We'd been warned about the Tongans' flexible definition of borrowing from tourists (you know, like stealing, only not as frowned upon). In fact, we had no problems with any human behavior at all. We found the Tongans to be friendly and exceptionally laid back. So laid back, that they really didn't enjoy working much and if they ended up working in the tourism industry, they liked to tell everyone how hard they worked and how tired they were. Those few Tongans involved with tourists did work hard compared to their countrymen and women. Since Tongans have a communal spirit, all possessions within a family can be claimed by any family member. It's a system that doesn't lend itself much to working hard, innovation, entrepreneurship or capitalism for that matter. Most of the people working in the tourism industry are foreigners.
In the case of Taina, a Tongan lady who is running her own accommodation establishment on the island of Eua, she was married to a German and lived in Germany for many years, where she must have learned something about capitalism. Unfortunately for Taina, her kids and nieces don't necessarily have the same drive so not only does she run the homestay and cook for the tourists (not to mention the awesome service she provided us by tracking us down at the bank to tell us that we could catch an earlier flight) but she cooks and cleans for the family, too. Her place is lovely, though, and we enjoyed our day hike through the National Park with her son, Michael. He's the gangsta looking one in the photo with the machete and the fan (tee hee).
Taina's Place
Hiking on Eua
Eua Landscape
Our plane to Eua was broken and none of the employees of the airline company had thought to check to see if our flight was actually going to depart. It wasn't that they were lazy per se, more that they just didn't think of taking that extra step. We ferried by boat to the island instead and flew back the 8 minutes by special medevac flight which was necessitated by a domestic stabbing. Pretty gruesome sitting in the airplane with the sobbing woman, her bleeding wounds and her IV...no attendant, no nothing. They even dropped her while transferring her from the ambulance into the 8 seater prop plane.
Eua Airstrip
It all sounds pretty grim, but we had a surprisingly good time. Almost everywhere we went, we bumped into happy ice people who were fun to be with and the slow pace suited our temperament. Other than post-ice trauma, I'm sure it was the heat that slowed us down to a crawl. When I now think back on those 2 weeks, I don't think about the humidity, the mosquitos, the dengue-fever lite that Michiel got (it's carried by mosquitos; there's no vaccine; there's no real cure; it's like a bad flu), the lack of motivation of Tongans or the cockroaches. I think about the Lysol blue water that is so warm that we could snorkel for hours, the markets with their woven baskets of taro, the tropical fruit, the enormous umu feasts and traditional dancing performance, the boisterous preaching and loud singing in Sunday churches, the steady pounding of mallets against wood as women prepare leaves for tapa cloth, the South Pacific version of Mormon missionaries in their woven skirts (the men!), white button-down shirts and flip flops, the pigs roaming freely and even swimming at the beaches, the Tongans with gold teeth (most of them have at least one), and most of all, the good times we had with Tracy, Barb, Steve, and lots of other ice people (and even some fun people who weren't from the ice!)
The market in Nuku'alofa
The root vegetable in the woven baskets is taro and/or sweet potato. Taro is the plant in front of the baskets, above
Steve (in yellow) and Barb at a Tongan feast and dace performance at Hina Cave
Tongan dancers
Stuffing my face with guava
