February 1st – Dimanche – Teahupoo

On Tahitian hospitality.

I am writing this late in the evening of another amazing day. No fishing, no water-based adventures, but cultural immersion instead. Last night was the birthday of Gineta, my hostess here. Her family and friends gathered around to celebrate. Present were some thirty people - sisters, in-laws, friends, all with kids of varying ages. But before I get to that, I should describe the situation here a bit better.

My hosts are Estellio and Gineta, a couple in their late forties/early fifties. They have three kids, and formally live in the town of Taravao about a fifteen minute drive away. Estellio works for the Service de Peche (fisheries service), and has generously promised to both arrange for housing and some contacts with the local fishing community. Gineta does all the cooking and together they take care of the Parish House. Indeed it was Estellio who largely built this house and, because of the small size of the congregation (only some six families), has somewhat the run of it. He prefers this place to his house in Taravao in that it is directly on the water in a setting reminiscent of his home on the atoll of Rangiroa. And after being here a couple of days I can only concur – this is a very nice little corner of paradise. Together they maintain the kitchen, work the orchards around the church, and generally keep the place up.

Since I arrived there has been a steady stream of friends coming and hanging out during the afternoon hours. Jean, the spear fisherman, and his wife Joana are here quite a bit as are cousin Louisa and her husband, the deacon Ernest. You put these six people around a table and what follows is much hilarity. I understand absolutely none of the rapid flow of Frehitian (French and Tahitian mixed evenly), but the peals of laughter are enough to bring a smile to my face. Everyone seems absolutely nonplussed by the presence of this strange person in their circle, and I quickly relax and am content to try to snatch a few words of the conversation here and there.

Right, and I should mention that Jean and Joana are complete Elvis nuts. I mean name-your-son-Elvis kind of Elvis nuts. Jean apparently in earlier life wore his hair Elvis style, and can do a mean Elvis air guitar complete with the moves. Why do I tell you this? Because the substantial boom box in the corner churns out a continuous soundtrack of Elvis. Elvis on infinite repeat. And not the young Elvis either I’m afraid, but the worst excesses of the Fat Elvis during the darkest moments of his Las Vegas career. I hope not to offend anyone by saying this, but a drug overdose seems like the next logical step for what pours out of the speakers. The juxtaposition of this and the life and people around me is something to behold.

Moving on, however, to the birthday soirée. The spread of the table was as lavish as it was broad in scope. The modern Tahitian family is a mélange of Polynesia and Europe, and accordingly on the table is everything from a potato salad to traditional Paumotu-style grilled fish. Potato salad being fairly familiar to us all, let me describe the traditional Tahitian end of the menu. The staples are uru (breadfruit), taro, various fish, coconut milk and, more recent additions, corned beef and baguette. The uru is roasted whole over a fire, peeled and served in chunks from which you break a piece of your liking with your fingers. Taro is boiled, with the coconut milk poured over everything on the plate. By the way, there are various kinds of coconut milk, none of which bear much resemblance to the Thai-style product found canned in American supermarkets. One variety is prepared fresh, tonight by the teenage girls. A fresh coconut is split and grated, the resulting pulp then squeezed through a cheesecloth to yield the product. It is lighter both in consistency and taste from the Thai variety. Another style is fermented for a few days and kept refrigerated, having a slightly tangy taste.

The fish. Where to begin? Prepared every imaginable way from completely raw with a bit of salt and lime juice to being tossed on the fire whole and turned until appropriately charred on both sides. In the case of Oiri, a species of trigger fish, the raw liver is inserted under the charred skin just before cooking is finished, the oily liver melting into the flesh for some extra flavor. Some fish are just tossed into the pot and boiled, others steamed, but in no case are any particular spices inserted into the cooking process.

Perhaps the most peculiar of these dishes is Fafaru. You start with some small fish, even lobster, which you place in a jar with some seawater. You then leave this jar sitting around sealed for four to five days – and did I mention the contents are dead at this time? You then carefully open the container and decant the liquid portion, this being the product (part A) of the process. Only then do you secure a perfectly good parrot fish (Uhu), tuna (Ahe), trevally (Paihere), or any other fish you might have on hand at the time. You then skin the fresh fish, fillet it into bite size morsels and pour part A liberally over the pile of it. Let the two mellow for few hours and…eat. Yes, I have tried it and yes, it does taste just as revolting as it sounds. Mind over matter, however, and if you avoid breathing and concentrate on Elvis crooning Moody Blue in the background you quickly realize that there are worse things in the world. I submit that this dish truly is one of the Kings of the Land of Acquired Tastes.

Overall Tahitian food is uncomplicated with subtle flavors coming wholly from the ingredients themselves rather than added spices or sauces. Provided you like fish it is really very good!

After dinner follows a performance. The young women of the family come out one after another to perform the classic Tahitian hula, complete with wreaths of flowers and colorful, not-too-covering dress. The dance is clearly and deeply part of this culture, yet I still find myself startled by the sensuality of the dance in this setting of family and friends. Clearly this is not Kansas, where a 16-year old girl would probably find herself grounded for a month should her parents see her perform a dance like this! The party goes on in a rather mellow way until about midnight as people drift off, leaving me eventually listening to the surf and the echoes of the mournful voice of Elvis still bouncing inside my head.

Sunday we go to church, where the priest does me the courtesy of saying a few introductory words and a summary of the sermon in English. Once again the generosity and hospitality shines through as after the service I am ushered to the head of the table, taking precedence even over the priest. He sits to my right and speaks very good English. We speak about modern Tahiti and the political troubles brewing in the Polynesian Assembly. After the breakfast preparations commence for an afternoon traditional family lunch/dinner, and I am ushered out the door with Louisa on an errand to do, well, I’m not sure exactly what, but options seem limited so I go along.

See, Louisa and I do not really have a common language. I mean there is a ton of good will and a real desire on my part to learn Tahitian, the intensity of which is only exceeded by Louisa’s determination to have me speaking fluently by the time we get back. Accordingly, she points out every plant on the roadside and loudly repeats the Tahitian name of each twice before moving on to the next plant we flash by in the car. I try to make the most of the opportunity by repeating each name twice, but the situation is utterly hopeless and my head soon swims with a cloud of syllables disconnected from each other; never mind of any particular meaning. My fallback position is the grin-and-nod routine. And grin I do, until it hurts. And eventually all the defenses and the verbal person gives way to a more primal grunting and pointing animal, and we establish some level of communication on this more limited plane.

So I get a tour of Taravao and its environs, the local schools, waterfalls, picnic spots, neighbors and relatives houses until I’m anxiously glancing at my watch as the hour draws past midday. We go to Louisa’s house to get some coconuts and mangoes, then to her daughter’s house to get some Taro and some other places for flowers and eventually I am emphatically pointing at my watch that now points at two o’clock. I get my point across and we get back to Teahupoo where Louisa is met with some reproachful looks from all the gathered family. Everyone has arrived, and much of the food is on the table; people had started worrying. I feel both mollified and indignant.

What follows is an eight-hour eating, drinking (not to excess), hanging out session during which I have time to talk to lots of people about, well, everything and anything. Lots of people want to hear about Obama. Some teenagers want to talk about the environment and their worries about Tahiti. Some people tell me about their relatives in LA and Hawaii. I hear about Jean’s older brother who went to Hollywood with the film crew of the Marlon Brando movie Mutiny on the Bounty some forty years ago as a very young man and had a career there. More dancing and eating until around eight o'clock people start drifting off and by 10:00 the place is silent. I sit up for a while listening to the surf on the reef and watching the lightning from a passing storm. Language may be an issue, but these people can certainly make one feel comfortable and at home.