This past weekend we attended several social gatherings, including a dance party at one of the “reception centers” (VERY loose term) on the beach during which our friend Mike acted as dj. It was pretty awesome. Then on Saturday we headed to a beach which actually has bathrooms and a shower and some fales in which people can hang out and camp! A bunch of people went diving, but I didn’t have any gear so I didn’t. It also would have been my first dive outside of my lovely little quarry certification dive. AJ and I hung out on the beach for several hours talking about life. It was one of those profound and inspiring conversations, and I really enjoyed it. As of now, the plan is not to save the world single handedly and not to be overly hard on myself. Rather, it’s time to really enjoy life during my senior year of college, learn some things, and realize that I’m not going to come up with a solution to all of the unbelievable problems on my own. I need to find my little sliver in which I can find happiness and make a difference, and I will.

            Saturday I had my first hot shower since arriving! We went to Kristine’s house after the beach to shower and change to go to a dinner at our friend Leilua’s house. The dinner was fabulous. Leilua is half Samoan (her father came here over 30 years ago from California), and she’s just awesome. Our other friend Quinana who is Leilua’s best friend also came. Her house is so beautiful, deeply set back from the road with a large yard in front and a spectacular garden her mom maintains. The house itself has tons of windows and huge rooms with tall ceilings and is decorated with Samoan art and beautiful photos of the family. Quinana played ukulele and sang with Leilua, and we all sat around talking while Leilua’s mom cooked. The girls are extraordinarily talented! It makes me miss Noah and Dan playing a lot; all of them playing together would sound great. Since Leilua’s dad grew up in southern California, they prepared us Mexican food. And Leilua’s mom even cooked things specially for me! There was Spanish rice and fried corn tortillas and whole wheat tortillas and guacamole and salsa and salad and artichoke hearts and asparagus and papaya and cantaloupe and grapes and for the meat eaters there were  refried beans and enchiladas and ground beef. It was delicious. After dinner we sat around and talked, and Leilua’s mom told me a story about Leilua’s high school graduation party during which they had 150 kids at their house. Apparently there was dancing on the deck, and the entire deck collapsed. Then Leilua danced for us! She has been taking classes since she was five, and danced hula, ancient Hawaiin dance, Tongan, and Samoan. It was spectacular.

            On Sunday we went to Tisa’s and hung out on the beach with our newest group of Coast Guard friends. Then yesterday I did my friend Lisa’s P 90 X yoga dvd. It was an hour and a half, and now my entire body is in pain. I love it. We also went to a bbq to celebrate the fourth to which I brought a “cake”? I had made. Originally the idea was to make chocolate chip cookies, but we couldn’t find any chocolate chips without milk fat in them, so I decided to make snickerdoodles. Considering I had no recipe, no measuring devices, and no baking sheet, and had never made them before, whatever I made turned out pretty well. We thought what we were making would be cookie cakes, but they really turned into some sort of cinnamon sugar cake/bread to which we of course added some chocolate frosting. I like them, and the entire pan was pretty much gone by the end of the evening yesterday, so I’m going to call it an almost success.

            I also realized how pathetic it is that I can’t hula hoop and have never been able to. I’m convinced that I’m perhaps the only girl in the world (with the exception of my mother) who can’t do it. It’s a rhythm thing I guess? I spent literally hours yesterday practicing, sweating like a pig, hogging the hula hoop and snatching it back whenever people would come over and have one try. Hannah became my personal coach, and I definitely did improve by the end of the night. It’s a new goal for me. I’m getting one and practicing when I get home. I look a little spastic while doing it, and more than once people implied that they would be too embarrassed to practice in front of everyone if they couldn’t do it like I was doing…it took me back to my gymnastics days when I would stay at the gym a half hour late after my four or five hour practices just to get a skill right. Except this was a little more sad. AJ hula hooping is also probably my favorite thing ever to watch. He thrashes about, thrusting his hips wildly in all directions. Kelly is totally a pro, doing it without thinking or trying at all. Life’s not fair. I can’t believe I just wrote such a long paragraph about hula hooping…

            Another highlight of the evening was making a coconut bra for Ava. This guy Robert worked on one out of a coconut Ava had cut the meat out of, using a broken knive and a corkscrew to drill holes in it and fashioning straps out of twine and palm fronds…it was pretty hilarious.

            Anyway, LESS THAN A WEEK LEFT. So crazy! I’ll definitely have some more exciting stories to share after this weekend.