Thursday, February 19, 2009

Odds and Ends Thursday 2

Another week into the school year and the honeymoon is definitely coming to a close. I’ve implemented a weekly quiz, and the results have been bafflingly varied. And yet as much as the path is unsure, we’ve settled into somewhat of a routine, and it’s comforting to know that there won’t be any adapting to a whole new environment until November at the earliest. Here’s a list of some other thoughts from the week:
  • I get weird songs in my head here. At lunch the other day, I had the “Wheel of Fortune” theme playing forever. Today as I was biking downtown, it was “She’s Always a Woman” from Billy Joel, apropos nothing.
  • Speaking of music, I was in the Congregationalist Church Treasurer’s truck last night, and we heard K-Ci and JoJo and Edwin McCain and Boyz II Men, and it was like being at a middle school dance in Samoa. In the Treasurer’s truck. 13 years after middle school.
  • I need to start exercising. I can’t be grilling pizza AND engorging on taro hashbrowns without a little jog now and then. I’d say the biggest obstacle to exercise is the laundry. In part, I feel like I don’t have the proper clothes in which to exercise, but also I’m not confident enough with my manual laundry techniques to employ them on a daily basis.
  • It’s fun seeing tourists around town because there’s a certain outsider bond that can be immediately forged. At the same time, it’s disappointing because they don’t have a bit of the insider perspective as well. But then it’s exciting to feel like an insider.
  • I had to whip out makeshift butcher skills on the pork this evening. It’s not like the pieces are nicely chopped or in any way boneless. It’s almost as though they diced the pig into large cross-sections and then distributed them. In fact, that’s exactly what they did. It’s so fatty though. And I’m no butcher. It was a bit of a farce staring cluelessly at the hunk of pork, arbitrarily deciding which parts would be edible.
  • I talked to my friend Chris who works at the US Embassy in Mexico for a bit on gchat today. Just FYI, should you and I ever have a conversation on gchat while I’m still living in Samoa, I’m liable to drop out without notice. The internet here gets a little overwhelmed when gchat enters the picture, so don’t be offended.
  • The other day I had a classic rock song in my head that goes something like (and I’m totally unsure of the actual lyrics), “Holiday roo-OOO-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oad / Holiday roo-OOO-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oad.” Who sings that? Why is it in my head? Also, “You are the woman that I’ve always dreamed of / I knew it from the start…” What song is that? And what’s the next line?
  • For some reason last Sunday, the streets of Apia were full of forlorn looking Americans (which is weird because usually the tourists are Australian or New Zealish or, strangely enough, German) aimlessly wandering. I overheard one asking a bank security guard, “So things will definitely be open tomorrow…. Right?” Ha.
  • The new computer teacher has been conducting all of her classes in the students’ normal classroom; i.e. not in the computer lab. On one hand, I’m impressed by this. I feel like the kneejerk reaction is to let the students loose. On the other hand, I’m still nervous about what will happen when she finally does let the students into the classroom.
  • One of the more exciting things about getting the camera back is I had promised my host family a large print of one of the portraits, and now I can actually deliver on that promise. I got 2 5”x7”s developed yesterday, which cost $30 WST. Ouch!
  • It sounds a little silly, but I am excited about going back to tea and a muffin at break every day. Supy told me his staff gets meals every day of every week, and I was jealous, but I’m ready for the simplicity of the muffin again. And the speed-guzzling of the tea in order to make sure I could pack in as many cups as possible. It just sounds less stressful than brown paper-wrapped pork.
That’s all I got for this week’s odds and ends. I’m heading to the host village tomorrow afternoon, so I’m going to shirk my blog responsibilities once more, but I’ll be back Saturday. And I swear after this weekend, I’m not going away until the 3rd-ish weekend in March. In the future, I think I might explore employing a guest blogger for days when I’m gone. For fun. We’ll see.

Hope things are well. Pictures below.
















This is the brown-paper-wrapped pork in my refrigerator. It was better wrapped when it was given to me.
















Hair on the pork.
















Cooked pork. It turned out surprisingly well. I'm not sure there's any more meat in that brown paper bundle though.
















In the insect "Cultural Exploration," I didn't talk about the bees. Generally they stay out of peoples' way, but they are huge. To the point that they FREAK ME OUT. This one got into my house somehow, and I had to put him down fast.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are the Woman - Firefall 1976 - I like that song.

Anonymous said...

...I saw your face and that's the last I've seen of my heart (is the next line)

Also, Holiday Road is a Fleetwood Mac song.

Eric Carr said...

"Holiday Road" is from National Lampoons Vacation by Lyndsay Buckingham. Today for me the song in my head is... The Theme from "Hogan's Heroes". Shultz!

Anonymous said...

I didn't remember the theme from "Hogan's Heroes" but after reading Eric's comment, Dad is standing behind me humming it!

Barb Carusillo said...

A local radio station here in Indianapolis has a "Name that song" segment daily on my commute into work each day. Most of the time I can never figure out what song the line they read is from. I was excited when I read your "You are the woman" line because I knew right away what it was for once. But just like the with the radio station, someone always beats me to the punch!

Barb Carusillo said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

where are you going in march?
and, what else did you eat with the pork?
and, if you soak workout clothes in soapy water, that might help with the confidence level of your manual laundry.

i like odds and ends =)

Unknown said...

Like Barbara I knew right away what song you had stuck in your head but as usual even my kid beat me to the punch. Is it weird that I think it is weird that she would know the next lines to the song and that Holiday Road is a Fleetwood Mac song. But now thank you very much that song is in my head. Maybe if I start humming - Hot dogs, Armour Hot dogs...Oh No What did I do!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

Love those Lampoons Vacation movies with Chevy Chase!!