The biggest samoan orgy... I am all in!!!

There is not much to do an island at night... i often end up just hanging out with friends or going to bed around 9.30... but there is one night, one special night... every year, on the third/quarter moon of October, when few people sleep, and many gather along the beaches of Samoa and take part into the biggest orgy these islands will ever see.
How can you sleep this night? How can you lay in bed knowing that you are missing the biggest feast of the year? For how tired I have been, I just could not justify bed time.
On Monday night after dancing practice, I drove all the way to Alega with a friend, and went straight to bed in Naomi's house... the party does not start until after midnight, and you never know when it is going to finish (I participated to this party 2 years ago on Ofu island... at 4.oo I called the night, but there were still people there!).
At 12.30, we hit the beach... bonfires has been lighted along the whole beach, and small crowd are sitting behind them (for how romantic the view can be, i think the purpose of the fires is to keep the mosquitoes away...). But the party won't start until the moon will rise above the mountain and the sea will send a very special messenger: a worm...
At this point I should specify that whether the feast is for us, the orgy is not. The palolo is a sea worm that lives in the corals, and that once a year, at night, swims to the surface to release eggs and sperm... Palolo is considered a delicacy in Samoa, and during these spawning nights the island join the worms in the water and collect and eat as much as possible.
Monday night: not much spawning in Alega, and we ended up going to bed empty handed. Still a good time though.
Next morning I felt like I was sleep walking all day... I think I kind of woke up when I saw a little yellow fish with black stripes swimming around the tank of my buddy. Then I though: "uh... life is interesting. It is lunch break, and I am scuba diving wearing my pajama (italiani! "pajama" e' inglese per "pigiama"! jajaja!). Again, how did I get here?"... you truly never know where live will take you and what it will bring you...
Tuesday night we tried again. This time we all slept until midnight and then we zombie walked to the beach. The moon rose over the mountain and the palolo came!
Now, it is wild game. People magically appeared from all over and entered in the water with buckets and home-made scoop-nets, sieves, flash lights.... I took off my long pants (mosquitoes-repellent...), entered the water and the party started!!My goal this year was to take few good pictures, but our "palolo team" (I proposed the name "orgy team" which I believe is more folkloric) collected enough palolo for...
People were laughing, being serious, walking around the reef flat... Some were wearing everyday cloths, other were wearing a fancy puletasi... Tisa was playing the ukulele and singing... On my opinion, it is totally worth the lack of sleep, and it is always great being part of this feast! (picture will give you a better idea... to come on monday).
So... we did it, we collected it, now we had to eat it... Naomi is a genius and prepared a great pizza we topped with fresh palolo. Of course our pirate loved to just eat it. Taste? it taste like salt... salt and some nutrients, like the sea... Palolo is a delicacy here but, personally, between palolo and strawberry, i would still go for the strawberry...
(pictures to come on monday...)

Turned 26 again!

I am alive, I am alive! Thanks for all the emails, I loved all of them as much as I love you all! So, yes, on the 17^th of October I turned 26. Again. And again… and again…. And again… I think 26 years old was quite a good age and I do not see why I should get any older. Plus, everybody knows that kids do not age in Neverland!

I have been incredibly busy catching up with friends, homework, moving to the new house (still!!!), dancing… I have not been to Taekwondo for a month now, I feel so guilty! And there are so many things I would like to talk about, but so little time…

I had dinners and lunches with friends almost everyday… Thursday we had a tofa (good-bye) party for one of the nicest guys on island that left on Sunday. He is the one without the black t-shirt (we made matching t-shirts for him, Samoan style). He is going to be SOOOO MISSED!!!!!!!!!! I miss him already! But he is also moving in Hawaii, that is the only place we can fly to when we leave the island... so...

Friday I had a potluck and BBQ at my new house, another official house warming party and birthday celebration. Very nice and relaxing, but I have to admit I miss celebrating with Maria Jose! But I have to say I did get a “super star” cake this year too! Thank you!!

Saturday I decided that it was a good idea to start the new year paddling a 10km race early in the morning. Of course, after the first kilometer I started thinking that it was not really a good idea after all, I could have started the new year with a nice long nap rolling on the bed instead. After 2 kilometers I was thinking, well, since I am here, I may as well paddle. It feels nice to feel your breathing regular after the first spring to get the outrigger going. After 10 kilometers I was not thinking anymore. Maybe I was thinking were I could go to sleep and how thirsty I was. We arrived 3^rd or last, depends from the point of views, but I am still satisfied with it.

The afternoon went on with more paddling races, my team (EPA) won a second place on the 250 meter sprint. In the evening all participants stayed at the yacht club for dinner and to receive prices. I received a round-trip to Apia as a present from my lucky star during the raffle… It is good to be back to super star again.. Last 5 years have not been too good; I think my next 5 years are going to be good again… ;)

I learned many things too… But I need to run now!! Love you all!

"GET OUT OF HERE!!!"

I think this was quite hilarious and worth sharing...
This morning I drove early to work as I had a bunch of data that needed to be ready by 10 o’ clock. Brian came also with me. As we were turning along Fagaalu bay, we saw a palagi man having serious problems with a couple of dogs. He must be a new guy here, as I saw him only twice, and also because he went running without any golf club or stones. He was kind of back walking trying to punch the dogs as they were going for his calves… I pulled the car over right next to him, thinking about getting out, take the emergency rocks I have on the back of my truckosaurous, and help this poor Christ. But as soon as I pull over, Brian, which was even closer to the scene, pulled his head outside the window and screamed, with an incredibly big voice “GET OUT OF HERE!!!”. The dogs got scared and ran away with the tail between the legs. The poor runner got scared, and also jumped back (he was probably too busy focusing on the dogs to notice us approaching). He finally gave us a weak smile, thanked us, and turned around to ran away before the dogs would come back.

Isn’t that something amazing to do 5.45 in the morning? If it were me running, I would have probably taken it personally and though, crying, “but I cannot leave today! It is Wednesday! No flights today!”. I hope this guy will not leave the island tomorrow… I also hope he will now go running with a golf club or stones or bear spray as everybody else does...

JB left the island last Thursday, what a wonderful visit it was! I guess I should be sad he left, but in reality everything was so perfect that I could not have wish for anything else! Incredibly, I am still in the process of moving! Two friends helped me to move the fridge 2 nights ago… what an adventure! But once home we hang out on the coach on the porch… what a peaceful place… the moon was rising big and yellow over the Pala Lagoon, and her light was painting everything silver… Big bats flying around, and a nice breeze keeping some mosquitoes away… it was nearly a pity to think to go to bed.

Sunday I got a tuna (it is always nice to get a big fish to BBQ with friends!) which we though to cook last night, if we did not forget to defrost it… Anyway, a good carbonara always makes it... I cooked at Brian’s house, as I do not have gas for cooking yet, and we had our first official dinner at my new place… so much fun! I love my neighbors! Capt Johnny and 2 other capts also came, such a merry company! And the bookshelf (made of bricks and boards) makes such a fast bench when are missing...And then on the porch again.. I think I can see myself spending many many nights just contemplating the view… (I will try to get a better picture...)

The first north shore annual expedition -part II

Paddling from the tip of the Pola to the cove I chose for lunch break felt incredibly easy. The cove was well repaired from waves and winds, mainly composed of shear cliff and a little rocky beach where we landed. Behind us there was a wonderful waterfall, with a pool at its base where we could rinse in fresh water.

(why do guys always have to bother little creatures?)

Even if here we do not have really season (we have a wet season, a wetter season and a dry season that this year happen on a Thursday), some trees where turning orange and red and loosing their leaves. I find it quite surprising, but also wonderful, and in a way it reminds me the autumn back home.

(i am sorry i could get the colors when i took this pictures. The wind was blowing a lot of red dry leaves on John, as we left the lunch cove).

Restored, rested and self-assured, we took off again to reach the cove where we were supposed to spend the night. Now, I do not really know how we miss it, because we actually stop in it and had a look around. Somehow we reached the beach in a speedy time and approximation of distance covered became a bit too hard… so we pass it…

(I did not use a zoom to take this picture. This bird was truly upset at us for passing next to his cliff and was all over us, until he decided to go for JB).

John and JB where behind us contemplating if it would be a good idea or not to enter into a cave that was aggressively hit by waves, when Erika and I turned around the point, where the supposed night camp-beach should have been. "Oh-Oh… there is a shack… oh-oh, I see a plantation…" There are many stories of marijuana plantations up in the mountains or is remote places that I am always worried when I go exploring to find one. One we got slightly lost in the mountain and found a tapioca plantation, which, from a distance, really looked like mj!!!

We decided it was better to wait for the guys to see what to do… we started being quite tired, and Fagasa must have been way to far to reach it for the night… As the guys reached us and we paddled a bit further in the point, we could see more houses, more plantations… it felt like being in the movie “The beach” and finding the much talked location...

Then a church… ok, maybe… maybe we are in Fagasa… yes, definitely, Fagasa.
At this point our moral dropped, as we were so well prepared for the camping and we were not ready yet to go back home. Erika had a great idea “I think Massacre bay is only 3 bays away!”… It took a minute of group thinking to decide to go for it!

(Seems like he is fishing, but in reality John is cleaning the camera in fresh water... This cameras are great! waterproof to 10 meters, and shockprouf! Perfect for this climate, highly suggested! Olympus Stylus SW 770).

(Erika's sexy tan line...)

Now, the question is: considering the option was between JB’s wonderful room with a big Jacuzzi on one side, and broken mosquito net covered by plastic tarp on coconut and banana leaves on mosquitoes and frog infested beach, what is it that makes you opt for the second choice?

Truth is, I just love camping, even if it can result in a long sleepless night waiting for the sun to rise again. Massacre bay is a long bay where the first contact between palagis and samoans happened. As the name suggest, it ended up in few deaths. As soon as we landed, we scouted the beach for the best place to set up the tarp, or to be more precise, we looked for that only place on the beach that won’t get wet at high tide but that would still be away from the jungle (and the mosquitoes) on the back. We found it right next to the stream, we seemed also a great romantic idea for the evening, but that resulted to be for me a source of worrying, considering the uninterrupted rain during the rain, and the high frequency of flash floods in the place. But we all survived (even if wet and cold in my case), so after all it turned out to be a good idea.

As JB and I were setting the camp, John and Erika were collecting coconuts for water and meat. They also found very big shells for dinner plates.

The evening died early, after a relaxing pink sunset, but the night was long. Frogs were mysteriously collecting all around our tend. Now I think it was just a bottom-up food-chain effect. We represented the first link, involuntarily offering our blood to mosquitoes grazing. The frogs just followed the mosquitoes to feed on them.

Morning was welcome, together with the end of the rain that seemed lasting all night. Few mosquitoes made it through the net, and one decided to bite me on my lower lips (which inflated to porno star dimension).

Before going to sleep we were considering the idea of continuing our trip all the way to the end of the island, maybe Poloa village, where we could find a ride back. But after such a wet night, the idea of the Jacuzzi was definitly more appealing. Paddling eastward from Massacre to Fagasa was quite hard. I felt we were paddling and paddling and never moving. Depressing sometimes. JB broke his paddle in half on a forward stroke.

Fagasa. Land. End of the adventure. Definitely something that needs to be repeated.

the first north shore annual expedition -part I

(Our t-shirt logo)

The Pola, the first challenge. There is a small passage between the main land and the Pola, but it was way to wavy even to see it clearly...

“Oh do not worry, we are very prepared, we have all the gear we need”. These were the words that I told last saturday to the very worried old lady, owner of the land where we parked our cars in Vatia. The plan was to paddle from Vatia to Fagasa, enjoying the beautiful coast of the National Park over the weekend. The participants: John and Erika, with who I usually paddle, and James Bond.

The sea did look slightly wavy from the beach but the calm waters in the (protected) bay mellowed our “alarm –it may be a bad idea” neurons in our brain. So we took off. John in a fancy plastic ocean kayak, James Bond on a plastic seat-on-top recreational kayak and Erika and I on a double plastic seat-on-top floating device.

As soon as we left the bay, the started being literally slapped in our face from waves coming from different directions. John soon disappeared behind many waves, followed by James Bond. Erika and I’s neurons instead started working after the second time we slipped in the water. “May this be a bad idea in such weather?”.

Last view of John...

It was very hard for us to keep the floatation device from flipping and it was a bit scaring for me seeing the waves hitting the share cliffs of the Polas on our left. I did not even get seasick, I guess the constant input of adrenaline helped me out. All I wanted to be was out of there, on the other side of the Polas, where a promise sea protected from the adverse winds and currents was waiting us.

Erika was very cool instead, and we both very proud on how well we tied the staff on the floating device. Then, suddenly I heard Erika saying “SHIT!”. As we did not slipped at that moment I wonder what it could have been, hoping that was something like “I broke my nail”. Instead, she said: “I lost a blade”. “So much for having all the gear we need” I thought. We could see the blade slowly (we thought) sinking not far away from us, a white shadow broken by the waves. I jumped in the water and tried to reach it with my feet, but nothing, it was deeper. I had to dive. So I gave my life jacket to Erika, and my sunglasses, and without thinking too much (or without even getting a big breath) I dove down. One frog kick, 2 frog kick, 3 frog kick… the blade was still somewhere further down. I could not see much, just undefined colors… but it felt so peaceful down there, with no waves, no white caps, no winds… 4 frog kick… “It is so blue down there, it seems like there is a light”… 5 frog kick… “uhmm… I think I am running out of air, I should not go further down, but…I like it down here…” 6 frog kick… “Oh, the blade! I reached it! Let’s go up!”. I looked around, where was up? I guess it was because of the light scattering the waves were doing, but it was honestly hard to decide where up was. And it was truly peaceful down there. I though of realizing a bubble of air from my mouth and follow it, but I did not feel like I had any air in my lungs. So I just decide to go back on the way I came from and started kicking my legs… I gasped for air when I surfaced. Erika was looking at me with a pale expression as to say “Where have you been” and “Please tell me you got the blade!”. Suddenly I returned to that hell of a sea and I realized I did not have my life jacket on. I jumped on the floating device; Erika sat on the loose blade and we started paddling moving away from the cliff.

James Bond, who has extended experience with white water kayaking, was waiting and playing with the waves at the end of the Polas, where the waves became much bigger but also less chubby and therefore much more manageable. A group of spinning dolphins was doing a show for us and, all of a sudden, made the whole experience worth it.

Pass the pola, there was a quite calmer sea, and a strong current flowing east to west carrying us to the cove we designed for the lunch break.

JB and John on the other side of the Pola... nice sea here... From this point of view, the Pola looks like a pink dog or a pig... both very samoan anyway...

But now I am going to bed… more to be told tomorrow…

A tropical tune

Good morning world!
I have been very busy these days, with work, with the new house and the new puppy, and with James Bond of course, which I try to spend as much time as possible.
Last weekend we (John, Erika, James Bond and myself) went for an adventure, paddling along the National Park from the village of Vatia to Fagasa... well, at least that it was what we originally planned... soon I will write the details of the expedition, which included not-too-reliable gear, nearly drowning experience, spinning dolphins, shy turtles, breaching whales and hungry mosquitoes, sandwiches with prosciutto and mozzarella, very big waves... and that also opened new horizons and possibilities on this small rock...
This morning I found this nice tune and I want to share it with you (click on the link). It fits my mood! ;)
a tropical tune...