sweet 16

2016's first sunset!

Cheers to a year of beautiful uncertainty! And plenty of transitions: finishing service, traveling, reverse culture shock, and finding a new place to call home – all things on the menu for 2016. My new year’s resolution (I’d rather call it my intention, sounds less binding) is to be present with every step of the adventure. Not dwelling on the last chapter or dreaming about the next one, but sitting comfortably and mindfully in whatever boat I’m in.

“The secret to a rich life is to have more beginnings than endings” –David Weinbaum

New Year’s Eve was pretty mild – checkers and bell ringing with children – so I wasn’t expecting New Year’s Day to be too wild and unruly.. I really underestimated this one! Apparently it’s island style to celebrate on New Year’s Day instead of Eve. They make a pretty good argument, considering you’re celebrating the new beginning, not the ending. Different strokes! After the wedding on the 31st I bought a jug of wine just in case anyone wanted some midnight sips, but no takers. So in the morning when Mami Amina and Uncle Glen showed up with 4 more jugs and a half bottle of whiskey, I actually felt underprepared. 

My papa had killed a pig and by now it was roasting over the fire. We spent the day drinking beers and hanging out, playing more checkers and eating delicious food. By afternoon the face paint came out and everyone was getting tatted up. Uncle Glen asked to become a butterfly, so I complied. His kastom name is conveniently (serendipitously?) Bata, so we called him Bata-fly. He loved it! Even my papa got some work done, becoming a warrior princess. Once dinner was ready they set up the food in a fanciful mandala that would soon be eaten. My papa plopped down on the floor and I snagged this hilarious photo, a telling peek into the silliness of the evening!

the silliest man

obrien art!

comfortable

butterfly!

mami amina and uncle glen!

pinkies locked!

Dinner was delightful and the company was even better, as usual. My sister had her first sip of alcohol and my brother had his first through twentieth sips. We danced to all kinds of music, played checkers and uno, and storian’d until it was time to pass out. We dipped into my papa’s pineapple homebrew which kicked us hard enough to stop at one glass. We polished off the wine jugs and I stumbled home to a peaceful sleep. January 2, 2016 will forever mark the day of my first island hangover. I never drink on the island, but if I do, it’s usually only a beer or glass of wine after kava. I woke up late with a pounding head (you know the feeling) and dragged myself over to my parents’ house to see what shape the others were in. Surprisingly (but not that surprising) everyone else was good as new. They told me that they continued to eat through the night instead of listening to my insistence on drinking lots of water. No one told me that steadily eating was the proactive game plan! Oh well, everyone needs a January 2nd every now and then. So I spent the day lazily in bed with rotations of sleep, my book, and Seinfeld.

I woke up on the 3rd refreshed and ready to start 2016. Kathleen was walking from her village into town and passed by. She visited and we swapped stories and then she was on her way. That morning on my run I had learned that they’d be painting mats in the afternoon. So after lunch I walked over to another village and participated in this intricate and exhausting process. I didn’t bring my camera because sometimes cameras should be left at home, especially when learning new things that need your full attention. On Ambae, woven pandanas mats are a big part of kastom. They are present in every kastom ceremony from births to weddings to funerals. They are valuable and used almost like currency within the communities. Bride prices are paid with these mats and you can even pay school fees with them!

Anyway, once they are woven, the women get together and dye them with funky patterns, which is what I got to observe on Sunday. You take a banana tree trunk and peel of the stringy outer layer. Then you cut your design into the stumpa and let it dry out. You cook down the dye (usually purple or pink here) and, as if it were a bigfala stamp, you take the trunk and dip it into the tray of dye. You then roll the mat around the trunk and tie it up, putting it inside a rolled piece of corrugated iron to dry. There were around 30 women working on 30 different trunks at once. All the designs were original, but similar in their tribal patterns. This process happened 3 times in the afternoon and would happen again the next day to prepare for the kastom mared in 2 days. Whew! The mama machine is at it again. Watching and participating in this makes me appreciate the beautiful handicraft and this element of kastom even more!

The next day I walked into town to see Grace and borrow her Ethernet cable. I sent in my Van Am articles, checked my email, and had lunch with her and Kathleen. As I was walking back, my uncle scooped me up in his truck and carried me straight Lolomanganda to enjoy the first day of the wedding celebrations for Edina and Dexter. The next 3 days were pretty eventful, so I decided to chop that out and give them their own post.

Let’s see, what else is new? My parents built an outdoor kitchen outside of their outdoor kitchen. It’s the new hangout! Every day my papa is adding some element to it and it’s quickly becoming such a cool space. I’m pretty impressed by the whole production and vocalize this all the time, I can’t help it. My parents don’t understand my passion, they just see it as another functional place to cook. But still they tolerate my bursts of excitement. We balance each other out.

the hut!

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When it comes to local language, I know enough to make pleasantries, but not enough to understand what’s going on. It’s always a comical guessing game as to when I can interject, and I’m often wrong. I’ll assume a pause in the conversation, so I’ll make my statement or ask a question, but I just end up cutting someone off or interrupting a serious part of the storian. I find myself mimicking what people say, too. For example, “sembe” means wait and “siseri” means hurry up. They are always telling the kids to speed! hurry up! So one day when our little neighbor Prasad came to the house, I jokingly told him “Niko mai, sisire” which I thought was “You come, hurry!” Well. Turns out I’ve been saying sisire instead of siseri. After my mama caught her breath from laughing, she informed me that sisire means sit sit wota or diarrhea! So I was telling Prasad to come and poop. Ha! Who knows how many times I’ve mixed these up…

There has been a remarkable amount of meat on the menu lately. I’m usually eating a vegetarian diet with occasional fresh meat, but these last few weeks have been quite meaty. I’m certainly not complaining. Most nights it’s either chicken or some kind of bird or a small pig or flying fox. One day my parents came back from the garden carrying a big pig. This was a mischievous pig eating their root crops, a big taboo. If a pig is eating your garden, you have the right to kill it and split it with its owner. This pig had been wild for a while, so my parents got to keep the whole thing. They butchered it and we brought it to Lolowai to go in the icebox for future feasts! Refrigeration in all its glory…

eyeing those ribs and feeling left out

School break means ample time to sit in my hammock and indulge in reading. I finished Les Miserables after Christmas, what an incredible book! Since then I’ve read Half of a Yellow Sun, The Finkler Question, and Cooked – each one unique and thought provoking in its own way. I’m currently reading Devil in the White City which is super interesting. My papa finished all of the Harry Potters! Happy to have a fellow pleasure reader nearby.

Life has been slow and easy. Some volunteers find it boring, but I really love the freedom to just sit and be with no place to rush to. Every day I get to read and relax and swim and every night the family will share a meal and conversation. The sunsets have been breathtaking and the stars have been overwhelmingly wondrous.  I don’t know if I’ll ever have this peaceful of a lifestyle again, but I hope to bring this sense of ease I’ve cultivated back with me to the busier world on the other side.

morning view