coming home

I finally made it home after 20 hours of plane rides and airports. . . I'm missing Tonga like crazy, but it's nice to be able to talk to friends and family again. The last couple of weeks have been a blur.  We had a lot of fun before we left, with goodbye dinners and picnics at the beach!  it was really great.  Saying goodbye to everyone was one of the most painful things I have ever experienced, but I know I will see them again.  I really couldn't believe three months had already passed when I left, it seemed so short.  My project went really well and I'm glad that I got to learn so much about the Tongan culture, but I feel like there is always more to learn!  Basically Tongan families are centered around respect and love and have more love than I can comprehend for everyone in their community.  Everyone talked about how much they were going to miss us and how they were sorry they had nothing to give to us to show us their love.  That always made me cry because I knew that they had given me more than they could imagine by just showing my so much love and kindness.  They are the greatest examples of humility, strength, charity, and respect in the world (I might be biased, but I'm pretty sure I'm right).  

We spent 10 days in sydney and new zealand which was really fun, too! Basically we hiked around beautiful mountains, saw a lot of beautiful scenery and beaches, black water rafted through caves, walked on a 3 foot ledge around the tallest building in that hemisphere, cuddled with koala bears, saw kangaroos, and hung out with some cool people. It was a great time!  Nothing compares to the beautiful vava'u though!

Near Death Experiences. . .

So much has happened since my last blog post that I can’t possibly write it all in the fifteen minutes of my precious internet time I am dedicating to this. . . but I will give some highlights. 

I think I’ll begin with my most near death experience (breathe mom, of course I’m being dramatic!). . . but really though, I had an allergic reaction to some canned tuna (watch out for the expired labels from the Chinese stores!) and thought I was going to die.  It happened really fast, but basically my hands, feet, head and face were itching and burning really bad and were really red and tight so I decided to go to the hospital after the dance we were on our way to.  But by the time we got to the dance I was completely covered in red bumps and itchy from head to toe, so we dropped everyone at the dance and went to the hospital.  I could barely breathe by the time we got there but my best friend here in Tonga, kefilini, was super nice and stayed with me while I waited for the doctor.  Finally they gave me a shot that was like a miracle drug and I got better really fast.  It was crazy how fast it got so bad though! The hospital was funny because they just right everything on a piece of notebook paper and there is no formal check in. They didn’t charge for anything either, which I GREATLY appreciated.  The people were so friendly, even in the hall outside of the doctor’s office the other people waiting were asking my all questions, like what did I eat, and wash my clothes in, and if I showered in rain water or tap water. . . it was really sweet. 

So my next near death came at the dance . . . ok not really, but it was pretty scary.  My partner and I only messed up like twice, which was better than a lot of the other couples, but I was really nervous the whole time!  One of the funny things they do during the dances is come up and give people money while they are dancing.  Which sounds nice, but you aren’t supposed to stop and instead of handing it to you, they stuff it down your shirt. . . which is just funny to me.  I made six dollars though, so that was exciting!

And then my next near death experience came yesterday at our farewell picnic at the beach.  We went with like 20 of our Tongan friends and our host family to the most beautiful beach in vava’u for a picnic.  We were there all day so it was really fun. We cooked chicken, ufi, tarroh, and turtle in a fire and just played while we were waiting for the food and after we ate.  The Tongans are funny because they put sunscreen on but it doesn’t rub in like ours does, so their faces are just white.  They look like Geishas! The boys played rugby in the water and on the beach for hours and we all played chicken and marco polo.  It was a really fun day! At one point, us five palangi and two 19 year old tongan boys decided to swim to the island across from the one we were on.  We decided that it was somewhere between a ¼ and a ½ mile swim.  On the way over there,  me and michelle thought we were going to drown because we were so tired! Between the current and the long swim, it was very exhausting!  Luckily we made it and the swim back was much easier!  It was so beautiful though.  It’s just this little island with a white sandy beach and blue water.  It was funny because on the swim over there we couldn’t touch because it was so deep, but we could see everything because the water was so blue. It was incredible.   Later in the day, I got stung by five or six jelly fish, which stung but wasn’t as terrible as I anticipated. It was weird though to see all of them floating towards me and around me, I felt like Dory in Finding Nemo.  It was a really fun day and made me sad to think about how much I’m going to miss the beautiful beaches and all of the friends I have made here.  

My next near death experience came when we went whale watching! We took this tiny boat, it was just the five of us, 2 asian women, and our 2 guides, into the deep DEEP ocean! On the way out there me, michelle, and Daniel sat on the top of the boat, which only has a two inch rail around it.  When we got to the parts not surrounded by islands it was super choppy and we were going so fast, that we almost fell off the boat a couple of times.  One time I was actually pretty sure that I was a gonner, but I didn’t fall! We finally spotted some whales swimming and chased them down. It was the most amazing thing I have ever seen! They were so big!  We were maybe 15 or 20 ft away from them, so LIKE REALLY REALLY CLOSE!  There were three that were swimming right beside us for a while, it was cool just to see their bodies and we even saw one of their faces once.  Whales are amazing. We got into the water once with them, but they swam away so we couldn’t see them.  I can’t describe how cool it was to see them just from the boat though.   We also went snorkeling by a really cool reef and in a cave.  Google mariners cave! Maybe you can see some cool  pics, and swallows cave too! Anyways, snorkeling was really fun! The water is so blue and light from the sun that we could see like all the way to bottom of the ocean floor. The reef has so many beautiful fish! A lot of them were really big and super colorful! It was awesome!  Mariners cave is cool because you can’t see it from outside, you have to swim under the cliff/rocks to get into it.  I was a little nervous just because you have to swim through to the other side and I didn’t know how far it would be, but it was good.  On the inside it’s really cool because it has all the steam coming off of the water and we snorkeled in there too! It was a really good day!

I’m really running out of time so this is probably not making much sense any more, but one last thing I have to mention! We went to one of our friends families for turtle (which is surprisingly delicious!) and a cookout there.  They made lots of food and we played volleyball and went to the beach that day too. They were so nice to us and it was just fun to be with a family and hang out with them. We went to this “resort beach” that we didn’t pay for because our friend knows the owner. It was truly like one of the resorts you see in the movies. The water is of course like aqua blue and the sand is perfect white, but it was really beautiful because of all the palm trees and wooden lawn chairs and hammocks and wooden tables just sitting every where on the sand by the shore.  I took a few pics, but I don’t know if it will really show how pretty it was. 

My project is pretty much done, I’m just trying to learn as much as possible before I leave, but I’m done interviewing!  I’m really sad to say bye to my students tomorrow, but I’m happy that I’m not actually leaving until next Wednesday.  I can’t  believe I only have one week here left, I am getting so sad to say goodbye.  I’m really looking forward to our 10 days in New Zealand and Australia though and hoping that will make leaving a little less hard.  I think that’s all of the really big/exciting things that we have done, pretty much everything else has been hanging out with the kids or with kefilini or working on school stuff or dance practice. . . living in Tonga has really made me realize how much I enjoy the simple life!