Tofa Halloween

My good friend Brigit had to leave the island this past weekend. Six months before coming to Am Sam she broke her foot very badly and about 1.5 months into our stay she started experiencing unbearable pain that left her barely able to walk. After doing everything possible here on island, the doctors came to the determination that she should return back home to the States for better treatment.

Of course I was sad to see her leave, but we got to celebrate her time on the island once more with a great Tofa  (Good-Bye) party (10/24/09)! Taylor and Scott, again, generously volunteered their house, and we decided it should be a Halloween themed bash. Since I am horrible at coming up with costume ideas, Ms. Brigit chose my costume, and I made it. After telling her that I was a Hershey’s Kiss when I was 4, she decided that was also the perfect costume for my 21 year old self. 

As you can imagine, creating an impressive Halloween costume from scratch on a little island in the middle of the South Pacific is quite hard. On Friday I went to Forsgrens in search of something to bring the idea to life. I found some shiny silver fabric to make a Hershey’s toga, and some shiny blue fabric (the color of the words on the candy’s tag) to make a belt. I then found some plastic-stick-things that I used to make my tag stick out straight. Unfortunately, the 24 hours before the party weren’t so smooth.... 

After buying my costume goodies plus about $35 of classroom school supplies, I got on a crowded bus home. When buses are crowded it’s customary to leave packages at the front next to the driver. At my stop, I squeezed out of the bus, I took 3 steps out of the way, the bus began to pull away, and I realized that I left my big bag of stuff on the bus! Loosing $50 of stuff is a big deal when your on a $400 a month stipend! I was so upset! It was close to 6 o’clock (when the buses stop running) and the bus was headed far west to Amanave; this meant that the bus wouldn’t be passing back by again. (At least some kids in Amanave got some great new school supplies!) So on Saturday I had to wake up early, go back to Forsgrens, and re-buy all my purchases before going on my other planned errands. At 3 I decided to catch one of the late buses out to Amanave (buses stop running by 4 on Saturdays). Just as I reached the street to wait in front of my house, Jess, a friend living on the east side, got off a bus. She saw me and decided to finish the rest of her journey with me. We waited for an Amanave bus for almost an hour before giving up. Instead we figured we could take a bus as far as Leone and then hitch the rest of the way. 

Once off the bus in Leone we began walking. (Hitch hikers tip: walking while trying to hitch gets far more rides than standing still while trying to bum around. I think it adds to the whole I’m-stranded-and-pitiful-and-will-be-walking-for-hours-if-you-don’t-pick-me-up vibe.) A few cars past but they weren’t pick up trucks (a Samoa hitch hiker’s dream) when all of a sudden we heard, “Hey girls! Where you headed?” An old man cleaning up the rubble in front of his “house” was waiting for our reply. I shouted back, “Oh..um..we are headed out to Fa’ilolo!” Nervous that he would commit to a 15 minute drive west. With out hesitating he replied that we should stay where we were because he was going to get his car, and he would be taking us the rest of the way. We felt slightly bad since we were clearly making him go out of his way but knew that he was just full of Samoan hospitality and wouldn’t have offered if he didn’t honestly mind. He was a great man and told us his story as we drove. His house, gas station, and store were all taken by the tsunami. The foundation he was standing in front of when we first saw him was what remained of his house. He had just gotten out of the hospital a week before and was still feeling the pain of his cracked ribs and soreness from all his cuts and bruises. He was thankful, however, that he was now walking without a cane. During the wave, he held on to a post with one hand and held onto his wife with another- they were almost washed away. He was still filled with such life, however, and was such a happy old man. When we reached Scott and Taylor’s house, he got out of the car, gave Jess and I hugs, and introduced himself warmly to Scott who was grilling out front. Random Samoan moments and meetings like this are truly special moments that will always stay with me!

After finally getting to Scott and Taylor’s we hung out with our west side crowd: Cynthia and John, Brigit, Kate, Thahn, Rosemary, and Julia. We spent a great afternoon  sitting on their porch, chatting, and staring off into the water. 

At around 7:30 the other WTers began showing up, and we all changed into our costumes for the night. My Hershey’s kiss turned out great. I created a head piece so that the candy tag could stick out and a big foil bow topped it off. I wore a shiny silver toga held together by a big light blue fabric belt that also read “Hershey’s Kiss.” I even accessorized with foil bracelets and silver shoes. Some of the other costumes were great as well. Taylor was a vampire, Scott was Indiana Jones, Cynthia was Jim Henson with a Kermit the Frog puppet, Raj was in a trash bag toga. A few of the volunteers made fun of each other by dressing up as members of our group. Tanne was Steve with his plaid, chest hair, bandana, backpack, and bright orange Crocs. Steve was Adam and wore his track jersey and short running shorts (Adam frequently runs 12 miles a day). We also had a few people dress in some funny “Samoa” costumes. Kate was the corrupt Department of Education leaders. She wore a puletasi with money sticking out everywhere and would say things like, “What money!? We have no money!” John was the ridiculous school Standards and Benchmarks. He decorated a white shirt and i’e with all the Standards for his grade. Thanh was our favorite aiga bus, the Blood bus (it has an awesome name and paint job.

The party was great and went off without a hitch! Kate, Jess and I slept over, and Taylor made us french toast in the morning before driving us home! (Taylor and Scott are awesome).