Kava ceromony

Once we arrived in Tongatapu, the new PC trainees (that's me) attended a bbq at the country director's house and as part of that we partook in a Kava ceromony. Kava is a south pacific drink made from taro root and sugar cane in room temperature water. It is said to give heightening effects to your sense and yet also make you very sleepy. The story behind kava in Tonga is that the Tongan King went to visit a family but they had nothing to offer him for a meal. The family, as the story goes, decided to kill their sick daughter and offer her as food for the visiting king. They killed her and began to cook her in an underground oven when the king found out what they had done. He was so moved by their sacrifice that he told the family to leave her buried. After some time the a taro root and sugar cane grew at the place where the daughter lay. The family noticed a rat that would nibble off the taro root, wobble about like he was intoxicated then nimble off the sugar cane and regain his balance. Thus kava was born. Interesting. The ceromony begins with the chief sitting at the top of a circle flanked by two speaking chiefs and the heirachoral ranking stems down from them to the bottom of the circle where the kava is made in a wooden bowl. The taro root is crushed and put into room tempature water and then strained out by dried reeds of sugar cane. The "doas" or single young females distributed the kava around the circle once the speaking chief speaks the name of who is to recieve and that individual claps in recognition of their turn to accept. After all the kava is drank, a young single woman comes out in traditional dress with all her exposed skin being her arms, shoulders and calves covered in oil to dance in the center of the circle of (typically) men. The men than slap money onto her oil covered skin and apparently if the money sticks then it is proof that she is a virgin. Lather up, ladies! Sounds sort of bachelor party like but it is a tradition boys club in my opinion. The kava tasted a little like, well, Iowa lake water; so dirt, only more watery. I didn't feel any side effects but others said they did so...? It was an amazing experience for sure but sadly my last on the recieving end since women are not allowed to participate in kava ceromonies. I could "go doa" and serve, which might actually be my style since it seems to be a more respectable cocktail waitress.