A Visitor From America

This week Ryan and I hosted a visitor from America. Janet came because she was a good friend of Tessa Horan. Tessa was the Peace Corps Volunteer who was killed 7 years ago by a shark. Janet is an artist and children's book author. So, she volunteered to come to our school and read one of her books to our students and do a fish painting activity with them. This was a really incredible experience for all of us at the school. Again, any time something new or different happens is a good day. The kids, true to form, were so timid and shy with Janet at first. They were hesitant to paint an actual fish and pretty much just seemed overwhelmed by all that was happening. But, after a few rounds of brave souls, we were off and running. Kids started to really get creative and enjoy painting and coloring fish. It was a high energy day. Tevita, our principal, and the teachers were so accomodating. They told us to structure the day however we felt and gave us free reign of the school. It was fun for Ryan and I to change things up and work with different groups of kids as well. 

Here are some pictures from our day together at school.

 

 

 

We hung the finished project in the library. One of the kids later told me the library is their favorite room :) 

Another activity we did was to hang a sign at the beach where Tessa's accident happened. We got a bunch of our kids together to help clean up the garbage on the beach and hang the sign. This was another huge success. Just another way to let their wacky personalities shine.

As I was trying to get the kids attention and focus their electric energy on me to hear the directions for the afternoon, I realized Lucky and Ryan with a camera posed too distracting for them. Typical.

The first hurdle of the afternoon was trying to figure out how to get rubber gloves on and plastic garbage bags from America open. All the kids brought both back to me moments after getting them telling me that they were "maumau" (broken). I died laughing and lead my first "How to Use a Rubber Glove and How to Open a Garbage Bag Session." My sessions were successful and we were good to go!

 

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Awhile back, Ryan and Laea started a private joke about being heroes. This has somehow spread, and so anytime our students do something new that scared them at first they come up to us and say "We are Heroes!" I LOVE that this is their new mantra. It makes tears spring to my eyes each time I hear it.

What would garbage pick-up be without ending the day swimming in the ocean?

All in all, it was great having Janet stay with us. It really made us realize how far we have come as volunteers. We planned and ran some activities all by ourselves.. and they went great. Our principal thanked us for all the activities and experiences we give to our students and said he thought we did good planning this week. It was cool to see how our community thinks of us because on the sly they would ask us if the palangi was okay and if we needed any help with her. It made me smile to think, "Wow, we are actually on the inside if people are asking US if we need help hosting a palangi." Pretty cool. Thanks also to Ryan who was the behind the scenes guy. He ran more errands, talked with more village women to make plans, ate more Tongan food than I have ever seen, and ran the camera for two days straight. A hero indeed. Thanks honey.

Oh, and I think this picture might give Ryan and Lucky a run for their money: