Friday 27th January – 10:47am – A quiet day on the resort, the internet has dropped out so we are at a loss at what to do…

It seems like we have settled into a fairly easy routine of life. I wake up at around 08:00am, have breakfast at 08:30am, then do some little jobs. That usually includes collecting litter, cleaning the bar area and tidying up the beach. The rest of the morning is made up of sitting around, reading, and passing the time. We usually open the bar at around 10:30am, then sit in it listening to music and reading until lunch time. We have lunch at around 12:30pm, then move back to the bar for the afternoon. At 16:45pm we get dressed for rugby, and are usually on the way by 17:15pm. This routine has enabled us to be ready for everyday, and the days have been flying by recently.

The first week of trainings were tough, on a account of the language barrier, but we were able to do some tough fitness and strength and conditioning drills. We have played a lot of touch games, which I assumed would be the correct way of coaching. I have since realised, with some help from a Samoa NRL coach, that we needed to directly involve league structure in our sessions, and work with more phase play type games.

We usually have Monday and Tuesday off, which enables us to explore the village and neighbouring resorts and relax.

On Monday 23rd we hired out a car with a girl who was staying at the resort, and drove to some of the tourist spots on the island. We first visited ‘The Trench’, which is a large hole in the ground, filled with sea water that comes in and out with the tide of the nearby sea. It’s a pictur-esk spot to visit, and we were able to go for a relaxing swim in the low tide. You can jump from the ladder, and swim into the caves. Next we drove up the road towards a nearby water fall, which was rather underwhelming. In Samoa you have to pay to look at most natural phenomenons, including waterfalls, which meant we all had to pay $5 just to look at a waterfall from a large distance – we couldn’t even swim in the pool at the bottom… It was a frustrating waste of money.

After the waterfall we decided to drive to the island’s capital, Apia, for a look around and to get some food. By this point I had lost my contact lenses while swimming, so was walking around partially blind. Due to this I accidentally spent $15 on next to nothing from McDonalds, when I was supposed to be getting a snack. We walked around the shops for a while, before eventually heading back to the resort. Once again we had training at 17:00pm, which really took it out of me. Training 6 days a week is tough, especially in the Samoan heat. I really don’t know how these guys do it. They play volleyball in the day, train rugby for 2/3 hours, then walk home and seem fine to do it again the next day. I once heard a rugby commentator say that if Samoa had to the money to invest in rugby that New Zealand or England did, they would be the best team in the world. Im starting to believe it. They have size, natural ability and a never ending engine.

On Wednesday and Thursday evening we had a coach from Samoa Rugby League come down to take training, meaning Ash and I were able to fully take part rather than coach. I can feel myself improving at dummy half, after just 2 proper league sessions. The coach highlighted that the team needs to improve its fitness, and has take back steps towards being a rugby league team. It hurt at first, as I had been really trying to run good constructive sessions, but I realised most of my sessions were directed towards rugby union and fitness, rather than league – I suppose it doesn’t help that I have never played or trained a single minute of league before this week.

Yesterday morning, Thursday 26th, we were woken in the night by torrential rain and a tropical thunder storm. The cabin was full of puddles, and everyone got soaked. The rain continued into mid afternoon, meaning we were unable to do any work all day. I have started resenting days like this, as the boredom really sets in. Whilst still being really happy I decided to come to samoa to volunteer, I cant help but thinking I wish I had only booked 3/4 weeks. 5 has been a lot, and its starting to become horribly repetitive. We have 2 weeks left, which isn’t a lot, however in that time period we will have 13 training sessions + a rugby league 9’s tournament… its going to be a lot…