Staff Social Gathering

I find it hard to write about what's happening here on a daily basis, because at this point it all seems so normal to me. However, recently we had our first staff social gathering for the teachers at the school so i decided I'll write about that.

Thursday was a Public Holiday here: Ascension Day. We had a staff meeting (see previous entry) and decided to move the holiday to Friday so that we could have a 3 day weekend. Fridays here are always half days. I'm not sure why, but we made Thursday a halfday and in the afternoon had our social gathering.

The Social Gathering Committee decided we'd get together and bring raw food and roast over the fire (like take unripe bananas, throw them on the fire with their skins until they're black, and then remove the skin and eat). Well not surprisingly things changed. This event which was planned to begin at 1 pm wound up starting around 3 when we all met at school. We lit a fire but instead of roasting, they just cooked everything in pots. We had quite the variety: manioc (root crop), banana, rice, chicken, two kinds of crabs, and two types of canned meat and fish. Around 7 pm al the food was ready. We brought it up to one of the new classrooms that were just built. We got our food and one of the teachers brought his TV from his house. They turned on the generator they've been using to power the saws and other tools for the new classroom. After a couple light bulbs burned and some wires were crossed, the TV was up and running. We watched 2 DVDs: one of a Vanuatu string band and the other of some famous Vanuatu singer. I prefer those types of videos (singsing as they're called here) compared to the typical Asian action movies that they like to watch. Anyway around 9 pm, the event ended and I returned to my house. The next day there was no school and it was raining and somehow I slept until 10 am. I think that's the latest I've ever slept in Vanuatu.

Just as a side note, it's been really cold here lately. I have no way of knowing the temperature, but maybe it's been in the 60s. I wear a jacket sometimes! I especially miss hot showers now more than usual. I'm glad that it's not sweltering hot all the time like one might think of the tropics, but I know when I go back to the U.S. I am going to freeze.