Vanuatu begins

We flew into Port Vila, in Vanuatu. We had a wonderfully British breakfast on the water then visited the museum. There we saw what they thought of WW2, masks, and many wildlife samples.
After setting out for the airport, we stopped by a French Bakery (run by an actual French lady- so you know it must be good) for the requested sandwich for Jacob. We arrived the suggested 2 hours early, and it took about 3 minutes to check in and we waited the remaining 1 hour 57 minutes. Upon lamenting this suggestion later to Jacob, we were told sometimes if most people are there, they will just leave early.
We arrive on the island of Tanna, greeted by a Jacob who has impressively still not cut his hair since arriving. He brought us to a deserted cafe where the other Peace Corps hang out on Fridays. They were a friendly bunch who talked us into trying “a shell” of Kava. It wasnt too bad and all it did was make my tongue go numb.
In Australia we had asked many people their o
pinions of it- our musician on the plane said it made him dizzy for 3 days, my uncle said it made you very lazy after drinking it. The Peace corps member who continued drinking it (he must have had atleast 10 by that evening) said that’s how he integrates into the community, and also it was better than what alcoholism had started to do in the community. Up until recently, only the 3 people in charge were allowed to drink Kava. Once it became accessible to everyone, the crime rate dropped as everyone did that instead of drink. He was a health education volunteer that said the worst part of the job was everyones total lack of care for the suffering of animals. A pig, you club to death. A dog, you let become a happy part of the family, until some friends who like dog come over and talk you into clubbing it to death. A cow, you club a few times before slicing the throat of. Hes working on explaining to them that animals suffer as people do, but it has not gone far.
We walked to
the road by the marke
t where someone bought a stick with about 15 coconuts tied on for the equivalent of $5, then sat to wait. Another member of PC said it was a great first day to experience life on the island, and we continued to wait another 3 hours for a truck to come by and bring us to Green hill where he lived. Each hill around was green, but this was the only one with red soil- so they called it green hill. Eventually we climb into the back of a truck already full of people and stuff. I sat with a little old lady by my feet and we set out along the extremely bumpy road. Our driver was excellent at avoiding the deep potholes that littered the road. He did speed up to pass someone else- when I remarked on it someone said we were still very lucky since the truck going slowly was drunk.
We stopped to pick up some roots and what looked like dead unfortunate chicken which was somehow still alive, before continuing on the bumpy road. The lady at my feet touched my leg and
laughed, which bewildered me until it was finally time for us to leave and I found the basket i was holding with bread and two eggs now only had one egg. The other egg was all over the basket and my pants. We walked the remaining to Jacob’s little hut. Here we started the 9 day wait without shower or washing machine, with egg on my pants and hands, thistle seeds on my back, and also it was cold. He had a nice 3 room hut powered by a small solar panel outside. We met the cat who arrived only for food but who’s scent drove off the rats (before, Jacob would drown them in buckets. The locals would put leaves out that make the rats itchy enough to scratch themselves to death. then went stargazing. We could see the orange of the volcano, and more stars than we had ever seen before.
Jacob kindly gave us his bed with a mosquito net, and hes now sleeping on a pad on the floor.