 |
| One beautiful view of Fiji |
 |
| The main road |
 |
| View along the gravel road |
 |
| The small boat |
The reefs around Fiji have some of the best soft coral in
the world. There were two large groups
of divers at the resort when I arrived; one from New Jersey and the OBCD’s (Old
Broads Dive Club). I was talking to one of the ladies of the club and she said
started diving when she was 58, she is now 63. Later I would dive with Bob, 73,
and at the next island a young boy age 10 would be part of our dive group. It
just goes to show that diving is relatively safe, not too physically demanding
and a sport that can be enjoyed at all ages. The big boat was full the first
day, so instead of going out with the seasoned divers I opted to join two
novice divers, Graham and Marcella, a honeymoon couple from Portland, Oregon.
We took the small boat over to another island about 15 minutes across the water
where we would start with a shore dive. To me the leaky wooden vessel, with
warped floor and 75hp outboard engine that wouldn’t initially start, did not
inspire confidence and looked too undersized for Lake Michigan yet alone an
open expanse of ocean, however it did not fail and served us well the whole
time. We landed on the beach and as we were preparing for our dive I looked
across the water to my home island for the week; a volcanic, mountainous, land
mass, covered in lush green vegitation, rising from the cerulean water, reaching upward into the sapphire sky and
golden yellow sunshine. The image was out of this world and I commented aloud
“I can’t believe I’m in Fiji”
 |
| Heading out to dive |
and had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t
dreaming. How did I get so lucky to come to this island paradise? There wasn’t
much to the first or second dives, they were more to get Marcella and Graham comfortable
in the water, but on the second day we moved out to the deep water of “The
Bligh”. The Bligh, named after the captain of “The Bounty”, is a stretch of sea
that separates Fiji’s two main islands, and the one’s I would be visiting, Viti
Levu and Vanua Levu. . Kudos must be given to the Fijian crew, these guys are
amazing. Without GPS and no buoys to mark the reefs (they keep getting stolen
even if they use just an empty plastic Fiji water bottle) these seamen can find
the dive locations in a great plane of plain blue sea just by using landmarks
on the island, an island I could barely see at times because of the clouds;
paradise is not sunny all the time. The water where the coral reefs lie is a
lighter blue than the deep blue surrounding them but to be able to know that
the reef we want is this one and not the one a hundred or two yards further is
pretty amazing. Our dive spot this time was “Heaven’s Swimthrough”, and heaven
it was. Fantastic canyons of feathery
soft coral, like living pieces of dainty lace, growing out from the ravine
walls and up from the sea floor. The passages were sometimes barley wider than
shoulder length apart, but always breathtaking in their color, fragile delicate
beauty and filled with fish. On this dive I had reduced my weights and felt and
my buoyancy control improve dramatically; from that point on all my dives
became much more fun and enjoyable. The following evening before I arrived at
dinner Marcella would be recounting her experience to Ben and Rachel, the
husband and wife resort managers. She was telling them how good she felt
swimming in, out and through the narrow coral passage and how she thought she
was doing very well for a beginner. Unfortunately her bubble as a
 |
| The dive team |
diving savant
was burst when Kristen, our dive master, let on that she (Kristen) was swimming
behind Marcela holding onto her tank and actually guiding her throughout the
dive. The letdown was pricelessly funny and Marcela took it all with great
humor. That evening I entered the dining room, as I had the previous nights,
expecting to have a quiet dinner by myself writing in my journal and working on
my blog. We had a late lunch that afternoon because diving took a little longer
than usual so I didn’t go to dinner until 8:00. As I came through the door I hear
this shout “There he is, NORB!” It was like I was entering the “Cheers” bar and
I was Norm. Astonished, I didn’t know what was going on. Marcela and Graham,
who seemed to have started celebrating their last night a little early, were
talking to Ben and Rachel about me; don’t know why. Days before I had just met
them, did a couple dives with them and had the courteous conversation you would
have with interesting people you had just met; nothing out of the ordinary.
Apparently they had been waiting for me and there was an ongoing running joke
that Rachel didn’t think I existed as she had not met me earlier in the week
and hadn’t seen me around. She and Ben usually introduce themselves to the
guests, but I had come in under their
 |
| These things are worth a fortune in Australia |
On the third day I dove on the big boat with the more experienced
divers. It was there I met a retired couple from Texas. The lady l is an award winning underwater videographer.
They have been to all 7 continents, over 70 countries and have dove pretty much
all the great spots in the world so I thought this would be a great learning
opportunity, and it was. I learned she is a b…..,
 |
| The big boat |
somewhat unpleasant person.
Self-important and disdainful, I did not hear a please or thank pass her lips
the entire time. She was constantly
telling her husband what to do, demanding things instead of asking and nothing
was ever right or good enough for her; the soup too spicy, the other divers
idiots, the dive master swimming too fast for her to video. I once commented on
the beauty of the coral and her response, said with contempt, was “I don’t care
about coral, I’m only interested in the small stuff”. I’m a new diver, so I’m
still looking at the forest, for her videos she is not looking at the forest or
the trees, but is down to the blades of grass, yet for all her experience in
some ways I am a better diver. Several times I saw her touching the coral and
moving it out of the way for a better shot or resting her fins on it and
damaging it just to steady herself for the sake of her video, all things a
respectful diver is not supposed to do. On my last night, as I walked into the
dining room, they were sitting at a table and asked me to join them for dinner.
Not having a good excuse to say “NO” and knowing that I would be in the bus
with them the following morning for the long ride back to the airport I
politely sat down, but once she had finished eating it was, Okay I’m done so
we’re going back to our room now, even though I still had food on my plate. Not
everyone you meet while flying is fun.
 |
| View of the islands from a kayak |
One of the activities offered was a boat tour around a few
of the nearby islands, so I joined Johnathan and Carol on this voyage. I would
join them again later on a bamboo rafting expedition. Johnathan, it was always
Johnathan, not John or Johnny, was an anthropology professor from England who
had lost his job and couldn’t find another one in the UK so he and his wife
Carol moved to Poland. Johnathan was an interesting character who asked a lot
of unanswerable questions. We cruised around three islands. One was bought by
some guy who gave it to his daughter as a wedding present; and it is a
substantial sized island, covered by jungle and with some great beaches. The
only inhabitants were the caretaker and his family. Our Fijian “tour guide”
didn’t know the name of the owner. I was going to ask them if I could use their
island sometime since they really weren’t using it. The second island, “Dolphin
Island”, has only one hotel on it with four “bures”. Bures are the traditional
style of housing in Fiji. Like island log cabins, they are simple dwellings
with high steep thatched roofs and screened windows with jalousie shutters
instead of glass. It’s what I stayed in while at Wananavu and later at Daku,
but I’m sure the ones on Dolphin Island are much nicer. I looked it up on the
internet. When you rent the place, you get the whole island for yourself. If
you only rent one bure, it was something like $28,000 dollars for 4 nights. If
you could get 3 other couples to join you, the price dropped to something like
$12,000. You’re paying for privacy. The guide said that when you own property
in Fiji, you don’t own the beach up to 6 feet from the water line. Supposedly
everyone has access to all the beaches. I’d like to show up at Dolphin Island
sometime and plant myself on the beach to test that rule and exasperate the
 |
paying patrons. The third island had two backpacker hostels and a few private
homes. Virtually all the nice homes on the islands are owned by outsiders, many
from Australia and New Zealand. They use them as vacations homes and rent them
out when they’re not staying there. Also on this island was a deserted hostel.
It was bought out about 6 years ago by some large hotel chain that was going to
develop a resort but their plans fell through and now it sits abandoned. The
Fijian guys miss it because they said it was always busy which brought substantial
income to the island. It was kind of eerie walking around the empty grounds. I
hiked up to the lookout tower and almost fell through the rotting floorboards.
There was even a helicopter landing pad up there. We did a little snorkeling
from the sandy beach before heading back.
 |
| Another reason there may be no worries |
The other activity I took part in was a trip to one of the
villages, Barotu, for bamboo river
rafting. The resort is working with some of the nearby villages to promote
cultural tourism and provide them a means of income. When you enter a village,
you are always invited to a “kava” ceremony. Kave is a drink made from the
ground up root of the kava plant mixed with a little water and squeezed by hand
through a kava rag. It is non-alcoholic, but contains an active ingredient that
numbs the lips, tongue and mouth, and supposedly has a calming, sedative
effect. Maybe that’s why “No worries” is another popular phrase. I never felt
anything more than the numbing effect because I could never drink more than one
cup, but would see the men drinking it all evening. It has a bitter medicine tang, looks like
gray, dirty dishwater and tastes awful. Everyone sits on the matted floor as
you are offered a cup of kava. You are required to clap once, accept the cup,
and drink. While you are drinking everyone else stares at you and claps.
Clapping is a big part of the ceremony.
 |
| A village house |
By US standards the
houses in the village we visited are nothing more than tin shacks raised off
the ground to avoid the damp earth and seasonal heavy rains. There is running
water and there are flushing toilets, although they are outside the houses and
barely a step up from an open pit outhouse. If you judge just by the houses
then Fiji would seem like a poor country, but if you look at the homes, i.e.
the families and people filling the houses, then Fiji is rich and prosperous.
Everywhere I went the people were welcoming and friendly. Always with a big
smile and a happy Bula!. Extended families seemed to be the norm. The children
would come out to meet us smiling, laughing, curious and full of joy. You could
see it on their faces as the school bus returned them back to the village or
when they were playing with a ball half filled with air. When I was taking one
of my daily walks down the road I could see children running in joyful
abandonment, mother doing the wash, father tending to the animals in the field
and the grandmother fetching water from a well.
Family and friends visit, sit, talk and seem to really take pleasure in
being together. They have little in material things but seem to have everything
spiritually. I was talking to Ben about going fishing one day. I asked him what
would I do with all the fish I’d catch. (Hey, you have to think positive.) He
said no problem they would use them in their kitchen. He then went on to say
that
 |
| Children come out to say Bula! |
sometimes he has trouble getting fish because the fishermen will go fish
and catch enough for himself and his family, If there happens to be extra he
will sell them, but he won’t go fishing again until he needs more fish for his
family. The thought of continuing to fish just to make extra money doesn’t
cross his mind. Why would he need more, when he has everything he needs? He
doesn’t need two cars, a larger house, bigger boat, etc. he has something more
valuable, time to enjoy friends, family and life. Maybe there’s a lesson to be
learned.
 |
| Crusing on a Sunday afternoon |
The bamboo river rafting was interesting too. The bamboo
raft is a mode of transportation and way of life for this village on the river.
In addition to Johnathan and Carol, we were joined by an Aussie couple, Ian and
Jane, who came to Fiji with their four children ages 2-12. They did not bring
their brood on the rafting tour because they were not sure what we would
encounter but later regretted the decision because it would have been a
wonderful experience for the children. Together we were carefully boarded onto two
long bamboo rafts in a muddy, black, mangrove lined river. It was strange as we
were helped onto the rafts as too avoid getting our feet wet or stepping in the
mud and given towels to sit on to soften our seats, yet the men and fifteen
year old boy poling our craft or “like punting at Oxford” as Johnathan tried to
explain, had no problem standing
 |
| The pole boy |
barefoot, waist deep in the murky water. I
wondered how they view us and our apparently delicate ways. As we went downriver
we learned about the plants, mostly mangrove, along the banks and their traditional
uses. Several times we got stuck on a shallow sand bar and the boy would jump
off the raft and struggle to pull us to deeper water. We came to the confluence with another river
which was our turning around point. We were told that ships used to ply this
river carrying sugar cane to the coast and that one sunk in this very spot.
They insisted the river was 300 feet deep at this location. I found that hard
to believe given the narrowness of the river and the shallowness of the river
we were on, but what does this city kid know. On the way back, the boy jumped off the raft
and ran into the jungle while we continued along. A little while later he
emerged upstream carrying a handful of something. When he rejoined us on the
raft we saw that he had caught some mud crabs. People from river villages catch
the crabs for food and sell them
 |
| Yummy! |
along the roadside for about $2.00 a dozen. We
saw many of them, along with fish mongers, as drove to and from the airport. Of
course the boy had to pull the pincher claws off the crabs before handing them
to us to look at; wouldn’t want the city folk to be nipped. I wonder if it is
tough for him to do that, not because it’s physically difficult, but the claw
is the meatiest part and it would be like throwing away good food. I’m sure
their mothers love them, but mud crabs are not cute.
After dinner on the last night before you leave, the staff
at Wananavu get together and sing to you “Isa Lei”, a traditional Fijian farewell
song. The words to the song and their translation I don’t know, but the poignant
melody, beautiful chorus, sweet harmonies, and lovely voices conveyed the sentiment;
we are sad that you are leaving and will miss you when you’re gone. I know they sing the song almost every day, but
they do it with such feeling, passion and delight that I truly believe they
will miss you when you’re gone. It’s quite emotional and touches your heart.
Now whenever I hear that song I will be transported back to the tropical paradise
and smiling faces that is Fiji.
 |
| Odysseying can be hard work |
Do you Wananavu?...........I think you do.
Norb
Next stop SavuSavu
No comments:
Post a Comment