Daylight Savings

Day light savings

In September Samoa introduced Daylight Savings Time.  Most of the country was against it as the sun began rising so late, and set late at night.  People were getting sick because of their time schedule.  They were waking up too early, and going to bed too late.  It took me a month to get used to it where I felt as if I was a walking zombie with a constant cold, like most others in the country.  The worst part of it was we switched from having dinners at 7, to close to 9.  I never felt like I was getting enough sleep.  When school started I spent my morning watching outside my window for the sun to rise, so I did not have to walk to school in the dark. 

A few weeks ago we had our time change.  We fell back to the regular time.  It was nice to be back to a normal life again, however, I had gotten so used to the weird schedule of life I was leading.  It was hard to get back to “normal”.  To make it harder to get back to normal, they changed the school schedule.  Instead of assembly starting at 7:45, it was now starting at 7:15.  I was so bummed to hear my alarm charm at the earlier hour. 

Most people in Samoa that I talk with are not fans of Daylight Savings.  They don’t see the need for it.  In a society where everything revolves around the daylight hours, you get used to that being your clock.  This means on a normal day, when the sun rises at 6ish, people start heading to the plantation and women start their weaving.  They work throughout the morning, and head home for the hottest part of the day.  People usually take naps during the hottest part of the day.  Then in the afternoon women begin weaving again, and some people head to church.  In the evenings, around 5, everyone gathers around the malae to play volleyball and rugby.  Then the church bells ring for evening prayer/curfew and everyone heads home for dinner.  It is a nice schedule that everyone gets used to. 

With daylight savings, those who work jobs outside the house have to deal with the confusion.  This means waiting for the bus in the dark, and go to church at different hours.  When you go through your life by a clock, it makes little things confusing when you are used to such a strict routine. 

They said Daylight Savings was started to save money on electricity by having more hours of electricity...however I never understood this.  Samoans do their life by the sun.  When the time of the sun setting changes, all of the activities around it change as well.  Instead of curfew being at 6:30, it was at 7:30.  I think more people that worked were using more electricity as they had to turn lights on in the morning to get ready for work, instead of needing electricity in the evening. 

I just don’t understand the need for it. 

Daylight Savings, I am not a fan of you.