I already told y'all about the bagillion plane rides we took between the states and Fiji and Tonga, but I have yet to mention our other modes of transportation - there were many. Let me explain.
BUS
I can't count the number of times we filed on and off of busses over the course of this trip. They were our main source of transportation, especially on days when we were going to a hospital or to the main market in town. Here's the tricky thing though: in Tonga the busses follow no schedule. It kinda seems like they just come and go as they please, so you never know how long you'll be waiting around at a bus stop before your ride comes. And they'll stop anywhere along the road to pick someone up... no matter how full the bus already is. I've never seen so many people packed into one tight space before. No matter how full to capacity it seemed, we always made room for more. You gotta get real friendly with the people around you real quick! My favorite parts though were the holes in the sagging bus floor (can you imagine the scene if the floor in one of those full busses gave way cruisin' along the road?!) and the office bell that had a string attached to it that was pulled whenever someone had to get off. So creative, and quite effective.
I wasn't joking about the holes in the floor...
Some bus rides were pretty nice. Others caused people to fold over in ways that make you wonder where in the world their heads have gone.
The Liahona transportation bus was always the best. Roomy seating and AC say whaaaaaaat. Definitely a luxury.
This was the bus we took on the daily to get to the hospital for clinical. Often times the door either remained ajar or had at least one person hanging out of it. On this day I scored a seat right by the door and took all that refreshing wind I could get.
The very last bus we took. Off to the Tongan International Airport, homeward bound!
CAR
I'm a firm believer in seat belts. Always have been. I was that child who wouldn't let mom start the car until she put her own seatbelt on. And with how many times dad has climbed behind the wheel and told everyone to "buckle-zee-nupsin!" (the guy practically has his own language) how could it not be automatic? But Tonga mighta knocked that safe habit right out of me. At least for the duration of the trip. Why? Because seat belts were either unavailable or broken enough to be ineffective.
When we couldn't get busses, we rode in cars driven by locals. And that usually turned out to be quite the adventure. Oh and let me tell ya what, it threw me for a loop to see the driver on the right side of the car, driving on the left side of the road. So many times I thought for sure we were going to die because we were going around the roundabout the "wrong" way. Whew. Weird.
Probably my favorite was the time we rented a taxi to get to church. The driver pulled up in his white van and Debs asked him how many people he could take. After he told us seven, we stepped back, surveyed the car, and decided we could jigsaw puzzle all 16 of us in that baby. And we DID. Double stuffed big white van. Done and done.
On our day trip tour around Eua (which will have a blog post all to itself) we split up between two cars and hit the road. While we may have taken a few too much off-roading risks in these beat up pieces of junk, it was super fun. I thought so, at least. Who doesn't like to fear for their life as the car roars and sputters trying to make it up a huge hill? I mean come on.
At least we rode IN the cars. This was not an uncommon sight everywhere we went. Along with cars packed full of tiny little children all squished into a back seat. Or drivers with babies sitting or standing on their laps. Or babies standing all alone in the passenger seat. *Shudder* I am happy that clicking that belt in was an automatic for me as soon as I climbed back into an American vehicle.
Well, I guess there was that one time in Fiji when we rode in the flatbed part of a truck on some wood benches. That one was just good fun though :)
BOAT
Those of you who stay up-to-date on my blog, you already know about spider raft. Eesh. I'll never forget this thing.
Kayaks! Even though my fear of whales was spurred on a Kayak when I was like 12, our day kayaking in Vava'u was soooo fun. We saw jellyfish. And a gigantic bee. And bluuuuue blue blue water. Kayaking > canoeing by a longshot. Just saying.
While in Vava'u, we spent an entire day with the community nurses traveling from tiny island to tiny island (again, this'll get its own blog post eventually). Twenty people. One boat. THIS boat. Imagine yourself in vast open ocean water with a lot of other people on this mini beast. I'll tell you right now, you sit wherever you fit. And half the people only fit on the roof soooo, there ya go.
Finally, whenever we weren't flying or bussing or driving or boating, we were flying on our broomsticks.
Obviously.
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