RIP Luigi's Pizza Pub

When Sara and I arrived in American Samoa, there were limited lunch options around our office. The Executive Office Building, not so fondly called the "EOB," is near the center of the island on the south edge of Pago Harbor. However, there's limited food options around here. There are a few sit down restaurants of varying levels of OK, but pricey. There's always McDonalds. A few food trucks are scattered around, but they severely lack vegetarian options. The various "Fast Food" places offer hotel pans of cold stir fry or fried food that had been sitting around for hours have never been an option that I considered. So Sara and I have been bringing left overs and eating lunch in our office or at the fales located on the beach in front of the office.

In August, Luigi's Pizza Pub opened behind the office opened. We'd been taunted with the "Pizza and Sports Pub" sign out front that offered the delightful combo of beer, pizza and TV for months as the business slowly crept towards opening up. Us eager contract workers were waiting for a place that combined all these factors here on island. When Luigi's finally opened, we were ready to embrace all that the sign offered. The pizza was good, New York-style thin crust, however the TV and beer were missing out of the gate. We kept returning for months hoping the minor issues would be resolved once the business could afford the TV and get licensed for beer. Those issues never resolved and the owner soon was complaining about the need for more business to offset his huge energy overhead costs (the electric pizza ovens are expensive to run on an island that gets all its power from generators that run on diesel fuel that is shipped in from thousands of miles away). Without money for advertising, the general public beyond those employed at the EOB, never really found the pizza place.

The place wasn't able to keep up with its bills and yesterday when I made plans to meet one of friends from the US Department of Agriculture there for lunch we learned the bad news: Luigi's had gone under. We had to scramble for lunch and go to one of the sit down places, not ideal, but we're back to the status quo for lunches here at the EOB. Luigi's We'll miss you.

Luigi's Pizza and Sports Pub, August 2011-January 2012. Rest in Peace.