86 Countries and Still Counting: Sports Day

Today is the May 13, 2011. It is the last day of my first term teaching in Samoa. It feels as if I got off the plane yesterday. Time really is flying by. I’m watching the sun come up over the lagoon as I type this on my bed. A bowl of oatmeal and a cup of Swiss Miss (straight from the U. S. of A.) next to me. I’m dawdling because school starts late today. I’ll still go in an hour early because kids will want to play hangman on my computer. It’s been a good last week.
Yesterday was Sports Day. I finally figured out the mystery of how everyone but me knows what’s happening next. Like Sports Day. There was no discussion or planning for the event. My limited Samoan, though, allowed me to understand what the pule was telling the kids at assembly Monday. On Thursday we’d have Sports Day. 4 teams, or “houses” as they call them. A teacher was assigned as coach for each team. Two Year 8 kids were named as co-captains for each team. They were told to bring baskets with six coconuts for each team.
There was a committee of 3 teachers responsible for the event, but I knew they hadn’t met to discuss it, so how would they know what games to play? Sequence? Judges? Scoring? This is the riddle that I’ve finally found the answer to. They all know because they do exactly the same thing, in the same way, every year. And they’ve done it the same way since the teachers were in primary school. No need for planning or discussion because it’s always done the same way.
OK, it’s not like I solved the mystery of life, but it has perplexed me and a lot of other PCV. How do they all know to come late tomorrow but we don’t? It’s because last year they came late on that day. How do they all know to wear a certain outfit on a certain day? Because that’s the traditional day for it. They don’t think to tell the PCV because it would be like telling us every day to breathe. Duh, everybody knows that.
On to Sports Day. The kids were majorly geeked about it. On Wednesday before the end of school each coach met with their kids to select which kids would participate in which events. Not all kids got to play, sadly. I don’t agree with the philosophy of many Americans that all kids should win every event because there are no losers and we don’t want to damage their self-esteem. That doesn’t prepare them for life, where there are winners and losers. Some get the scholarship, some don’t. Some get the job, some don’t. I think it’s better to prepare them and teach them about sportsman ship with small losses, as children.
I do think all kids should be able to at least suit up. There are no schools for kids with special needs on Savaii. We have children in class who are slow academically. They rarely get a chance to shine in the classroom. Sports Day would let them show off their physical talents. Some didn’t get the chance. That was the only downside to the day, for me.
We started with some standard relay races. Lines of kids passing a ball over their heads to each other. Passing the ball through their legs. Kids taking turns throwing the ball to each child on their team. First game was the elementary kids, years 1-3. Next came intermediate, years 4-6. Seniors were years 7-8. The SRO and Infant Supervisor kept track of scores, by division, for each event in new notebooks, brought out for the occasion. The judges sat at desks on the stage of the faleaoga. As an esteemed staff member (aka white and old) I sat with the judges.
Team members sat on the edge of the faleaoga to watch and cheer on their teams. Coaches sat on benches behind the observers. This was all arranged without discussion. Not because Samoans are psychic, which is what I’d begun to suspect, but because they do it exactly this way every year. Except for having a PCV there, which required explanation to the PCV on where to sit.
After the initial races we had sack races, using 50 kg sugar sacks from Thailand. Which explains why the kids next door were practicing sack races the other night. They knew it was coming, because they did it last year. An aside. I planned to visit southeast Asia while I was here. Shorter flight than from the U.S. But, about the same price as flying from the U.S., which is about the same price as flying home from Samoa. So how can they get the sugar so cheap from there to here? BTW, kids here are strong. I’ve seen year 8 boys carry the full 50 kg bags. I couldn’t lift one onto my shoulder unless my life depended on it.
We also had 3 legged races. We had a longer distance relay race that required running the length of a soccer field. The final event was a race to see who could peel and eat a hardboiled egg and drink a mug of water the fastest. I was impressed that in the senior division, the girl who is number one in her class academically was also the fastest peeler/eater. One of my favorite year 7 boys got robbed. He could have won easily, but the peel to his egg stuck and ripped the egg apart so it slowed him down. Clearly the cook didn’t put vinegar in the water when she boiled the eggs.
After the races, the bell rang for recess, which meant we all stayed outside, but the play became individual and the kids just did what they normally do during recess. The teachers also did the normal routine, except they cooked ramen and ate outdoors. Tea yesterday included the leftover boiled eggs, ramen and sandwiches provided by one of the parents. Avg. was 2 eggs, 1 package of ramen and 2 sandwiches per teacher. I had an egg.
After an hour or so of recess we had the announcement of the winners. They were told at the beginning not to cheer or applaud until the end. The SRO made a very traditional speech, first thanking the committee, the teacher/coaches, me for showing up to watch and God for allowing us all to be there. She then announced winning teams, by event, by level. When the big announcement came of overall scores a huge cheer came from the winning team, which was quickly silenced. She went on to announce the scores of the losing teams. They didn’t seem overly disappointed and when told it was ok to cheer for the winners, everyone did.
A couple of side notes. No parents were present. I was surprised, since parents are routinely there to watch me do the Hokie Pokie in the morning with the kids. Apparently it’s also traditional for all parents to stay away for Sports Day.
Before coming to Samoa I did a lot of reading and learned that Samoa is a collective society and as such there is little individual competition. We were told in training that children are shy about being called out individually and would not want to compete against each other.
I’m here to tell you that the people who said those things have never seen four Year 2 girls eating hardboiled eggs in a race. They were going for the glory.