A Night Out

Had to write a post today about our fabulous night out last night.

The occasion was Fashionista, with entertainment from the Island Divas, over the road at Trade Winds hotel.

The opening act (only 45 minutes late) was the Divas, a group of 12 fafafines dressed in their skimpiest day dresses. The most beautiful, weirdest group of individuals I've ever seen. Great taste in shoes though, even if they were size 12 minimum.

In complete contrast, the demure, shy Samoan girls and guys modelling the latest in church wear, pule tasis (the matching outfits) and day wear were much more refined. We are just going to have to get our selves a set of matching outfits. The guys all wear their shirts completely oversized, so they made Matt's work shirt look miniscule in comparison.

The models were superb as everytime they came out, the heavens opened, but they still kept smiling and posing as they were getting absolutely drenched.

A highlight was the commentary by the MCs: an older diva who still looked as if she'd give the younger ones a run for their money and who instructed the the sound guy to "Always leave my microphone on, honey" and a local radio announcer. His description of every outfit was along the lines of "and here's Sele looking beautiful in a purplish top matching beautifully a purplish skirt, with a flower pattern going from right to left, no left to right, which highlights the middle section of the skirt" and so on!

In between the models, we were entertained by a guitar trio of palagi who started with a 14th century tune, then descended to self-penned blues: "Come and have some kava kava and loosen up your lava lava". What are the chances of these guys finding each other on a rock in the middle of the Pacific? And then there was the glamourous Miss Bianca Del Terra (or something like that) who lip synched and gyrated to some obscure Hindi/Chinese tune. Truly.

The divas came back a couple of times, for the sports wear and the evening dress (but thankfully no swim wear). The sports wear was best, as they all dressed up in a different sports uniform-fafa style. So the volleyballer stripped off normal shorts for the teeny-weeny variety, and the basketballer wore high heels, and the tennis player did very unusual things with a racquet. But boy could they move. Three of them worked the splits into their routine although they did have some trouble getting back up again, the very large karate fafa could do back flips, and the boxer's high kicks were impressive.

The event was raising money for the American Samoa National Olympic Committee, and a table ticket got you wine and nibbles. The wine was the most revolting thing I've ever tasted, since the days of Blue Nun and Wohnseidler. Nasty, nasty sweet Californian drivel. And the nibbles were cold, deep fried pork, chicken, fish, meatballs and wontons. Luckily the beer was cold and it kept coming, sometimes two rounds at a time when the boys got confused.

Our lovely "housegirl", Mele, was babysitting, and it was bliss to be able to walk home afterwards to a tidy house (she'd emptied the dishwasher, tidied the kitchen, folded the washing). We ignored the savage dog attacks outside the hotel this week that had seen an American tourist get 12 stitches. I'm sure all the dogs were in bed by then.

So, our first experience of a night out Samoan style! While I think if you've seen one fafa show, you've seen them all, it was definitely a great night, and if you happen to be visiting when there's a show on, prepare to be entertained.

Miss Sharyna