More Christmas Eve

Thursday, December 24...continued

We finally got a little bit of rain today, so we quickly grabbed buckets and held them underneath our one downspout with no rain tank.  We filled enough buckets for one load of clothes, but we still need lots more rain.  Aaron has started locking the big rain tank because people are coming at night while we are asleep and taking water.

 

After we finished putting the lelenga and umalau in the motu, I took a quick shower (I had coconut milk all over me) and headed down with the family to welcome the other villages.  We watched the canoes accumulate in the ocean just off the shore and everyone from Marulaon began dancing and singing along with the PVC pipe band.  It was a beautiful and joyful noise!  While everyone was still singing, the canoes began to come ashore.  Suddenly, four young men wearing traditional dress and holding bamboo poles came running down to the shore.  They shouted at the people in the canoe and slapped the water with their poles.  I asked one of the ladies what was going on, and she said it was a traditional welcome.  I'm glad they didn't welcome us this way!  One of the village leaders asked if he could borrow our woven mat that we had purchased from his sister to provide a place to sleep for a guest, so he followed us home to grab the mat.

 

After everyone was distributed to their host houses, we all attended the Christmas Eve services at church around 6:00.  Then Pogo and Melissa came by to help us take our umalau out of the motu and deliver it to the visitors.  We're part of Group 2, the middle section of the village, so we took our 9 x 13 pan overflowing with umalau and watched as our food was distributed evenly across the table covered with leaves.  Eventually, all of the food was set out and everyone was able to get a leaf plate with a little bit of everything on it.  Talk about easy cleanup!

 

About 9:00 p.m. the bell rang again, and all of us walked down the hill to listen to the Christmas caroling.  Aaron is part of Marulaon's choir, and they sang first.  We sat on our mat and listened as a group from each village sang several Christmas carols.  While each group sang, those in the audience walked up to small table and laid down small gifts for the members of the choir.  Thanks to our sweet neighbors, we knew to expect this, so we brought bags with sugar, tea, and coffee mix inside.  Everybody finished a little before 11:00, and we dragged ourselves back up to hill to await the early bell for Christmas morning.