Laura and I stayed with Kate and Bryan at their house on the school grounds of Santo East. Kate teaches primary like Laura and me and Bryan is an IT vol teaching secondary students about computers. Their setup is pretty awesome. I say awesome in a nonjealous way- I'd never give up my "authentic peace corps experience" on Ambae and I genuinely mean that. There's something satisfying and rewarding about living simply- sans lights, plumbing, and other conveniences. But that being said, the Bate n' Kryan Lodge is a great place to visit! Luganville is a laid back town surrounded by beauty. Kate and Bryan have a comfortable home with 24/7 electricity, running water, tile floors, and an indoor toilet and shower! Prettttty unreal. They've painted the living room and made it feel like home.
The week was full of fun activities. The whole country switches to celebration mode when Independence rolls around. And Luganville, being one of the two towns on Vanuatu, is a hub of excitement. Unity Park, which sits on the water in the middle of town, was packed with things going on. Food stalls lined the park, each one selling a variety of goodies. Fresh meat, laplap, corn, cake (cake!!), and endless other foods were laid out for cheap prices. You could (and we did several times) buy a hoagie roll packed with cooked-in-front-of-you killed-that-morning steak and sautéed onions for just over a buck! There were games, too. For around ten cents, you could join a game of darts or try your chances at bottle caps. We kept getting lucky and then treating ourselves to banana cake and kabobs (meatsticks!) One area of the park had a row of kava stalls with men and women selling kava from many of the surrounding islands. Oh the options! We sampled em all. There were live bands, fire dancers, water musicians, basketball games, boxing matches, and a bunch of other random happenings throughout the week.
Other than spending ample amounts of time at Unity Park soaking in the festivities, we bounced around town checking out all the volunteers' houses and lives.
Sunday we went to David's place (an IT vol working at college de luganville) and had a movie day. We played some frisbee, cooked up some grub, and watched cosmos and human planet. It was wonderful!
Monday afternoons are reserved for ultimate frisbee between the pcv's, volunteers from other organizations, ex pats, and locals on the field at Kate and Bryan's school. Man it was fun. My plan is to get some frisbees to my site so the kids and teachers can play!
We woke up Tuesday and got ready for a bike ride. Laura, Kate, Bryan and I rode the 20 km on beautiful country roads out to Mantevulu. Santo is home to many blue holes- swimming holes that are just what they sound like. So incredibly blue and clear! We swam around, swung on the rope swings, and headed back to the house for pizza night. Homemade pizzas were the perfect topping to a nice, exhausting day
July 30th marked the 24th anniversary of Independence for Vanuatu! We celebrated by making Kate's family's special banana crepes for breakfast. I think I'll celebrate every holiday with that recipe. So delicious! We had a pretty easy going day- hung out at Unity Park, drank some kava, and met up with other friends. Maureen Mike and Sara came in on the ferry from Malekula in the evening, sowe met them up at an extendee vol Sam's house. We all played catch up and listened to their entertaining stories about the trip over.
The next day Laura and I went to Million Dollar Point with Sara, Mike, and Maureen. In an earlier post I talked about the US presence in Vanuatu during World War 2 and how we dumped all of our equipment into the ocean so that our enemies couldn't use it when we left. Well this all happened at Million Dollar Point on Santo! We snorkeled around checking out the tanks, airplanes, and rubble underwater, repurposed as homes to endless sea creatures. The beach is covered in sea glass, which was awesome! Old coca cola and medicine bottles from the wreckage were welded into the rocks creating a manmade reef. I found an old spoon engraved with "USA" on the handle! It was a day full of exploration and it ended with a gudfala meal at the beachfront cafe.
The weekend was full of last minute errands to run in town. I bought some lumber for the bed and bench I'm building for my house and they put it on a ship to Ambae. We had a big family spaghetti dinner with sangria and charades! On Sunday Laura left and the rest of us went up to Hog Harbor and spent the day on Champagne Beach. Wow! It's an incredible white sand beach with cool reefs for snorkeling. A great end to my stay on Santo!
My next trip back will include some scuba diving around the island. The USS Coolidge was sunk there (along with the rest of America's footprint) after WW2 and is apparently a great dive site!
Woke up early on Momday and had a last skype with my sister before she becomes a mama in September! She was glowing and absolutely beautiful! It's hard not being there to see my first niece pop out, but hopefully coming home at the start of 2015 to meet the little nugget
I had my last kakae - a 9 am burger at Attar. Sydney (a vol on Ambae who's in the earlier group) walked in, sat down, and told me bout her trip to Indonesia that she just came home from! Definitely putting it on the list of places to see while I'm on this side of the planet.
I got back to my wonderful family and to animal children that are still alive! All three pups are growing up and full of energy. My papa has a new pet flying fox these days so that was a fun greeting! His last one died a few months ago after a 3 year run, so we'll see how it goes
Some pigs roam free and others are fenced in - easier to maintain a pig that way when you're raising him for his tusk. My brother was keeping his baby pig, Wala, in my parents' kitchen while he builds a fence for him. He's now moved to the tree hole by the toilets! He's such a cute little guy - his fur reminds me of a chipmunk and he loves to have his belly rubbed. Who doesn't, really?! I've been keeping him company whenever I want a blast of oinks.
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