Children’s day

A few weeks ago, Sister Roundy invited us to go to sister Veronica's school for  Children's Day.  Children's day  is celebrated once a year, and the whole community participates.  You see parades, games being played in the parks, programs with speakers, and cake.   Many of the shops even close, except for the Chinese shops.  The Roundy's have really helped with Veronica's little school.  Being on the humanitarian side of things for the church, they have been able to help with school supplies; fabric for uniforms, sewing machines (hand crank), and various repairs.  I've mentioned before that Greg helped with roof repairs and electrical work, and I helped make uniforms for the pikininis.  As part of their celebration they wanted to thank us all for helping them.  The celebration was held at a little park by the school.   When we arrived, they had been waiting for us.  They ushered us to a row of chairs that were set up especially for us, and put a lei around our necks.  I'm so glad I was wearing sunglasses because my eyes were gushing with tears (I know you're surprised about that).   The children sang fun songs to us, they had speakers (wish we could have understood what they were saying).   We could only understand "smoll tok tok." They asked if any of us would like to say anything, so I nudged Greg, and he got up and gave a real sweet speech.  My phone died, or I would have recorded it.  I wanted to say something, but I couldn't keep it together.  After the program they brought fun cakes out that the village people had made.  We helped cut the cakes and served them.  I'll attach a cute little video of their "sing sing." 

Once a year in Port Vila they have an international food day.  There are  people from all over the world that live here, I was surprised.  They have a small building downtown that they hold it in.  They had you buy tickets in various denominations (.50, 1.00...), you then went to the individual food booths and used the tickets to pay for your food.  They had Greek, Philippino, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Polynesian, American and several others.  The people serving were dressed in their country attire, it was so colorful and fun.  At the Philippine booth, they had a whole roasted pig, they sliced off however much you wanted and then weighed it.   The American booth had chili dogs, and that's what Greg got!! (come on a chili dog?!)  He said, he wanted to support the Americans, they are here with the Peace Corp.  We all bought what we wanted to eat and went across the street to the park and ate it.  It was a beautiful day.  (I'll attach a pic)  It was fun to see many of the people that live around us, that we normally don't see.  You're probably wondering what they are doing here.  There are business owners, doctors, and those that just want to live on the beach and enjoy that life style.  However, Port Vila is Vanuatu's capital, and there are people here from other countries for political reasons such as staffing their embassy's...   America doesn't have an embassy here, but China has a huge, new, embassy, right across the street from where we live.  I was reading that they want to build a military base here. 

Last weekend was Vanuatu's Independance Day celebration.  This celebration marks the end of colonial rule by the French and British, 30 July 1980. I wrote about it last year.  If you look it up on the internet, you can read all about it.  We went to the central park, with the Collettes, to the main celebration, on July 30th.  They had a few food booths and other concessions.  They don't have a military, but they have a type of militia or border patrol??  They have a uniform that they wear that is very military.  The only time you see them all dressed up is for celebrations.  It was like being at Camp Williams for Governor's Day, on a much smaller scale.  They were marching, saluting,  and being reviewed by the Prime Minister.  There were A LOT of people there that day.  Like I've said before, they don't have alot going on around here, so it's fun for them to have something to look forward to.  Many of the families wear matching outfits, girls have flags stuck in their hair, all were having a good time.  Later on in the evening though, they get drinking their kava and party til the wee hours of the morning in the villages.  

As always, we hope all is well at home.   Our time here is getting short.  We love the people here and wish we could bring them home with us, it's a hard life here.  Be thankful for all that you have, because you have plenty. 

 Love, Elda Greg and Sista Ann