time it's something funny in local language and the other half it's just baby chat. Everyone, especially me, finds it funny that I'm in the weird position of not knowing the difference! 

do do bird in my kitchen!

Another part of life here is saying you're sorry. All day you'll here "sorrrri" this and "oh! sori" that. Sori basically means I feel bad for you in some way, whether it's because I'm stepping in front you to get somewhere or I just finished my meal. When I made my first wakobaot to Lolowai with Mami (aunt) Amina, she said sori the whole way- both because I hadn't walked to town yet and because I was having to make the trek. I'll offer to scratch some coconuts for the laplap and multiple people will say sori during the process. I have to remind them that I chose to scratch and they shouldn't be sori, and they always find this funny. Most things are funny here. He who laughs, lasts! 

A prime example of sori is my now short hair. Without exaggeration, every day since returning to site from training part 2, someone has asked me (already knowing the answer) if I've cut my hair. Without fail, my "yes" is always followed by a "sori." Every time! It's amazing! I tell them not to feel sori, that I cut it short on purpose and that I love it - it's not as hot with short hair and bucket baths are cut in half. They still say sori and make me promise not to spoil my hair again. 

So something some friends and I talked about in Vila is what happens when something bad happens and you really want to say a good sincere sorry? The power of the word is lost among the sea of unnecessary soris! And for this unfortunate thought, we all simultaneously said a good ol "sori!"

Sorry ceremonies are kastom and still used today. If there's a feud or someone acted with really bad fashion, the chief will bring the families together in the nakamal for a ceremony. Everything that happened is said out loud and there's an exchange of pig tusks. After this, all is good. Well on the surface, I imagine. It rids the community of tension, but it doesn't change the underlying problems. I respect the tradition and understand its purpose, but I've heard about some sorry ceremonies and I'm shocked that things are "okay" now between everyone. I guess that's life for ya though. 

Sneeze closure. I never knew it was a tissue (whoops, I mean an issue - haha had to) until I got here. No one says bless you after a sneeze! During training part 2 some of us talked about how bizarre it is, both that we need sneeze closure and that it's missing here. 

You just made a ridiculous sound and facial movement and then you're stranded out there waiting for someone to acknowledge your near death experience. Though I'm pretty sure that's one of those things we take as true but never really look into for ourselves. Like if a dog's mouth is actually cleaner than a human's. Also not true. 

It's not like there's not enough sneezing going on to constitute an acceptable method of recognition. Trust me, plenty of snot. My friend Michelle kept referring to "the 11's" and I finally asked and found out that it's the two lines of snot coming down from all the little noses. Yum! 

And the funny part is how it's second nature for us to say bless you. So of course I still say it out of life habit. But here everyone stares and laughs and mumbles something in language, probably about the white man doing black magic. 

So now I just go with it. Sometimes I throw out a gazunteight to make them laugh and it always reminds me of my dad (not because he's German- quite far from it! But he's always been a loyal gazunteighter)

growing