“The are wonderful, Mama Rose, Fi hasn’t stopped talking about the flax outfit she started making at your house last week and Abe is determined to build a canoe. He is scouting the tree trunks out back for a suitable base.” A slight exaggeration, but I learned a long time ago that its easier to deal with Mama Rose if you tell her what she wants to hear. The lectures are shorter that way.
“Ahh thats good to hear, Fa’a Samoa…” I barely listened as she rambled on extolling the benefits of teaching her grandchildren about their culture and history. Having long given up on teaching me the ‘Samoan Way’, Mama Rose had turned the full force of her efforts onto her grandchildren.
I am the first born and pride and joy of my gently spoken, but fiery tempered Scottish Pa and the second born of my late mother. My mother already had a 1yr old daughter when she met and fill in love with my pa. Pa raised, my half sister, Tiresa, as his own and when I was born 12 months later, Tiresa and I were brought up as true sisters till the tender ages of 10 & 8 when tragically and unexpectedly our mother died of cervical cancer.
Dad’s heartbreak over his wife’s death was doubled when our Mothers’ ‘Aiga’ (extended family) came and took Tiresa from us to live with them. As much as we were brought up a true family, dad had never formally ‘adopted’ Tiresa so her biological family had every right and my dear Pa had no say whatsoever. It was just ‘Pa’ and I from then on.
I saw very little of my sister over the next few years. We were brought up in two very different cultures. Pa tried to do his best to instill in me the traditions and values of both my polynesian and scottish backgrounds however he knew more about his scottish heritage then he did about his wife’s polynesian side. Apart from the smattering of times I spent with my sister and my mothers family i have been brought up practically ‘white’ and a proud Scot to boot much to Mama Rose’s dismay.
Anxious to get this particular conversation over sooner rather than later. I interrupt her “Mama Rose, What can I do for you?”
Momentarily startled by my gentle interruption, Mama Rose hesitated before she continued on with the reason for her call. “You know that Tiresa and Mika announced their engagement a couple of weeks ago”
Actually, I didn’t know, Tiresa and I haven’t shared much in the way of personal details with each other for years. Not that it surprised me. Tiresa and her long term partner Mika, who was, incidentally, also a cousin to my X husband, had been together even before, I started going out with, Tupa, my wife bashing and emotionally debilitating X husband.