Pacific Islanders Essay Example

Pacific Islanders Essay Example Pacific Islanders Essay Pacific Islanders Essay Forrest Dabb Pacific Islanders 1/24/2009 What Do I Know About Pacific Islanders? I didn’t know what a Pacific Islander was tell I was about the age of 10. I was warming up for a football game and someone asked me who the big Polynesian player on the team was. I didn’t understand so that night I asked my parents what a Polynesian was and they explained to me that it is a race from the islands. Since then I have had a great chance to learn a lot about two of the cultures from the pacific islands. Football has made it really easy for me to get to meet Polynesians and make friends with them. I went to Bingham high school and it started out with my friend Derek Tuimauga moving in the neighborhood and after that all of his cousins started moving in before I knew it middle school came and we had a lot more diversity in the class rooms. The two cultures I have had the chance to get to know is the Tongan and Samoan cultures. I would hang out with my poly friends every week learning more about them every time we were together. I think that there is a lot of very bad stereotypes for the Polynesian people. Some of the stereotypes I have heard are that Tongans eat the horse which can be true but is also offensive. Polynesians are known to be lazy, eat a lot, late, and large. Some good stereotypes are good at sports, very generous, family oriented. All though some of these stereotypes are true they are wrong to judge because most of them do not apply to the Pacific Islander. Whenever I go over to my friends house the family is always really welcoming and feeds me even if im not hungry they insist. Some of the usual food they have for me includes pig, taro, chicken and rice, octopus, beef, pork, macaroni salad, pagi popo, simeni, chicken catsu, palusami, musubi. Most of the food I have eaten has been great, the only thing about the food is that it tastes so good because of all the fat that is in the food. Whenever I hear the term Pacific islanders I think of Polynesian people and all the islands that they come from like Samoa Tonga Fiji Hawaii Tahiti. I picute the tribes on there home islands in the jungles in skirts and tribal tattoos. I see both Tongan and Samoan people fighting each other. Using spears to hunt for there food and living in huts. I don’t know that much about the pacific islanders and the history but I have learned a lot just from all my friends and the types of actions they show to me when I hang around them and their family. I love the Polynesian culture and everything that I have learned from them. There is a big difference in the way I was raised and the way my Polynesian friends were raised I was raised without as much affection and less family oriented things in my life. Where my friends were shown a lot of love for the family and they would always be having big family parties or stake dances. I believe this class will show me a lot that I don’t know about pacific islanders and help me to understand the culture better. I am excited to learn just because I was raised with them I would love to hear more about them.