Another Week in Paradise!

Mermaid Beach

Papapapai-tai Falls

This week went by quickly because we have been very busy.  Our routine daily schedule is as follows:

6:00 AM Get up and shower (our choice, we could get up later if we chose)

7:00 AM Breakfast, Personal Study

8:00 AM Leave for the office (we stop by the Cantina to buy sandwiches for lunch – it costs us just over $2.00 for two sandwiches). As we walk past the classrooms, they are having their devotionals.  We often here them singing a hymn.

8:30 AM Arrive in our office.  Work on planning our lessons that we will be teaching (BYU Hawaii education courses)

12:00       Stop for lunch and go back to our apartment.  We sometimes go shopping or take a quick nap

1:30 PM  Go back to our office and make final preparations for our class

3:30 PM  Teach our class.  We are currently teaching Educational Foundations to 6 teachers.

5:30 PM   Finish our class and either go home for dinner, eat out, or attend a session at the temple

9:00 PM   We sometimes watch pre-recorded episodes of the TV series Blue Bloods then read a chapter of the Book of Mormon out loud in both English and Samoan.

10:30 PM Retire to bed tired and happy to rest up to do the whole thing again the next day.

Our weekends are a little different.  Friday nights, we try to go out to dinner for a date.  Saturday mornings, we take an hour or two to clean the apartment and do our laundry then take off for either an activity with the other senior missionary couples or go off on our own to explore the Island.  Sundays, we go to Church at 7:30 AM to our Samoan-speaking ward.  We finish by 10:30 AM then have the rest of the day to rest, read, nap, visit or whatever we want to do.

This past Saturday, we went to a beautiful beach (Mermaid beach).  It had a row of fales we could use under the coconut palms.  We tied up our hammocks and then snorkeled in a beautiful blue lagoon.  Janice rested in the hammock while I hunted for shells up and down the beach.  I have included pictures on the blog.  On the way home, we stopped at a beautiful waterfall that must have been a 500 – 600-foot drop (Note the lovely lady in blue).  We also stopped at an overlook that showed some of the shoreline and a village.  There are hundreds of villages around the edge of the island.

We are happy, healthy, and working hard.  This is our dream come true.  The only thing that is missing is our family but we have been fortunate to be able to communicate with them at least once a week by phone or facetime.  We are extremely grateful for this opportunity to serve and feel so needed here.

A Great Week in Samoa

Suafa'i (Banana pudding) and breadfruit

Along the Road to Sauniatu

We had a great week in Samoa this week.  Monday was a national holiday celebrating White Sunday which commemorates the influenza epidemic of the early 1900’s where one in four children here perished.  It is a national holiday to honor the children.  The rest of the week was spent working hard preparing and teaching the BYU Hawaii course Educational Foundations.  The book is based on the history of US education so we prepared and presented a lesson on the history of Samoan Education which was quite interesting.  The Church has been a leader in providing the most modern curriculum and schooling on the islands.  We are grateful to have a small contribution to those efforts. 

Friday night, Janice and I went to a restaurant next to Apia Bay and had a lovely dinner at sunset looking out over the water.  We had an outside table surrounded by palm trees and an ocean view for about $22 for both of us.  Earlier that day, we drove to Sauniatu and helped prepare the teachers who still need to pass their English test so they can obtain their ITEP certificate.  We stayed for a delightful morning while they celebrated their culture day by having each class fix their favorite  Samoan food.  We helped fix saufa’i a banana pudding prepared with fresh coconut milk.  We helped shred the coconut and watched them squeeze the milk out of the shavings.  It was delicious.  We also ate some sopapassi made from coco beans and pureed papaya.  My favorite however, was the breadfruit that was prepared in an outdoor oven (umu).  It was hot and delicious as we dipped it in the fresh coconut milk.

Shredding Coconut to make coconut milk

We attended our new ward for the first time today (Pesega 4^th ward or Pesega fa).  It is a Samoan ward but a lot of our teachers attend and they spoke English to us.  The singing is wonderful and the Spirit is powerful.  We look forward to rubbing shoulders with these good people.

Our First Class

Waterfall at Sauniatu

McKay Fale at Sauniatu Campus

This past week was filled with firsts as school resumed here at Pesega.  We are established in our office now and we quickly organized offering the BYU Hawaii class Education 212 Foundations of Education.  Last Thursday after school, we held our first class session with 6 teachers here at Pesega College.  We also attended a middle school faculty meeting and attended 2 assemblies in the open-walled assembly room with hundreds of students all dressed in their school uniforms of yellow and blue.  They always sing a hymn at these assemblies.  We cannot adequately describe the feelings that come from hundreds of young people singing a hymn without any accompaniment.  Their voices are strong and clear and they sing with enthusiasm.

Students at Sauniatu Primary School

We also took a trip up to the little village school at Sauniatu.  What a wonderfully peaceful place.  There is a spirit of peace and beauty there.  We visited with the teachers and learned how we can help them get their certificates by helping them to pass an English test.  We also visited a beautiful waterfall there.

This Saturday, after cleaning our apartment, we drove around the island to explore a little bit.  We ended up at another waterfall that was delightful and then spending some time on the beach and doing a little bit of snorkeling.  They have the most amazing deep-blue starfish here!

We are happy and healthy and working hard.  We are having the time of our life in this beautiful land with these kind and gentle people.  We highly recommend a senior mission to anybody whose circumstances permit.   

At the top of Togitogiga Falls

Togitogiga Falls

Samoa!

We are here!  Last Saturday afternoon, we flew into Samoa.  What a wonderful paridise it is here.  Our office has a view out to coconut and banana palms.  We cannot believe it.  I will try to post some pictures of our environment.  We have a car (a Hyundai Tuscon) and miraculously passed our Samoan driver's test (they drive on the left side of the road here) so now we have our licenses.  We have met the principals of the schools we will be working with and look forward to getting to know them better.

We had a visit with our mission president, President Ho Ching and his wife.  They are very kind and encouraged us to attend a Samoan Ward every Sunday for church.

We are moving into the next door apartment which is a two bedroom unit instead of a one bedroom unit where we started.  Yesterday, we took our former neighbors who lived in the apartment, the Little's to the airport as they finished their mission.  We only knew them for 6 days but they became very dear to us in that time and really helped us get our feet on the ground.

We are getting to know people around here and everyone has been super nice.  We highly recommend it!  There are hibiscus, orchids, and other colorful flowers growing everywhere.  The people dress modestly in colorful lava lavas and everyone has a smile on their face.

Our school (Pesega College) as seen right out our front door

                                               View of the temple seen out our front door

Janice with fresh tuna purchased at the dock