Diversity

One of the things I love about where I live is the diversity of cultures. I'm not saying that I appreciate those who make a home in this country and enjoy the benefits of being here without showing respect to our country by learning the language, thinking I should know their language instead and not assimilating what so ever...but that's another issue all together. I've had a few experiences this past week that have made me think about how cool it is to be able to experience other cultures with out traveling to do it.

Last Sunday was Fast Sunday...the first Sunday of the month where we fast for two meals. Every fast Sunday for the last several months we have had a Samoan Sacrament Meeting in the evening. This is in addition to the regular one at church in the morning and it's for the many Samoan members we have at church to be able to have Sacrament Meeting in their language. I went to the first one with Rich who has to go to all of them because he's the Bishop and therefore the presiding authority. Last Sunday was the first Tongan Sacrament Meeting, right after the Samoan Sacrament Meeting, because we also have so many members who are Tongan also. I went to this one last Sunday. I loved it. There was no piano player so they sang a capella. They didn't need accompaniment because they harmonized so beautifully, I felt like I was in the Islands. It was so neat to hear the familiar melody of songs we sing on Sundays sung in Tongan. Even in a language I didn't understand I still felt the message of what these songs are about. The talks were interesting...not that I understood those either...but I picked out some words or phrases that I heard repeated several times, I wondered what they meant. After the meeting we had wonderful food, which is not the ususal for us Palongis after regular Sacrement Meetings. They had papaya, guava, and watermelon all spinkled with coconut. There were fried pastries, kind of like big doughnut holes, called Kei Kei (I probably didn't spell it right), and a drink I don't remember the name of which was very yummy. It was watermelon juice with little chunks of melon, coconut, and I think some other fruit. Everyone is so kind and respectful, it was very cool.

Saturday we were invited to our neighbor's house for a celebration for her, Taiyo, who graduated with her Master Degree in Nursing from Loma Linda. They are from Nigeria and the nicest people. They told us that the party started at 5:00, so we got there about 5:15. No one else was there and they were still just getting ready. We thought we had gotten the time wrong so we asked and they kind of laughed and said they had forgotten to explain African culture to us. When someting is scheduled at 5:00, "African time" means that they don't think it really starts until an hour after that, then they don't want to be the first ones there so they wait another hour before they come. So, we took their little boy Fumbi, who is a year and a half, over to our house to play with the kids who love to play with him while they continued to get their house ready. A little after 6:00 we went back over and there were a few other people there. They had a lot of food and wanted to get started for the people who were there but their pastor wasn't there yet so Femi, the husband, knowing that Rich is a Bishop in our church, asked him to say a few words about why we were all there for the celebration and to say a blessing on the food. Rich did a great job and said the prayer. I think it's the first time I've heard people say, "amen', "that' right", and "uh huh" durring a prayer given by Rich. They were very respectful of Rich because of his calling as a Bishop. Femi explained that in their culture a man of God is highly respected, not because of the man but because of his position as a representative of God. I thought it was neat that even though they are not of our faith they still respected the calling. We got to try some African cuisine too. It's amazing how similar the basics of the food is to the Polynesian and even South American Cultures, it's just seasoned differently. They had a ton of rice which was spicy, kind of like Indian food. There was the beef and pork and most all the parts of the animal in a sauce, spicy again. There were fried Plantains which reminded me of Brazilian food. They also served something like pastells...seasoned meat wrapped in a pastery. Most everyone wore traditional African clothes which were very pretty. We were the only white people there. It was very cool. Sorry, I'm saying cool a lot in this entry! But it was!