Birthday fun with Cindy of Samoa

By Elizabeth Ah-Hi 30 June 2018, 12:00AM

The Palmer family from Wellington, New Zealand, thought they were going to enjoy a quiet night cap at the Taumeasina Island Resort bar on Wednesday night.

That was until they realised that they had come across the Cindy of Samoa night show and they were dazzled by Cindy’s gold sequin dress and island cabaret style show. Before they knew it, they were dancing to the greatest pop hits of the century and cheering the Samoan diva on throughout the night. 

“The show tonight (last night) was a bonus because we just been out to Scalinis where we had a world class dinner and we are a real fussy group, but it was just so impressive. Then we thought we would have a nice quiet nightcap,” Matt Palmer laughs. “But then we’re sitting here and we see Cindy and we thought ‘hey this is alright – what a voice! So a bit a fun to end the night I would say.”

Matt is celebrating his 60th birthday, he rallied his family and some of his closest friends together to make the trip to Samoa for 10 days of fun in the sun and 22 members answered the call.

“In theory it was to celebrate or commemorate my 60th birthday, and so we just put an email out there to ask the family and friends if they want to come over and as a result there are 22 of us here, so it’s been fantastic. We are really impressed with Samoa, for a start the weather has been great and the other thing it’s the people. Everyone has been just very friendly, everybody’s just great. 

“New Zealand is interesting in terms of the different cultures, especially Auckland, but there’s a few chips on everyone shoulders but not here, everyone is genuine. And we’ve all been talking about that and we really appreciate it.”

The Palmer family has taken large group trips to the Pacific Islands before but Samoa gained their attention once they took stock of where their favourite sports players were from.

“Most of us have been to Fiji, we’ve been to Rarotonga but we hadn’t been to Samoa. When we had a look at it we thought, these guys crank out the best rugby players, the boxers, it’s just a fantastic race.”

The family has spent most of their time staying at the Taumeasina Island Resort and using it as their base while everyone was off on their own little adventures. 

“Everyone has done the tourist thing, visited the beaches and so forth. We’ve stayed here at the resort but we’ve gone out and had a look around Apia to try and get a flavour for it. We don’t all go out the 22 of us together; we sort of do it in groups. Then at night time we get together and compare notes and they are all good stuff.”

Staying on another five days, Mr. Palmer and his wife are going to spend another five days in Samoa and heading on to Seabreeze to enjoy the rest of his birthday holiday. Asked whether he would consider coming back again and Mr. Palmer said without a doubt there was talk among their group about returning.

“Compared to the other islands we’ve been to, this one is on the up and up. It’s going to get there and it is going to get there. We were talking about that tonight; it’s quite likely we will be back.  We were impressed enough we will come back.” 

By Elizabeth Ah-Hi 30 June 2018, 12:00AM
Samoa Observer

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