Ahh I’ve fallen behind on my blogging. Happy Thanksgiving! I had a pretty good one compared to my depressingly uneventful Halloween. A bunch of Peace Corps from my island, Malekula and the neighboring island Santo got together to celebrate. We made tons of American food that people’s moms had sent from the states. We had our feast at Dan’s house, which was interesting because Dan lives in the middle of a school closing. Since it’s summer break now all the schools have big school closing parties. Now remember I’m in the middle of nowhere rural Vanuatu so this school closing is the happening thing in town. As Justine pointed out it’s sort of like little house on the prairie with huge rented speakers pointed directly at Dan’s house. Music started around 11am and ricocheted off the walls of Dan’s cinder block house and into our ears blocking out the ability to hold a conversation. Around 3 pm I began to feel a bit insane as I kept having circular thoughts of turning down the music and then realizing I couldn’t and then wanting to turn it down again. By 9 o’clock we gave in and went and danced our hearts out with all the 13 year olds in front of the speakers.

Since then I’ve been two other school closings, a school fundraiser and a wedding. And I danced with all the 13 year olds or all the mama’s every time. All the Mamas like string band music, folky ukulele, guitar songs with big wooden box, a string, and a stick providing the bass. All the 13 year olds prefer hip-hop remixed in with their string band. And there’s war on the dance floor. when string band comes on all the kids slow down their dancing and when hip hop comes on a the mama’s stand there and wait for the next song. I think both types of music are atrocious but I really just want to dance. I kind of prefer dancing with the kids because they are really good dancers and the Sean Kingston lyrics make it a bit less foreign to my ears but I can’t help thinking I should be dancing with the mamas cause they are my age. I feel like I’m supposed to be a role model and people treat me with a lot of respect but I frequently find myself sympathizing with the youngfala over my authority figure allies. When the MC got on the loud speaker and reminded all the girls that they are not to be wearing trousers, all the girls I was dancing with ashamedly covered up their baggy jean shorts with big pieces of fabric that were passed around the crowd by an old man. Another announcement came on that a few young men had snuck some beers in and I couldn’t help thinking they had a great idea and I wish I could be doing that instead. Fricken missionaries ruin everything.

So I’m at my permanent site here in Lamap, Malekula. On my first day my rural training center counterpart, James, took me to harvest the kava of Jack, the previous volunteer who was spending his last week here during my first week. So I went to plant my kava from the stalks of his which will be ready to harvest in about two years when I’ll be heading out. It was actually quite a trek. Lamap is like a big village with about 1000 people living in natangura and bamboo huts all clustered together. But their farm land is a few miles away. It takes about an hour to walk to the farms. An unnecessary two hour commute just seems a bit crazy to me. But the walk was gorgeous. We walked through a coconut plantations with it’s perfect rows of column trunks reaching up to a palm fronds roof top set on top of a ridge overlooking the Port. The greeks couldn’t have planned it better. A coconut Parthenon. The rows of trunks look like they go on forever. And it’s fun to watch the optical illusion of the diagonal rows moving as you walk down the path. The big columns look like they go on forever and men walking about to collect the coconuts look tiny in comparison. The greeks however probably wouldn’t keep their cows in the Parthenon. Keeping one eye on the path to look out for cow pies. Sort of spoils the mood.

I went to a wedding yesterday though they were actually already married in church. In fact they already had three kids. This was just the dowry ceremony. My uncle tried to tell me it’s the traditional way to say thank you to the woman’s family for giving her away. However in bislama the name of the ceremony translates to “buying the woman”. So yea this woman’s price was about $1000, a ginormous pig, a couple hundred pounds of root crops and bananas, 20 mats and a basket of fish. The woman was covered and guarded by her aunts and there was a fence of palm fronds around her house. All of the man’s family came and brought gifts. The brother of the man has to remove the fence and then the woman’s family and then man’s family make speeches and except each others gift. I though it was very interesting that the man and the woman (apart from being covered in brightly colored tapestries, baby powder, leaves and flowers) were not really the center of attention. They were both well into their 20s but their parents did all the talking. After the exchange of gifts the man goes home and waits for the woman to be delivered by her family to his house in parade of singing and flowers. And after, dance backagain!