A birthday to remember

Turns out my birthday is on Chief's Day in Vanuatu; a national holiday. That means that while I normally would have headed in to Vila with my fellow ICT volunteers, we went in a day early and had Thursday free.

We started the day with a walk to the conservation area on Nguna, and spent the rest of the morning snorkeling around. I even got to see a sea turtle! The picture I got of it is reminiscent of the pictures of the Loch Ness monster in it's quality, but I swear it's there!

We headed back to our host village at around lunch time, and proceeded to hang out on the beach for the rest of the afternoon. Colton and I made a bunch of new frisbee friends; Laura and I played with a kite until we gave it to my host brother who proceeded to run away with it down the beach; we helped make a volcano sand castle on the beach; I played with the adorable puppy at my site; and I spent some time reading on the beach.

At about 4:00, the rest of the VITEL vols staying in Taloa came back from training up the mountain in Mere, and we headed to a Nakamal (kava bar) for cake and celebrations. Sean Corrigan, a fellow VITEL volunteer who also happens to be working on Ambae with me shares my birthday, and some of the other volunteers had organized cakes for us. As I was on my way out the door of my house my host mama called me back and insisted I put on an island dress (pictured below) before I could leave.

After cake, we hung out on the beach storyan (bislama for talking/hanging out) and drinking kava for a while.

A couple of us headed back to my house to make crepes over the wood fire, only to head back to the beach to watch a beautiful sunset and enjoy some warm nutella crepes.

All in all it was a pretty phenomenal birthday, and one I will not soon forget.