Monday, November 29, 2010

The More You Know



When two people have sex , the sperm builds up in the mother's stomach over time. When there is enough, it turns into a baby. After the baby is born, the goo that it is covered in is the excess sperm.

Samoan pregnancies can also last for much longer or much shorter than 9 months. Usually, this is due to the mother's sadness that the father was away for a long period of time.

I went to the hospital for a TB test, which is required for renewing my work contract. They gave the skin test, and when they took the needle out, it kept squirting. All over me, and in my mouth. Then we all laughed.

Laughed and laughed.

Because we didn't know the consequences, and by laughing, we all hoped to forget about what we were laughing about.



"The More You Know" segment states facts as told by American Samoans.

Cancer is a palagi disease, therefore Samoans do not need to worry about it.

Friday, November 12, 2010

Email From a Friend Trying to Sell His Scooter

Hello,

My name is Jeremy and I'm a recovering American Samoa resident. I'm still on island time and have not yet sold my old transportation device: a 2007 Honda 125 AMF scooter affectionately called the Poof Scoot 2.0. It's a good bike, has brand new brakes and I'm asking $1400. I've attached a photo of it here. When I was on-island, I met with several locals about the bike and will now answer their questions again, in order to minimize the anticipated email inquiries I expect to receive from you.

Yes, it is waterproof.

Yes, it uses gasoline.

Yes, you can buy the gasoline on island.

No, it is not a car.

No, it is not a truck either.

Yes, it has an engine.

It's currently housed somewhere in Tafuna. If you're interested, please contact EPA Nate to check it out.

Thanks, and good luck on the rock.

jer

Monday, November 8, 2010

Like the rest of the United States, American Samoa held its midterm elections in November. Below is the text of an article which summarizes how the electorate handles elections here.

Voters get expressive on ballot forms

11/03/2010

Some voters expressed their votes by writing messages and pictures on the ballot form. As long as the marking is made inside the box, that ballot is counted.

According to poll watchers messages included “A okay”, “I love Eni” or “U rock” which were scribbled inside the boxes next to their candidate’s name. Several voters also wrote the words “yes” or “no” inside the boxes.

A poll watcher said on the first absentee ballot counted for the constitutional referendum at the Election Office yesterday the voter wrote the word “No” inside the no box and then drew the picture of a skull.

Friday, October 8, 2010

Awesome Samoan Names

We were discussing some of the more imaginitive names Samoans have decided to name their children. This came up when Meg met Han Solo. As it turns out, this has been a topic of discussion many times over, as we don't have much else to talk about. These are all actual names of actual people. So here it is, the latest update of awesome Samoan names:

29
Abcde
Aetalo - means eat taro
Afasene (half-a-cent)
Air Jordan
Alcapone
Anewvision
Asoluaoiuni (2nd of June... he'll never forget his birthday and neither will you!)
Army and Navy (Brothers)
Baby
Batchlor [sic]
Bear
Beaver Ho Ching
Billclinton
Boyblue
Budweiser
California
Christmas
Cinderella
Clever
Conference
Congress
Disciple
Dynamite
Fa'afetai ("Thank you")
Fa'afetai Fa'afetai Jr.
Fa'asoesa (a formal way of saying "total pain in the ass")
Fabulous
Fantastic
Fiapapalagi ("Happy white person")
Gasoliga (remember the g=n)
Hail-Mary
Han Solo
Happy
Hollandaise
Hulk
Hurricane
Kirisimasi ("Christmas")
Kuwait
Larrybird
LBJ (this refers to both the president and his namesake hospital)
Leo Leo (told to the police while being booked. "leoleo" in Samoan means police. The police didn't get it)
Lima (5 or hand in Samoan, was probably the fifth kid)
Lua (2)
Mac Year (mispelling of Macgyver)
Marie Antoinette Resurrected
Mastard Seed [sic]
Moonstar
Muliai ("asseater")
New Year
Nixon
Numero
Omaha
Oti ("dead")
Pago Pago
Pigeon Shit in Samoan
Pluto
Ponce de Leon
Popeye
Poti ("dick")
Pretty
Princess
Pu'u Brown
Queen.
Rainmaker
Rapture
Rectal
Rocky and Rambo (brothers)
Roketi (Rocket---tons of those)
Saddam
Salvation & Goodwill (brothers)
Samoa Samoa
Saumaleatomeaai (means "come and bring the bag of food")
Shaqkobe or Kobeshaq
Socrates
Souvenir
Sterchicht
Superbowl
Tajmahal
Tutuila
Two brothers, possibly twins, one named Eddie the other Edwin
Ultimate Warrior
United States of America
United States of American Samoa
United States of Samoa

Sunday, September 12, 2010

An Answer to “Indicate General Ways in Which the Internationalization of Culture Benefits People and Other Ways in Which it Can Hurt People. What Distinguishes the Situations Producing Good and Bad Effects?” Written in Verse in a Vain Attempt to Make Sense of It.

Knowledge
To our stored body of fats,
Beliefs and practical skills
Modern societies
In generating and storing knowledge
At a very rapid rate.

In addition to that
This can be expressed in language,
Numbers
Or other explicit symbols;
Much knowledge is maintained only in the form of practical abilities
Than of content.

Postman believes
That the lines between show business and serious public affairs
Is becoming increasingly fuzzy
Our priest
And presidents.

He writes
Our surgeons and lawyers,
Our educators and
New
Scasters
Need worry less about satisfying the demand of their discipline
Than the demand of good showmanship
And then he thinks
That this pervasive show business outlook
Arises in large part
From out constant exposure
To television
As well as its contents.

We can see
The effect
Of the internationalization of cultures.

The spread of news
Through informal networks
As well as mass media.

The immigrant’s problem
That will include the gab
Between assimilated immigrants and traditional subcultures,
The clash of beliefs
And a struggle for cultural dominance
As some attempted
To defend their ideal of freedom
Of the press
And other
Their religious beliefs.

All cultural products from a social movement
Like that in China
To a novel
Are not potentially part
Of an international process
Of communication.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Cold Blows the Antarctic Winds

Winter is here. The last few days have been made the island a frigid tundra with temperatures dropping all the way down to 25ยบ Degrees (Celsius). But don’t worry, Meg and I have our sweaters on and are braving this beautiful weather new ice age. We will power through this. Pray for us, and we will try to reach you again when we get back from the beach dig our way out of the house.


Full disclosure: This image is not from American Samoa. You can tell because they have functioning street lights.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Island Images

Here are a few pictures a friend took of things of interest around the island.


A jar...at the hospital. Don't worry, it's for the kids.


Sometimes, all you have to do is ask nicely.


Around here, meals come as a side order...to larger meals.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Get Out of Jail Free



The Lt. Governor here just got a mistrial on his federal corruption charges in D.C. Our unscripted public forum is the comments section of the newspaper website. This is by far my favorite quote:

ENTER THE DRAGON wrote: 24 Feb 2010 09:49 PM
CONGRATULATIONS! YOU ARE NOW ENTERING INTO THE SHAOLIN TEMPLE. UPGRADE FROM BLACK BELTS TO RED BELTS. GREAT.. STARS OF THE "ENTER THE DRAGON". MASTER THE BRUCE LEE. GREAT JOB. YOUR NEXT CHALLENGE WILL TO CONQUER THE WHITE HOUSE. IF YOU WIN, YOU WILL BE REWARDED FOR NOBEL PRIZE AND THEREFORE IMMUNE FROM ANY PROSECUTIONS. FEARLESS!

And that about sums up public opinion.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Super Bowl

As we all know, our New Orleans Saints blew them away during the Super Bowl. The NOLA curse, for having built the Super Dome over a cemetary, was finally broken. So here is us, after our Super Bowl party, along with Lisa Johns (a Loyola New Orleans alumn) sitting in my truck outside my house. Note the splendor of the truck.


Sean in American Samoa's Christmas Concert

Of course, I did it too. Note the AG's speech. That's why he's known as the great orator.



And part 2:

Monday, February 15, 2010

Meg in American Samoa's Christmas Concert

The government Christmas concert. This once a year phenomenon goes on for three days and forces all government employees, from every agency, to get on stage and sing praises to Jesus. While some may call that a blatant violation of the separations between church and state, we call it "pese."

Here is Part 1 of Meg’s Christmas singing experience. She is singing with the Department of Human Resources, for whom she was working at the time.

And the exciting conclusion to Meg’s pese concert. This one is especially good, because there’s dancing!

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

This is my life...

Today, Meg and I used a machete and tiki torches to knock down and move banana trees during a tropical storm to keep our power on.

That is the very definition of island life.