Like any tourist, we took a trip to the reconstructed house, now museum, of the Scottish writer Robert Luis Stevenson, who spent the last five years of his life in Samoa. He came to Samoa hoping the warm tropical air would ameliorate his tuberculosis. The story goes that he died while helping his wife in the kitchen prepare mayonnaise. The tropical islands of the South Pacific have long been considered by Westerners as far away paradises, and with reason when one sees their tranquil beauty and lush scenery; however, life doesn't automatically improve as the paradigm might suggest, you are unable to escape the truths within yourself, if that was what you had in mind.   (15/52)