Too bad it rained the whole time. Last week, I finally made the trip over to Savai’i, which is the other main land mass of Samoa. It’s often referred to as ‘the big island,’ and the jaded metropolitan workers of Apia (hah) told me more than once that ‘it’s more laid back’ than ‘Upolu. Never having seen anything remotely approaching uptight-ness on ‘Upolu, I was pretty excited to experience Savai’i for myself. The first thing to note is that although Savai’i is, indeed, bigger than ‘Upolu, it has one-third the people and far fewer paved roads. I’m told that many people are originally from Savai’i but relocate to ‘Upolu for better work or school opportunities–so I guess the rural-urban shift does exist here, just on a considerably smaller scale. Savai’i is also supposed to be quite beautiful and a big tourist destination in Samoa. I was only there for a day and a half, and I can tell you that I would love to see more.
A sizable chunk of my work-plan with Kiva involves gathering video footage, and in one case, editing it. Considering it’s been oh-so-long since I took that film-making seminar in college (and debatable how much I learned from the pass/fail course), I figured I should get some practice in with my hapless blog readers before unleashing myself on the Kiva community. Thus, for this week, I present to you: video blog! I spent embarrassingly long throwing this together, and I still must apologize for the shaky footage and sudden cuts. I have nervous hands and ADD, sorry!
And just in case that amazing film wasn’t totally comprehensive somehow…some pictures to fill in the gaps.
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- One of my bucket list items for life is to see the sun rise on the ocean. I didn’t quite get to check it off, but this was pretty close!
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- The SPBD branch office in Savai’i.
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- One of their computers, although I’m not confident that it actually works. Looks and sounds like a struggling refrigerator.
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- A map of Savai’i. The red dots are places where SPBD has centers!
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- Traditional rain defense for fales.
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- You can’t quite see it, but the loan officer/center chief and secretary are sitting almost on top of a family grave. Yup, right there in the house.
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- A small market stand that the ladies from one center take turn using to sell goods by the road.
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- Cocoa rice!
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- Two women show off their fish. One strand sells for ~30 tala ($15)–no one else seemed surprised at how blue the fish are!
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- The first of the angry pigs.
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- Mean death stare from an pig, looking artsy.
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- Pig in a blanket, Samoan style!
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- Unfortunately I didn’t capture the loan officer taking the pig apart with a machete. But this was the result.
Oh,no! Did you actually witness the slaughter of the piggy whose picture you had taken? Dad ..
Yes, it was one of the pigs that I stalked. It died of fright.
JUST KIDDING. I did not see this particular pig get slaughtered, nor did I see it get cooked. It got dropped off at the office by one of the staff members who’d just had a baby (it was a gift in return for the gifts she had been given).
Ah! Much better… I was about to arrive Princeton for dinner with Nik.. A different answer would have turned me to be ( just for this evning
vegetarian .. Love your video clip.. Give us more !! Love you.. Dad