Easter Weekend Activities

I hope everyone had a nice Easter weekend. My Easter was good. Easter is one of the biggest holidays in Samoa. My Easter festivities began on Thursday the 13th. We did not have classes that day, but our students (primarily Year 13 and Tech2, seniors) put on a big thing including songs, dancing and a play for their parents. They sang songs in Samoan and in English. One of the students from Year 13 has an amazing voice and sang a few solos. I really enjoyed the whole thing. I felt like a teacher that was really proud of their students. I liked seeing the students in a setting other than inside the classroom, and they were having fun. I don’t know the student that played Jesus very well (he’s not in my class), but he did a good job. After Year 13 was done, other classes or groups of students could do a skit or song or dance. The rugby team did a drill team dance that the parents loved. One mom got up and danced with them. Year 12 put on a skit called You the Choice of my Parents. A few of the boys from Year 13 got up and dressed like girls and danced and sang a song like girls. They were so funny. I took a lot of pictures and a few videos of the whole thing.

Good Friday is a public holiday here. I got up early and headed to church. It was a good service. I don’t always understand everything, but I am so thankful to be a part of this community here and experience this part of Samoan culture. When I first arrived one of the faletua (pastor’s wife) called me over and said she wanted me to walk up with her today at church and do communion with her. It was nice to share that with her and like I mentioned above, feel like a part of this community. Afterwards Meaalofa stopped by and gave me some of the to’ona’i that her parents had made. (That’s the huge meal after church). We chatted for awhile and I spent the rest of the day reading a good book, The Time Traveler’s Wife, and figuring out what I was going to bring with me to Mexico. I cannot believe that has come so quickly. That evening I graded the first of many country wide tests that year 13 has to take.

Saturday Bob headed out on the first boat to Apolima-tai (another island in the Samoan chain). He went for the day with one of our co-workers. Our co-worker’s brother got married that Saturday and Bob has a nice manual camera he brought to take pictures with him. I cooked key-lime bars and got some goodies ready. In the afternoon I biked over to Claire’s house. That night we spoiled ourselves. We ate the key-lime bars, made a pineapple chiffon pie thing… and ate that too, drank real good hot cocoa, watched our favorite thing on DVD here, the show Arrested Development, with La La and painted eggs. La La lent us a set of her acrylic paints to paint the eggs. We didn’t have a brush, but we used our fingers, toothpicks and q-tips to paint the eggs. We went to bed pretty late still awake from all the sugar.

Easter morning was great. I got to talk with my parents in the morning. After church, Claire and I dressed up in Easter-like clothing, skirts and pastel colors, and then we tried to find suitable Easter baskets. We decided to split the compound into 2 parts. I hid eggs on one part and Claire on the other. Then we tried to find the eggs we hid for each other. It took us awhile to find them because the grass was pretty high and there are a lot of trees and bushes around; we really could have hid them anywhere. The water soluble acrylic idea didn’t seem so good after awhile when the dew of the morning wiped away all the paint we had decorated the eggs with. It made them more of a spastic spattering of colors. After finally finding them all, we headed in to make breakfast. We made hash browns and blueberry pancakes. After breakfast we ate more chocolate Claire had and then a few Cadbury eggs my parents had sent out. After feeling a little sick, our own faults, my parents called from my grandparent’s house and I got the chance to chat with some of my extended family. It was so nice! Thanks for doing that dad.

Claire and I decided to rest and play a few card games after that because we had eaten way too much junk food and it was a day of rest, so we couldn’t go biking at least until the evening. I taught her Sweapie (the very popular Samoan card game), Speed, Egyptian Rat Sphinx, and War. She had never played these card games before, so we had fun.

That evening Claire and La La and I biked back to my house where we watched the movie Cool Running (very funny to watch while in a hot climate yourself), and made cornbread and deviled eggs from all the left over Easter eggs. I think I shouldn’t have eaten the last bit because I ended up feeling sick all day the next day. I brought it on myself though, so I can’t complain.

Easter Monday was another holiday, so it was nice to have a day to get a few things done. I went for a really long bike ride to try and feel better and work off at least a little of what I consumed from the weekend. The rest of the day was very relaxing and uneventful after a fun and unforgettable Easter weekend.

I cannot believe that I only have a few weeks left until I leave. I am trying to get my counterpart ready for the 2 weeks I will be gone right before midterms; I am writing the tests for Year 12 and 13 and I am tying to pack for the trip. These next few weeks will fly by and next thing I know I will be on a plane. I will try and get pictures posted from my school’s festivities and my Easter weekend with Claire and La La.

Until next time.