Features of the Church

This week we have been doing our Features of the Church

The Early Church

 

 

The Umu at school

                                     Samoan language week

Key Words:

Food - Rice, chop suey, pork buns, seafood salad with and without yogurt, cooked bananas with and without sauce.

Teachers - Miss Paton, Miss Haslem, Mr. Tyrell and Mr. T. 

Word - Umu, warm, morning tea, wet sacks, banana leaves, coconut, assembly, national anthem, New Zealand, school, keychain, book and Fr. Benedict.

Umu Recount:

The official language of Samoa is Samoan and it is spoken across the majority of Samoa's islands.  We had Samoan language week in our school. It ended with a celebration on Friday in school. All the school children were very excited because we were going to have an Umu in school where Samoan food would be cooked and served hot to every school child. At the same time we were sad because it was Miss Haslem's last working day at our school.  

We started the day with prayers. Then we did our reading task. After that we did our writing. Mr Tyrell came along to each class and told everyone to go to see Room Six’s assembly in the school hall. The assembly was on Samoan language week. We all went to the school hall. The assembly started with the national anthem of New Zealand. We had to stand and sing for the national anthem. After the national anthem we sat on the floor in the hall. Then Room Six children explained some things about the Samoan language week. 

After Room Six’s assembly, we went back to our classrooms but Mr Tyrell said to the teachers that we could go to the top of the field to see the Umu. An Umu is a Samoan way of cooking food above the ground.  

Me and my classmates were very excited to see the Umu. I have never seen an Umu in real life before. It was so warm next to the Umu. I saw some wet sacks, banana leaves, and two boxes which were red and blue near the Umu. In the red box there were some stones and in the blue box there was something inside which was wrapped in tinfoil. Mr T was cutting some coconut and he very kindly gave us some to eat. Some of us had it but I did not have it because our teacher called us back to class at that time. 

We continued doing our work till it was morning tea break. We ate our snacks at morning tea and we played with our friends. Me and my friends again went down to see the Umu. We got some coconut to eat. The coconut was hard to eat but I liked it. The bell rang to go to class. We went inside the classroom and sat on the mat. Miss Haslem told us to do our Maths. Some of us worked with Miss Haslem and the rest of us worked with Miss Paton on Maths. Mr. Tyrell called us again to go to see the Umu. When we went there, we saw newspaper on top of the Umu. Some parents were removing the newspapers. Then they were removing some banana leaves which were under the newspapers. There were all stones and tinfoil on the Umu. Inside the tinfoil was food. We saw all this and then we went back to class. 

We continued with maths. After maths Mr Tyrell told us to go to the school top court. All the school children were there. Father. Benedict started the Umu celebration by saying a prayer and then we sang a song. Thereafter, we all went down to the hall. Father. Benedict blessed the Samoan food. We sat down on the floor of the hall. We lined up class by class to serve ourselves. There was so much food to eat. We sat on the floor and some sat on the chairs and ate. Our classroom went last to get food. I ate rice, pork buns and seafood salad with yoghurt. We enjoyed the food. It was yummy. 

After eating, I played with my friends. We had more time to play than the other days. The bell rang to go to class. Then we did our migration animals presentation. We have been working on our migration animals presentation for a number of weeks. Miss Paton showed Miss  Haslem how to go to a website called “Spin the Wheel” to choose who would present their migration animal project first. The first spin would decide who would go first to present their migration animal and the second spin would decide who would judge the presenting team. Some of us made our presentations in front of the class.

Miss Haslem stopped the presentations a little early and told us to tidy up the classroom. She played a song for us and we sang along. 

Miss Paton then got out a gift from a bag to give Miss Hamslem on her last day. Miss Hamslem opened her gift. There was our letter book which we made some days ago. There was also some Roses chocolates which Miss Paton bought and there was a book. Then Miss Hamslem got out two bags. One was for Miss Paton and one was for all of us children. First, Miss Paton opened her gift. There were two key chains, one had Miss Paton's name with a rainbow on it, the second one had her name “Joy” on it. There was also a card in it along with a chocolate. Then Miss Haslem gave all the children in my class and me some chocolates in a little bag which was individually packed in a transparent bag. 

The bell rang at the end of the day and we all went home very happy. We had a lovely day. The Umu food was great and we do miss Miss Haslem. I hope we have the Umu some time again.   

                                                         THE END