Christmas Craziness!

           Christmas in Kosrae is a big deal. A very big deal. Preparation for Christmas starts about two weeks before Christmas Day, though the countdown begins in September. Kosraeans celebrate Christmas quite a bit differently than Americans and it was certainly an interesting tradition to experience. Christmas this year was special as Kosraean churches from Pohnpei, Guam, the Marshall Islands, and the United States came to Kosrae for a HUGE celebration that happens every four years.
           Kosraeans celebrate Christmas by marching and singing in church, think marching band with no instruments, and they take the marches very seriously. As I stated above, we started practicing our marches about two weeks before Christmas and practiced every day but Sunday from 7 pm to around 11 pm. The marches were divided into several groups including the children, Etawi Fusr, Woman's Chorus, Men's Chorus, older adults, and the whole church. Since this was a special year, we had two separate celebrations, one just for Walung and the larger celebration, which means we had to learn even more marches.
           One of the most important parts of the marching is the stars, or etu. Each church is given an assigned number of stars depending on the size of the church. Stars are usually carried by the high schools girls, but in Walung there are 20 stars and not enough high school girls so the stars varied from middle school girls to college students. I was chosen to carry one of the big stars, etu luhlap, and therefor as one of the leaders of the marching. It was the first time a Peace Corps Volunteer had been chosen to carry a star and I'm incredibly honored that my village chose me.

Etu luhlap

          Walung had its celebration on the Thursday before Christmas and it was a lot of fun to watch all the marches, and dodge the candy that was thrown at the end of each march. Since actual Christmas was on Sunday the big celebration was on the following Tuesday to ensure everyone had enough time to practice and Tafunsak Church, who was hosting, was able to decorate and set everything up for the celebration. We had two practices in Tafunsak before the actual event and, if I wasn't already nervous enough, our march was changed the day before the celebration. I had struggled to remember all the moves and learn the song we were singing, in addition to be pretty sick, so the last minute changes did not make me very happy.
          The order of the marches weren't decided until the morning of the celebration and when Walung was assigned to go first it led to a lot of last minute scrambling to get ready. The actual marching was a bit of a blur as I was trying to get through it without messing up, which I did anyway, twice, but the rest of the day was a lot of fun. All of the other PCVs were at the celebration, including one of our friends who was visiting from Pohnpei, and it was fun to watch the other 13 marches and spend time with the other volunteers. The celebration started at 9:30 in the morning and didn't end until after 1 in the morning, though luckily I was able leave early with the other volunteers. Unfortunately, I ended up losing my voice from a combination of being sick, singing, and talking way too much with the other volunteers, but it was totally worth it.
           In addition to the church celebrations, we also had a Christmas celebration for school. The grades were divided into clusters, ECE-2nd, 3rd-5th, and 6th-8th, and each cluster performed a song or two for their parents and the rest of the community. The teachers sang as well, so I now can sing Silent Night in Kosraean.

The 3rd-5th Graders at School Christmas

          One of the highlights of Christmas break, was the chance to see my friend, Matt, who's a volunteer on Pohnpei. Matt, Sorcha, and Ashley came to Walung for a night and it was great to spend time with each other and have a chance to catch up. I also got to show my village to my friends and introduce them to my host family. On Friday, before heading back to Tafunsak, we went on a hike with my host siblings, Ahok, Srue, and Titan, to a waterfall. The hike took about an hour and a half and was a bit of a challenge as we were hiking barefoot and had to spend a lot of time walking up creeks, with a lot of falling down. At the waterfall there was a pool large enough to swim in and it was cold! It was really refreshing to swim in cold water after a hard hike and it was great to spend bonding time with my friends and my host siblings.

Ahok, Srue, and Titan at the waterfall

Waterfall

         On a side note, I highly recommend that everyone watch the newest Disney movie, Moana, as soon as possible, I think I've seen it 4 or 5 times already. Not only is the music amazing but the island life is very much like Kosrae, especially Walung. It's hugely popular here and it reinforces the importance of representation in media and entertainment. This is the first movie my students have seen when they actually look like the person in the movie and can understand all the references. Anyway, issues of representation aside, the movie is great and everyone should watch it. 

Facsin Fridays: Alu

           Every Peace Corps volunteer has three goals they hope to accomplish, regardless of the sector they serve or the country in which they serve. The first goal is capacity building and skills transfer, which for me means working with a teaching counterpart and passing along English and teaching skills. The second goal is to teach host country nationals about American culture, such as Thanksgiving. The third goal is to teach Americans about the culture and traditions of the country in which the volunteer serves. In an effort to teach my, admittedly limited, reading audience about Kosraean culture I have decided to post periodic culture posts. The title of each post will be Facsin Fridays, as facsin (fay-seen) means culture or tradition and I'll hopefully able to post on Fridays.

          The rest of the title of this post, Alu (all-u) means church in Kosraean, one of the most important parts of Kosraean culture. Before talking about church in modern culture I'll need to give a short history lesson to put things in perspective and I'm a history nerd so I found all of this extremely interesting. The Christian church didn't appear in Kosrae until the mid-1800's and prior to the arrival of the missionaries, Kosrae was a polytheistic, matrilineal society. One of the few remaining ancient ruins in Kosrae are those of a temple to Singlaku, the Goddess of Breadfruit. 

           The first European contact occurred in the 1820s and shortly after, Kosrae became a stopping place for whale ships in the Pacific. The consistent contact with the Westerners led to the transmission of many diseases to which the Kosraeans had no immunitiy. As a result, the population of Kosrae plummeted to about 300 and much of the traditional way of life and culture was lost. The first missionaries appeared in Kosrae in the 1850's, and by the 1870's the entire island had converted to Christianity. Today the church is the most important part of Kosraean culture and is a major part of daily life.

          Sunday in Kosrae is rest and church day. To start, traditionally, there is no cooking over a fire during the daylight. I'm sure some of you are saying, wait, Devon, you don't have a stove, you have to cook over a fire, how do you eat on Sundays? On Sundays, my host mom will wake up really early and cook a big pot Kosraean soup or fry fish, which we will eat throughout the day. Though this is the tradition, there are times when my host mom or others will cook anyway. Most other activities aren't allowed either; swimming, running, playing, any loud activity are all frowned upon on Sundays. So most Sundays are spent watching movies, talking and reading, a very relaxing day.

          Now, on to church itself. Church service starts at 10 and will last anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour. Immediately after church, is Sunday School, which lasts about the same amount of time. Unlike in the US, there are entirely separate services for the adults and the children, including Sunday School. In the afternoon, there are a second services at 3, for the children, and 4 which is split between the Etawi Fusr (young adults) and the adults.  I usually go to the morning services but not the afternoon service. There are additional services on Wednesday, for the women only, and Friday. In addition, any community or government activity is started and ended by praying. Clothing for church is very strict, either mumus or dresses for the women and collared shirts and long pants for the men. Any activity that involves entering the church, including cleaning, requires church clothes.

          While it may seem this amount of religion can be overwhelming, it really isn't that bad. As not a particularly religious individual, it did take some time to get used to the constant presence of religion, especially in school and meetings, but at this point it has become a normal part of daily life. It is impossible to separate church from Kosraean culture and at this point I wouldn't want to.