Ethan's Semester In the South Pacific: First Days in Tahiti

Papeete, Tahiti

So here I am on Easter Sunday trying to get caught up on Tahiti. Though I rarely post anything on this blog in a timely manner, I think it bears noting that I am about to follow through on blogging my entire trip without ever giving up. Easter is a little different when you’re on Discover Abroad. First of all, instead of starting your day with an Easter Egg Hunt and chowing down on some peeps and jellybeans, you start your day with two hours of class. So that’s been my days so far.

Anyway, backtracking a little bit as always, after I posted my blog in Christchurch, NZ, I waited all of 5 minutes before everyone else’s alarms went off and it was time to start our voyage to Tahiti. I showered and within 30 minutes, we were on a bus headed to the Christchurch Airport. Some people were a little too bright and cheery for my liking so I put my headphones in and tried to act asleep. We got to the airport in about 15 minutes and didn’t have too long to wait before boarding our connecting flight to Auckland. I still had an assignment that I needed to finish before our international flight, but I passed out with my pen in my hand and my notebook in my lap. I opened my eyes again right as we landed. So as soon as we landed and walked to the international terminal, I made it a point to crank out the assignment as fast I could. We boarded our plane for Papeete, Tahiti shortly thereafter and once again, I fell right asleep on the plane. I probably woke a few times, once to eat the lunch provided and drink a glass of wine to knock me right back out. I think I woke up for good about 30 minutes before landing, so when it was all said and done, I had probably slept for about 4 out the 5 hours on the plane. That compounded with the earlier flight gave me about 5 hours cumulative sleep for the day, which was certainly better than 0. We landed in the late afternoon and disembarked via stairs rather than a gate. The first thing I noticed was the heat and humidity. It felt pretty similar to August in Atlanta (which kind of makes sense because it’s the equivalent to September-October in the Southern Hemisphere and we’re much closer to the equator). In the non-air-conditioned airport, we had quite the line through customs. The whole process probably took about an hour. Finally, we met our transportation and headed to Foyer des Jeunes Files, which would be our accommodations for the next few nights. I’m not sure of the exact translation, but it was an all-girls boarding school and I think it means something along those lines. It was definitely nice to be driving on the right side of the road again, which will hopefully get me conditioned for coming home. We arrived and sort of waited around for a little bit, trying to understand what we were doing. No one spoke English and our professor and a few others didn’t arrive until about 30 minutes after us. Finally, once everyone arrived, we figured out what we were doing and were led to our room. Ours wasn’t that bad. It was all tiled with single beds, but it didn’t have air-conditioning. Luckily, however, there were fans and I had been traveling with one as well. After getting settled, we ate dinner, which was pretty good, and walked across the street to the greenway that splits the main road and the coastline of the harbor. We had orientation for Tahiti for about 30 minutes and then went back and passed out.

The next day, we got up, had breakfast, and boarded a coach to the University of French Polynesia. We had a couple classes, one about the biodiversity of Tahiti and one about the socio-culture of Tahiti. Neither professor spoke great English, so it was a little interesting. Afterward, we had a luncheon with Tahitian students majoring in English. The school prepared an incredible lunch for us and we had a great time interacting with all of the students and hearing about life in Tahiti and telling them about our lives at the University of Georgia. After lunch, we had time to spend more time talking and they performed a cultural dance for us and taught one the dances. We all agreed it was a great afternoon. When we got back, we walked into the city of Papeete. There was a nice greenway that took us all the way to the city. Though it didn’t look exactly like the US, the city still had a developed feel. The street front looked very nice, but all the back street and alleys were a lot different than the nice front. We ended up sitting down outside at a restaurant (the temperature gets a lot better in the afternoon) and having drinks and dinner. After a few hours, we walked back. It felt like 11, but it was really 8, so we stayed up for a couple hours before going to bed.

The next day, we took our tour of the island. We really covered a lot of ground and saw a lot of places in the span of the day.

Tahiti Social History Museum- was our first stop, and I’m glad we got it out of the way because it was really boring. It wouldn’t have been that bad if we could have just gone through and look around for about 30 minutes, except our guide gave a long lecture at every exhibit. It was quite miserable actually. However, outside, there was a cool cultural festival going on with elementary school kids and we watched that for a little which was pretty neat.

Arahurahu- was our next stop and we saw a “marae” which is a Tahitian temple (although no one in Tahiti still follows the ancient religion. Almost everyone accepts Christianity)

Faarumai Waterfalls- was our next stop. There were several really cool waterfalls that were huge and were a lot like pre-conceptions of Pacific islands. It was nice to see that those weren’t far off. We saw a huge lava tube as well that had filled with water, and we also saw a blowhole, which was unlike anything I have ever seen. You would stand next to this hole and every 40 seconds or so, a huge gust would come out and it would be quite startling. It managed to blow my hat off and knock my sunglasses off my face.

Venus Point- After a long, hot day, we made it to Matavai Bay where Captain Cook first landed in Tahiti. We spent about hour there on the black sand beach and swimming in the waves of warm water.

We made it back around dinnertime and walked into Papeete’s famous “moving market”, which are vans that show up and turn into kitchens at night. It was a lot like a food court at a mall. We stayed out a couple hours and went back. That night, we got a letter from the students at the University of French Polynesia, inviting us to afternoon party on the beach the following day. We called back and accepted the invitation and went to bed shortly, thereafter.

The next day (Wednesday, March 27), we had breakfast and went to College Anne-Marie Javouhey, a middle school. We spent the morning with kids, letting them practice their English. For the first part, I was with 3 kids, ages 13, 14, and 15 who had no interest in practicing English. I tried asking and acting out probably 50 questions, but did not get too much help. So that was a little bit of a bust. The next hour was great, though. A couple of us went to actual (air-conditioned) classroom with a full class and teacher, and 5 different groups made presentations to us in English. Afterward, we got up and gave a make-shift presentation about the US, GA, and Athens, and we taught them how to the Go Dawgs kickoff cheer, which was great. Our presentation pretty much brought the class to the bell, so I’m sure they were grateful for that. We left the school, and went to fruit market with the assignment of buying an exotic fruit that the rest of the class could try. I settled on some starfruits and spent the rest of the time walking around. That afternoon, we had our party with our new friends from the University of French Polynesia. We had a great time trying their food and just getting to know one another. We spent a good couple hours with them and were amazed at their generosity in coming to pick us up, cook for us, share with us, and take us home. It was definitely a blessing to really experience their culture in that way. We had to get back by 5 because that night, we had a social with the English teachers from the school we visited earlier. We went out for drinks at a local karaoke bar called “The Retro” and had a great time with them too. After a couple hours and couple drinks, we went back to the “Moving Market” for dinner and stayed there for a while before going to bed.

The next day was our departure day for Moorea (another island in French Polynesia), and if I’m being honest, I probably won’t post about it until I get home. It will be about our final destination for our final week. At this point, I have officially 3 nights left in Tahiti before our departure for the United States. It’s bittersweet knowing I’m going home, but at the same time, I’m excited to get back home and see family and friends and to experience springtime in Athens, the best time of year in the best place in the world.

Happy Easter!!!