Long voluptuous late-day shadows. Sputtery motorbikes, cackly kids, idle unamused adults. There is no hurry. Nothing pressing, nowhere to go. Unless they work in a fusi (shop) or get handicrafty, most Tuvaluans do little because there is little to do.
And yet Funafuti Atoll's main coral road is abustle. We seek refreshment. In a tight black “Beautiful Since 1992” T-shirt, her hair yanked into a bulbous brown bun, Katalaina is the young doe-eyed clerk at Tefota Mini-Mart. Outside, crude art on the red-and-blue shipping container hawks Tefota Liquor Express and its “amazing beer garden.” A green taro leaf-shaped arrow points the way. But the amazing place isn't open.
Illegally (so she claims), Katalaina sells me a sixer of Victoria Bitter. Daniel, Nico, and I each crack a can. Then another. Seeing this, Katalaina demands we file into the shaded area behind her fusi.
“Might we get arrested?” I ask.
She laughs. “Probably. The police here don't have much to do except arrest guys who are fighting or are drunk on the street.”
“These are our first beers today. We're not drunk.”
“Not yet,” Nico says beneath his sly Canuck smirk.
“Did you guys come to see
