There isn't all that much happening in Tonga this week. That and I am feeling a bit fakapikopiko (lazy). The next month is sure to be full of excitement with the King's Birthday, the Miss Heilala Pageant and my fortnight long trip to Samoa. As such, I am not going to publish a proper post this week and have more frequent posts throughout July.
For now, enjoy the picture above and, hopefully, my blog looking as it should.
29 June 2006
23 June 2006
the day the princess came to my birthday
This has been a week of celebrations in Tonga.
The group of seven AYADs that I arrived with have settled into three houses. For simplicity, we can call these the boys' house, the girls' house and the couple's house. Last Friday the girls' house had their housewarming. The theme was cocktail, so most of took the opportunity to wear the "semi-formal" outfit we were told we would need in our pre-departure pack and have since discovered we will wear only when taking advantage of the flimsiest excuse possible - like on Friday. Others, as pictured took to the markets and a fabulous store here called The Shop That Time Forgot to put together there creations. As you can see from the pictures and guess from the name, this shop specialises in selling clothes manufactured in the 60s, 70s and 80s that never made it out of the wrapping, let alone were sold, at that time. Anyway, the night was fun. Most of us made it home around 4am.
On Tuesday, my work launched the Kingdom of Tonga Strategic Development Plan 8 (SDP 8). This was the culmination of some eighteen months work, so though somewhat stressed about the day going well most of my colleagues were pleased to finally reach the launch. I was more excited because it was my birthday and the Princess would be attending. It is not often you can say that a princess came to the party on your birthday. Maybe it wasn't exactly my party, but near enough. The other fun part of the launch was the addition of an SDP 8 theme song and dance. If we ignore Unchain my heart and the GST, Australian governments don't do theme songs for their big launches and more is the shame. I can't wait to hear Looking to the Future, Building on the Past on the radio or playing at the Billfish, will have to try and remember the moves to the dance.
That night, I went to dinner and drinks with some fellow AYADs and assorted palangi and managed to celebrate both my birthday and the arrival of the new group of AYADs. With three intakes a year now, there will be arrivals quite regularly.
And, of course, there was the celebrations at lunch time on Thursday amongst a group of Aussies who managed to find somewhere to watch a replay of a soccer match that had happened a few hours earlier on the other side of the world. Our disappointment at missing the first half thanks to the ever unreliable TonFon television programmers was long forgotten by the time the final whistle sounded. There will be a few phone calls to TonFon today to make sure we get the whole match versus Italy tomorrow.
On Saturday, I participated in the 2006 Olympic fun run. The run itself wasn't particularly notable, nor much of a celebration, though I did manage to run more than the four kilometre course by being foolish enough to follow some Tongans who went the wrong way. What was a highlight, was finally meeting somebody who plays hockey. As part of the day's activities, there were demonstration clinics for kids of various sports including hockey. The local competition gets underway next month and I may now be coaching one of the teams. It should be fun.
The group of seven AYADs that I arrived with have settled into three houses. For simplicity, we can call these the boys' house, the girls' house and the couple's house. Last Friday the girls' house had their housewarming. The theme was cocktail, so most of took the opportunity to wear the "semi-formal" outfit we were told we would need in our pre-departure pack and have since discovered we will wear only when taking advantage of the flimsiest excuse possible - like on Friday. Others, as pictured took to the markets and a fabulous store here called The Shop That Time Forgot to put together there creations. As you can see from the pictures and guess from the name, this shop specialises in selling clothes manufactured in the 60s, 70s and 80s that never made it out of the wrapping, let alone were sold, at that time. Anyway, the night was fun. Most of us made it home around 4am.
On Tuesday, my work launched the Kingdom of Tonga Strategic Development Plan 8 (SDP 8). This was the culmination of some eighteen months work, so though somewhat stressed about the day going well most of my colleagues were pleased to finally reach the launch. I was more excited because it was my birthday and the Princess would be attending. It is not often you can say that a princess came to the party on your birthday. Maybe it wasn't exactly my party, but near enough. The other fun part of the launch was the addition of an SDP 8 theme song and dance. If we ignore Unchain my heart and the GST, Australian governments don't do theme songs for their big launches and more is the shame. I can't wait to hear Looking to the Future, Building on the Past on the radio or playing at the Billfish, will have to try and remember the moves to the dance.
That night, I went to dinner and drinks with some fellow AYADs and assorted palangi and managed to celebrate both my birthday and the arrival of the new group of AYADs. With three intakes a year now, there will be arrivals quite regularly.
And, of course, there was the celebrations at lunch time on Thursday amongst a group of Aussies who managed to find somewhere to watch a replay of a soccer match that had happened a few hours earlier on the other side of the world. Our disappointment at missing the first half thanks to the ever unreliable TonFon television programmers was long forgotten by the time the final whistle sounded. There will be a few phone calls to TonFon today to make sure we get the whole match versus Italy tomorrow.
On Saturday, I participated in the 2006 Olympic fun run. The run itself wasn't particularly notable, nor much of a celebration, though I did manage to run more than the four kilometre course by being foolish enough to follow some Tongans who went the wrong way. What was a highlight, was finally meeting somebody who plays hockey. As part of the day's activities, there were demonstration clinics for kids of various sports including hockey. The local competition gets underway next month and I may now be coaching one of the teams. It should be fun.
15 June 2006
the sounds of tonga
Unfortunately, my match on Saturday never eventuated. The Kolofo'ou team arrived half-an-hour late and had to forfeit. It was a bit disappointing to have ridden all that way and not play, but given it was a grey, rainy day I wouldn't have been doing much other than soccer.
As it was, I did get to watch a couple of games whilst I was out at Veitongo. The most entertaining was a junior match where the muddy conditions did little to disrupt the spirit of the players.. About a third of the players didn't have boots and were running, or more accurately sliding, around in socks. There was also a pair of innovative kids, one with the left boot and the other with the right. To add to the absurdity, the game began with one team conceding three goals in quick succession, before settling into a muddy midfield scramble only to come back in the dying minutes and score three goals also. Not world cup quality, but great viewing.
Given I don't have much to report about from my soccer non-match, I though I would move on to the next of my planned insights into Tonga. This week, the sounds of Tonga.
The overwhelming sound of Tonga is UB40. Yes, the Birmingham bred reggae band - that most of us have avoided listening to since their hit about that very unreggae topic of alcoholism in the 80s - are huge in Tonga. UB40 toured here in March shortly before I arrived. If they weren't popular beforehand, they certainly are now. There are probably a few people looking forward to the next major touring artist to take the place of UB40 on the airwaves. It would be impossible to go a day without hearing UB40. In supermarkets, workplaces, restaurants and emanating from peoples cars and homes UB40 is being played continuously somewhere in the Kingdom - except on Sundays.
Tonga's love of reggae is not limited to just UB40. I have heard plenty of Bob Marley as well as a cover of Every breath you take with more of a reggae feel than The Police ever intended. The cover band at our most frequented haunt is gauranteed to play this song, something by UB40, Queen and - recognising their location below the equator - Men at Work's Land Down Under all infused with an extra dose of reggae.
I hope to record some of the more improbable reggae covers and place the recordings on my flickr site for your listening pleasure.
During the day reggae competes with the sounds of Tongan culture - tapa mallets and church bells.
Tapa is the traditional tongan cloth that featured as the photo of the week with my last post. To produce the cloth, Tongan women pound the bark of the mulberrry tree from 5 cm wide strips into a thin cloth about 20 cm wide. The rhythm of this pounding can be heard over most of the island during daylight hours. Sometimes this is quite therapeutic, at others it is headache inducing.
On Sundays, church bells ring out from before 5am calling people to mass. They continue on every hour or so through to the mid-afternoon or early evening. In between, the sound of hymns drifts gently across the island. I think the church nearest my house is at least 500 metres away, but the singing carries quite clearly over that distance. There might be a church nearer to me that I haven't noticed yet. This is very possible as there are churches everywhere.
The last major family of sounds in Tonga come from animals. Every Tongan seems to own their share of dogs, puaka (pigs) and chickens. Even in downtown Nuku'alofa pigs and chickens aren't too far away.
As it was, I did get to watch a couple of games whilst I was out at Veitongo. The most entertaining was a junior match where the muddy conditions did little to disrupt the spirit of the players.. About a third of the players didn't have boots and were running, or more accurately sliding, around in socks. There was also a pair of innovative kids, one with the left boot and the other with the right. To add to the absurdity, the game began with one team conceding three goals in quick succession, before settling into a muddy midfield scramble only to come back in the dying minutes and score three goals also. Not world cup quality, but great viewing.
Given I don't have much to report about from my soccer non-match, I though I would move on to the next of my planned insights into Tonga. This week, the sounds of Tonga.
The overwhelming sound of Tonga is UB40. Yes, the Birmingham bred reggae band - that most of us have avoided listening to since their hit about that very unreggae topic of alcoholism in the 80s - are huge in Tonga. UB40 toured here in March shortly before I arrived. If they weren't popular beforehand, they certainly are now. There are probably a few people looking forward to the next major touring artist to take the place of UB40 on the airwaves. It would be impossible to go a day without hearing UB40. In supermarkets, workplaces, restaurants and emanating from peoples cars and homes UB40 is being played continuously somewhere in the Kingdom - except on Sundays.
Tonga's love of reggae is not limited to just UB40. I have heard plenty of Bob Marley as well as a cover of Every breath you take with more of a reggae feel than The Police ever intended. The cover band at our most frequented haunt is gauranteed to play this song, something by UB40, Queen and - recognising their location below the equator - Men at Work's Land Down Under all infused with an extra dose of reggae.
I hope to record some of the more improbable reggae covers and place the recordings on my flickr site for your listening pleasure.
During the day reggae competes with the sounds of Tongan culture - tapa mallets and church bells.
Tapa is the traditional tongan cloth that featured as the photo of the week with my last post. To produce the cloth, Tongan women pound the bark of the mulberrry tree from 5 cm wide strips into a thin cloth about 20 cm wide. The rhythm of this pounding can be heard over most of the island during daylight hours. Sometimes this is quite therapeutic, at others it is headache inducing.
On Sundays, church bells ring out from before 5am calling people to mass. They continue on every hour or so through to the mid-afternoon or early evening. In between, the sound of hymns drifts gently across the island. I think the church nearest my house is at least 500 metres away, but the singing carries quite clearly over that distance. There might be a church nearer to me that I haven't noticed yet. This is very possible as there are churches everywhere.
The last major family of sounds in Tonga come from animals. Every Tongan seems to own their share of dogs, puaka (pigs) and chickens. Even in downtown Nuku'alofa pigs and chickens aren't too far away.
Pigs in Tonga are like cows in India. They are everywhere and treated as sacred. If you run a pig over whilst driving, then you have to pay for not only that pig, but all its potential offspring as well. Pigs aren't too noisy, but they can certainly keep me awake sniffing around in the dirt if I forget to shut the gate at night.
In the early hours, the neighbourhood roosters compete with the church bells to wake us up. I always thought that roosters crowed at dawn. Tongan roosters must be able to see over the horizon, because the sun is rarely up when they start making a racket.
Dogs in Tonga aren't too keen on people. Rightly so, they are treated appallingly. We were told on arrival that having a dog would be good security, and to have a dog all we needed to do was feed one. Haven't taken to feeding any dogs, their barking is incessant and vicious. They go bark for crow with the roosters. Alongside Tongan drivers, dogs rate as the greatest danger whilst out cycling. Ahead of potholes even.
Finally, my photo of the week that accompanied my last post was nicked by the Tonga Visitors Bureau to promote a forthcoming cultural festival. I will have to find out about the royalties I am due.
9 June 2006
kicking goals for newtown fc
This week has been a particularly good one.
For the first time, I feel that I actually have something to do at work. Not quite make-Tonga-a-better-place things to do. More at-least-it-stops-me-playing-solitaire things to do. Which I am more than happy with, I would like to believe I am not naïve enough to think that I, as a volunteer in town for 12-months, really am going to make too much of a difference to Tonga. Maybe this is an acknowledgement of my laziness as much as it is a commentary on the role of the volunteer.
Either way this week I have been busy and it looks as though I will stay that way, but still with some time for solitaire. I have also confirmed that there will be work for me to go on with beyond the ‘Eua project and an urban planning project I am involved in. I will be working more closely with Minister's staff and have better access to learn what actually goes on here. It should mean I can find enough to do at last.
If nothing else, the Tongan national development plan is released next week. I haven’t had much to do with its preparation so I can sit down in the latter part of next week and read it through for the first time.
Also, this week, I managed to join my local soccer club. Or should that be local soccer team. I am not really sure, it all just kind of happened.
Having been filling 8:30 to 4:30 of each day with not a great deal at work, I was pretty keen to find something to do in the evenings. Cooking dinner, reading books, watching DVDs and drinks at the Billfish, had been only somewhat filling in my evenings so I thought I would join in with a group of Tongans who play soccer each evening in a park near my work.
It has taken me awhile to work out what time they play and get along at that time, but this week I managed to go twice. At the start of the second night, they announced we have a game on Saturday (tomorrow). So tomorrow I will line up for the Kolofo’ou (kolo is town and fo’ou new, so Newtown) Football Club in some tournament. Should be fun, though I think they have an idea of playing me as the goalkeeper which could be rather shambolic as the team certainly doesn’t play with any structure. Let’s hope the opposition is just as bad.
I thought that seeing this weeks entry is a little short I would write rather randomly about anything to do with Tonga. I have chosen to talk about cars in Tonga.
This was prompted by my sighting a battered up old Toyota Corolla whilst riding home the other day. As a kid, I had a matchbox version of this same car. Another kid at school gave it to me when I was at Franklin Public School, so in 1983. This matchbox car was still floating around in my dad’s garage the last time I lived at home, in 1999. You can imagine the amount of abuse this little toy would have received over those sixteen years. I was never gentle with my toy cars and this one would have survived a dozen or so moves, been bashed about in toy boxes etc on top of all the damage that a kid can inflict on a piece of diecast metal. Anyway, the point is that the Toyota Corolla I was following the other day looked exactly the same as my matchbox version circa 1999. Most of the paint was gone, the doors were barely hanging on and whilst there was a windscreen that was about all of the glass. Now, this is reasonably typical of many cars in Tonga. There are some fancy new ones, mostly big 4WDs, but many of the cars are old and judging by the rego stickers have enjoyed previous lives in Japan (or China) and New Zealand before arriving in the Pacific. Already dilapidated on arrival, the cars deteriorate further in a hurry thanks to not-so-meticulous care of the Tongans and the abundant sea air. There is a good chance that this is why drivers stay under the 40 km/h speed limit, to make sure their cars don’t fall apart.
On that note, read my new word of the week.
For the first time, I feel that I actually have something to do at work. Not quite make-Tonga-a-better-place things to do. More at-least-it-stops-me-playing-solitaire things to do. Which I am more than happy with, I would like to believe I am not naïve enough to think that I, as a volunteer in town for 12-months, really am going to make too much of a difference to Tonga. Maybe this is an acknowledgement of my laziness as much as it is a commentary on the role of the volunteer.
Either way this week I have been busy and it looks as though I will stay that way, but still with some time for solitaire. I have also confirmed that there will be work for me to go on with beyond the ‘Eua project and an urban planning project I am involved in. I will be working more closely with Minister's staff and have better access to learn what actually goes on here. It should mean I can find enough to do at last.
If nothing else, the Tongan national development plan is released next week. I haven’t had much to do with its preparation so I can sit down in the latter part of next week and read it through for the first time.
Also, this week, I managed to join my local soccer club. Or should that be local soccer team. I am not really sure, it all just kind of happened.
Having been filling 8:30 to 4:30 of each day with not a great deal at work, I was pretty keen to find something to do in the evenings. Cooking dinner, reading books, watching DVDs and drinks at the Billfish, had been only somewhat filling in my evenings so I thought I would join in with a group of Tongans who play soccer each evening in a park near my work.
It has taken me awhile to work out what time they play and get along at that time, but this week I managed to go twice. At the start of the second night, they announced we have a game on Saturday (tomorrow). So tomorrow I will line up for the Kolofo’ou (kolo is town and fo’ou new, so Newtown) Football Club in some tournament. Should be fun, though I think they have an idea of playing me as the goalkeeper which could be rather shambolic as the team certainly doesn’t play with any structure. Let’s hope the opposition is just as bad.
I thought that seeing this weeks entry is a little short I would write rather randomly about anything to do with Tonga. I have chosen to talk about cars in Tonga.
This was prompted by my sighting a battered up old Toyota Corolla whilst riding home the other day. As a kid, I had a matchbox version of this same car. Another kid at school gave it to me when I was at Franklin Public School, so in 1983. This matchbox car was still floating around in my dad’s garage the last time I lived at home, in 1999. You can imagine the amount of abuse this little toy would have received over those sixteen years. I was never gentle with my toy cars and this one would have survived a dozen or so moves, been bashed about in toy boxes etc on top of all the damage that a kid can inflict on a piece of diecast metal. Anyway, the point is that the Toyota Corolla I was following the other day looked exactly the same as my matchbox version circa 1999. Most of the paint was gone, the doors were barely hanging on and whilst there was a windscreen that was about all of the glass. Now, this is reasonably typical of many cars in Tonga. There are some fancy new ones, mostly big 4WDs, but many of the cars are old and judging by the rego stickers have enjoyed previous lives in Japan (or China) and New Zealand before arriving in the Pacific. Already dilapidated on arrival, the cars deteriorate further in a hurry thanks to not-so-meticulous care of the Tongans and the abundant sea air. There is a good chance that this is why drivers stay under the 40 km/h speed limit, to make sure their cars don’t fall apart.
On that note, read my new word of the week.
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