Turtles

Swimming with the Turtles

Turtles & More

This week marked midterm for our ITEP class.  We handle whatever develops during the course of a week.   A few of the Primary School children like to come by our office after school to say hello.  We have to encourage them to find their parents who come to pick them up. 

Friday night movie for the dorm girls was "The Last Airbender".

On a social note, we've made friends with Elder & Sister Deffense, another Sr. missionary couple on Savai'i whose role is leadership support to the young full time Elders and Sisters on this island.  That includes everything from missionary housing maintenance to medical help and even helping stranded tourists.  We got together for Family Home Evening Monday night and potlucked our dinner and played table games. 

Then Saturday we drove to the site, "Swim with the Turtles", and we literally did swim with turtles, nine of them.  The day was perfect; the water clear.  The turtles love eating papaya.  Their teeth aren't razor sharp and don't hurt.  They were gentle creatures which liked to be stroked or to nuzzle.  Little fishes were about in the water as well.  We spent a few hours there and met visitors from Indonesia, Australia, Brazil, New Zealand, and Chile. 

Swimming with the Turtles

Rugby National Championship

This week our teaching responsibilities included a review for the midterm exam and administering the SLEP test.  SLEP is a Secondary Level English Proficiency test and is a standardized test required for international Samoan applicants to BYU-Hawaii. 

A highlight was the banquet Friday evening to honor the teams from Vaiola College who won the boys' Rugby Samoan national championship and the girls' Net Ball championship that took place in Apia the week before we arrived.  As you can imagine, this is a source of pride to this school.  Every effort was made to arrange a grand celebration. To give you an idea of the effort, they decorated the "hall" with fronds and draped cloth.   One teacher with the help of others stayed up most of the night sewing chair covers.  The meal was catered and every detail planned.  Parents came with their athletes; presentations were awarded and accolades given of deserved praise.  It was really nice seeing how dressed up mom and dads were and how they beamed with their son or daughter.  It was our privilege to be invited. 

National Rugby Champs

Rugby Team

National Netball Champs

Net Ball Team

Taro & Coconuts

Monday a family invited us for a Family Home Evening to teach us how to collect, prepare, and cook taro.  We traipsed behind the houses where Brother Tufuga, using his machete, pulled up taro out of the ground like a huge sugar beet and topped it, and then picked off the ground a few coconuts.  Back at the house, Ron was volunteered to husk the outer shell off the coconuts by banging them on an upright, three-foot pipe to penetrate the husk.  The hairy coconut fibers on the coco-nut itself were pulled off and saved.  The coconut was split open and we sampled fresh coconut water.   After the meat was shredded, the mass of husk hair fibers is wrapped around the shredded coconut and squeezed; discard the coconut, wrap some more, and squeeze. The process is repeated until all the milk is squeezed out.

Meanwhile, the mud and outer skin of the taro is scraped off---let's just say it is an art.  Then it is sliced and put into a pot of boiling water in the outdoor cooking area.  Once cooked through, water is drained and the coconut milk is added.  The starchiness of the taro makes it like a gravy.  Taro is similar to potato but denser.  The taro was accompanied with a delicious pot of soup bone soup made with onions, carrots, and bok choy.  We sat down at the table for a wonderful, typical Samoan dinner.

Afterwards, the young family held a short FHE as the two oldest children recited in unison the first two articles of faith in Samoan and then James 1:5-6 in English.  They have four delightful children.