Tales of Old Samoa - The Diver and the Shark

    My only venture into free-diving 60 feet deep was when we were living on the island of Aunu'u, in American Samoa One weekend the Pago Pago Dive Club chartered a small boat to bring them out to "my" island. They tied up to the Aunu'u mooring buoy just offshore.
     I brought my mask, fins, and snorkel down to the beach to join them. Most of the club members had SCUBA gear, and soon they were splashing by ones and twos over the side of the motor launch "FiaFia". Within minutes several divers surfaced with remarks that they'd spotted black coral about 60 feet down off the edge of the reef.
     From the surface I could spot far below the black smudge that they were talking about. I was determined to get some for myself.  I floated quietly, face down, breathing through my snorkel and hyperventilating for almost a minute. Putting my head down, I kicked for the bottom. I could feel the pressure compressing my chest and lungs. The negative buoyancy slightly accelerated my descent as I glided down.
     I planted my feet on the sandy bottom, 60 feet from the surface, grasped the black coral firmly, and pulled hard. It wiggled a bit.
     I twisted it, hoping to separate it from its base. It yielded only slightly.
     I was beginning to feel the carbon dioxide building in my bloodstream, urging me to breath.  Releasing my grip, I headed leisurely toward the surface.
     Floating face down on the gentle waves, breathing again through my snorkel, I could heard admiring remarks from those with SCUBA gear, pointing out to others, "Hey! Did you see Hastings diving? He went all the way to the bottom out here!"
    After a few minutes of recovery, I drew extra deep breaths again, getting ready to head down. I was determined to surface with that piece of black coral. Kicking hard, I raced straight down. I leveled out two feet from the bottom, and found myself staring head on at the face of a large shark not more than three feet away!

    All thoughts of black coral vanished as I planted a foot on the bottom, pushed hard, and took off toward the distant surface as fast as my fins could propel me. I shot halfway out of the water like a Polaris missile, spitting out my mouthpiece and yelling "SHARK"!!!!!!
     To my amazement and consternation, as I took a deep breath I realized that my friends, my fellow divers, were all laughing! I was miffed!
     "There's a large shark down there!" I repeated, thinking that perhaps they hadn't heard my warning.
     "We watched the whole thing!", someone replied.
     "We saw the shark at just about the same moment that you headed for the bottom. There was no way we could warn you! You were heading straight down, and the shark was swimming along the bottom. It looked like you were going to collide with each other.
      You leveled out and stopped suddenly. The shark saw you and stopped just as abruptly. You both froze, staring at each other for about two seconds, and then you both flipped around and shot off in opposite directions!
     If we could have heard shark-frequencies and understood shark-talk, that big fellow was probably screaming "PALAGI!!! I'm being chased by a palagi!!!"

Another tale of old Samoa - Pago Pago i le Po - Pago Pago Harbor at Night

Tropical Night Magic

      The perfume of night-blooming jasmine slipped through the corroded copper wire window screens of the house by the bay. Its sweet aroma almost masked the combined stink of sour mud and fish oil wafting across from the cannery less than half a mile away across the water.
      Perched several feet in the air on sturdy posts, the house had a rocky front yard just six feet wide, ending suddenly at a stone wall that dropped a few feet to the waters of the harbor at Pago Pago. The kitchen window faced away from the bay, only inches from the paved road that skirted the deep, L-shaped harbor.

      Directly across the road stood an old two story building known in the 1960's as the Max Haleck General Store. Many years earlier it had been the Haleck Hotel. Somerset Maugham had tarried there for several days, watching torrents of water sheeting down from low-hanging clouds, inspiring him to write a tropical tale of Sadie Thompson and rain.
The night was warm and humid. Unlike the stifling hot summer nights of a big city, soft tropical breezes flowed into the harbor from the southeast tradewinds of the open ocean, gently caressing moist skin.
      Lights from across the across the bay bounced shimmering reflections through the open front of the house, dancing across the ceiling of the darkened living room. Just outside the door on the side of the house, standing in the small grassy yard, I could watch a slow-moving light soaring away from the low hill on the side of the bay, gaining altitude as it hummed along a thick steel cable. The small hanging gondola swayed slightly from side to side as it began the steep caternary swoop toward the towering black wall of Mount Alava and its red-winking transmitter tower. From that high point TV programs beamed out across the island of Tutuila and over the 75 miles of open ocean to the islands of Ofu, Olosega, and Ta'u, a day's journey by boat toward the east.

      Retrieving a long, pointed Samoan paddle from under the low steps where I had stashed it, I stepped barefoot across the rocks. Reaching under the house, I grabbed the curved bow of my paopao, a fourteen foot long outrigger canoe. I lowered myself over the edge of the stone wall into the shallow water of the bay, moving cautiously in my flip-flops so that I wouldn't cut my feet on the jagged oyster shells that covered the bottom. A quick tug, and the narrow wooden canoe slapped down onto the water.
      Hewn from a single log, the paopao hull was perhaps a foot and a half deep, but too narrow to sit inside. A short board set atop the gunwales served as a seat. I dipped the paddle into the water, and found the shallow bottom just a few inches below. A couple of shoves with the tip of the paddle sent the canoe gliding out across the coral shoal and into deeper water.

      I paddled along the waterfront past the boat shed and the main dock where freighters unloaded goods and occasional cruise liners disgorged hoards of silver-haired tourists intent on bargaining for carved wood souvenirs and shell leis in the few hours ashore before heading off again toward some other south seas port. The lights from the government housing along Centipede Row cast sparkling paths across the black water. Passing the oil dock, I could smell a pungent mixture of diesel oil mingled with the sweet smell of the blossoms of the pua trees that grew on the grounds of the Rainmaker Hotel.

      Looking south, away from the lights of Fagatogo on this moonless night, I could see the black silhouette of Rainmaker Mountain against a brilliant background of thousands of stars and the faint double smudge of the Magellanic Clouds. The five stars of the Southern Cross pointed toward the mouth of the harbor and the ocean beyond.
As I turned again, I could feel the long ocean swells raising, then lowering me, gently urging me back the way I had come. I glided along the eastern side of the bay, skimming the surface of the smooth ink-black waters.

      The tip of the outrigger began to glow with a faint eery blue-green light. It pulsed each time the paopao surged forward, suddenly leaping around the paddle with each stroke. Now it brightened, sparkling like thousands of bright watery stars, swirling galaxies of light suddenly flashing into being and fading away in the glowing wake.
The phosphorescence stayed with me for most of the return trip, escorting me back to my starting point, leaving me with a lingering sense of connection with the whole Universe.

Tales of Samoa - o le sami faigata

Ole Sami Faigata - The Dangerous Sea
It was proved, over and over again, just how dangerous the ocean could be while we were in Samoa. I remember that two yachts left Pago Pago about the same time headed for New Zealand. They were caught in a big storm. One survived. The other was last heard from via radio somewhere near the island of Niue, in trouble, and never heard from again.
Then there was the trimaran "Extended Adolescence", which brought a young man rumored to be a draft dodger to moor for a time in the harbor. I think I remember that a government agent (F.B.I.?) was sent to "collect" the young man, but before being taken into custody, "Extended Adolescence" headed out to sea. The trimaran did not reappear in any port for several months, and it was circulated that perhaps the boat had been lost. Long after any hope of seeing the sailboat again, it came limping back into Pago Pago, having been dismasted in a storm, and sailed back on a jury rig using the jib sail attached to the mainsail boom as a makeshift mast. The young man in question left the boat moored in the harbor and flew back to the States to face the charges. The "Extended Adolescence" broke its moorings during the big hurricane of 1966, and broke up on the rocks at the head of the bay.
Speaking of storms, I also remember the day that several teenagers decided to take surfboards out to ride the storm surf somewhere off the village of Matu'u. They got caught in a strong current and swept out to sea. Two were eventually rescued by the Coast Guard, but one was never found.

Living on the island of Aunu'u, we had our share of close calls.













Before today's seawalls and breakwater constructions on the landings at Aunu'u and across the channel at the village of Auasi, the 20 to 30 foot longboats from Aunu'u used to make the crossing twice daily, about sunrise and sunset. There were many instances over the years of longboats being shattered on the reef at Auasi.
I can remember vividly some morning trips in to a principals' meeting in town when I wished fervently that I could just get out and walk! The fresh water flow from the small stream at Auasi had left a break in the structure of the coral reef there, probably 15-20 feet wide where there would be an opening in the line of surf crashing on the reef, called in Samoan an avaava. Water tossed across the reef by waves would rush back out through the opening, creating a strong outflowing current.
Whenever there were nearby or distant storms, however, the large swells would break farther out, completely closing out the opening. This made arrivals and departures much more "interesting"! Incoming longboats would wait just outside the point where the huge waves were breaking, getting a feeling for their size and frequency. At some point which I never learned to discern, the man handling the steering sweep oar would call "ey-yo!" in a booming voice, and the six or eight men manning the oars would bend their backs, pulling with all their strength. Someone would be calling the cadence, "ho, ho, ho, ho", while one or more of the passengers shouted encouragement. "Malo! Malo", and "Malo i fa'auli" (Good work on the steering oar!). The next wave would begin to build behind the longboat, lifting the stern, and suddenly we would be surfing the steepening slope, shooting through the avaava to the calm protected waters inside.
One time, coming home from Fagatogo, I was on the first longboat to go out from Auasi. Since the surf was exceptionally high, our boat waited outside the surf line for the other boat to negotiate the passage. They waited, and waited, and waited some more as giant wave after wave crashed on the coral. Finally we heard the call to row and saw men pulling with all their might as the next wave approached. The swell passed beneath us, and as it approached the reef it began to rise higher and higher. The other longboat disappeared below the racing mountain of water. The top of the wave began to peak and curl over, and there was a collective groan of anxious anticipation, for we were all certain that the other boat was about to be crushed. As the fifteen foot wave began to crash down, the bow of the longboat miraculously came smashing up at a 50 degree angle through the breaking curl, the bow coming down with a resounding smack on the backside of the wave as if to punish it for its bad behavior. Immediately six or seven people jumped overboard from the now-flooded boat to keep it from sinking, and our longboat quickly went to the aid of the other, helping to pull it out away from other waves while everyone assisted in bailing out the half swamped boat with much laughing and hilarity.
The same reef opening almost claimed our whole family on another occasion. We had decided to make the crossing on a fine, sunny day. Although there were some medium size waves as I dragged our 16' aluminum boat across the Aunu'u beach and attached the 20 hp motor, I could see that just beyond the surf the cobalt surface was glassy. Two teenage boys from the village asked if they could come with me, Jan, my 4 year old son Mark, and my 1 year old daughter Lynne. I had no idea at the time my affirmative answer would be so important.
The mile and a half trip across to Tutuila was uneventful, although I started to get a bit apprehensive as we approached Auasi. Although the surface of the channel was very smooth, the ocean swells were very large, and as we got closer to shore we could hear the deep booming sounds that warned that the waves were breaking heavily on the reef.
It was soon apparent that there was no opening in the crashing waves, and that if we wanted to get to shore it would be a matter of waiting outside the surf line and going though the avaava in the gap between the breakers. We waited….and waited some more, trying to get the feel and timing of the approaching waves. At last it seemed that there was a little bit longer opening, and I let one wave pass under us, then followed the breaker close behind... a strange sensation, since we were going forward, but actually climbing up the back of the wave. It left us, crashed down on the reef in front of us, and gave us a clear view of the opening in the reef, marked by the swift backwash of water from the previous wave.
I approached the choppy outflow cautiously. Suddenly one of the boys in the boat yelled, "Look out!"
I glanced over my shoulder to see another huge wave starting to build behind us. I slowed the engine to idle, expecting the wave to pass under us so that we could follow it in. Bad mistake!
Instead, the stern of the aluminum craft was lifted at such a steep angle that the boat began to slide down the face of the wave. If I had cranked the throttle to wide open at that instant, we might have made it to calm water safely. A second's hesitation was all it took; the skidding bow slid off to the left. The wave began to curl. The right gunwale scooped up the choppy water, and the entire boat went stern over bow as the sea crashed down on us.
My feet slammed onto the bottom, and with a push I shot to the surface. Jan had our one year old daughter Lynne securely in her arms. The boys were bobbing in the outrushing water. I couldn't see my son Mark!
As the capsized boat, baskets, suitcase, and all of us were swept back out toward deeper water I heard a muffled "Daddy!" coming from the air pocket under the bow. I reached under the edge and dragged a very frightened boy still in his lifejacket out of the gasoline fumes to the fresh air.
I wrestled with the boat, turning it right side up, but the weight of the outboard motor kept the transom at the stern submerged, making it impossible to bail out the water. I put Jan, Lynne, and Mark in the swamped boat, and grabbed the bow, for it was becoming obvious that the current was slowly pulling us toward the point of rocks where the huge waves were still crashing.
The very next swell unbalanced the flooded boat, and it tipped over again, slow motion. We clung to the overturned hull, and I gripped the bow handle, side-stroking as hard as I could, trying to fight the relentless current.
The two boys in the meantime and swum across the reef, body surfing in on large waves that kept them from being torn to pieces on the sharp coral. They gained the beach, and without hesitation ran up the hill to a house in the village where earlier longboat crews had stored their oars for the day.
They rushed back down to the shallow waters near shore where there were several longboats floating at anchor. Leaping in to one of them and casting off the mooring line from the bow, they began to maneuver the heavy wooden boat to a point near the reef opening. They struggled to keep from being swept into the incoming waves. Without a third person in the stern to man a steering oar, they were hard pressed to keep the longboat from turning sideways and being swamped by the breaking surf.
Somehow the two of them managed to get that boat, normally manned by four or six oarsman and another man at the steering oar, out through surf that would have challenged a full crew, arriving just in time to keep us from being swept by the towering waves onto the rocks on the Auasi point. We all sat in the longboat, thankful that we were alive. Eventually we paddled around to collect still floating suitcase and baskets, but we weren’t yet ready to attempt the reef opening again.
Some sharp eyed observer on Aunu'u had noticed that there was trouble on the other side of the channel, and soon another well-manned longboat came to our rescue, providing extra hands for disconnecting the drowned outboard motor and rowing both boats ashore, towing the aluminum boat. (The outboard never DID run properly after that!)

Tales of Samoa - o le momono i le va'a - The Plug In The Boat

My first experience with Aunu'u was in 1965. When we arrived in Samoa in March of 1965, quite a few consolidated elementary schools were under simultaneous construction, and virtually all of the construction was behind schedule (surprise, surprise! Things are almost ALWAYS behind schedule in Samoa. What's a schedule?)

Although I had been hired as a school principal at the tender young age of twenty-seven, when I first walked into the old office that sat approximately where the entrance to the Rainmaker Hotel now stands, I was told that school assignments for principals were still pending, and that we would be housed temporarily in Tafuna, the new government housing area out near the airport on the main island of Tutuila.

Other school principals were also living temporarily in Tafuna, awaiting school assignments, including Dick Danner, Doug Thorpe, Don Miskovsky, & Harold Hooten. Between us we were loaned an old blue government jeep, which we used to go shopping, visit schools under construction, and most often to drive down the dirt road from Tafuna to the end of the airport runway where there was a nice swimming hole!

One afternoon when the whole unassigned principal corps and families were down there swimming, I was wading out of the water after some snorkeling when I stepped on the dorsal spines of a stonefish. It felt like someone had inserted a hot poker through the arch of my foot and rammed it up past my knee almost to my hip! Needless to say, I let out a huge yelp, and yanked that foot out of the water. As I set the other foot down I managed to place it exactly where the first foot had been, thereby puncturing the sole of that foot on the stonefish too! I tumbled into the shallow water, groaning and causing everyone much concern while I contemplated the ephemeral qualities of life. Fortunately, neither wound was either very deep or particularly serious, evidently due to the fact that I had chosen a very small stonefish to exterminate, and within 40 minutes or so I was able to walk around again.

I was soon assigned to the newly opening Pago Pago Elementary School until the end of the 64-65 school year to work with Cantley George, the first palagi principal, and Mageo, the Samoan principal.

Not long after that, Dick Danner was assigned to become the first principal of Aunu'u Elementary School when it opened for the beginning of the 65-66 school year. I was with him and Tasi Tuato'o when we went out one day to see what progress had been made on the school construction.

When we arrived at the village of Auasi there were the usual number of longboats bobbing at the end of ropes attached to chunks of coral in the calm waters inside the reef, but nobody there to meet us as promised. Tasi proceeded to walk up the road about a hundred yards to the place where the road curved sharply around the point toward the village of Tula. He grabbed a small soft piece of wood and another short stick, and hunkered down just off the road. Using the short stick, he gouged a trough several inches long on the soft wood, and then, his hands and arms working like the pistons on a steam engine, rubbed the small stick back and fort in the groove, faster and faster. In less than a minute there was a wisp of smoke. Just like that there was a tiny fire to which he added other small sticks, then larger sticks. When the fire was well established he dumped a great armful of leaves on the flames, and a column of billowing white smoke rose into the air and blew off toward the west.

Less than ten minutes had passed when we saw another longboat putting out from the beach at Aunu'u. Before long the four rowers and the man working the steering oar had crossed the channel, maneuvered through the cut in the reef, and were jumping out into the shallow water to pull the boat up to the beach.

After greetings, introductions, and handshakes were exchanged we all climbed into the longboat for the crossing to Aunu'u. We waited just inside the narrow passage through the reef called avaava in Samoan. The rowers backpaddled to keep the current from taking us out until the proper moment.

The steersman gave a "ey-io!", and the rowers pulled on the oars, shooting out through the cut, surging over the incoming swell with only a little water splashing into to boat, and we were on our way. The color of the water quickly turned from shades of green to light blue as we reached the deeper water just beyond the reef. The clarity of the water was impressive; you could see the coral on the bottom easily, thirty or forty feet below. Within a hundred yards or so the bottom dropped away and the sea became a wonderful cobalt blue. A couple of flying fish erupted ahead of us as we approached, skimming away just ahead of the cresting swells, extending their gliding paths occasionally with a rapid flippity-flip of their tails on the surface of the water.

About a third of the way across the mile wide channel, Dick Danner, sitting between a couple of the rowers, leaned over toward the bottom of the boat, picked up a wad of leaves, and casually tossed them over the side. Much to our surprise, two men simultaneously shipped their oars with a yank, and standing on the seats, leaped overboard! As we gazed at them in amazement and looked at each other, we saw immediately the cause for their unexpected actions; there was a four-inch fountain jetting up inside the boat from a finger-sized hole that had been drilled next to the keel. It seems that all the longboats had several of these holes drilled right next to the keelson. When pulled up on the beach the holes are left open to drain any water that has splashed inside. Before the boats are put in the water a small cone of banana leaf, rolled tightly, is pushed firmly into each hole, sealing it tightly. The rolled up piece of banana leaf that Dick had so thoughtfully decided to clean up turned out to be the PLUG!

The errant soggy plug was duly retrieved from the water while another one of the longboat crew kept his heel on the open hole. As the two swimmers clambered back over the gunwale and stuffed the rerolled plug back in the drain hole everyone, Samoan and Palagi alike, was laughing so hard that we had trouble staying on the seats. Everyone except poor Dick, who apologized profusely, and spent the rest of the ride across to Aunu'u sitting very quietly!

The tales of the boat, the floating frozen chickens and a near drowning, and another tale of the drifting photographer and her aging mother will have to wait for another posting.