Rainy Sunday in Suva

Yadra, friends!

Well it turned out that today is pretty much a free day for us. We're spending the day buying last minute items (although most stores are closed here on Sundays), doing laundry, and repacking to board the boat to Nayau!

Oh, I realized I forgot one of the best parts of the first full day's activities! When we finally left the village (Koro Va - with "koro" meaning village, and "va" meaning four), it was dark and we were right next to a huge soccer tournament going on. We soon realized it would ridiculous to try to flag down one taxi, let along the four we needed to get all of us back to the hotel! So Paul graciously led us to a bus stop and got us on the correct bus back into the heart of Suva.

Now, the bus...AWESOME! We call the "disco buses" because there's loud music blaring through the whole vehicle...usually Bollywood style but some electronic dance music and we even heard the Backstreet Boys at one point! Open air windows and Friday night activities made it a fun bus ride...right up until the point where the bus broke down! Lol. But I have to hand it to the Fijian transportation system because we had a replacement bus roll up next to us in less than 10 minutes. That totally beats Birmingham! We finally made it back, and we can really say that we loved the disco buses...both of them!

But now to finish out yesterday. After a breakfast of coconut sprial rolls, curry rotis, and cream-filled pastries (which we've taken to calling "crack cream buns", hahaha), we headed out to the Fiji Museum. Along the way we passed a few rugby games, which I was fascinated with since I've never actually seen anyone play rugby.

The Museum itself was great, with a lot of really interesting artifacts. My favorite though was the first gallery room that had full-scale replicas of traditional sailing canoes, including a double-hulled canoe that was used to first colonize the islands. It was all incredibly interesting, especially following our ride in the outrigger the night before.

One quite interesting artifact in the museum was the boiled remains of a shoe that belonged to Reverend Baker, a Methodist missionary to Fiji back when it was first "discovered" by Europeans. Apparently, Mr. Baker greatly offended the chief when he snatched his comb back from the chief's hair. The head is sacred in Fiji, and you should never touch anyone's head...least of all the chief! Needless to say, Reverend Baker ended up converted to dinner rather than converting any natives. :-)

After the museum and lunch, we split up the shopping list for supplies for Nayau. Betsy, Catherine, Kaylin, and I were assigned to get the food supplies for our breakfasts and lunches. We missed the huge Publix-style grocery store and ended up in a smaller store that didn't have everything on our list, but we got most things. We bought a ton of rice, flour, sugar, pasta, and peanut butter. :-) Just the essentials! We also bought oatmeal, jam, Ramen noodles, and spaghetti sauce. We were going for easy to make and could be bought in bulk. I think it worked out well!

Last night I opted to chill in the room with leftovers rather than go out to dinner with the big group. Several others chose that option as well, and we had a nice evening chatting and drinking Fiji Bitter...a beer I actually kinda like! Unfortunately, I won't be able to find it anywhere in Alabama, according to Catherine, who is also disappointed by this. :-)

Today Betsy and I attempted to wash our clothes in a basin in the hotel. There was a washing machine, but no one could figure out how to drain the water from it, so we decided against that. We managed to get the clothes washed and rinsed without any major problems (the tiny closet with the rinsing since didn't have a light though...but we had headlamps! Lol). However, when we went to put everything to dry on the balcony, it was raining. Of course. We tried it for a bit, but the clothes kept getting dripped on. Luckily, Anne and Vassillika found a laundromat that was open today. We wanted to just stick ours in to dry, but apparently the guy said they were too wet, and he'd have to wash them first. Yeah, because THAT makes sense. Oh well! :-) At least our clothes won't be wet and moldy when we get to Nayau!

This afternoon is just packing and discussing what we've learned so far and what to expect and how to act on Nayau, and then free time. I'm afraid this will be my last post until I get back since we're leaving around 10AM tomorrow morning. There will be plenty of pictures and many many stories for you when I return, though! Love you all!

Yadra from Suva!!!

Hey friends! We have safely made it to Fiji! We touched down the day before yesterday in Nadi, Fiji, where we got on a long but beautiful bus ride over to the capital of Suva. The island is beautiful, even through the city grit, and I love it so far! If I think Suva is wonderful, I can't wait to see the relatively unspoiled beauty of Nayau! Speaking of that, we have good news. We no longer have to take the awful, hellish cargo ship for two days to Nayau. Sharyn managed to get a great price on a charter dive boat that can get us there in one night, and she described it as "palatial". :-) So we're all really excited about a much nicer boat ride.

We've actually done a lot since we've gotten here, but I don't want to overwhelm the blog, so I'll hit the highlights. Yesterday was probably the most eventful day. We went to the University of the South Pacific for a lecture, which was very interesting. It's one of the only universities for the region, so there are people from all over the surrounding islands, not just Fiji. Then we went to the market! It was even better than the markets in Spain! There was every conceivable vegetable and fruit and spice, and it went on forever! Then we went upstairs to the kava market to get some for our sevusevu in Nayau. Lauren and I tried our hand at finding and haggling kava...and failed miserably, lol. We ended up almost getting ripped off by a jerk of a kava vendor, but we managed to walk away before he demanded we pay him. We found Sharyn and she helped us find a good vendor for a good price. If I had to do it again, I think I could now!

Last night was probably the best. We met up with Paul, a university professor who has lived in Fiji for something like 20 years and who actually wrote the phrasebook we've been using! He took us to visit a traditional Lauan village right outside Suva. We got to partake in our first sevusevu, and Sharyn said we did pretty good. :-) There was lots of sitting quietly and drinking rounds of kava (not the same as rounds of alcohol, btw). The women showed us some of how they make masi (or barkcloth), and we got to try some cassava straight from an earth oven. The kava wasn't as bad as I expected. As Amanda said, it wasn't Kool-Aid delicious, but it was drinkable and not altogether unpleasant.

Then came my favorite part of the trip so far...we got to go on a boat ride in a traditional outrigger canoe! We hiked up our sulus and waded out to the boat. It seemed so fragile, but once they got the sails up and going, it actually moved really fast and gracefully! I absolutely loved it! Sitting up front with the waves and the reef ahead and the stars coming out, I felt more relaxed than I have since the first showers after all the plane rides! It's hard to describe it except to say that it was beautiful.

Today we're doing a bunch of shopping for Nayau and going to visit the Fiji Museum. I'm hoping I can do another update tomorrow (we leave for Nayau on Monday morning...it's Saturday morning here now), but no promises. If not, I hope you all have a great month, and I'll be sure to update on everything when I get back!

Moce mada!

Almost Time!!!!!

Hey friends!

As the title suggests, it's almost lift-off time for Fiji!  I'm meeting the group at the airport in about 8 hours!  From there, it's off to Houston, then L.A., and finally Nadi.  As soon as we get off the plane in Nadi, we'll get on a bus for a 5-hour trip to the capital city of Suva, which is on the other side of the big island of Viti Levu.  Once we get to Suva, we'll probably be there until Sunday morning, when we board the cargo ship for the (apparently hellish) ride to Nayau.  We'll be on Nayau for about a month before heading back the way we came.  We should have several days in Suva and Nadi on the way home, and it's back to the States!

One significant change is that it turns out we're most likely going to be staying in the village now.  This is great in that we'll have more interaction with the locals...but it's not so great in that we'll have more interaction with the locals.  :-)  Privacy will likely be more of an issue in the village, but the experience will probably be much richer in the long run.  And on the bright side, we wouldn't have to build our own latrine!

Ok, now that I think I may have finally finished all the packing I can do tonight, I'm going to try to get some sleep.  We're meeting at the airport at noon tomorrow...errr, today?  You know what I mean!  I'm so excited (and just a touch nervous)!  Let's hope everyone can keep a positive attitude and make this the absolute best trip of our lives!

Fijian words:

Lako tani. - Go away. (for use both with children and with pushy adolescent boys)

Vale lailai - Toilet (literally "little house"!)

Jilo. (pronounced "chilo") - Excuse me.

Malo - Good

Bula levu - Full (as in: "I'm full.")