Day 7 – Painting at St Peters Falefa

Our new Samoan hosts Sita and Ennie made breakfast again this morning at out residence. Everyone was up bright and early and in uniform. Only confirming just as we left we finally had heard back from someone from the primary school. Which was handy because we were on our way.

Falefa from Leauva’a through Apia took us nearly 1.5 hours in our bumpy little van. We had our art supplies and gifts ready and we were greeted at the school by Sr Vita. Sr has taught there since 2016 and remembered our last visit. She became Principal in 2018 and has looked after the school since. She is a lovely lady and gathered all the teachers to meet us.

After a quick tour we could see how we could leave our mark. Sr told us they were desperate for blackboards to be repainted but with no way of getting supplies we had to settle for working with the individual teachers of each classroom in teams and helping them brighten up their rooms with learning walls or images that they chose.

Lauren and Isabelle chose the Year 2 class and brightened it up with quotes and bright colours. Once again a beautiful job. Manvir, Shanuille and Tarnpreet took it to a new level whilst creating vital learning walls around biology and time.

Teneeka, Julian and myself worked with Sr Monika’s Yr 8 room where she requested the national flower and a more welcoming entry. Teneeka and Julian nailed this with the beautiful teuila flowers. Sr was very pleased. She had also requested a graduation wall and I was able to paint her a little something to remind the students that this was there final year but also the start of something much more. I also included a portrait of a past student who they recognised as ‘Patricia’ and our Project Samoa logo.

They then had teachers literally running back and forth from a local shop supply us with something to eat. Before we finished up.

We then arranged all our gifts. Stationary from everyone, clothes from the Aventi’s, with more pens from Griffith Real Estate, Marian merchandise and musical equipment, Flags from Susan Ley, rugby balls and a lot of Aussie paraphernalia. They were stoked and offered us their prayers in return and that God would bless us with a long life so that we could continue to help the children of their school for many years to come. It was a beautiful moment.

We left feeling worn out but deeply enriched from the experience. We stopped in then to swim at the cave pools and recharge whilst escaping the heat.

Our second last dinner together with hopefully an early night. Our trip is sadly coming to an end. We ate on the way home in Apia and when we arrived back there was a gift waitinf for us… more food.