Independence Day Part II

Saturday we were ready for our round two of celebrations. The morning was spent diddly daddling around the office and Apia. We went to the market to buy fresh fruit to make fruit salads for our events later in the day.
When we were hanging out, we got to talking about one of our favorite events over the 4th, and hot dogs came up several times. Who did we think was going to win the hot dog eating contest, and what are the best ingredients to put on a dog. We talked about it so much that I craved hot dogs all weekend and tried to eat them every chance I got.
Since we had a water boiler, a few of us decided to have a hot dog party, since we didn’t have the financial resources to make our own hot dog eating contest. We cooked our hot dogs and walked to the sea wall to get the full experience of being in Samoa on an American holiday.
The hot dogs tasted so good that we ate and ate until we were stuffed. (Then wondered how the people in the competition at Coney Island can go through 50-60 dogs in such a short time.) While we ate we had two dogs drooling over our food. Since there were leftovers as we are not the true Coney Island champions, we decided to feed the hungry dogs.
The Ambassadors office was having a picnic for us that evening so we headed over there where we shared food and a good time.
At the park we played croquet, ate a lot of food, and played volleyball. The US Coast Guard was docked in the harbor, so some of the men from the ship came and joined us. When it became too dark to see the ball we headed back to the shelter where we watched a slideshow about America making us all teary eyed. They handed out sparklers and the evening came alive. It was beautiful.
After the picnic we had a gong away part for group 80. The party was to take place at another volunteer’s house which is on the school compound. The students at his school helped him clean up and decorate in true Samoan fashion. The place looked amazing.
We played games, ate a lot of food, sang karaoke and just had an amazing time. It was truly an evening to remember.
Throughout the day, I decided I was going to celebrate the holiday right, so I kept two flags in my hair at the pig tails. I would randomly take them out and begin waving them around until some begged me for a flag, and I caved. (PS Jen…can you find more flags!)
It was still only the 3rd of July…so more fun had to happen before the holiday was over!