I am actually going to have to start with Thursday night, just after I sent that last email. Actually, even before then, because I forgot to mention going to the bookstore the other day. I have been asking around about a library, but there doesn't seem to be one. I think probably there is something at the University, but there doesn't seem to be just a general national Library. BUT there is a great bookstore that has it's own press, and there are six books on the history and culture of Tonga that I will be buying before leaving. One is called "Mr Baker and the King of Tonga," and I already have written notes from the NYPL about Mr Baker. It seems that part of his history is an earlier version of the Jeffrey Bogdanoff story, the Jester, where he ran off with all the money. There is another book about Tongan dance and it has great pictorial descriptions of the variety of moves they use. The sitting down dance where the women are covered in Coconut oil. It is a sign that you are a virgin if oil drips from your elbows, so mothers would always slather on extra oil just before their daughters would dance.
OK so just after I sent the last email out, I received an email from Lyndsey, the NZ expat who contacted me when I originally was going to come. She actually wrote that she had sent it from Friend's Cafe, where I was sitting. She also mentioned that her van was kind of hippie with flowers and pigs painted on it. So after, I stepped outside, and there was her van. So I went back in and there being only one woman inside with four kids I walked up to her and asked if she was Lyndsey, which she was. So we sat and talked for a while, with the proprietor as well, and got to know each other a bit. She told me to speak to Rodger at Waste Management about going to the Minervan Reef, as he has been there a number of times. But it is too far away. The only way to make it there would be to hire a plane, as a boat it seems would take more than a day to get there and back. But later that night I thought about it and realized, if I can convince him, that Rodger could do it for me! He travels across the reef sometimes, so I could just give him the Robert Smithson salt and have him dump it there for me... We'll see if that pans out.
In any case Lyndsey wants me to come talk to her high school students about what I do. I don't know really how to explain experimental theater to a bunch of Tongans, but I will try I guess. Lyndsey and her son and friend were going to see a movie, so I joined them. River Queen, a NZ flick with Kiefer Sutherland. Beautiful parts, but silly symbolism, too much angst, and the conclusion is a bit weak. The Maori warriors were great, though.
OK now to today. Spent the entire day With Davida, the fisherman. We went and got Petrol for his boat, then headed out to the islands, me sitting on the front of the boat to stifle the bounce from the waves. As we left the wharf, we kept passing people walking in the middle of the water. Literally two football fields away from the land, just slowly walking in the water. I found out they were somehow fishing for some type of crustacian, but I don't know how, as they never seemed to be reaching down or anything, just walking slowly.
Of course I left the map I have back at the hotel so I can't tell you the names of the islands we went to. Suffice it to say that they are all uninhabited, and the largest you can circumnavigate by foot in 25 minutes. (Some ridiculous song is playing on the speakers- I swear they have said "falling in love again" 50 times. At least it is not UB40). So we get to the first island, which is the one I really wanted to get to, because there is a little mini island that stands like a tree out in the water. The base of the little island is very thin, like 10 feet in diameter, then spreads out to 25 feet wide, but not til it is 10 feet above the water. Then on top are two trees growing. I will show you pictures when I can. In any case Davida said he would make a little food, that I should walk around the island and when I get back it would be ready. So I did, taking pictures of the stump island, walking out into the water every once in a while. When I got back, he had cooked some breadfruit he had found in a fire and it was delicious. So no fish there, we got back in the boat and headed to the second island. There seemed to be two types of island: one flat and covered solid in vegetation, or the other with a bit of a hill. The hill always was a bit grassy, and the palm trees seemed like they had been thinned out, so that a fan of trees spread out evenly across the hill. Again I have pictures. This second island was the hill type. We landed, and Davida saw some birds diving, so he was excited about fish, but they turned out to be quite small. So we walked around it, and a storm was blowing in. For some reason there was a little shelter built on the North end of the island, and two fishermen were pulling up. We all got under the shelter while the rain passed. The fishermen pulled out their haul, two ropes with hundreds of fish skewered on them like popcorn for a christmas tree. they proceeded to dump them off the ropes and Davida had a conversation with them. At the end they gave him about 25 small fish for some reason. The rain let up and we walked back to the boat, where another boat had pulled up, with some of the walking fishermen in it. Davida took one of the small fish , de-finned it, gutted it, then sliced the sides in strips and handed it to me. I asked," eat it raw, no cook?" And he said yes yes, so I started to gnaw on it. It was delicious, very buttery. I had five. Davida laughed at me and we headed off to island three. We pulled up to the island, started walking around, and Davida yells fish fish! All of them!! Joe my back pack!! So I grab his backpack and he pulls out one of his bombs I frantically grab my bag and pull out the camera as he is running to the shore trying to light the fuse. I start filming and he hurls the bomb, which lands in the water and 2 seconds later, KABOOM a spout thirty feet tall shoots up and falls. He runs back and gets his snorkle and strips and runs in the water. I look down and my camera ISN"T WORKING!! I try to get it going again but either it got wet on the way out there or the cheap batteries don't have enough juice to do a film. DANG!! MEanwhile he has hauled in 9 large fish in a bag. I strip down and run in the water to help him look. he lends me the snorkle and I swim around a bit, but he has retrieved all the fish. He says there were one hundred fish, but only nine we got.
We were going to hit the three farther islands, but Davida suggested we do it tomorrow, early when the fishing is better. So we headed back in, leaping over waves in the open sea, then turning off the motor and using a stick in the shallows near the inlet. Got back to the house where we sat with His father and uncle. His uncle is old droopy and quiet, and is missing most of his thumb. He had been working all day on the dock making a new net, crimping leads onto the bottom rope for weight. His father is large uses a cane, and speaks a bit of english. He lived in the US for a number of years, he says twenty, or maybe it was twenty years ago. In any case we had a long conversation, of which I gathered little. He spoke of the King of Tonga for a little, talked about how money is important in America but not in Tonga, and then started scheduling things for me. I am now going to go to the Ha'ipai islands with David on Monday, then he and Seisei will join us on Tuesday. The whole family is originally form there. I told him I need to do interviews, and he suggested I do a group interview with all of them at once. He then asked who I was interviewing, and I told him Lyndsey, from NZ, then the woman from the Tongan Ladies Magazine wants to interview me, then I also had Gary and Rodger. He said Rodger is Indian and Gary is not a Tongan name, so he must be British. So why would you want to interview all these people who are not Tongans? This conversation is happening on their little dock under a stretched blue tarp, with the boys climbing in the trees around us, a large pig and some piglets in the water's edge sloshing around, three dogs running and barking, and Davida and I sipping sugary sweet coffee. Then Davida's wife brings out the fish we caught today using a bomb, and serves it to us with boiled breadfruit. I had always wondered about breadfruit from the bible and wondered what it was like. It tastes better thrown into a fire, but it is moister when boiled. We finish the food, arrange to meet again at 7am ( I don't know how I am going to get up, I have no alarm clock) and I headed into town to try to buy some SUNSCREEN since I have been unsuccessful as of yet in finding any, some decent quality batteries, and some plastic bags so I can seal the electronics. Tomorrow I bring the Video Camera out, baby.
Cheers,
Joe
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