Mac is still not very well but is still e-mailing strong. In this month’s Globetrotter e-newsletter, he writes about American Samoa, his friend Frank adds some of his reminiscences about British Samoa and other random thoughts on travels that we love to hear about.

Sending picture postcards to self. For a while when travelling overseas I would go to a department store or cheapest place to buy picture postcards or go to travel bureau and see if they hand any free ones.

I would usually put down name of cheap budget place I stayed and how much and anything else I might forget and would have the foreign stamp on card date etc. This was before e mail. Unfortunately I wrote so small on some of the cards that I can’t make out what pertinent information I wanted to save, but here’s some notes that I made that I can read.

Apia Western Samoa, November 20 1978. Stayed first night at Hotel Tiafu US $19.26 and then moved next door to Appian Way Nala US $11.6l. The owner of the budget place was the sister of a famous sister that owned a more famous more expensive place in Apia.

In WWII Michener met this sister and supposedly got the idea for one of his characters in his South Pacific tales. Anyway, my landlady told me of a trip she and sister took to Rome to have an audience with the Pope (one for the public.) A friend of mine here in Washington DC who was a travel agent had booked an around the world trip for one of the officials in Western Samoa and had asked him to look after me. Mr Pinata Ah Ling, ex member of Agriculture.

He took me to beautiful government sponsored Hotel Tusitala (teller of tales) and then across the island to a beach where some of South Pacific was filmed etc. We passed cattle under Coconut Tree project. Samoans dressed in white carrying bibles were on the way to church where they sing beautifully. I was told Samoa has the most churches per capita of anyplace on earth including Rome. There was a new brewery operated by a German brew master. Valima (pure water,) was the name of Robert L Stevenson’s home on W Samoa.

Later while on my own a laughing Samoan policeman told me that Samoans consider it discourteous to drink or eat while walking. He was not reprimanding me but using this piece of information to open up a conversation with me. An American was running the Returned Serviceman’s Club instead of a Samoan veteran. To keep club open, they took in associate members that had not been in the service. He told me that he taught the children of man that befriended me and that this gentleman was dying and that is why he took a trip around the world and why so much of his conversation was about religion and how we should all try to get along. I am glad I got to meet him. If you write picture postcards to yourself write more legibly than I did.

Frank, also an American retired serviceman adds to Mac’s e-mail: British Samoa was one of the finest places in the Pacific. I was there from December 1942 to May 1943, then went to American Samoa to June 1943 next to Wallis Island French Polynesia and then in October 1943 back to American Samoa for one month, then to Maui until January 1944. I left there and went to Marshall’s for combat etc.

British Samoa was a great place. Frank explains that the woman who ran the expensive place in Apia was Aggie Grey. She was the girl friend of MG Charles F. B. Price, CG of Samoan area. He used to send his PBY, (airplane) over Apia to bring her over to his place in Am Samoa.

I still speak a little Samoan. It came in handy in early 90’s when I was working in Hawaii. A lot of Samoans live there. When they found out I could speak some Samoan they couldn’t do enough for me. I like British Samoa better than any place I was in WWII. When someone died, there would be a feast and I would go out to the village Luemwinga, can’t spell it, that is a phonetic version. It was about two miles from airport. If I heard the drums being beaten, they actually were hollowed out logs, I could tell which were from Luemwinga. I would go out to the village and go in the bush and shoot a couple pigs for them. I always made it to the feast. I was sort of adopted by the village. Have never been back to British Samoa but have passed through American Samoa several times, last time in December 1999. I could tell you many tales about the place…

Mac is a huge fan of Lew Toulmin who wrote book The Most Travelled Man on Earth wrote about a rare British (Scottish) Medal, The Order of the Thistle which is granted to only sixteen distinguished Scotsmen, making it the probably the most exclusive order in the world.

In one chapter of his book, he wrote about the last Japanese soldier hiding out in Guam – seeing Guam the hard way, living twenty eight years in a hole. The ironies of his situation are amazing. While Yoki crouched in his cave, planeloads of Japanese tourists arrived every hour delighted to sun themselves on Guam’s beaches just miles from his cave.

Within nine months of his return to Japan he married a younger woman. They took their honeymoon where many Japanese couples do – on Guam. His call up letter in Japan had read, “Leave home as if you were going out for a stroll. Do not pack. Do not say goodbye to your family.”

Nearby Johnston Atoll is a chemical weapons facility southwest of Hawaii and run by the US government and Raytheon. The only way to really see the island is to get a degree in chemical warfare and join Raytheon.

One time I wrote a fan letter to a deal lady that travelled on her own in China and wrote book I Never Heard the Temple Bells. She answered that she was leaving that morning driving to California.

Another interesting nugget: I read somewhere that Paul Warren of Pitcairn Island descendent of Fletcher Christian has two necklaces that include nails from HMS Bounty.

If you would like to get in touch with Mac, he is happy to correspond by e-mail when he is well. His e-mail address is: macsan400@yahoo.com