It's Friday night about 10:00 and just like last week at this time I am sitting on our balcony. Tonight I am enjoying a beautiful Southern Hemisphere full moon and I can see the Southern Cross. Today we were in American Samoa which had one of the most picturesque harbors I have ever seen. There are actually two Samoas, American Samoa which is a US territory and Western Samoa which is an independent nation. We learned from our tour guide Mike that as a US territory they do not have voting privileges for the presidential election which may not be a bad thing with the upcoming election. They do have a non voting congressional representative who is allowed to serve on various committees. Young men and women may also join the US military which per capita they do in a higher rate than anywhere in the 50 states. Their two biggest exports are tuna and NFL football players. We docked in Pago Pago which is home to the worlds largest tuna cannery. Troy Polomeau and Junior Seau are both from Samoa and years ago there was a quarterback named Jack or Jake Thompson who had the very cool nickname the Throwing Samoan.
As I said earlier it is Friday night, however when we wake up it will be Sunday morning. Sometime over night we will cross the international date line. Just like that poof Saturday is gone. I'm a little confused about what that means about my beloved Gators playing their Saturday afternoon game! Also for all my Adventist friends this offers the perfect excuse for skipping church!
We had a great visit at the American Samoa National Park which for you trivia buffs is the only US National Park in the Southern Hemisphere. While we were at the park we saw some machine gun installations from World War 2. Someone asked if there had been any battles in that area during the war and our tour guide shared a story of some really bad karma. According to him the Japanese navy fired one missile at a US military fuel depot. The missile missed the depot and struck a house and killed the only Japanese citizen living in Samoa at that time......really bad karma!
Still having trouble with pictures. Will try to post some as I get better at it! Whatever day and time zone you are in... make it a great day!
