We were suppose to get up really early this morning and take off for our drive. I set the alarm clock for 5am so I could get up and shower. Except there was no water this morning. Apparently it goes out every now and then. They live higher up on the mountain so if it doesn't rain a lot then there isn't much water... it all goes down hill to the main part of the village. I take comfort in knowing that we aren't the only ones up here without water. Hopefully it'll come back on tonight.
The drive around the island was fun. The island is so green and lush! It was very pretty to see all the trees, valleys and the mountain. There were a lot more of the open type of homes than I thought there would be. The one thing that I tried over and over to take a picture of was peoples workout weights and stuff. It was just funny cause it would be so random and the weights looked like they were made out of tree trunks and stuff. I guess you'd have to see it.
Another thing I noticed was that there was a church building in almost every village. There were so many of them which means that the church is very strong in the islands. Not only were there a lot of LDS buildings but a lot of other churches too. Just in Magiagi there are 4 different churches. Religion seems to play a huge role in the lives of the people here which is good and bad. You should see how big some of the homes of the ministers are. They are ridiculously large and out of control.
On our way to meet Kasala's uncles we were able to see a lot of the damage from the tsunami that hit there a few years ago. There were still a lot of homes that didn't get rebuilt, cars along the side of the road that were mangled and businesses that just didn't rebuild or reopen. It was a little shocking that after a few years people had still not fully recovered from the disaster.
We met Kasala's uncles but didn't stay for long. They were on the property of his Grandfather who passed away a few years ago. It was a fairly large piece of land right across from the beach. The foundation was still there of the original house that his Grandfather built way back in the day. Ala was telling me that it was a huge Samoan fale that they use to play in as little kids. There is now a western style house there but the bathroom and kitchen is still outside. I don't think there are many homes with the kitchen/cooking actually inside.... Or at least I didn't see any.
After taking pictures with the Uncles and on the graves of his Grandparents we made our way to Vaiula beach. This place was amazing. Nothing super special but the water was so blue and clear! The sand was very fine and even had black sand mixed in! I had never seen black sand before. The kids had a blast. They were happy to be out of the car for a few hours and in the sun. Manamea had no fear about going into the water. She crawled right in and started splashing around. She did on several occasions try to eat the sand. Peta and Paline made some awesome lunch for us too. They were going to BBQ so we brought a bunch of stuff to BBQ but when I didn't actually SEE a BBQ I started to get a little worried. I wasn't informed that a BBQ was really a fire under a piece of metal with a skillet type thing on top of that. I guess it didn't really matter how they cooked the food.... it was good!
After spending a few hours at the beach we were on our way back home. We were suppose to go and visit my Dads village today but the kids were tired and the family was just ready to call it a day. On our drive home we cut across the island and saw an amazing waterfall. It was called Papapapaitai Waterfall.... Don't ask me how to say that cause I"ll just keep repeating Papa over and over. We drove by where Robert Lewis Stevens is buried. I don't think we're going to make the hike to his grave this time around. We were planning on it but it looks like we're running out of time. When we got home the family had a lot of things to do to prepare for Sunday. The kids and I just kind of took it easy, watched a few movies, played outside,..... Waited for the water to come back on.... which it didn't.
Not having water caused a little anger in me to come out. I'm not use to not having water available when I want to shower. Kasala did go to the pipe out front and fill up a bunch of buckets of clean water to shower the kids with. He then informed me that I needed to fill up a bucket, take the pan and go shower myself. That right there threw me for a loop and I threw a little Diva Tantrum.... well a big Diva Tantrum. I told him to take me to a hotel and check me in cause there was no way in HELL that I was using a bucket and a PAN to take a shower. That of course didn't go over very well and a few hours after our big argument about showering it started to rain really hard... and the water came back on! Hopefully it doesn't turn off again because if it does I have a feeling I'll be outside with a bucket and a pan.
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