The 40 Days of Kava (Approximately): The Birth of a Kava-Head

Well, I have already touched on kava in past blog posts, but everything has changed now. To elaborate, kava strength varies drastically island to island and preparation to preparation. As well, rate of kava consumption varies greatly from island to island and place to place. It seems that stronger custom correlates with larger amounts of kava consumption. In regards to strength, Penama Province is known for some of the strongest kava in Vanuatu. This includes Pentecost, Ambae, and Maewo. Before coming to Maewo, I asked one our language trainers, who drank kava every night, where the strongest kava could be found. His answer was Ambae and Maewo. Pentecost had strong kava too, but had the bad repercussions from too much intake (i.e. dry skin, red eyes, and liver problems). Ambae and Maewo, on the other hand, are good to drink all time. Now when it comes to Maewo, the people of Maewo are very proud of their kava and consider it a much higher quality than others. In addition, every person on West Maewo considers the kava in East Maewo strongest.

 

Coming into Naviso, I was pretty much unaware of the kava culture in Maewo-really anywhere off Efate. On Efate kava was a business like alcohol in the states. There was no custom and you had to throw down 50 – 200 Vatu for every shell. I drank a few time before leaving training, but only four times before going to site. What I learned in Naviso was that kava is an everyday experience for most and kava is either free or 30 – 60 Vatu a shell (not that the people of Naviso ever let me buy my own shells). This comes mostly from the fact that people can grow kava in Maewo (opposed to the inability in Efate) and in Naviso, people’s gardens are much closer than other parts of Maewo and, in general, most other islands; while this leads to easy access to an abundance of food, it also leads to massive amounts of kava (tumas kava lo Naviso). Additionally, Naviso has a lot of custom culture left and kava fills a particular part of that, but more importantly kava is a way of life in Naviso or, should I say, a part of life. All these factors, especially, this last one, result in heavy kava use. The nice thing about the strong kava in Naviso is the ability to drink 2-3 shells and feel the effects, unlike Efate where many people drink 10 – 20 shells.

Wassis, Tambia, Lassa, Tiri, Saama, and the Spit: Min Malo

As I have said, I drank kava, maybe, 4 times in my first 2 months in Vanuatu, but everything changed in Maewo. I liked kava in Efate, I didn’t find the taste to horrible, and when the kava “hit” (various phrases can be used to describe the affects of kava-ranging from small effect to large effect: working, hits, kicks, holding) me it was worth it, but the kava wouldn’t always hit and the effect was never as good as the first time. Coming into Maewo I was interested in drinking good kava and different kava and that’s what I got. Every day I was brought to the Nakamal and, in the early days, was given stone ground shells. Kava preparation varies in different parts of Maewo. In kava businesses, like Efate, the kava is ground in hand or electric powered mince, but on the outer islands, many times, kava is prepared one shell at a time by one man for another. On Tanna, in the South, they chew the kava, in Epi they pound the kava, and in Penama and Torba Province, they grind the kava with a stone.

In local language the stone is called a Wassis and they hold the kava in one hand while grinding the kava with a swift flicking motion of both wrists. As I learned how to grind kava I was instructed that you must slacken the arm with the stone and hold the kava hand strong. This was very frustrating to learn because I had no idea what I was doing and was being told in Bislama nothing but: slaken han blo you mo holdem strong. That was a lot of help. Anyway, the kava is ground in your hand and over a special piece of wood, called a Tambia. The ground kava falls from your hand onto the Tambia. After the kava has been grounded you pour a coconut shell, a Lassa, worth of water onto the kava and proceed to press the kava into the Tambia and around it, mixing the water and ground kava into a mixture. Once you have finished this you gather the kava-water substance together and form it into a ball in your palm and with your other palm, place on top of it, “milk” the kava into the empty Lassa. Basically, what you are doing is squeezing the kava water out and into the Lassa and trying to keep the solid parts of the kava in your hands. Once you finish squeezing out every ounce of water in the kava ball, you make one final squeeze and form it into a ball, called a Saama, and put the Saama to the side. After this you must grab another Lassa and a coconut skin, called a Tiri, to strain the kava. Another frustrating part in learning to grind kava: how to fold the Tiri. The problem here was that they would start slow, showing me how to fold it (with the only instructive word being olsem or, in English, like this) and then take off at full speed at the most critical part and I would totally miss it. Whatever, mi save nao. After you finish folding the Tiri, you capsize the Lassa with milked kava into the Tiri over the other empty Lassa. You proceed to do this over and over again-washing the Tiri and other Lassa in between each time-until you are content with the final product (usually 2-3 times). Once this is done you put the kava into the Lassa not for drinking and wash the drinking Lassa and Tiri and fill up the Lassa with water. Assuming this is the first shell of kava for the person, you capsize the water over their hands and they wash their hands (a part of custom). After this you strain the kava one more time into the drinking Lassa you just washed their hands with and the kava is ready to drink.

Here is where the custom comes in that makes me really enjoy drinking kava in Maewo. First you must drink the kava facing North and in a squat. After this comes the Custom Prayer for Kava (in local language) which I have not learned yet, but am trying to learn before PST-2. EDIT: I did, in fact learn the kava prayer before PST-2-Mak malo herria hai bil taro na kwamaso hinda bona ta na kwamaso. Turns out it can be played with an transformed and the one I just typed is a transformation, not the simple, basic one. It roughly means: My kava that came from the earth is ready to drink and it is time to drink kava. I am alright and everyone is alright. END EDIT. After the prayer you blow the bubbles off the top of the kava with a rotating motion of your head that circles the Lassa. Following this you close your eyes and drink. After you finish drinking you pour the Lassa, and any kava remnants left, over the Saama sitting next to you. After this you take the Saama and throw into the designated “socking area” and then my favorite part comes: the spit. Also called the sing out, after you sock the Saama, you can sing out to announce that your drinking kava and others should come to “storian” and drink too. The spit goes something like this: a loud, projecting Swa-A followed by a sharp, high-pitched: S-Fee (the S is slurred, almost like a hiss from a snake). The phrase: Spit comes from the fact that when you make the final S-Fee you are supposed to be spitting. I have quite mastered the spitting action at the same time, but I do sing out a lot and whenever I get the chance. Not to mention everyone in Naviso loves it, which can only be a good thing in my eyes. Well that’s the end of Kava 101, now I will get into the birth of a Kava-Head and the 40 days of Kava.

Anglican VS SDA

One of the best parts about the kava culture in Vanuatu is the bonding experience. Drinking kava with someone basically makes you best friend for life, especially if they grind a shell for you-and everyone wants to drink kava with me (that sounds arrogant, yes, but I will go into this aspect further in another story-The Guy Everyone Knows and Love: The Niceties of Maewo-coming next). On top of the bonding you just have fun joking around with everyone: mostly about drinking kava, because while everyone wants to drink kava, they absolutely hate the taste and dread the act of drinking the stuff. This is very true as I have learned: the taste of kava gets considerably worse as the shells pile up every night. Due to this most people force other people to drink by buying a shell for them and simply offering it to them without saying a word until the recipient takes the shell. In general, most people only buy shells for other people and have shells bought for them. Bitterly, I learned that I cannot force people to drink kava like everyone else, because if I do they proceed to buy me a ridiculously big shell to repay the favor. Additionally, I have learned that I should not play around at the Kava Nakamal because it just results in me being forced to drink more. One form of playing around is the chin scratch which I have managed to take to an entirely new level of entertainment. The purposeful scratching of the bottom of chin, next to the throat, to another person means that your “throat is dry”, your “thirsty”, or “you want kava”. Now, at first, I thought this was just a joke, and it would, and still does, cause laughing hysterics, but I have learned that I should not abuse the joke because it literally means you want that person to bring you kava. This misunderstanding has resulted in me drinking a lot more shells than I wanted to many times at the kava bar. Now that I understand this I joke much more prudently with the people of Naviso.

Now another joke that popped up became the Anglican VS SDA line. In Vanuatu, unsurprisingly, Seventh Day Adventists (SDA) doesn’t drink kava. To the Anglican community of Naviso, this fact is completely mind-boggling. They are willing to accept the no smoking and no alcohol, but the idea of not drinking kava is the antithesis of their being. One story that came up early was, apparently an SDA Pastor came to the church in Naviso and attempted to preach the evils of kava to the congregation. The yungfala of Naviso then proceeded to harangue the Pastor for not knowing the Bible, because the Bible never mentions kava and that he should preach what’s in the Bible and nothing else. As they say in Bislama: yungfala ia I bin kilim faea blo hem (The young people kill his fire). This resulted in some fellow kava buds and I referring to days off from kava as being SDA and days drinking kava as being Anglican (or “days of prayer”). Basically, this means that people in Naviso now determine if you’re drinking kava by asking: Bae you stap SDA tudei o Anglican? As you can probably guess already this led to many other jokes about Church and Kava, but also led to what I now refer to as the 40 days of Kava.

Anglican Ko Kasem Krismas / Ko Kasem Taem Mi Ded Finis

In the first few weeks at site, from November 10^th to the end of November roughly, I “spelled” (mi bin stap SDA) two days. One of these days was because the kava had “held” me the day before and the next was because it held me and made me puke. Now I should probably explain the “Holding Principle” of kava:

The two times kava has held me and the time it has made me puke has been on one shell of stone ground. Wan sel nomo. I’ve drank 5 -6 shells in a night and you can feel sick and the next morning you might not feel good, but the times where it has absolutely floored me have only been one shell each. I’m not sure why this is, but I think it has something to do with the variability of kava strength. Anyway, when kava “holds” you the room starts to spin, meaning the room is moving, but you aren’t, then you have to lie down. Attempting to walk at this stage is impossible. You are completely coherent, you just can’t stabilize your body and you will fall trying to find stability and balance. Then if the kava really “kicks” you feel horrible nausea which results in expulsion (vomiting). The rest of the kava is sweated out like crazy. The thing about this is the next morning you feel perfectly fine, while you can drink 5 shells some nights and feel horrible the entire next day. Well, that is the end of “Holding Principal” 101, now back to the 40 days of kava.

Now I was never planning on drinking so much these first weeks, but my Papa would come get me every night and we would proceed to go to the Nakamal every night. It was like a schedule. Turns out he doesn’t normally drink every day like I thought, so I am not sure why he was coming to my house every night to take me to the Nakamal. I think it had to do something with me not saying I want to spell, but I didn’t think of that option because he was searching me out. More or less a cultural misunderstanding, but what came of it was more of a conscience choice based on an ongoing joke and my inherent stubbornness. When it got close to the end of November and I started mentioning how we had been drinking kava every day. This led to jokes about never “spelling” and eventually to me saying: bae mi stap Anglican evri dei ko kasem Krismas (I will drink every day until Christmas). Eventually, I realized, as we got closer and closer to Christmas, they took me seriously. While it was still a joke, I still couldn’t disappoint the people of Naviso and thus became the goal of drinking kava every day until Christmas. The joke eventually evolved into: bae mi stap Anglican evri dei ko kasem taem mi ded finis (I will drink kava every day up until I’m already dead). This, fortunately, remained a joke and I spell a lot more now and have relegated my drinking to 3-4 times a week. So after 20 days in November and 25 days in December and a few days of spell in November the result was the “40 Days of Kava (Approximately)”. Not to mention the final result: the birth of a kava-head. If I knew beforehand that to become a kava-head, you had to learn to hate kava, I might have chosen a different route.