four weeks long Vanuatu!

It’s nearly the end of week four for Vanuatu and week two for Luganville. Work continues to be a fair amount of digestion (ie reading). Although yesterday I managed to accompany some guys from the Provincial Council on a trip to the south side of Aore Island, to look at some management issues related to a boarding school. Travel is always fun: although being a young lady : ) I don’t even need to yell shotgun to get a front seat, rather than riding on the back of the ute. Probably a good thing, as there are some pretty massive potholes and I’d hate to break the other collarbone! After a spel (rest) at the local boat launching spot, waiting for the chief fulla, we caught a small vessel for a half hour trip to Aore Island.

The school is set in a beautiful lagoon with a school farm which ensures that the school is self sufficient: from producing most of the food (kakae) for the staff and students, bullocks and copra (coconut) for cash, and even coconut oil to run generators! The school principle wants to enhance the existing cattle farming and possibly revive a dairy farm that closed a few years ago, so is looking at the water supply. The Provincial Council also provides advice and seedlings for forestry initiatives, so we also went round with a forestry officer looking at the various options for Sandalwood, Mahogany and other varieties. After a big feed put on by the school mama’s, it was back to the office in Santo- a full day in the field!

Although I’ll go into a bit more detail about different aspects of life here, its surprising how busy I am already. Usually there’s a game of volleyball after work with the other Aussie and Peace corp (US) volunteers, and anyone else keen to join in. Then there’s the trip to the market for supplies, or the local Chinese shops. Quite a few expats do the kava thing, although if I head to a kava bar its normally for a Tusker (beer blong Vanuatu). And there seems to be a lot of events down at Unity Park, like movies, music and hiphop. A public holiday was declared on Wednesday when a war ship from New Caledonia arrived in town, although I missed the parade… apparently they love parades here even if the event is pretty much the same every time, so I’ll be sure to get pics in the future. Its also an “early to bed, early to rise” sort of place, with a long long lunch hour(s) so am easing myself gently into island time.