My Tonga Soundtrack

I was skyping with a friend the other day (technology is so great) and they started laughing.

“Mandy?! Did I just hear a rooster?”

“Yeah, I guess you did.”

I’ve lived here so long that I have become completely accustomed to the sounds that surround me and forget that my ears would definitely not be graced with the same symphony if I were living in Colorado or most other places. I forget that the soundtrack that makes up my day-to-day life here is unique and special and something that I may miss next year.

If my life in Tonga could be transformed into a soundtrack I imagine it would be called something catchy like “Tonga Tunes”.  It wouldn’t include music per se (aside from track 3), but a compilation of other sounds gathered from my life here.

Here's what I imagine the album cover to look like:

 

And here’s what I imagine the track listing to look like:

1.     Cock-a-doodle-doo. [3:13] A wonderful mix of rooster noises. Clucking, cock-a-doodle-doo-ing and rooting around for food at all times of the day.

2.     Is that a dinosaur? No, it’s a pig being chased by a dog. [0:59] Squealing piglets or big pigs all being chased by ferocious dogs. Sounds a bit like a soundbit from Jurassic Park.

3. The louder I sing, the closer I am to Him. [5:29] Various recordings of different churches throughout Tonga singing their best on Sunday morning. 

3.     Drip drip drop. Thud. [2:22] Torrential downpour through the coconut trees.

4.     It’s a bird, it’s a plane. Nope. It’s a bat. [1:23] These guys sound somewhat like what I imagine a flying rat to sound like. They love to fly around at night.

5.     Woodblocks in my house. [0:33] The clicking of the blue-tailed skinks (lizards) in my house. 

6.     A Ring-a-ding-dong: The Bells of Tonga. [3:33] Bells in Tonga are made of various items - empty butane tanks, wooden blocks, pieces of metal. This track showcases all the different "bell" sounds found in Tonga.

7.     Moo, Moo, adflkasdflkj! [2:00] This track doesn't only include cows mooing, but the noises they make when they get each other angry or need to let others know that they are around.

8.     Giggle, Giggle, Cackle, Grin. [4:24] So much of this culture involves laughing at yourself and others. This track includes people giggling.

9.     The Sounds of Water [5:33] The waves crashing against the tide flights, the sound the water makes as it moves through the coral, sailboats clanking on the surface. A perfect ending to a perfect soundtrack. 

So, there it is. I bet it'd be a bestseller on iTunes. I just bet it would.