June Beginnings

June has started out eventful:
Yesterday was granddad's birthday as well as the first round of our local legislative elections (which actually weren't much to get excited about, inspiring a record poor voter turnout, <40% in all three of our Polynesian constituencies).
Today was french mother's day (not the same day as in the UK or the US, just to keep you on your toes); this year Matotea was unable to contain her excitement at having prepared a mothers day card at school, she couldn't even wait 'til the day itself to give me the card!

 

It was also the day of the Queen's diamond jubilee party on the Thames (Lord bless 'er Majesty). Tomorrow we welcome Tuati back here for the long holidays, he will be defending his horse-riding title this july. On tuesday there's the transit of Venus to enjoy, don't forget because the next one will be in 2117! To add to all this Viriamu's re-doing our septic system, so we're up to our necks in cement and rubble. This afternoon, with the cement-mixer rumbling in our ears it seemed like a perfect opportunity to get out of the house, and given that we actually saw the sun for a few hours, we girls decided to take a hike along the beach up to Matotea's cliff.

The girls were absolute champions, they must have hiked a good 6km in total, and all without too much grumbling, though we did make a lot of stops.

blue rats tail, a common weed, with an edible blue flower

We collected all kinds of interesting things on the way: two types of edible flowers (squash blooms and blue rat's tail), pebbles, water from the source, some fresh vanilla vine, hibiscus cuttings, candle-nuts for planting and a whole heap of Tropical Almonds (Terminalia catappa, autara'a) that we didn't manage to crack open, yet but we'll work on it as I'm told that they're good.

squash flower

Squash flower

We ate the blue rat's tail flowers with our sandwiches, they taste slightly like raw mushroom, and Matotea loves the idea of eating flowers! For dinner we had our squash flowers....they are really, really tasty battered and deep fried.......you can also use courgette flowers in the same way.

deep fried squash flowers

 

May's end

May left, as it arrived, in the rain! It's been amazingly wet this year, and while rain is good for the garden, you can have too much of a good thing, having previously rejoiced with the rain I'm now feeling less happy as my poor seedlings are getting a real battering from the torrential downpours that have been passing over every couple of days.

It's also left Viriamu frustrated as he's just received a shiny new cement mixer and he's itching to mix cement! But with all the rain, even the best laid plans have to be changed! Guest-wise it was also a busy old month, for the down season, with a steady trickle of guests and so many holidays that we spent most of the time stuck at home with the kids (there were 5 bank holidays, a week of official school holidays and a teacher training day, so Matotea spent just 13 days at school).

 We also had the annual Protestant 'mei' celebrations around Ascension, here it's a three week long celebration, another display of village pride, each sunday one of our three village hosts a marathon of religious fervor with services throughout the weekend and a midnight vigil on the sunday, the singing and hats are truly impressive. It's also the time to spruce up the village, everyone gets busy white-washing walls and cleaning the house, and most importantly (for the church) it's the time where everyone digs deep to in their pockets to subsidize the local church.

Coco loco cat

Our little kitten is definitely getting into her troubled adolescence, she mysteriously disappeared for almost four days straight, causing Matotea to morbidly lament her disappearance - not sure where she went, but she nonchalantly showed up, looking a little skinnier, but none the worse for wear. She's also really into climbing at the moment, on sunday she put on quite a show, suddenly shimmying up our nearby coconuts, then gingerly climbing down the palm leafs, before sliding and and tumbling the few remaining feet to the ground, and then starting again! It kept the girls shrieking with delight for a good half hour!

Rain, rain, rain rain!

Beautiful rain!

Today the skies are grey and humidity is 100%! It's cold and damp, but I don't mind. I indulged myself and the guests this lunch time, by preparing a good stout Taro chowder (based on a corn chowder recipe, with a few shrimp and taro chunks added for good measure). I love preparing Taro chowder when the weather is gloomy, it's SOOO thick and delicious, it really does warm the cockles of your heart, or was it just that I was a bit heavy handed with the white wine! Another reason why I'm not feeling down because of the rain, is because of my new gardening projects! I'm getting a bit of green-thumb fever here, and am trying to plant anything I can lay my hands. Of course sometimes it works, sometimes not, but it's fun to try and there are so many exciting plants that could grow here, if you could just get hold of the seeds/cuttings. I have some kiwi fruit seeds, longan (a bit like a lychee only different) and cape goosberry seeds planted up and have my fingers firmly crossed. I've been battling to get a bit of a veggie patch going outside our back door, and it's coming along, the basil, strawberries, green beans and tomatoes are all in, now it's a matter of defending the seedlings from the dogs/pigs/birds or whatever it is that goes rooting through my beds when I'm not looking.......I'll wait a few weeks, but hopefully I'll have something to show you......