After waiting a week for cyclone Vania to pass, my PCV friend and I were finally given the okay to go to her site by plane (original plan was to take a little passenger boat). We boarded another small plane which landed on Ambryn firstaem and then proceeded to Epi. The landing on Ambryn was pretty rough....let's just say we swayed back and forth through trees before hitting the grass runway. We landed on Epi and scouted out a boat to take to Lamen Island.
The solwota was still really rough when we arrived and we got drenched on the ride over. It was pretty amusing however since we were on a boat with some chiefs...we all laughed at how wet we were getting.
Lamen Island is a small island of about 1 km in diameter and a population of 500. It is surrounded by bigger islands which protects it from tsunamis and cyclones. The people on Lamen take canoes to Epi to tend to their gardens. They spend most of their days making mats, laplap, and keeping the island clean and polished.
The island was so well groomed I felt like I was walking into a movie set. Apparently everyone rakes the road and around their house on Saturday...which explains why it was so clean. Everyone pretty much lives on top of each other as you can imagine with a population of 500 in such a small area.
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