Full Full Day and a Little Tragedy!

Today was by far the longest day that I have had since I have been here. It started with waking up extra early, about 7:30, to get ready and have time to call my brother for his birthday. We talked for about 10 minutes and then my phone went out and did not turn back on until, well, I didn't try before I left, but I presume it is working now. Anyways, we went to VBS and had a great day. It had rained over there all night, so the pavement under the tent was completely wet. The kids didn't want to sit down (I can't blame them; I didn't either) and so it was hard to get them calm enough for a story. We talked about patience and faithfulness. Colleen was Ruth and Marci was Naomi and it was great. We did a couple of crafts that I thought went really well, until Salvation showed me he used a nail for his clock center thing instead of gluing them on. No one got hurt, so I guess it was alright. We tried to do relay thing for faithfulness, but that didn't go too well, and the little ones on my team ended up in tears and having to be rescued from the fury of the game. Sulu and I had to take a couple of minutes before she was ready to go back under the tent. 

After VBS, we ended up staying in Nu'u Uli for the afternoon to play volleyball. I am so glad that we did. We went to two Samoan houses and got to see the culture in action. The kids were walking on the roofs, lighting long sticks on fire and running about with nothing better to do. It was scary, but the parents weren't concerned, so neither were we. We changed clothes and started playing with a couple of kids. Before we knew it, there were like 30 people all wanting to play. They also stopped rotating spots, so if you were on the front row, you were there permanently. I didn't like that so much. It started raining, so they pulled us off the court, but resumed play in the rain. We insisted we didn't mind getting wet, but about 10 minutes later, after playing in the pouring rain, I was glad to get under a little shelter to dry off. 

Then we changed back into our jeans (not easy when you are wet by the way) and Ruth (from last night) gave us lavalavas to dance in. We went to what we thought was the girls dance practice for an upcoming meeting thing, but it ended up as the girls teaching us a dance and laughing as we did it wrong. I got to hold the baby Gideon Luke again and he was such a good baby. We kept dancing and we got pretty good though, but then Ruth sent us back to her house because the pastor, her father, had bought us McDonald's for lunch and had it waiting there for us. This is the tragic part of the event for me though. I decided to stop drinking "dark colored" sodas last March(2007) and hadn't had one in over a year, but today Luao had gotten us all Coca-Colas and I wasn't in the position to refuse it. I drank it and I have to admit, it tasted really good. I was sad to break my streak, but at the same time, it wasn't really my fault either. 

After that, we went back to the little fale and danced more. We did the chacha slide with them and I taught a couple of the girls how to salsa (very hard without partners) and they loved it. Then we kept dancing for about another 3 hours non-stop and were completely worn out by the time we got around to the evening lectures. 

We went to the church for those and hung around a little bit afterwards. We beat Danna and David home, so we couldn't get into our house first thing. I really just wanted a bed and a bathroom, but I had to wait another  30 minutes.

Today was one of the very best days of my life. I had a blast with the girls and I think they had fun too. Ruth and I put the dance we learned to "Testify to Love" by Avalon and it totally worked. She is seriously like a Samoan me. She is precious. We are for sure going to work on that dance so that we can both show our friends our other side. I am going to have to get Marci and Melinda to record it for me to show all of you. 

I am coming closer to connecting with the Samoan inside of me. I feel like I have been sworn in now. I even wore my lavalava(on top of my jeans) to church tonight (very Samoan thing to do).

Thanks for reading and more later!