Wild - B-iva ma I-sefulu-tasi, B-iva ma I-sefulu-tasi
I have been trying to learn Samoan numbers since I arrived here in American Samoa. Luckily, it only took me one full day, 7 months later, of playing bingo to make me proficient in counting, especially when the numbers are prefaced with B-I-N-G or O. I have also never been good at bingo - any random player at a VFW hall could beat me, blindfolded; so playing in American Samoa, was interesting and defeating. In a country where gambling is illegal, bingo is the biggest form of entertainment. On my way home each day, I see lines of cars along the street outside of churches, where a diversity of Samoan people sit stamping away at the 9 bingo sheets in front of them with the monotonous voice of the bingo caller holding the players' destinies. Playing bingo was not going to go well - but as a large part of the culture in the country that is my current home, I was stoked to get a shot at it. Rather than joining bingo down the street in downtown Leone, my Samoan best friend, Joey, and his badass mom brought us to the far away village of Aoa to play in a game his church was organizing. Aoa is a village all the way on the east side of the island, and so we spent an hour and 15 minutes in the back of a pick up on Monday morning driving to Aoa, soaking in the sunrise and blasting music out of our speaker. Eventually, after driving over the mountains and down a cement road that only services 200 people, we arrived at a small church in Aoa. We were too tired to even begin to think about winning a game of bingo, but we were quickly thrown in to learn the rules of the trade with Joey’s mom’s friend, as she and Joey left us to set up the venue. They walked away in their vibrant blue matching shirts, which they had gotten made earlier that week just for the event, and we were left with our bingo ‘dabbers’, a schedule of the day, and an experienced bingo-er (?) by our side. She explained that the schedule explained the different sequences that would win the prize for each bingo game – not the simple straight line, but things like ‘kites’, ‘corner stamps’, and more that went right over my head. I focused instead, on the fact that my dabber was my favorite color, orange, and on the 10-year old girl next to me who was silently mouthing to me asking about Johannah’s nose ring. Eventually, the game began. We were handed stacks and stacks of complicated bingo cards and a stick of glue – we watched as our neighbor glued 4 bingo sheets at a time to the table in front of her and followed suit. How were we going to stamp 4 2x2 bingo sheets at the same time? I had no idea, but for some reason it didn’t seem too daunting in the moment. The way the paper filled with color as I stamped away with my orange dabber and Johannah’s pink one made the effort worthwhile. At the end of each game, instead of being left with bingo sheets that smelled of old newspaper, we created masterpieces. Johannah and I looked at each other and knew immediately what we had to do – use them as wallpaper. We were thought of as a crazy as we piled up dozens of cards instead of throwing them in the multiple trashcans set up around us, but it will be beautiful it, I’m sure. Because we were the only ‘palagis’ there, the numbers began in Samoan. It was okay, because immediately our large table of welcoming Samoan women shouted out the translations for numbers as they were announced, and applauded us when we knew them without their help. My stamping skills allowed me to stamp 5 boxes per minute while my neighbor stamped at least 50. When wild numbers were announced, she would finish her own and go stamping away at mine before I got the chance to check for mistakes. At a break, we asked Tina how often she plays bingo…”everyday since I was 25” she replied…”and how often do you win?”… “maybe twice a month?” Woah. Now that is dedication. As bingos were called behind, in front, and all around us, with none coming from our table, she did not even look defeated. She laughed with the rest of us when the counter spoke too quickly and we yelled at him, or when we made joke about our dabber (let’s take a moment to realize how awesome it is that it’s called a ‘dab’ber and our favorite thing to do is dab). The game went on for hours, 4 to be exact, with only short breaks for the callers to rest their voices. At jackpot and bonus rounds, which we knew we had no chance in winning, we took a break as well and scrounged around for bottles of water. Although we were in the middle of a jungle at a beautiful Samoan church, we were also under a tent in the hellishly hot sun. A breeze that would come every 10 minutes caused everyone to breathe a sigh of relief, and then left us begging for more. Dehydration hit hard, as a result, and I chugged as much water as I could get my hands on. When I ran to the bathroom, my new 10-year old friend followed me and stood in the stall with me asking who my mom is (a weird question to start with, I think). When I got back for a snack break, our new table friends offered me a guava, after I shared that I’d never eaten a fresh one. As a fruit fanatic, it was my favorite part of the day. FRESH GUAVA, how cool. Once we got to the final few rounds, it was clear we were hopeless and no rewards were coming our way, so I started trying to give myself intense motivational speeches in my head and Johannah began helping her neighbor. The last 20 minutes felt like ages and when the final number was called followed by a victorious player yelling ‘BINGO!’ (not us), we sighed again in relief. Samoan Bingo was over and we were losers. Still we smiled at those around us and shared our losses. On the ride back it began raining, proving mother nature’s bipolar qualities, which have been showing themselves a lot in the past month, and we cuddled up in the comforting AC of Joey’s mom’s car and fell asleep, dreaming about those orange and pink dots that were almost permanently etched in my mind. Another one off the bucket list!
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January 2017
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