Things I find ________________ about Tonga. Fill in the blank.

Things I find hilarious about Tonga:

I met a fella named Sydney and I noticed a tattoo on his arm. The tattoo is the name of his village, Kolomotu'a, and the numbers 213. 213 was my area code in Los Angeles and I suspected that the numbers had an LA influence. I asked Sydney what the numbers stood for and he said, "You know....Tupaki?" He is talking about Tupac. I thought it was funny. Anyway, we share music now. He also likes Selena.

How telling white lies is considered a Tongan tradition.

In the office, when I make a phone call to the Prime Minister's office and am put ON HOLD, the waiting music is "Ice Cream Truck" music.

You know the Britney Spears driving with baby in hand incident? It happens all the time in Tonga. It is normal.

Faka'uha. It means rain bath. 'Uha means rain. When it rains in Tonga, people and kids shower in the rain with soap. I haven't done it yet, but I am getting ready for the next down-pour. It is going to be fun.

If you do your laundry on Sunday!!! you have to hide in your house and hang your clothes to dry inside the house. Otherwise your village will talk and say you are a bad Christian for working on the Sabbath. I haven't done this myself, I just know people who have.


Things I love about Tonga:

The little kids. They are so cute when they speak Tongan and when they dress up with the traditional Tongan wear for special events.

The ice cream.

The singing.

The night sky.




Things I find annoying about Tonga:

The dogs.

When mosquitoes wake me up at night.

Pigs that dig humongous holes in our yard.

Very bad fuel exhast from many of the cars here. No regulation.

When people (parents, adults, older kids, grandparents) hit little kids for no reason which is all the time.

I ate dog last night

So, I was going to bed and the lights were off. It was 11pm. But, friends came over and they were kind enough to bring over some "puaka" for me. Puaka is pig in Tongan. This "puaka" was cooked in the umu. (Tongans roast pigs or cook them in the umu or underground oven.)

Anyway, my friends got me out of bed to have some "puaka". I wasn't really committed to sleeping and I am on my weight-gaining program and so I went to have some "puaka". Plus, they were so nice to have brought me food and I was grateful.

At the table I saw the meat and I thought to myself, I never saw a puaka that looked like the one they brought. They brought over a leg and other parts of the "puaka". But, the skin was really dark. It was almost black, but it wasn't burned. I never seen pig skin like that. (They brought over some mei also [breadfruit] to eat with the meat.)

So, I tried the meat. It was hard to tell that it wasn't puaka at first. When food is cooked in the umu, it has this taste to it. I will just call it the umu taste. Anyway, I was familiar with the umu taste but the meat was a little different. I suspected it was dog shortly after this but I didn't want to falsely accuse my friends, although I knew they were the type to play this kind of joke on me. I just kept tasting while my friends were feasting on the meat. The meat is tough and I don't really like it, but that is mostly because I suspected it was dog. There was barely any meat on the bones, which is not surprising to me at all. I have never seen a healthy looking dog in Tonga. They are all skin and bones pretty much.

Anyway, my friends and I had this silent conversation during the meal that consisted of a lot of laughing. Basically they knew that I knew, and without saying a word, the joke was exposed. They just kept asking for confirmation from me that I was eating and that I was enjoying the food. Later, when my friends were walking out the door to leave that night, they confirmed that it was dog just to have the last laugh. I was cool with it and I found it pretty hilarious more than gross. I was down with trying dog at least once while in Tonga.

But, I really hate Tongan dogs with a passion and I definitely do not enjoy eating Tongan dog and will not willingly eat one after this experience. Dogs are pests here. They are really annoying menaces. Just imagine a country where all dogs are filthy and ugly! strays. They are walking diseases. They just roam around, sometimes in packs, and they bark at me while I am riding my bike. They attack sometimes too and I always have to be ready to fly off my bike to defend myself and hope that a car doesn't get me first. I guess this is how it feels to be a Mormon missionary or a postman. Anyway, the dogs are also doing the nasty in public everywhere. Come on, get a room!

Anyway, it is mostly sad but it is hard for me to sympathize with the dogs in Tonga. I forgot about the funniest part of the night. All the left over dog meat and bones...we fed it to our dogs! Haha. And I swear after our dogs ate the dog meat, the look in their eyes changed. I was trying to interpret the look. It was like they thought I betrayed them, but that they also felt that they are helpless prisoners of a country where it is not in the culture to care for them properly and so they have to resort to eating their own kind. Faka'ofa.