On my 4th day in Vanuatu, we went to visit Matt’s host family in the village of Epau. We opened the door to head out and Nicky was sitting outside waiting, which was a big surprise since he could barely walk the night before after celebrating his film festival win.

We drove an hour to Epau and parked in Matt’s family’s area of the village. It was time for more hand shaking. Over the course of the day and night, I think I shook hands with almost everyone in the village, even the little kids.

I met Matt’s abu (grandpa), Dan Bob, but Matt’s Papa, Kalmel, was out in the bush cutting up firewood, so we went out to meet him. We got put to work almost immediately. We carried a couple loads of firewood to Matt’s truck and then Papa sent Lil Jon to go get us coconuts.

Papa tried to cut the top off a coconut with Matt’s machete, but it was so dull that he insulted it and grabbed his machete. He basically looked at Matt and said, “That’s not a knife…..This is a knife.” (Picture a black Crocodile Dundee.)

After we drank our coconuts, we went trekking through the garden so that Papa and Jon could dig some yams.

Once the yams were dug, Papa went looking for a grub for me to eat. I wish I could have had my Simba moment, slurped it up and said, “Slimy, yet satisfying,” but unfortunately there were no grubs to be found.

On the way back from the gardens, we stopped at Matt’s friend, Morris’ house. They had some pig liver on a stick that had just been cooked and gave me some to try. I assumed they had just killed a pig somewhere.

We went back to Papa’s, unloaded and then went down to the river to wash Matt’s truck.

We went back to the village for a while and Abu Dan Bob tried to speak to me in Bislama. I had no idea what he was saying, but I did my best to roll with it (Matt told me today that he went back to Epau yesterday and Abu misses me.)

When the sun went down, we headed back down to the river. We dropped Morris off to go dig some kava. We dropped Papa Andrew off at the ocean to go dive for lobster and fish. Matt, Nicky, James, Papa and I went to the freshwater stream to go shining for eel and prawns.

Matt told me I should wear my hiking boots because of sharp stuff on the bottom of the stream. I listened and as a result I had to smuggle my soiled boots through Australian customs the next week.

Our group killed 2 of the 3 eels we saw and I managed to chop a prawn’s head off with a machete. No such thing as overkill in Vanuatu. After more than an hour and getting lost for a moment, we headed back to the truck. Everyone else was already back at the truck and Morris had already cleaned the kava. A bunch of people began chewing the kava and Nicky and I had a few shells of the redi-made kava.

We headed back to the village to prepare the kava and all the food we had caught. We drank kava and storied while the food cooked.

Matt had told me to be prepared for a lot of questions about how I was finding Vanuatu, but one he had not prepared me for was when Mama Rita asked me, “Do you think black people are kind?” My drunk kava brain was thinking, “Well, everyone in Vanuatu is way more friendly than most people in the U.S.” My drunk kava mouth said, “Yea, here they are.” Another one of my awesome answers was when she asked if I liked Vanuatu and I said, “Yea. I mean, it’s definitely a new experience.”

Stop talking and drink more kava, Greg…..

When the kava was almost gone, we ate dinner and then it was off to bed before the kava kicked. For the record, the eel tasted like white fish and it was delicious.

We were woken up at 6 am for breakfast (although the roosters woke me up for a while a couple hours earlier). I had some bread and jam and then they pulled out the leftover eel, which I politely declined. It was too early for eel. We said our goodbyes after breakfast and told them we’d be back the next day for the 100 days ceremony. We took the long way back around the other side of the island and after a couple drop offs, went back to Matt’s to get some sleep.

The next day we headed back to Epau, but this time with a full truck load and truck bed of people.

When someone in the village dies, they have a 100 day mourning period that ends with the 100 day ceremony. The men don’t shave or cut their hair during this time and then cut their beards and hair as part of the ceremony. Abu’s wife had died and it just so happened that the 100th day was while I was in Vanuatu.

When we got to Epau, we sat and chatted for a while then drove about 20 minutes to another village to pick up some food and more people. When we got back to Epau, the daytime kava was almost ready. After the first big shell, I was half in the bag already. This was a strong batch of kava. Only Matt, Papa Andrew and I were drinking and after 3 shells we were all drunk. Papa Andrew was so drunk that he disappeared without saying anything to anyone.

Matt had told me to bring sunglasses for daytime kava drinking, but I forgot. It was a mistake. Kava makes your eyes light sensitive, but also we were the only ones drinking and I felt like the other 10-15 people were staring at us. I wished I had sunglasses to hide behind and Matt kept pointing and asking me how many chickens I saw. He was seeing double. This was definitely the strongest kava I had the whole trip.

A little later we brought some people down to the river so they could dig kava for the evening. Matt and I went down to the ocean and took a much needed nap under the sheoaks.

We went back to the village and Matt played soccer (for like 5 minutes) with some of the kids. Kava and skilled movements don’t mix. I took some pictures and sat with the guys while they cleaned the kava root. Abu came and talked to me in Bislama and I did the best I could to respond. Eventually Matt came and sat beside me to translate.

We dropped the people back off at the other village and returned to Epau for a shell of kava. We chatted with some of the new Peace Corps volunteers quickly and then began saying our goodbyes. Mama told me I needed to come back to Vanuatu to live and Papa told me they would find me a girl when I came back. I told him to make sure it was a big mattress. (They loved the big mattress jokes. It was what won them over on the first day.) I thanked them for everything and we were on our way.

Ale, Epau. Lukim yu nekis taem. Tangkyu tumas.

(Update: I left Vanuatu, but Vanuatu did not want to leave me. After a couple visits to the doctor in Brisbane, it was discovered that I came back with an intestinal parasite called Cryptosporidium. It could have come from a number of things, but most likely the pig liver or the kava I drank down by the river which may or may not have been mixed using river water. Other than a week of somewhat frequent, unpleasant trips to the toilet, I was fine though and it would pass through my system on it’s own. I’m in Perth, Western Australia now and I’m almost back to 100%. Just another thing to add to the list of trip experiences.)