Photos

Let's be honest, you only come back hoping I'll shut up and post some photos.  Don't blame you.  Before I get to the photos, though, another real time update.  It's Friday, January 28 and I'm town for the Peace Corps All Vol meeting tomorrow.  Should be a fun day of team building.

Met with PC staff today and someone will be coming to my village next week to let them know they need to find a place for me to live, that meets PC standards, sooner rather than later.  They were just put on notice that they have to live up to their responsibilities or I'll be moved to another village.  So, fingers crossed that the school committee finds something or builds something and I don't have to start over in a new village. 

Now, onto the good stuff - photos!

You have to step up, then down, before entering one of the main stores on the island.  Unique, don't you think?

 This dad was playing in the water with his kids.  Wearing a green hard hat.

Later, a young boy from a different family was wearing the same green hard hat.  When is my turn??

Now them's some banker's hours.  Only branch on the island and the ATM is down about 50% of the time.  

Results of a shopping trip to 2 different stores and 3 different vendors on the street.  I described the shopping in an earlier entry.  The breadfruit leaves are wrapped around limu.  Notice how big that cucumber and those avocadoes are!

Limu, which is a kind of seaweed and delicious.  Tastes like the ocean smells.

Largest "mall" on the island.  Closed on Saturday afternoons and Sundays.  Oh, and closes at 4:00 p.m. on weekdays.  Makes shopping tough for us working stiffs.  Plus, the post office is in there.  I bet I have packages languishing behind those gated doors.

Think someone was stockpiling sand?  Nope, came from the sea after the waves went across the road.  Left large, perfectly shaped piles of sand in front of the beach fales, instead of on the beach behind the fales.

 

A couple of the guys I sleep with.  The photos belong to the family I live with.  Yes, that's a bed.  It's used for storage.  I'm still sleeping on the floor.  No, I don't understand the logic.

They used big equipment to clean up after the storm.  He's filling in a large puddle that forms in our driveway every time it rains.

 

Lady Samoa I.  The old, small ferry with no indoor seating.  It was coming in to dock, then take me to Upolu (the other island) on Thursday.  That's Apolima island in the background.  

 

I guess when you can see the ocean through the hole in the shoes I paid a quarter for 7 years ago, it's time to retire them.  I'll miss them. Have I mentioned I've been doing a lot of walking?

Biggest pineapple I've ever seen.  She was charging $20 tala for it at the market in Salelologa.  The other night for dinner I ate an avocado.  And a pineapple.  A much, much smaller pineapple.  No cooking required.