Rapa Nui

I just got back from Easter Island last night and it was incredible. It definitely lived up to its billing as being a magical place. Not only is the island incredibly tiny (only 11 miles to the other side) but there are no other islands anywhere near. It´s just this little patch of volcanic rock dead square in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The moai are also impressive as they are what you think they are, immense rocks, a sort of more sculpturally intricate version of Stonehendge in Englad. They would be a pain in the ass to move with a forklift and a crane let alone just man power. I did notice that of all the moai on the island only one had nipples. I´m not sure what this is to mean. It could be that the other´s nipples were rubbed off in centuries of erosion (think wetsuit rash multiplied by a million). It could also be that there could only be one mother moai (it was one of the bigger more important moai, one of the fifteen in a row) and that the ancient society revered the one mother. And as honed as my anthropological instincts are, I´m really not sure what to make of the one nippled moai.

The other highlight is the people of the people of the island. I was known ¨california¨or ¨la barba¨on the island. The population is so small that not only do the locals know all the other locals (population 3500 roughly the size of my highschool) but they know all other visitors of note. I was one of the few surfers to visit the island and due to the winds, I only surfed in town and met the majority of the locals. It was the most anti hostile vibe I´ve ever been around, especially because my spanish is pretty good at this point. Everyone was coming up to me and talking to me. I met all the local groms, the local vetrinarian, half the airport crew, some restaurant owners and this girl that wore a celest blue wetsuit with a matching duck billed hat with ear covers (my dad has now been moved down to the second dorkiest looking surfer i´ve seen, which is really saying something). Everyone would say Hola as I was walking down the street to check the surf. If I was sitting on rock looking at the surf one of the locals would come and sit right next to me and talk about it. I even met one kid, Joaquin, who saw me off at the airport. It´s such a beautiful culture. I will try to go back someday.