I had no idea what to expect in the Samoan countries. Prior to this cruise, the only thing I knew about Samoa was that it typically produced, shall we say, rotund people. The only Samoans I had ever met were the fire blowers in Hong Kong Disneyland's stage production of "The Lion King." Other than that, I was completely ignorant of all things Samoan. So, I attended one of the ship's lectures on the history of the Samoan islands and found it extremely fascinating. In case you were wanting a brief history lesson, let me save you the trouble of Wikipedia-ing and give you a summary: Samoa wasn't discovered until 1722 and then again in the late 1700's. Like a lot of South Pacific cultures, the Samoans believed in "trade" as the unspoken rule of giving what one had and taking what one needed. So, when a french explorer (I can't remember his name) arrived at the Islands in the late 1700's, the Samoans gave him and his men food and shelter and in turn took tools and nails from the ship. Well, the captain thought the natives were stealing his goods and hung the son of a Samoan chief from the mast of the ship. This of course caused an outrage and the Samoans killed the captain and most of the sailors. When word got back to France, Samoa was deemed inhospitable and not visited again until the mid 1800's. At that time England, Germany, the US and France all wanted a part of Samoa. The four countries tried to share control for about 10 years but it was a disaster. England and France pulled their interest and, after splitting the country in two, Germany took over Western Samoa and the United States adopted Eastern Samoa, now American Samoa. After World War I, Western Samoa was given to New Zealand and remained under their jurisdiction until it became the first South Pacific nation to gain independence in the late 1960's, dropping the "Western" from the name. One disturbing story I remember from the speaker took place during the great flu epidemic of 1919. A flu-infested ship sailing from England wanted to dock in American Samoa but was turned away. It never should've been cleared in Western Samoa either, but because the wife of the New Zealand governor had china and other fineries on board, they allowed the ship in port. The flu killed over 30% of the Samoan population because doctors were only allowed to treat the non-natives.
American Samoa was turned into a naval base for the US and 90% of the population left behind their rural plantation lifestyle and moved near the harbor in Pago Pago to take advantage of jobs in this rapidly growing city. The naval base provided almost the entire economy of the Island and Samoans were, and still are, very proud to serve in our military. However, with the wars over and no need for another South Pacific naval base, we closed the base in the 1950's and left American Samoa with a dramatic population increase but no jobs to sustain the economy. Even now, 35% of the population is dependent on US welfare. The speaker pointed out that with financial help from the US and better public education and health standards, American Samoa is much more affluent than Samoa. However, Samoa has maintained more of their traditional way of life and takes pride in their Samoan culture. Having briefly experienced both American Samoa and Samoa, I didn't notice a big difference and the deeply religious people in both countries astounded me with their generosity and sincere Christian kindness.
Ok, enough of the history lesson. Now onto our days in the Samoa's:
Friday, September 23: Pago-Pago, American Samoa
I volunteered to help out the Shore Excursions office and as a thank you, they offered to put Jeremy and me on tours together, at no charge. In ship life, it's important to get in with the right people! So, we signed up for the "Taste of Samoan Village Life." We took a tour of the Island's best sightseeing attractions on a small open air bus with the final destination being a re-creation of a traditional Samoan village. This beautiful village constructed within towering coconut trees and the unsurpassed landscaping of tropical rainforest had five different huts/stations showcasing Samoan life. First, we watched in astonishment as a large Samoan man shimmeed up a palm tree in six seconds to grab a coconut. Then, they demonstrated how they harvest coconut milk by shucking the outer layer on a sharply carved log, extracting the coconut meat, mashing it with the coconut milk and then draining it through a cheesecloth-like substance fom the banana tree. The second station offered a taste of a roasted Cocoa bean drink that Jeremy I both agreed we would switch to every day instead of coffee or tea. Next we witnessed women weaving banana leaves amd palms into baskets, trays, plates, etc. The fourth hut gave samples of fresh mango, papaya, pineapple, sugar cane and bread fruit. At the fifth station we witnessed what I was most looking forward to - Samoan men cooking their delicacies for us in a traditional outdoor underground oven called an Umu. On individual banana leaf plates were placed samples of chicken, lamb, roasted spinach in coconut milk, tuna in coconut milk, fried bread fruit and fried banana. Lastly, they entertained us with traditional Samoan dancing. It was such an educational tour! We were grateful for the chance to experience so many different facets of Samoa in such a short amount of time. We returned from the excursion around 1:30pm but still had until 10:30pm in Pago Pago. We spent the afternoon at a grassy cove/beach, laying out and swimming in the crystal clear warm ocean. The weather was gorgeous but like all tropical islands it rained lightly on and off. For dinner we walked to a nearby resort hotel, Sadies By The Sea and unexpectedly ran into a bunch of other cast and crew members. We joined them for dinner, drinks, food, dancing, pool partying, crazy underwater camera picture-taking and nighttime ocean swimming.
Saturday, September 24: Apia, Samoa
Unlike our long port day in Pago Pago, we only had about five hours in Apia due to a raft drill and an early all aboard time. Jeremy ventured on a tour of the Robert Louis Stevenson museum, the great author's homestead where he spent the last five years of his life. He saw letters, original drafts of "Treasure Island" and even Stevenson's grave site! I walked around the town of Apia and went into a few of the local markets. I bought a whole coconut and drank it's milk with a straw - a highlight of my day. We didn't get to see as much of Apia as we did of Pago Pago, but we still enjoyed it. Seeing the Robert Louis Stevenson museum was a major highlight of Jeremy's cruise contract.
During the five sea days from Hawaii to Samoa we crossed the Equator and the day after Apia we crossed the International Dateline. We went from Saturday, September 24th to Monday, September 26th. It's really interesting seeing the Southern Hemisphere sky. A few nights ago, Jeremy, Kurt, Kassie and I were on the bow studying the foreign constellations with an astronomy app on Kurt's iPhone. It uses GPS to identify stars and planets in the sky. What did we ever do before the iPhone? Ah, that reminds me of a funny story: Kassie's 15 year old niece was talking about her astronomy lessons at school and said, "Why do I even need to learn about astronomy? I totally have an app for that." :) Our future leaders...
Next up - a day in Fiji! We love you,
J & J Bernard
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