Tiffany and Greg Around the World
When we called Bali the Cancun of Australia, we had no idea how right we were.
Because, like Mexico, people do come to Bali to drink cheap beer on the beach, party and buy cheap souvenirs so Bali caters to that. And they even have a good sense of humor about it:
But that’s not all this island is. Because Bali, like Mexico, is far more fascinating when you’re paying attention to the details.
That question took us a bit by surprise because, well, we hadn’t really put a lot of thought into it…
And we would be dramatically understating things to say that shocked our Australian friends.
Travel is an interesting thing and one of the most interesting things, in fact the very reason Greg states for wanting to travel in the first place, is to discover and challenge one’s own unknown assumptions.
What do we assume is “normal” without even realizing that we’ve made an assumption in the first place because everyone around us makes the same one?
For example, in an urban culture (like the one we were raised in) 10PM is an early bedtime for a young professional. Whereas in an agrarian culture…
(or a sailing one – “sailors midnight” is 9PM)
…10PM is an extremely late bedtime when you are accustomed to waking up at 6AM and 8AM is “sleeping in.”
(and no, we never got used to that… 😉 )
But what does this have to do with Easter?
Well, let us ask you this:
Tongatapu, Tonga
Did we mention that the ferry that we’re on replaced the one that sank with 27 people onboard a few months back? The ship was unsafe and everyone died.
We found this out at about 1 am while chatting with the bridge team.
Our voyage was thankfully uneventful and we arrived the next day on the capital island of Tongatapu.
We spent a week there and first off: Best Chinese fried rice ever! No idea why, makes little sense, but dude, you’re talking to two people who lived in the Bay Area for years so it’s not like we’ve not had good Chinese. If you ever get to Tonga, go to the Chinese restaurant next to the hotel in the capital facing the water on the main shore road.
Speaking of friend rice, Tonga is also a perfect example of something we’ve been meaning to bring to your attention for quite some time now: The Mormon church and the Chinese government are buying the South Pacific one village at a time.
Continue reading “China and the Mormons are buying the South Pacific”
Papeete, Tahiti, Society Islands, French Polynesia
(cont’d from previous)
Then there is the whole nudity / sexuality thing here in French Polynesia. Which, why put sex and religion in the same blog post? Because here one isn’t exclusive of the other and that’s a good thing. In America, sex seems to be at odds with the institution of God. It’s not like the French are “modest” in that respect to start with when compared to Americans but when the European explorers landed on the Polynesian islands the natives would willingly give their women over to the sailors for sex. It was considered the polite thing to do! Hippies had no concept of “free love” compared to the Polynesians. (In retrospect, considering the syphilis that decimated their population, not the best move.) Well, a few centuries and a great deal of western Christian influence later, the Polynesian people aren’t quite as promiscuous as before but they are in their younger years still rather “open to exploration.” Interesting to note that, according to what we learned talking to the local French and reading travel guides, if a young island girl gets pregnant, her entire family simply raises the child as its own. Our guess is that when your population is decimated down to the 2% level, not to mention you are adamant pro-Catholic, your cultural views on abortion change. Right along with your views on familial responsibility to the next generation.
…and their tolerance for nudity, and for referencing the naked human body, is a good deal higher than your typical American. You all probably remember the most awesome name for a bay, ever. While in Papeete we bought a ukulele playbook from a newsstand and right there on the cover was a topless woman. Also, Tiffany was looking at a book on wearing sarongs and this is what she saw (blacked out areas explained below)
Papeete, Tahiti, Society Islands, French Polynesia
We Americans are such prudes.
No, seriously we are. We’ve heard it before and really, it’s true. Puritan roots = massive prudes. You really aren’t able to appreciate the level of our prudishness until you live in another culture that is more open in their beliefs on sexuality while at the same time more strict in their interpretation of religion. The fact that this is not an oxymoron is in and of itself rather eye-opening for an American. Yes boys and girls, you can have lots of sex and still love Jesus. This is not a message that modern American Christianity has effectively distributed to the masses. To be fair, it’s hard to blame them. The Christians that is, a.k.a. “us” being as we’re on that particular team. The mass media has taken the position of “free sex with whoever you want whenever you want” so when Christianity opposes that they get cast as the people who are against sex. It isn’t true, but that’s how it’s played in the States. I think we’d get a lot more traction stressing all the awesome sex you can have as a married member of the church than just focusing on the stuff people can’t do. As an organization, we have really gone on the defensive on this particular front, letting our opponents pick the battles and cast us in the “bad guy” light and really, it hasn’t gotten us anywhere. Pretty sure we’ve actually lost a bit of ground with this strategy.
In fact, many Christian religions would really like it if their people had more sex, since we’re kind of dying off right now. It’s a numbers game people and we’re losing. Continue reading “Sex and Jesus”
As our friend Justin put it:
“Did you ever think they came up with a bunny that brings baskets of candy, and lays chocolate eggs, to prove you will believe anything?
Happy Resurrection Day!!”
We’ve always wondered why Easter isn’t a bigger deal in America. Christmas is a big deal, no doubt about it. While the birth of Jesus is important, it is not the central point of the faith. The events surrounding Easter: Jesus dying and rising again are the clutch beliefs but we don’t seem to give this holiday the credit it deserves. You can blame commercialism, the decline of society, etc. but ultimately, it’s us. It’s not a big deal because we don’t make it a big deal. For our fellow believers, today is our victory day and the reason we are who we are as a faith. Just some food for thought to go with the chocolate. Yes, chocolate. We defy you to prove to us that God is not down with chocolate.
And bacon. Not the BS bacon they cook out here in the middle of the ocean either, but the good old American bacon (these people just don’t get what they are missing…). Thank you Jesus for dying for us…and for bacon. The forgiveness of sins thing is beyond comprehension awesome (it actually is a bit mind expanding to attempt to wrap your thoughts around the concept) and is more than we could ever even hope for but then you just went ahead and took it to the next level. As a deity goes, seriously, you’re the best.
Avatoru, Rangiroa, Tuamotu, French Polynesia
Welcome to the big city of the Tuamotu,
Did you see that? A paved road! We’ve seen paved roads before in the islands but now we start putting this information together. How do you make a paved road on a remote desert island…well concrete requires sand, rocks, fresh water and cement. Cement you have to import on the boat, no surprise there. Fresh water can be harvested from the rain; take a while but do-able. Sand can come from the beaches but rocks…rocks are a bit of stumbling point. In the Marquesas they had mountains of rocks (literally) to turn into roads but in the Tuamotu, their land is not made up of rock anymore and shipping in tons of rocks can get expensive. So what is an islander to do except improvise?
And while we’re on the topic of logistics, Greg ran into something that seems out of place in the islands: a graveyard. Yes, we understand that people die (heck, they did a lot of dying not so long ago) but it’s where they go when they die that concerns me, and not in the spiritual sense either.
We’ve already made it clear that there isn’t a whole heck of a lot of real estate out here. Also, Catholic doctrine is pretty clear on the matter: no cremation. So how long will it be before these people are deciding between housing for the living and housing for the dead?
Speaking of the Catholic Church, they have one here and it’s gorgeous.
Did you see that tabernacle? It was the tiny little castle up on the altar at the beginning of the video. (For the uninitiated: Tabernacle is the little box they keep the blessed bread in. So in the minds of us Catholics this is the place where the physical presence of Jesus resides.) In the states, you find a lot of tabernacles made out of precious materials like gold & silver. Here they don’t have stuff like that so what they lack in metal they make up for in expert craftsmanship & skill.
Toau, Tuamotu, French Polynesia
We arrived in Toau to find two really nice guys in an outboard who guided us into the 10 boat anchorage they had set up near the “village.”
Why is “village” in quotations?
Just wait for it.
After helping us get anchored the nice guys invited us over for dinner that evening. It’s a pretty common practice for the locals to prepare dinner for cruisers for a price and then “invite” you to dinner. Remember in Fatu Hiva where the terms “restaurant” and “living room” were synonymous? Yeah, pretty normal and to be fair, they take good care of you:
Those would be fresh lobsters. Paired with baguette and fresh fried parrot fish and by “fresh” I mean the two guys who guided us in? They are also the fishermen; brought the fish in that afternoon and cooked them up alongside one of their wives. Same with the lobsters.
Also, they have a dog
Cute little guy, kinda scraggly. Not really worth noting until…hey wait a second…how the heck did a dog get way out here?! It’s not like he evolved from the freaking fish! Did you ship him in? How much would that cost? Is he some sorta descendent from dogs brought over by Capt. Cook? Seriously, where did you get a dog!? (see, like I said, sometimes it’s the little things that make you remember where you are).
We had a great time at dinner and then the 2 nice guys and the lady invited us to come to church tomorrow. Well, we’ve all heard legends of the Polynesian church singing and it’s also when the whole “village” would typically turn out, what a great opportunity to meet people! …and truthfully, it’s been a while since we were able to get to an actual church, so heck why not?
Here’s the church:
And here’s what the service was like:
Not exactly what we were expecting. Ok, so all the white people? Sailors. That leaves the lady at the front and the two men in the seats…
…noticing a trend here?
You know that joke where the town’s so small that the mayor is the sectary while moonlighting as the pastor and city garbage collector?
Yeah, that’s here.
Greg played bocce ball with the two guys on the beach with their bocce set. Won one game, lost the other. In other words, he beat half the bocce ball playing population of this island in one go.
…Hey wait, where the heck did they get a bocce ball set?!
Fakarava, Tuamotu, French Polynesia
Welcome to the main town in Fakarava. So what does one do here?
(aside from the diving, we’ve already established that’s amazing. Well, that and suicidal crabs)
1) First off, secure transportation. Preferably, transportation with shock absorption.
What Tiffany fails to mention in the video is that at that point we still had to bike back… And it was a very long trip home, let me tell you!
2) Well, there’s the dive center.
Two notes here:
– Greg can officially now say that he’s had a French tutor. Which is cool, right? The fact that his tutor was male and taught diving vice female and “l’art d’amour”…eh, less cool. He thinks that the fact that he learned to dive in French Polynesia almost makes up for it.
– If you are one of those people looking to jump the puddle, as it is called, get your dive certification in Mexico. Yes, we realize that it is expensive compared to other things in Mexico and you will tell yourself “nah, I won’t dive, I’ll just snorkel.” No you won’t. What you’ll do is snorkel by yourself and be terrified of all the sharks swimming around you while you’re all alone and all your friends are off diving. Remember the part where they school? Like fish? (ask Greg how he knows this!)
Then all your friends will gang up on you and convince you that paying the exorbitant prices for a private French diving instructor is actually very chique (a French word, not coincidentally, I’m sure) and is a really good idea in order for you to fully experience this “once in a lifetime diving opportunity.” They will be right and you will be a fool for not having paid half the price in Mexico to get your certification. The one consolation you will get is that the instructors in French Polynesia are really cool and they use your practice dives as opportunities to actually show you some amazing stuff. Still, it’s WAY cheaper to get your cert in Mexico.
2) The store, where we discovered that your local grocer is actually not only a national brand, but an international one:
For you east coast people, this is like running into a Publix (or in the case of our Texas friends, an H.E.B.) out here in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. I mean really? Safeway? In FRENCH!? Who knew?
3) The church (which is actually pretty cool)
Click on the photo above to enlarge it. The shell chandeliers and other decorations were amazing!
(to be continued… We had way too many videos for one post!)
Kauehi, Tuamotu, French Polynesia
So that’s the city sign. Guess they don’t exactly have a city line, being as there aren’t a lot of other cities out here to butt up against.
So the semi-obvious question I left out of the previous entries (I ran out of space!) was, “Greg, I get how the islands got there, how did the PEOPLE get there?!?”
Good question, and the short answer is…no one actually knows for sure.
Some people say they sailed from South America. Some dude name Thor (no, really, it’s his name) sailed a raft from South America to prove this theory. He made it to the Marquesas, so, it possible. However, the current popular theory is that the ancient Polynesians came from Asian stock:
(thanks to httpthe.honoluluadvertiser.com)
The summary version is that the Polynesian people were beyond comprehension badasses at seagoing navigation. They were human sextants capable of determining their exact position on the largest expanse of bleak nothingness on the planet Earth (the Pacific Ocean) by doing things such as watching the stars, checking the angle of the waves, looking at birds in flight and…no that’s it. That’s what they did. I am not a Polynesian. I use a GPS because I suck with a sextant, much less reading the angle of a wave bounced off an island 100 miles away (not making this up or exaggerating here.) So these people sailed against the current and upwind in what amounted to two canoes tied together by some wood and some sails lashed on top. Why did they sail against the wind and current? So that if, while exploring, they failed to find any land, they could easily get pushed back home once all the food and water was used up onboard. Doesn’t that just sound swell? Well it sure did to them because they got really, really good at it. Therein how they found, charted and settled all these islands long before we Europeans with our clunky tall ships (and syphilis! Let’s not forget what we brought to share!) showed up on the scene.
As for Kauehi city, well, city is a generous term. Here’s me in the center of town, which also doubles for their beach:
They have a “store” (it may one day grow up to be a 7-11) where they sold baguettes!
Our elation at being able to resupply our junkie fix for awesome fresh French bread was short lived when we found out that the baguettes were frozen. It did lead us to wonder though: are they frozen because they got shipped here? Or do they just turn on the bread baking over once a month to save energy? Unfortunately my limited French skills did not cover such complex topics of conversation. I did manage to find ice cream though. Hey, if they can freeze bread they can have ice cream. More importantly, I can have ice cream.
The main structure of the town is the church. We were lucky enough to be here on a Sunday and we attended a Catholic mass in Tahitian. Though we couldn’t understand the service, we did get to meet the entire town (maybe 100 people in total) and they were really nice to us. Also, the percussion instrument in the choir was an Alhambra water jug. I felt that it would be disrespectful to tape this guy playing during mass but man, WOW. You’d be amazed how good people can get at playing an empty plastic water jug when it’s the only instrument available for 600 or so miles.
They have a dinghy dock and yacht anchorage. The monthly resupply ship, their only semi-reliable (weather depending) means of contact with the outside world, stays offshore and sends in small tender vessels with supplies for the residents. No exports that I am aware of or could find evidence of are taken back out to the ship. With only 100 people on the island and about 30 yachts a year that visit, they have an almost untouched natural beauty and crystal clear blue water right up the edge of the dock.
These people LIVE here. Perched on this tiny ring of coral in the middle of the ocean. They fish, collect rain water to drink and they have been doing it for hundreds of years.
-Greg
