Savaii Day 1 - Safua Hotel

We caught a ferry over to Savaii today. The trip over was gorgeous with the water all different shades of greens and blues around the coral reefs, then the palm tress lining the islands. :) So pretty.

Savaii is the largest island in Samoa, but it is the least populated. There are like 225,000 ppl in Samoa but only 42,000 in Savaii. There’s only 1 well paved road that goes all the way around the island that follows the coast line, and the Samoans use the rest of the island for their plantations. The traditional culture is very important here, and they stick to many of their old ways of doing things, even though they have some modern things, like electricity, cars, and roads.

We’re staying at Safua Hotel for just over a week here. They cater to big groups like us, so it’s just CCSP that’s here. And it’s so nice! They have open-walled buildings (called fales: “foll-ehs”) where we eat and where the lounge is, and they have really cool native plants around the whole area – we even have a mango tree in the backyard. Sweet. Everything is so open here, and they’re so laid back about it. I’d be scared to have a fale like these back in America because everything would be stolen. Guess not around here. They have books and tablewear and artifacts and valuables.

7 of us girls are staying in one of the fales. It’s so nice. There are bunk beds and a couple single beds, and we have a nice sitting area in the middle of the room. It’s comfortable. Apparently Chris’s (a Samoan basically heading our program here) whole extended family lives around the Safua Hotel are and they all run it. So there were cousins, aunts, uncles, sons, daughters, all working to make this a great stay for us.

The beaches here are incredible! Palm trees, beach fales, white sands, coral reefs. :D I’m in heaven! (only downside is the heat and humidity…a very big downside, but still! I’m in Samoa for crying out loud.) We all snorkeled again for a couple hours, and we saw a huge stingray out there. That was cool.

We had a lot of traditional food for dinner tonight, like “taro” – something like a potato – and breadfruit – really light tasting fruit, and some fish I’ve never tried before. Several guys sang and played guitars for us during dinner, which was neat. They played Samoan and American songs – a lot of them speak decent English. A lot of them hit on you too, cuz you’re an American lol.

Leah