My Tonga 2007

Traveling to Tonga with Tevita was something we had wanted to do for years. Since this conference came up, it became the perfect opportunity with such perfect timing to go to this perfect island with my perfect husband.


While Tevita had a conference to attend, I was happy to just see where he was born and raised. This was the main reason for my wanting to go.

This is Tevita's house. It's a little older than he is and its where him and his eight siblings were raised. It's right downtown in Nukualofa. The market, banks, cafes', and bakeries were a block away. Ti and I had a lot of fun cruising the hood.

I loved the little footprint he made in the concrete when his family built an addition to the house. Super super cute.

This is his backyard. . . well, about half of it, actually. His family has a huge piece of land. But the part I loved was all the fruit trees and vines! They have banana trees, mango trees, avocado trees, and watermelon vines. How fun as a child to be able to run and play, pick and eat a banana and then continue on the with task of causing childlike mischief! In contrast, my summers were full of eating dorritos in front of the TV while watching soap operas. aaaahhh . . . the life of a latch key kid in Vegas. Good times.

So on to the greatest invention on the planet:
This is going to sound a bit nuts. But seriously, this water tank was one of many awesome things about Tonga. Built in the backyard, it "catches" and then filters rain water. The vai melie (sweet water) is pumped into the house where we got to shower in it. Ok, no joke, THE BEST SHOWER EVER. I never ever knew a shower could be energizing the way this clean yummy water was! My skin and hair never felt cleaner actually.

This was my very favorite part of being in Tonga. This tree is Tevita's tree. It grew out of his pito that was planted there almost 38 years ago. His siblings are planted around him . Can you believe how tall and beautiful it is? I loved it then and looking at it now makes me so happy that he was born.