A warm welcome awaits the athletes at Faleula
With only four more months before the opening ceremony, the preparations of the Games Village in the Methodist Church of Samoa compound at Faleula on the Main West Coast Road are well on track.
The compound will host athletes from 4 July till the end of the XVI Pacific Games on 20 July.
“Our focus is providing quality, safe and cosy homes for the athletes,” says Reverend Amosa Tapuai, the Accommodation Project Manager for the Methodist Church. “It will be a full house here during July and we want to provide the best for all our athletes that will be staying here. We’re looking at all different aspects of maintenance in terms of the water supply and the electricity."
They’re working with the Fire Emergency Service Authority (FESA,) the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MNRE), the Electric Power Corporation (EPC) and many other different organisations such as Ministry of Health (MOH) to ensure athlete safety.
New buildings are under construction such as the dining hall at Levaula, new toilet blocks and showers to be able to cater for the great number of athletes.
“We’d usually have our annual Methodist Conference here in July, but this will be a greater number of people,” Reverend Amosa continues. “All the buildings that we have in this compound will be used to host the athletes, which also includes the classrooms and school buildings that we have.
"Our aim is that everything will be in place for the Games by May or early June.”
All the Methodist Church pupils living in the compound will be moving to open houses behind the homes that athletes will be living in. Reverend Amosa says cleaning will be done three times a day for the all the houses athletes will be staying in.
“As of now everything is on track and the focus of the President of the Methodist Church is that we’re able to have everything required of us to be ahead of the deadline given,” he adds.
“We’re now working on getting new mattresses, bed sheets and bunk beds from overseas for the players.”
In terms of the renovations of the houses everything is progressing.
“Having a look from the houses outside is far different from when you get into the houses. Everything is under renovation at the moment which is close to completion.”
The Games Village will also be responsible for making breakfast for all the athletes. The menu has already been created and given to them by the Pacific Games Office.
“We were planning on having three dining halls, but we looked at the halls we had, and they were both spacious enough. One hall is in Levaula and the other in the Avoka close by the sea,” he says.
For the Methodist Church of Samoa, to provide the Games Village is not an easy task due to time constraints and having their annual conference meeting postponed for the first time in history. However, to rally behind the Samoa 2019 Pacific Games is a privilege.
“This is not the first time Samoa has hosted the Games in the Pacific. I’m thankful for the opportunity that the Methodist Church in Samoa can help with the Games,” Reverend Amosa says.
“It’s not easy or cheap, but as the Methodist motto goes, the best of all is that God is with us! We believe in sacrifices made for a good cause because there is a reward in it. We give all and we will never labor in vain in God.”
