Today was officially my first day in my new place and boy was it spent cleaning! It wasn't like I had to many options because for some reason, mother nature has decided that for the past two days (and what looks like the next few days) its going to rain a lot in Samoa which isn't a lot of fun when you no longer live next to your friends and can just hang out in a hotel room with them. So I spent the better part of the day just hanging out in my FaleSamoa house, still cleaning up the place. It's kinda overwhelming because my place is so huge, but with dedication and the next two days I should be able to get the bedroom and the kitchen area finalized (the two important areas). I am not alone at the school right now, because Mika and his nephew Liu are here house sitting until the fathers come back at the beginning of the year. So I got to talk to Liu a little bit because for some reason they think I'm very lonely here even though I'm not (one of the blessings of being an only child, you don't need to be around a lot of people to keep yourself entertained) but it was nice getting to talk to him. He was born in American Samoa and brought over to Western Samoa when he was two, so in reality he's an American citizen which is kind of a strange thought since he's lived in Western Samoa for the majority of his life. He currently goes to St. Joseph and he's a year 10 (sophomore) which is funny because he also has family in the village of Amaile, which is the training village of Group 74 – so he's got plenty of connections to Peace Corps, hopefully we all have a positive impact on him. This also goes to show how small Samoa is – even in this small, enclosed environment I'm meeting people that have a connection to me without going anywhere. Scary! Well after chatting with him for a bit, I decided it was time to find out if I could bike from my house to Apia, which was a good idea and a bad idea. It was a good idea because I needed to get out of the house and get some shopping done and also just to see what kind of bike shape I am in. It was a bad idea because I forgot to bring my water bottle and I am not in very good bike riding shape. J All that exercising I did before camp and all the muscle I put on during camp has obviously been lost during my 3 months of Peace Corps training. While I made it to Apia in about 15 minutes (it's a 45 minute walk) I was dead tired when I made it there. It could also be that I'm not use to riding a mountain bike yet so I'm using way to much energy and thus becoming tired quicker. All things I have to work on! But from my house it was all downhill so I was impressed by my time of 15 minutes. Then it took me another 5-6 minutes to get to the Peace Corps office so I now know I can get to the Peace Corps office in about 20 minutes (hopefully when I'm in better shape I can make that number more respectable). But after I did my thing at the office, I rode back into town and did a little shopping (mainly for the bug spray, I was not going to sleep another night without spraying my bedroom area to get rid of bugs) and once again I had to take into account what I could carry – this time on my back. While I probably couldn't carry food like that, the few things that I got fit perfectly in my backpack and didn't weigh me down to much. After I was done with my shopping, I decided I needed to find out where some of my group members lived so I went to Sara's school, Saint Mary's, to find out where she lived and what it looked like. It took a little bit of snooping around (and fighting off some dogs) but I finally found her and boy did it feel strange seeing another former trainee in a new setting. I guess we'll get use to it but as I visit more of the PC75 volunteers it will definitely be an interesting experience on my part – because they'll be out of place in my mind. We chatted for a bit about life after training and possibly getting together to go bike to some of the other PC75 Volunteers houses tomorrow (if it doesn't rain) and I had to leave before sunset. That was a strange thing too, basing everything I do off the time of something else (whether it be the buses or the sunset) because in the states I could just drive home in the day or dark, but here since I have to either bike or take the buses everywhere I have to be conscious of the time a lot more – this is what some would call the simple life! J After leaving Sara's I tried biking home and got almost half way there before my legs just said 'I don't think so mister!' and started going out on me. It's easy going down, its hard going up the hill that my house is on. So I had to walk it to my house – but that's when I realized that I better get into shape fast otherwise I might have to spend some money on taxis to get to my house and I really don't want to do that this early in my volunteer career. So while it started off as kind of a blah day, it ended up being kind of festive and I got to see the area in which I live a little more (you can definitely take in the sights better on a bike then you can on the bus). Tomorrow is a new day – hopefully it's not a rainy one!
12 days of homestay:
On the 4th day of homestay, my family gave to me:
Fa ula vai
Tolu ofu tino
Lua lavalava
And pea soupo ma le mulipipi
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