Ending Tropes

So, I sorta forgot to mention: I've moved away from American Samoa and am now back home in the States for good. Yeah. Just thought I'd bring that up.

I really wanted to be a little more clever about it. Write a two-page entry about how half a bag of baby carrots sent me to the hospital with a 104 degree temperature¹ and end it with and out-of-the-blue twist ending of "Good thing I'm leaving soon."

But as you may have guessed, preparing to move 7,000 to a different hemisphere, moving 7,000 miles to a different hemisphere, and then putting my life back on track after moving 7,000 to a different hemisphere has really taken up a lot of writing time. I'm starting to feel like if I don't get something in quick, I'll never get back to this blog at all. This blog is facing a cosmic deadline known as "before I forget completely."

So I present to you my account of what it was like in the last few weeks, as my time on the Rock drew to a close. In another weird, listlike form of "tropes" of course. Writing it out conventionally wouldn't really work, since it's not a coherent story.

Ending Fatigue- Starting at about six months left, you start to keep in mind that you're "about to leave." But six months left feels almost exactly the same as it did when you had no real plans to leave. Probably because almost nothing has changed, and that you don't want your bosses to know too soon that you plan on skipping out, so you don't tell anyone. And if you're like me, you've always had a "Bucket List" of things that you wanted to do before you leave, and you've already done most of them.

And then five months left feels the same as six months left.
Four months...same.
Three months left...feel the same.
Two months left...feel the same. Actually have to think about whether or not you'll be able to use it all up when buying stuff in bulk from Cost-U-Lots. Nothing else is different.
One month left...feel the same.
Three weeks left...feel the same, except for about 15 minutes after you book your tickets home.

And then...
Seriously About to End- I'm hiking through the jungle on one trail that I've always wanted to try and so deep in the woods that I later find some kind of tree worm dangling from the brim of my hat, when I realize that there won't be enough daylight to finish this trail today. Maybe I should come back next weekend. No, I have plans then. Maybe the weekend after. Then it hits me.

There. won't. be. a. weekend. after.

I guess I don't reach this phase until I get to the point where I actually start to run out of time, and the fact that I'm leaving starts to seriously affect my life.

The Reveal- After almost five moths of keeping it a secret, it was time to tell my boss that I was leaving. Then everyone else, via a Facebook posting. Reaction was mixed, mostly depending on if you were a friend from home or a friend from the Rock. Finally, I didn't have to lie about why I wasn't shopping at Cost-U-Lots anymore.

How Could You Ever Leave Samoa- "But Samoa is the best place in the universe! It's absolutely perfect in every way! There's no poverty, rampant bacteria, collapsing economy, language that you'll never be able to learn, widespread corruption, power-mad politicians that try to close any business they personally don't like, super-high cost of everything, or people overreacting to things you write on your blog. Why would you ever want to leave? The island is BEAUTIFUL!"

It's Just Not Home- As much as those things bother me, they're not really in A-list of reasons why I left (except maybe the bacteria one, which is how I ended up in the hospital). But I have a story that tells it pretty well.

About a month before I left, I was hanging out at Tisa's for what ended up being the last time. A Samoan man told me about how he lived on the American west coast for years and absolutely loved it, but he couldn't stay there forever because it just wasn't his home, and he didn't want it to be.

How true. How true.

For The Last Time- "Wow, I'm leaving my workplace for the last time." "Wow, I'm going to my island church for the last time." "Wow, I'm going to my favorite restaurant for the last time." "Wow, I'm getting gas on the island for the last time." "Wow, I just chased off a pack of snarling stray dogs for the last time." "Wow, I'm leaving my workplace for the last time, for real this time." "Wow, I'm using the bathroom next to my workplace for the last time...I think."

The Long Goodbye- The same sort of thing, but with people. Saying goodbye to the people I worked with for two years. Saying goodbye to my friends from the Dissociates and church. Saying goodbye to the security guard at the building where I worked. Saying goodbye to that random neighbor who never introduced himself but we'd say "hi" to each other when we passed. The whole process involved a lot of awkward "Well, if I don't see you between now and when I leave a week from now, uh...have a nice life!" I think I ended up saying goodbye to a few people three or four times.

The Auction- A tradition among palangis on the island that probably began when Phineas Taft became the first American contractor that I made up to get fed up with the island in 1901 is the "Leaving the Island Sale." Unlike every other time most people move somewhere in their lives, it's waaay too expensive to take most of that stuff with you.² So you have to sell it, give it away, or throw it away. Although sometimes done as a traditional yard sale, the cultural-rich experience of the Leaving Sale now usually done via the famous Dissociates Email List (i.e. we email each other using the all-purpose email list, tack on the address of a few Samoan friends that might be interested, and ask "who wants to buy this stuff?") Then about a year ago, someone discovered that you can make online auctions with a Google spreadsheet, and those of use feeling that it was worth a lot more hassle to make about $35 more started doing it as a very drawn out online auction. This process was more fun than a barrel full of turkey tail.

Moving Out Nihilism- ASPA raising power rates again? "I'm leaving soon anyway." Good friend moved away a whole month before you? "I'm leaving soon anyway." Island economy in danger of collapsing now that the tsunami-related FEMA money that supplanted the closed cannery has stopped coming in? "Good thing I'm leaving soon anyway." Furry Vengeance playing at the only theater instead of the smash-hit move you were pumped to see? "I'm leaving soon anyway." Roads flooded? "I'm leaving soon anyway." Stub your toe while walking through your apartment? "I'm leaving soon anyway." Cable company switched from amazing CNN International to inferior US version of CNN? "OH COME ON!"

Final Food Problem- Sure, not shopping at Cost-U-Lots as much for the last month or so is no big deal, but you really get into problems when you get down to the last two weeks or so. You're afraid to buy almost anything, as you're supposed to be cleaning out your pantry at this point, not adding to it. And for the same reason, you end up eating a lot of really random meals. For the last week or so, I ate an awful lot of frozen chicken nuggets with Oreo cookies and long-expired Kraft Mac & Cheese. I paid good money for that food, and it's not like I can take it home with me.

But then at the same time, sometimes you clean out your pantry a little too well, and you have almost nothing left to eat, and thus have to go to the store anyway to buy overpriced basics that you'll get to use about half of. I still ended up having to throw away quite a bit of stuff. Especially expired mac and cheese.

Book Ends- So many random things from my last days on the island mirrored my first days there:
-No car
-No furniture that didn't come with the apartment
-Not a lot of food in my pantry/fridge, for the reasons discussed above
-3/4 of the stuff I own is in a USPS warehouse somewhere, and will be for months because I got the cheapest rate on shipping
-It's November, which meant everything from the holidays approaching to breadfruit hanging from every other tree
-Random Samoans I just met are asking me if it's my first time on the island
-I was to fly through Honolulu and Las Vegas, just like the first time

What Sort of Ending- How would I end my time in Samoa? Maybe a Dance Party Ending. And having a Bittersweet Ending is kind of inevitable, seeing as I'm leaving almost every friend I've met over the last two years for good. Maybe I'd just sorta ride my plane into the sunset. And what could be more appropriate for Samoa than an Everybody Laughs Ending? Or maybe using all these TV Tropes entries is something only fans of the site will appreciate, and I should stop doing it.

Well, as it turned out, I got a Grand Finale to my Grand Samoan Adventure.

More on that soonish.


¹ This actually happened.
² Despite this, everyone still takes a lot of stuff back with them. I mailed myself about 20 boxes of every size, and I've known people who rented out space in shipping containers, or even rented the whole thing for themselves.

This may have worked better as a Carnac the Magnificent joke

A few things I never thought I'd see in the same news article:

-Swains Island, a fairly remote part of American Samoa that I've never been to.
-Wikileaks
-Good, coherent journalism
-Something by the Samoa News

And yet, you can find it all here.

Real entry coming soon. It's time I started wrapping this blog up.

Electile Dysfunction

Note: This post was originally written on the night of November 2nd, 2010

It's almost 11 PM local time, and I'm still at work. Such is the life of media employees on election night. And no, we don't have an 11 o'clock newscast, or even a 10 o'clock one, or even a 6 PM one. Heck, as far as TV is concerned, we don't even have a newscast at all.

But I digress. I'm here to give continuing coverage on our "slideshow channel," Island Info Channel 13. A few individual polling stations have yet to submit their results, and for all I know they've already gone to bed and plan on counting the ballots tomorrow afternoon. But now I've been told that I can go home as soon as the channel is back to normal, so now I mostly just have to wait for most of the night for the computer that runs it to finish loading.

Anyway, the voters of the Rock have roundly rejected a number of "revisions" to the territorial constitution. Revisions, not amendments. Amendments would require approval by the United States Congress. And I don't think they'd approve of all of them, particularly one that basically says that the Governor and a 2/3rds majority of the Fono can nullify any Federal law they feel like. Come on AS, we in the Carolinas tried this once before, and it could've gotten really ugly.

Though instead of a serious standoff, it probably would have been more like the following conversation where I imagine the Federal government talking to ASG via text message for some reason, probably because they know the Feds can't be bothered to actually call down here:

ASG: No $7.25/hr. minimum wage for us, LOL!
FEDUSA: LOLWUT?
ASG: Yeah, we dnt want it. So it dsn't count.
FEDUSA: LOLWUT?
ASG: We said we cld nullify laws that we don't like in our cnstitutinal revisns!@
FEDUSA: LOLWUT?
ASG: We revisd our constitution.
FEDUSA: U hav a constitution? & U can amend it without us?
ASG: Hey, we only need ur permission to amend it, not 2 revise it.
FEDUSA: ...LOLWUT?
ASG: Come on, its totly diffrnt!
FEDUSA: LOLNO.
ASG: Plz?
FEDUSA: LOLNO. LOL.

(Cue random commenter telling me that I spelled "different" wrong)

So yeah, good on ya, voters of AmSam.

The other big race was for the territory's nonvoting Representative to Congress, which I can't help but notice that none of the major American news networks have covered in their website maps that supposedly cover the whole country. What's up with that? Anyhow, the seat appears to have been retained by 398-term delegate Eni Faleomavaega, who I actually quite like, especially since he was cool enough to do an interview with Steven Colbert that I posted way back when I first started this blog. And later come on our show and talk about how terrible an idea some of those Constitutional "revisions" were.

But the only really funny thing about that race, besides Tuika Tuika in general (who is really not the "ha ha" kind of funny), is that early on, a candidate who should probably remain nameless ran on the campaign slogan "Manifest Our Destiny," apparently not knowing any of the horrible Indian-killing history behind Manifest Destiny. But I never got to tell her, because she probably would have pulled all of those ads that she ran with us using that slogan.

Yeah. Now you know what my sense of humor looks like when I'm really tired.

Something I meant to post ages ago!

No time to write about the days after the tsunami now, but I'm really due for another entry while I work on one about something else entirely.

Here's some epic ukulele playing here on-island from a few months back. It's by Taimane, who is basically the Jimi Hendrix of the ukulele. She's so awesome that she would play duets with Don Ho, even though she's currently only 21, meaning that she would have been about 18 at the time.

You may want to view these videos in a separate window by double-clicking them, unless you just don't care for the right side of videos.

Adam's Story Part 2: Pictures

In the days and weeks after the tsunami last year, my TV channel wasn't running and wouldn't be for at least a few days. But as you might remember from my entry about the actual day, we did have some pretty strong contacts with the international media. So in lieu of regular work, I was to travel around the island and film/photograph the devastation on the island and send it to the Associated Press via an FTP server.

For the anniversary of the tsunami, I had planned on posting an album of photos that I had taken all over the island in the days and weeks after the event, but I was slowed down for a very good reason¹.

But anyway, it's finished now and is available for viewing here on Facebook.

I've actually lost a lot of my 2009 photo archive, so, lucky for you, it's a normal-sized album instead of the enormous monstrosities that I tend to create.

I had wanted to also write about some specifics of what I did, but I figured that this entry is late enough already. Hopefully, I'll get to do that next time.

¹I'm just now getting into the show Lost, which is a program that I can really relate to.

Under Pressure

As I write this, it's raining outside. Hard. I mean like really hard, maybe even for here. Plus it's really consistent and the tradewinds are still blowing, so it's just generally very nasty outside. There's some kind of low pressure system, maybe a trough, that's been hanging over the island for at least a week now. I'm so used to constant rain here that I think I've completely lost track. I don't know that much about it, partly because both local news outlets that I follow¹ covered it for about one story last Friday and then went on to other things.

In fact there was a lot of flooding on the roads both yest-*BZZZZZZZT* *BZZZZZZZZT* *BZZZZZZZZZT*

*BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP*

FLASH FLOOD WARNING
ASZ001-002-150800-

BULLETIN - EAS ACTIVATION REQUESTED
FLASH FLOOD WARNING
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PAGO PAGO AS
600 PM SST TUE SEP 14 2010

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN PAGO PAGO HAS ISSUED A

* FLASH FLOOD WARNING FOR
TUTUILA AUNUU AND MANUA...

* UNTIL 900 PM SST

* AT 550 PM SST...AN UPPER-LEVEL TROUGH HAS GENERATED
HEAVY RAINFALL OVER TUTUILA AUNUU AND MANU`A. THE
WEATHER SERVICE OFFICE IN TAFUNA RECEIVED OVER 1 INCH
OF RAINFALL DURING THE LAST HOUR. HEAVY RAINFALL
OF 2 TO 4 INCHES WILL CAUSE FLASH FLOODING OF SMALL
STREAMS IN LOW LYING AREA AND ROADS. LAND AND MUD SLIDES
WILL OCCUR DUE TO HEAVY RAIN AND RUNOFFS.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...
A FLASH FLOOD WARNING MEANS FLASH FLOODING IS IMMINENT
OR OCCURRING IN STREAMS...ROADS AND LOW LYING AREAS. MOVE
TO HIGHER GROUND IMMEDIATELY IF YOUR HOME IS IN A FLOOD
PRONE AREA.

DO NOT CROSS FAST FLOWING OR RISING WATER IN YOUR
VEHICLE OR ON FOOT. REPORT SEVERE WEATHER TO THE LOCAL
POLICE OFFICIALS OR THE EMERGENCY OPERATIONS CENTER (EOC)
...THEY WILL RELAY YOUR REPORT TO THE NATIONAL WEATHER
SERVICE OFFICE.

&&

$$

LAPATAIGA MO LOLOGA MA TAFEGA TETELE
OFISA O LE TAU
600 AFIAFI ASO LUA SETEMA 14 2010

...UA I AI NEI LAPATAIGA MO LOLOGA MA TAFEGA TETELE MO TUTUILA AUNUU MA
MANU`A E OO ATU I LE 9 I LE PO NANEI...

O TIMUGA MAMAFA MA FAITITILI UA MAFUA MAI I TULAGA LOULOUA O LE TAU O LE
A MAFUA AI LOLOGA MA TAFEGA MO NOFOAGA MAUALALALO...FAAPEA FO`I SOLOGA
MAI MAUGA MA NOFOAGA MAUALULUGA.

E LAPATA`I ATU LE MAMALU LAUTELE INA IA AUA NE`I FAAFOEINA TAAVALE
I NOFOAGA MA ALATELE UA MATUA LOLO VAIA. IA TAGA`I ANE FO`I I NOFOAGA
TU LATA I MAUGA MO NI SOLOGA.

FAAMOLEMOLE VALAAU VAVE LE OFISA O SAOGALEMU LAUTELE MA LE EOC...E RIPOTI
ANE AI NI LOLOGA MA TAFEGA.

IA FAAUTAGIA MAI LENEI LAPATAIGA MA PUIPUIA LOA LOU SOIFUA MA AU MEA
TOTINO.

$$

BAQUI

(That seriously was issued while I was writing this. And our radio stations really did an EAS bulletin for it. We now return you to our regularly scheduled blog entry already in progress)

-and that's how they got rid of all the dead dogs they had lying all over the place. With a mail sack.²

But yeah, it's kinda weird how so many people just keep going about their normal everyday lives as if it wasn't flooding outside. From what I've seen, this kind of thing happens once or twice a year here, and I guess if you've been living on the Rock your entire life, you really don't think that much of it. Maybe that's why the news isn't covering it very much.

Anyhow, the big way that it affects me, other than basically not being able to do anything outside, including things like take out the trash, is driving. On the NWS website, underneath the bulletin that I posted above, there was a second one that said to avoid driving until the flood alert has been lifted. I discovered this right after driving home.

As I and just about any other person who's driven on this island will tell you, driving on this island is a) more difficult and b) more dangerous. There's a lot of different "rules." Not real rules, mind you, but just a totally different driving style. People merge onto the road from driveways by cutting everyone off. People stop in the middle of the highway with 10 cars following them to let a single car merge onto the road, thinking that they're being courteous. People will go into the lane made for oncoming traffic to dodge a pothole in their lane, a rough spot that looks like it may become a pothole sometime soon, or even a metal plate covering up a pothole. Or sometimes just because it gets them around a curve faster. Somewhere around a third of drivers don't turn on their headlights until it's 100% pitch black.³ People drive 10 miles under the speed limit. (OK, I know that that last one happens in the States all the time, but here the speed limit is 25 MPH and there's almost no passing zones.) And aiga bus drivers are the worst about all of these. But eventually you learn to expect all of these things and adapt to them as best you can.

But it gets much worse when there's a trough overhead. The roads flood in seemingly random places, occasionally deeply enough to stall a car, as I know all too well. There's at least one spot on my daily commute where I can hear the water sloshing against the underside of my car. People veer into oncoming traffic to drive through the shallow end. The potholes all become hidden. That same third of drivers still leave their lights off, even if it's 30 minutes to sundown and severe thunderstorms are cutting visibility to next to nothing. And of course, everyone is driving slower than usual.

So, uh, I hope it clears up soon. Especially because I have outdoor plans for this weekend.

And this song seems appropriate. Partly because of it's lyrics, and partly because it will not leave my head until it clears up outside.

¹It's best that I don't get started on the other two news outlets, one of which is known to mostly just copy our radio newscast word-for-word without giving our newsteam any credit whatsoever. Plus, neither one has an active news website anyhow.

²This is from a true story, but it's totally, totally unbloggable. Ask Jason Thomas if you know him. If I'm very, very lucky and everything goes according to plan, I'll get to record him telling it and make it into a Flash cartoon. But first I have to get Flash, learn how to use it, and record Jason's story.

³When I first started driving here, people were flashing their lights at me to let me know that I left mine on accidentally, because surely no one would be using theirs just because it's overcast out.

Mini-Adventures on the Docks

I end up going on a lot of mini-adventures here on the Rock. I might go for a quick hike and discover an amazing view that I've never seen before. I might take a wrong turn and end up at the beautiful Turtle and Shark Site at sunset. I might stop on the way home from work to take a picture of a departing cruise ship and find myself running all over the docks.

Sorry I didn't give any hints to which one this was in the title.

Better check it out while it's still viewable to the general public, as I'm going to set it to be only visible to Facebook friends in a couple of weeks.

Oh, and if your attention span is as short as mine is-

Sorry, I got distracted. What was I saying? Oh yeah. If your attention span is as short as mine is and you get bored easily, the first thirteen pictures are the more interesting ones.