An Update!

No, the Internet is not lying to you! I REALLY updated my blog!

Been really busy lately hanging out with Steph, my new lady-friend, and planning a trip with my parents to The Nation Formerly Known as Western Samoa. Also been busy at work, but I've only ever made a few really short blog posts from there.

Anyhow, I've found lots of really cool things to do in Western like an underwater cave pool, lava tunnels, watching fire dancers, swimming with sea turtles, and much much more! And by that last one, I mean that I'm not even halfway through reading the guidebook yet.

I also got a LOT of stuff stolen from me when, as I put it on my Facebook status, my pants were stolen, along with their complete contents. I was out paddling in my bathing suit by the Yacht Club and had left my pants partially hiddend under the picnic bench where they always went. The pants, along with my wallet, keys, cell phone, and still camera were stolen. Of course I hated myself for leaving them out like that, but not as much as whoever took them.

A day or two later, that same guidebook told everyone planning a visit here to not ever, ever, ever let their on stuff out of their sight, because in Samoan culture, "stealing isn't really a sin," mostly due to communal concepts of ownership.

NOW I learn that!

Oh well, learning that now is less annoying than how in the moments right after all that stuff getting taken, the only thing that 9 out of 10 people (both Samoan and white) could do was tell me that I shouldn't have left them out, which basically just starts the self-loating phase before I'm even ready to concede that my stuff is really gone.

Where I'm from, the culture is very different. Very few people who saw a pair of pants lying there would think to steal them.¹ In fact, they'd probably think that going through another man's pants is pretty gay.

The really bad part is that this is actually the third thing that I have had stolen from me. My iPod was stolen a few months ago from my car (I think because I didn't notice that the window was stuck open, because I'm pretty good about locking it), my shoes were stolen from the Yacht Club when I accidentally left them there overnight, and now this. Perhaps the same person stole them all, and there's a Samoan kid walking around with an iPod full of loud punk music, a pair of shoes that don't fit him, and a really worn-out phone with the theme from The Office as it's ringtone.²

At least now I have finally learned to keep everything behind at least five padlocks and six guard dogs³, because stuff WILL get stolen here. It's probably a good thing that I couldn't upadate this blog for so long, because without some time to cool off, I'd be talking about how I feel like I'm on an island full of kleptos. But I'd never say nor imply that, not even in the slyest indirect manner. Nope, nope, nope.

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On a completly unrelated note, I was saddened to learn of a recent celebrity passing. One who moved us all on many occasions. Yes, Billy Mays, the infomercial guy and star of the Discovery Channel's Pitchmen died today at age 50. Love him or hate him, her was a great salesman, which is apparently really, really important in my industry. Here is the best tribute YouTube has to offer, a gangsta rap remix.



I also want to share this great Fark posting, which I had planned on tellin Mays about after I become a Hollywood bigshot and meet him.

First poster: "Billy Mays is an underappreciated genius. He could read the phonebook, and I would find it amusing."

Second poster: "BILLY MAYS HERE FOR THE WHITE PAGES! LOOK, ARE YOU TIRED OF SEARCHING THROUGH COUNTLESS ROLODEX CARDS LOOKING FOR PHONE NUMBERS? TIRED OF LOOKING THROUGH COMPUTER FILES, PAPER FILES, EVEN THROUGH OLD MATCHBOOK COVERS OR BUSINESS CARDS? WELL THEN LOOK NO MORE!

WITH THE WHITE PAGES YOU GET MEN'S NAMES! WOMEN'S NAMES! YOUNG PEOPLE'S NAMES! SENIOR CITIZEN'S NAMES! EVEN FOREIGN NAMES! AND IT'S ALL ARRANGED ALPHABETICALLY! WHAT COULD BE EASIER?

AND IF YOU CALL RIGHT NOW, IN ADDITION TO THE WHITE PAGES, WE'LL INCLUDE THE YELLOW PAGES ABSOLUTELY FREE! HUNDREDS UPON HUNDREDS OF PAGES OF NAMES AND NUMBERS OF BUSINESSES YOU WANT TO TALK TO, ALSO ARRANGED ALPHABETICALLY BY BUSINESS TYPE! YOU WANT A CHINESE TAKE OUT? BOOM! RIGHT THERE! YOU NEED A PROCTOLOGIST? BAM! HERE'S A DOZEN OF THEM RIGHT AT YOUR FINGERTIPS... AND THIS BOOK IS AVAILABLE AT NO ADDITIONAL COST TO YOU!

AND IF YOU CALL IN THE NEXT TEN MINUTES, WE'LL ALSO INCLUDE THE GOVERNMENT PAGES! THAT'S RIGHT, RIGHT AT THE BEGINNING OF THE BOOK, YOU'LL GET A COMPLETE LIST OF GOVERNMENT SERVICE PHONE NUMBERS -- FEDERAL, STATE, AND LOCAL! -- WITHOUT THE EMBARRASSMENT OF ACCIDENTALLY CALLING 9-1-1 FOR NON-EMERGENCIES!

SO RIGHT AT YOUR DOOR, YOU GET THE WHITE PAGES, THE YELLOW PAGES, AND THE GOVERNMENT PAGES! A $199 VALUE, FOR ONLY $19.95 PLUS SHIPPING! CALL NOW!"

¹Also, in the mainland there would have been lockers to store things in and an adequate number of parking spaces, so that I could have parked nearby and kept my stuff in my car, but that's just me feeling bitter.

²If you see him, you have my permission to hurt him.

³This part is easy. Dogs are really plentiful here.

A Twosome!

That's right, everyone! You get a post with two (somewhat) new photo albums for the price of one, one of which has never before been posted to my Facebook news feed, so no one only one or two of you have ever seen it before!

Grand Samoan Adventure, Part Lima (5)- Captions that I don't think many of you have seen.

Grand Samoan Adventure Part Ono (6)- New to (most of) you!

I also have one of the ever-popular "story"-type posts coming up that I started working on, but got lazy.

Take a Look

Yes everyone, today is an important anniversary. It was just a week ago that I did that post about it being a year since I graduated. Let's spend some time looking back on...

OK seriously, I just want to post this awesome music video that I did most of the shooting work on. It's directed by BlueSky's Tukaine, who learned just about everything he knows about videomaking from YouTube. Joey, my boss, explains as follows:

LOCAL MUSICIANS MAKE "ROCK" VIDEO

Four guys made quite a stir in the MacConnell Dowell rock quarry this past weekend while taping scenes for a new music video. And I sure had a blast! The story starts 18 months ago when I wrote and recorded a track called Monkey On My Back which I sent to my friend and fellow musician Tulaga "Tukaine" Whitcombe. He remixed it with a hip-hop flavor and added lots of his own personality to the song. We're both busy guys, so we haven't done any other projects together but we always talked about shooting a music video for Monkey.

Saturday was the day. I got 93KHJ morning show host John Raynar, our friend Tusi, Tulaga and myself down to a rock quarry for the shoot. We tapped TV guy Adam Leonard to run the camera for us. Tulaga had a concept for the video. Work. Dirt. Another Place. You see, all the other local music videos invariably have an island theme. Beaches. Palms. Green stuff. We, on the other hand, had rocks, dirt and grease. It was a ton of fun. Tulaga did all the editing and post-production work. He just sent me the first cut.

More Anniversial Brooding! Horray!

Well everyone, it has now been a year since a very monumental event in my life. On that beautiful, fateful spring day in 2008, something that I will remember as long as I live took place.

I had my best Facebook status ever:

"Adam Leonard beat college. The end boss was hard."

Oh, and the "end boss" was hard. My last day of finals involved both a major presentation and a final project for animation class, both of which turned out pretty well in the end. Probably because I got about two hours of sleep that night.

Yes, it was 365 days ago today that my world was turned upside-down and I was no longer a college student. I took my first steps in to the adult world, to be followed with five months of being unemployed and living in my parents' house.¹ Finally, I left what I had dubbed the "Parallel Universe" (being stuck somewhere between college and the real world), and came to the Surreal World, as the tagline of this blog calls it. Eventually, I'll get around to joining the real world. Maybe.

You know, if you had told me a year ago that I was going to be spending more than six of the next 12 months on an island, I would have thought it was a metaphor of some sort.

Anyway, I'd go over what's happened to me in such a wacky year, but I already blogged about that in my wrapup of 2008, and last week. Instead, let's look at where a few of my friends are now. There's a special focus on those that graduated (or were originally intended to graduate) as part of the Class of '08, but I'm going to be pretty loose with that. I won't name any names, as some of them may not want the great rush of fame and media pressure that comes with being mentioned on such a wildly popular blog.

So, as of now, what I know from the top of my head and Facebooka is:

At least seven of my friends are living and working in Hollywood.

One is also living and working in the Outer Rim Terriories (At a newspaper in Guam).

One climbed mountains all summer before going to grad school during the winter before he starts climbing again.

At least eight are going to grad school somewhere.

At least five have gotten married or are about to be, one of whom happens to also be in Hollywood.

At least five appear to have bounced around Europe for at least a few weeks or are currently doing so.

At least two graduated early.

At least six are just now graduating.

At least two um..hope to graduate next year.

Nearly all of my friends that wanted to work in media are getting to. We're talking about at least 15, going by what I know alone. Only two are working elsewhere. Awesome!

However, the majority of my friends didn't fill out their work info on their Facebook pages, which might mean that they're not working at all. Or that they're lazy. Probably both.

Six talked to me on Skype just today.

One has a party to go to now and can't keep blogging forever without missing more of it. I'll try and refine these numbers a bit later.

¹It's worth noting that just within the last few weeks, I had finally spent more post-graduation days being employed than unemployed.

Special Six-Month Anniversary Superpost!

NOTE: Sorry for the font inconsistencies. Blogger's fault. Will try to fix later.

Well, it seems that I have now been here for a full six months. Time for some reflecting, observations, and whatnot of my experiences thus far. I don't know why, but I wanted to break everything down into categories of Things I've Gotten Used to, Things I'm Gradually Getting Used to, and Things that No Sane American Can Ever Fully Adjust to.

Things I've Gotten Used to
- Random crazy things happening all the time. Cars driving down the street with two flat tires. Going on a hike and happening upon a large abandoned WWII-era cannon. Learning that my friends like to compete to see who has gained the most weight while living here (yes, I play). Edible Beef Blood and Canned Bamboo in grocery stores. Grocery store employees asking me which competing store I'm spying for when they see me taking pictures of the weird stuff they have. You know, LOLWUT-isms. I've learned to keep my camera with me at all times, because those things tend to show up at all times. I just hope that they never get old, like some of the crazy things in college did.¹

- The climate. Not very hard to adjust to beach weather year round, though I find that I miss having four seasons after a while. Not to be confused with the day-to-day weather.

- Natural beauty of the island. Like that's hard.

- Essentially starting a new life. A lot of thanks goes to the Internet, but I was able to leave everyone and everything behind. Not that I don't miss everyone tremendously, but in general, I've been able to take starting over pretty well. Outside of my immediate family and a few of my closest friends, I was keeping in touch with most people via Facebook anyhow.

- Not being able to get everything locally. After my iPod Nano was stolen, I had to order the new one on eBay. The only place on the island that sold them had them in a wide assortment of the three ugliest colors that they come in for $90 more than what I ended up paying. If you want a specific book or DVD, that usually has to come from the Internet as well. Most of the DVDs for sale here are leftovers from the rental places. A couple of things, like Lectric Shave shaving lotion, I have yet to find. But I'm certainly getting by and the annoyance has passed. There's also a lot of things that barely anyone sells. So far I've found only three places that sell contact lens solution and one that sells dental floss.

- Being on the opposite side of the tourist-local relationship. But what I really like doing when there is a cruise ship in town is getting the souvenir-sellers to think I'm a tourist, then surprising them by knowing all kinds of things that only people that live here would know. Did some of that today, actually.

Things I am Gradually Getting Used to
- Being a minority. Definitely not something I've been before. The white or "palangi" population of the island is something like 10%, tops. But it's not hard to adjust to, seeing as just about everyone treats me the same as everyone else.

- The Samoan language. One thing I liked about Spanish in high shool was that it was a Latin-based language, and a lot of the words sounded almost exactly like their English counterparts. Not so much with Samoan. After about ten weekly night classes of Samoan, I can, on a really good day, understand a handful of words from a Samoan radio ad and maybe be able to tell you what it's for. It took some getting used to to not be able to understand half of what it said in the office. But at least I stay out of the gossip this way.

- This wacky "keep it in a glass case" system. In every store I can think of, almost everything remotely medically-related is kept in a locked glass case or behind a counter so that you have to ask someone to get it for you, and then they bring it directly to a cabinet by the register for you to forget about until you've paid for everything else and driven home. And this doesn't only apply to things that they have a reason for locking up, like things that are even remotely dangerous or expensive. They lock up everything, including contact lens solution, toothpaste, and band-aids. And of course, this is The Island, so there is rarely anyone there to open it for you. They've actually lost a lot of business from me for that reason.² I have to wonder if this is all due to a badly-written law or something. I'll get used to it eventually.

- The weight gain inherent with living here. This only makes it into this category because so many of my friends have adjusted to it (see the aforementioned game), that I can't say I will never adjust to it.


Things No Sane American Can Ever Fully Adjust to

- The Traffic. Speed limits that never go above 25. People that never go above 20. Drivers, especially of the bus variety, that peel out right in front of you even if you're going the breakneck speed of 30. (Someone once did this to me on the mainland and I thought it was one of the worst drivers I had ever seen. Except that was in a 45 MPH zone and right after a traffic light, neither of which exist here). People that pass on curves. And my personal favorite, a ridiculously high number of drivers who have to slow down to one mile inch per hour when driving over a metal plate in the road put there to cover potholes so that people don't slow down while driving over them. This literally backs up traffic for miles about one day a week (even though the plates are there for seven) and has made me late on at least three occasions.³

- The Weather. Who knew that a tropical rain forest area could have so much rain? Both my plans and backup plans last weekend were ruined due to it. This week has been the second one since I've been here with almost no sun. The good news is that on most weeks, if you don't like the weather, wait a few minutes and it will change. Oftentimes it will go from a torrential downpour to completely sunny while I'm in the bathroom.

¹Freshman Year: "Get this: I woke up in the middle of the night because it was freezing, even though it's September. Turns out that one of my suitemates got DRUNK and thought it was a good idea to turn the thermostat down to 55 DEGREES! Haha, isn't that CRAZY?
Senior Year: Dammit, someone got drunk and turned the thermostat all the way down. Now it's freezing so badly that I woke up!

²And even then, it's no guarantee. I was looking in one store to see if they had any muscle rub which I totally needed for my bulging paddler's biceps and not something lame like carpal tunnel-like pain in my wrist. I asked the Asian woman by the case if they had any "Bengay." She unlocked the case and gave me Band-Aids. After a lot of explaining and trying to think of other ways to explain what I was looking for, I asked if they had any "Icy Hot." I guess she thought I said "Can I see that?" because she opened up the case again and handed me whatever we were in front of at the time. Eventually I found what I was looking for.

³People here have a really irrational fear of those things. Almost everyone will drive into the other lane just to get around them so often that the lines in the road next to them have worn away completly. I often see giant SUVs drive off the road and onto sidewalks just to avoid that metal plate with the thickness of a quarter. The one that causes the traffic to really back up actually has people stop entirely and wait for the other lane of traffic to clear just so they can avoid driving on the demon plate. I feel like such a badass when I drive over them WITHOUT EVEN SLOWING DOWN! :o

Vewy Intewesting

Sooo, during the recent Swine Flu scare, I happened to learn that during the legendary 1919 Spanish Flu pandemic, Western Samoa, then newly under New Zealand military administration, suffered a 90% infection rate, the highest in the world, resulting in the death of 22% of the population. A lot of this was due to the general in charge of the island actually didn't allow any vaccines to be imported to the island (Sorry, don't know why). Also, the first case was brought there by infected monkeys.

Meanwhile, American Samoa avoided getting a single case by SHUTTTING. DOWN. EVERYTHING. And by that, I mean that the Governor at the time, Navy Commander John M. Poyer, closed the one seaport on the island.

It's true! I read it on Wikipedia! Except for that part about Western Samoa not allowing any imports of the vaccine, I heard that from Monica. And the part about the monkeys, which I just made up.

Longer post soon. With pictures!

Happy Mothers' Day!

...and who could show appreciation for mothers everywhere better than...Mr. T?

No one, that's who.



I like how he doesn't care that the kids are being so rude to one another until the subject of moms is brought up.