Oh what a wonderful day for me today!
The kids are both at school AND the internet is working!!!!
Which means I have spent the entire day on my laptop, which is a complete
luxury and hasn’t happened since I arrived here and I am stoked!
Noah is finally wanting to go to school now, after having a
really hard time adjusting to the (non)system at the local school. Every time I
would go with Saulei to Preschool, which is on the primary school’s grounds, I
would see Noah wondering around the school grounds, hiding under trees, looking
for someone to talk to (unfortunately sometimes that someone would be the high
school principal, who wondered why he wasn’t in class with the rest of his
classmates...- getting in trouble already!!!?!?!?!). No one tells him what to
do or not to do, I think the teachers and principal are just fascinated with
him and his stories of faraway lands (Israel and Australia) and love hearing
about all his favourite foods and the different dishes I cook and how I make
them....
There is absolutely no discipline there, and they let him
get away with whatever he wants, therefore he feels a bit lost and like he
doesn’t belong. He wasn’t learning anything at school, so I decided to keep him
home one day and home school him, which I feel he is benefiting from a lot. And
like I said, he is now much happier to go to school and is almost as keen as he
was when he was going to school in Oz.
Saulei has taken even longer to get him keen, I think he
just didnt want to be away from me for such a long time- 7:30am till after 4pm
is a long time to be away for this particular 4yr old, and only when he
realised that when he goes to preschool without me, and is in the care of my
friend Fotfiri (who runs the preschool)- he gets given so many treats and lollies that he would never get at
home, he’s decided that school is an essential part of his life,
and has been going to school every day
this week!
So this is what it has come to- if I want a bit of peace and
quiet and time to myself, I have to send my kids to a place where they get fed awful
fluoro coloured ice blocks, green bubblegum, COFFEE lollies and deep fried
donuts drizzled with chocolate sauce.... and they LOVE it!!!
Who said that
parental decision making was easy????...
Bro's..
Sheik Saulei
House is starting to look like its actually progressing,
Carl and his uncle Varo have been hammering away and getting some window frames
and walls up and its looking damn good! Carl has another week or so’s work in
the bush cutting timber, and then he will be down here working away on the
house from then on.
Where its at now
Men at work
My in-laws are coming over for a visit at the end of the
month which will be great! More company, grandparents for the kids and more
help for Carl!
We had a big Piggy event happen a couple of weeks ago, we
decided to buy a pig and butcher it PROPERLY with the help of a Tasmanian guy,
Arnold, who was here for a couple of months. He is a butcher by trade and was
keen to teach us how to do it right, as opposed to just chopping the beast up
into whatever many pieces and chucking the thing into the Lovo (underground
oven).
It took a while to find the right pig, we wanted one that
was big and fat, in order to gain a lot of Bacon, so when we eventually found
one and payed $300 for it, they brought it home with a bullet between its eyes, and a freshly slit throat.
The pig! As usual the kids were very amused...
(Oh whoops! WARNING: THE FOLLOWING BIT MAY
CONTAIN OFFENSIVE DESCRIPTIONS AND IMAGES. IF YOU PREFER TO SEE YOUR MEAT FILLETED
AND BBQ’D AND ON YOUR PLATE- YOU MAY SCROLL DOWN AND SKIP THE NEXT BIT...)
So with the sun setting in the background, the men cut up
the beast into 4 pieces (head, front legs, torso and back legs) and chilled it
over night. The next morning our kitchen transformed into a makeshift butchery
and Arnold showed Carl and Varo how to butcher each leg, which cut to use for
bacon, how to slice out succulent massive Pork Chops, and cube about 8kgs of
meat for stewing.
They prepared a solution of salt, sugar, water and some
stuff Arnold had for curing meat which they injected into the legs and bacon
chunks and put it all in a big barrel full of the solution to cure for a few
days.
We were so excited about having loads of bacon (no one here
has ever made it, and its not like we can buy it here...) and legs of Ham...
All I could think of was how much easier school lunches are going to get with
such a huge amount of ham...
What you DONT see at your butchers!
Nothing else to say about this pic, but laugh!!!
A lot of Future stew!!!
We were all waiting patiently, each of us drooling over our
Bacon and ham fantasies, until about 3 days later we woke up to not a fishy
smell, but a ROTTING PIG smell!!!
I couldn’t deal with it and went to school with the kids,
and when I came home, I was told the devastating dream crashing news of THE
WHOLE LOT having to be chucked out coz it went bad...
It turns out that they didnt consider the temperature here,
and thought that it wouldn’t affect the meat if it is drowned in the curing
solution. Unfortunately they were wrong....
BIG BUMMER it was, but like Carl, the eternal optimist said-
at least we learnt how to butcher a pig properly... and also managed to get a
bunch of chops, cubed meat and a whole lot-a -lard...
Who woulda thunk that a Jewish Princess like me would be so
enthralled and occupied by the processing of swine???...
Meanwhile, we have been getting almost daily deliveries of
giant watermelons from our friend Michael Jackson, and today we got given 5
enormous Pineapples so sweet that the juice that leaks out of it tastes like
syrup!!! Ahhhhhh.... life!!!
My VCO (Virgin Coconut Oil) and soap making is still going,
although after being busted by the immigration officer for selling soap at the
local shop, I’ve decided not to sell them and keep them for personal use and
gifts...
Apparently on my current visa I am not allowed to “generate
income”, and some how, via the “Coconut Wireless network” and a few cases of
TPS (Tall Poppy Syndrome) the news spread that the Henfisi (white woman) was
selling soap at the shop. So when the
immigration officer went to check it out (and bought one of my soaps!), he told
me they could cancel my visa, but wont, as things are a bit more lenient here
in Rotuma. If I really wanted to sell
them, we can get a permit on Carls name, but we’ve decided not to bother with
it, and just enjoy the soaps ourselves.
As I assume is happening in the rest of the western world,
here too people are getting excited about Xmas approaching, only here there is
no outrageous spending, annoying brightly lit shopping malls, and consumerism
slammed in your head making one feel
inadequate if one doesn’t participate. No, over here, on the 1st of
December, all cane knives are put away, work seizes to be a part of daily
activity, and partying begins. People here work on their plantations for months
in advance to provide enough food for
Xmas time, many Rotumans living all over the world come here to celebrate Xmas,
and the islands population triples.
I remember the very first time I came here in 2005, pregnant
and in complete culture shock, I didnt quite know what to make of the whole
“Xmas period”. I wonder how now, 7 years on and with much more experience and
understanding of the culture, how my experience of it will be...
Till then (or before), happy days to you all and lots of
love from all of us xxxx
That carcass was so clean. It would be great if the folks in the village can do the same. Just hot water?
ReplyDeleteReally enjoy following your stories. You describe the bounty of the island with such clarity and make it so special, thank you.
Pity not many of the villagers are helping and learning from Carl, especially in making timber off the giant Mahogany trees.
Alalum