Rats, sleep, kava and a bride

These past couple weeks have been a roller coaster ride, albeit a slow one. I have limited time to be online when we are in the city so I type these up at the training village to then upload. Sorry if I am not able to type more personal emails. HOWEVER, I would love to know what is going on in your life no matter how eventful or not. Even current events and pop culture would be great to read about. (volunteer@vu.peacecorps.gov subj: AMY)

So…torrential rains one day and then a hot day followed by a cool one…it’s pretty unpredictable now but summer is coming and so is cyclone (hurricane) season. We’ve learned ways to deal with natural disasters such as cyclone, mud slides, bush fires, flooding, earthquakes and volcanoes. Vanuatu sits just on the “ring of fire” from which the archipelago was formed. Peace Corps safety and security is very thorough and we feel well cared for but ultimately the Ni Vans have lived through them for years and we will just do as the villagers do. Just hope this isn’t the year for anything too extreme.

About half our group got sick last week but luckily I did not. However, it is bound to happen. The thought of being sick in the smol (out) house is terrible! I have a new friend in my custom house…a mouse and he’s been doing laps around the rafters above, getting into some food and keeping me up at night. AH! Then there’s the mosquitoes who love me and cases of dengue fever have appeared in Vanuatu which is carried by morning mosquitoes. It causes a migraine, fever and just feeling miserable for 6 weeks. So, now every bite I get during the day, I diagnose as dengue fever. AH!

I never realized how sound proof our western lives are…sleeping here can be difficult when you have roosters crowing at each other from across the village, dogs barking while bullying the pigs, people laughing and talking and a string band video or actual string band playing. It’s great music but not all the time! Then the little critters I’ve mentioned. Geckos, frogs, chickens…it’s a zoo over here.

The Bislama classes are coming along but I am still not proficient. They say it will come by the end of training. We leave next Monday for “wokabaot” where we live at our sites for a week, meet the community and take inventory of what settling-in supplies we will need. I have no expectations but do hope I am near the ocean at least.

Today, back at the village there is a bride-price celebration happening. Preparations have been occurring all week and essentially, once a woman is “blocked” by a man or in our words, engaged, it is then followed by the bride-price, similar to a dowry in which the man’s family comes to the bride’s village to “pay” for the woman. It’s more symbolic now…mats, calico, island dresses, shirts, food and yams but still costly. Then a wedding will follow in December. Interestingly, most couples have kids before all of this happens since it sometimes takes time to prepare for the bride-price and wedding. Even more interesting is that the family name passes through the woman! Fantastic! J

Kava…so Peace Corps Trainees are only allowed to drink it on weekends and in many of the outer islands women are not allowed or can only drink at home and not at the nakamal (kava bar). On a side note, other than at home, men and women are very much segregated. Women cook together and men fish and drink kava together. So the affects of kava are not strong and some batches differ in degree. It’s often just a nice chill buzz, makes you lethargic, decreases appetite and too much can make you pass out or nauseous. As I’ve mentioned it smells and tastes terrible but nonetheless it’s enjoyable…really. For the Ni Vans, it’s less expensive than alcohol but drinking both (called kale) has been blamed for belligerent Ni Vans.