We went to a squatter settlement and hung out, drank kava, designed and made masi ( bark cloth). The designs that cover it are made with clay paint and boiled bark ink that are patted through a stencil on top of flattened bark. Very cool. The people in this squatter settlement were from the lau island group and had sailed there on the "canoe" that is in the picture above. It is made totally out of wood and bark and they took us out on it for a joy ride. Here are some of the kids we hung out with during the day.

After a long week of rain in suva, we all decided it was time to hit up the beach. So we took a bus to pacific habor which is about 30 miles away. This was the closest place to suva with nice beaches and somewhere for us to stay. So we stayed at a backpackers hotel for the weekend. Ten of us stayed in one room with 5 bunk beds and then there was a huge common room with a tv air hockey table and some couches. It was really nice to get away from suva and eat what we wanted to eat. So we treated ourselves to some delicious meals and some sun bathing. The hotel had a cool bar and a huge tiki man pool. The theme of the pool area was cannibalism and had a bunch of paintings of Fijians eating white people, a giant spoon sculpture with human skulls resting in it and a giant boiling pot ( hot tub). Only in Fiji. Every room in the hotel was a different theme and megan and alex's room was under the ocean theme. PRETTAYY COOL.

The second day started off to be rainy so everyone wanted to leave but me and a couple other people decided to be optimistic and went swimming in the rain. We wound up staying later and it got really sunny out which was a surprise and it turned out to be a great day. As we were catching the bus back into suva it started down pouring. We got on the bus and there was only enough seats open for the 5 of us. So we made our way down the isle and squished into our seats. I was sitting with one cheek on the seat and the other basically on another mans lap. The bus was not like the others in suva with open windows and instead had horrible circulation and smelled of BO. Not the best way to travel. But we survived and made it back to suva.

After a week of school we made our way to Levuka. We took a bus 2 hours to a boat, where our bus drove onto the boat. The boat ride was an hour and once we arrived at the island, we got back onto the bus drove two more bumpy hours. This used to the be capitol of Fiji and is the oldest city in Fiji. We stayed at the oldest hotel, which needless to say, was very creepy.
This trip was pretty cool. We went to the tuna factory which had about 800 employees on an island with a population of 8000. They are in partnership with Bumblebee tuna, so if you want to support Fiji’s economy, buy Bumblebee tuna. We weren’t allowed to go through the factory, but we walked enough inside of it to reek of tuna. We got to see a short movie on the process of packaging tuna, which was pretty cool. After that we went on a walking tour through the town and then took a truck to different churches. THe whole town smelled of tuna and we were happy when we could leave that. The first night we went out to a bar and wound up being 14 of the 20 people at the bar and danced the night away with a transvestite named Gina (harry) and her sister. The second night, after a packed full day of tuna, we went to bed early to get up the following morning at 415. We had 5 people to a room and we pushed all of the beds together because we were all scared. I woke up with another girl in the middle of the night to a horrible screeching noise that sounded like a window cracking and a water faucet turning on. This sounded like a women screaming. I didn't sleep at all that night because i was too horrified. The hotel is haunted and one of the girls claimed she saw a ghost while we were pulling out. I was very happy to leave there. Here are some pictures from that day .

At the end of the week we went to the Sand Dunes, which is the only National Park in Fiji. We climbed the lush sand dunes to the top, jumped down a couple and then ended up at the water. During our hike it started down pouring. Later we went to the 7th most beautiful beach in the world and hung out in the water all day. We were in Sigatoka which means always shinning. (possible thought for a new tattoo) Here are some pictures from that day.

The next day we left for Suva. After a 3 hour bus ride that was needless to say, fast and bumpy, we arrived in the rainy city. As we were entering the city we came across a Hindu festival that was just starting. After the part that we saw, they were walking down the street to do fire walking. Unfortunately we did not get to see that. Here are some pictures and videos of what we did see.

Loutoka City and Pecani Youth Group

The next day was by far the most interesting and rewarding experience. I can barely put it into words. We had the “drop off”. We were paired up randomly and given a topic that we had to discuss with random strangers and find out as much as we could about it. Then we had to find our way into Loutoka city and eat lunch and then catch the bus back to the hotel. Well Megan and I got dropped off in a low income housing project and as we walked in we had never felt more awkward in our lives. Two white girls strolling through the middle of a housing project trying to talk to people about education. Then a women invited us up into her home and told us everything we needed to know about the schooling system around Loutoka. Which seemed very similar to America’s traditional way of schooling. After the visit, megan and I wandered outside to a field where about 15 little kids came running up to us. They were a little shy at first and then after about 2 minutes they were jumping and grabbing our earings, playing with our hair, staring at us, climbing on us; just infatuated. One of the kids asked if we were white which was pretty funny. It was really cool to see how much joy they got out of the simple things, how little they knew about America, and how happy they were with their lives even though they were not very healthy and poor. Later we made our way back to Loutoka city, ate really good spicy vegetarian food and then caught a bus back to the hotel.









That night we went to a Pecani Youth group that was made up of all flamboyant gay men and drank kava all night, sang, danced, spilled kava, had fun. This is a picture of everyone dancing and below is a clip of the youth group singing. The traditional way of fijian dancing is to stand hip to hip holding the other persons back and step forward 4 steps and backward 4 steps, while shaking your hips. Then you can back away and do any sort of dancing you want that usually involves shaking your hips and arms. When a group is preforming the polite thing to do is to go up and put baby powder on their faces and heads and money in their shirts. Since these men were very flamboyant the dancing got a little out of control and one of the guys from our group got up and shook his boootayy. Their voices were amazing and unfortunately the video did not do them justice.

First Day

So the group is awesome. We have four boys and 10 girls. This past week everyone has bonded really well, which i am extremely happy about because the group is extremely diverse. There are kids from all over, one from Colorado, Minnesota, New york, Boston, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Virginia, Wisconsin, La, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Westport and Long Island. I cant say that I don’t like anyone in the group because every person brings something to the table. I can see how we will get on each other’s nerves during the trip but so far I love it. The first day we were all together we went into Nadi and walked around together and shopped. Later we just went back to the hotel, had a couple meetings, swam and then went and got dinner. The second day we went into Nadi again and went to a Hindu Temple. This was a very interesting experience because the guide who explained every mural to us seemed to hate Americans. He blamed all evil in the world on White Caucasian Americans. This got a little awkward and I didn’t follow anything he was saying because learning Hinduism in about 15 minutes doesn’t really work out very well. There was a Buddhist tree outside that was for women to walk around with yellow string to promise good health for their husband and a long life together. After we explored and took all the pictures we could, we separated and each had a buddy for the day.

We were supposed to eat lunch somewhere where we wouldn’t normally eat and then find out way back to Tokatoka, the resort. I ate lunch with a couple people and had lamb curry and some vegetable rice fried balls which were all amazing. We left lunch, walked around and then Gillian, my buddy, and I found the bus station and made our way back to the hotel. We all wound up swimming for a couple hours. After our group took a very bumpy ride in a large unsturdy van (that we traveled around in the whole week) to a Muslim man’s house. His name was Abdul and he had his own farm on his property that he grew all of his own vegetables, herbs and fruit. He also had a honey house where he made his own honey. We had the privilege to eat a honey comb for desert. That was the best tasting honey I’ve ever had. I will try to bring some back for everyone to taste. His house was right next to a mosque. This is a picture of Abdul in his garden.



This was an amazing experience. He greeted us by showing us every vegetable and spice he was growing. Then he sat on the floor and chatted with us for a while. He had been fasting and the meal we were about to have was going to be the one breaking his fast, so while the women prepared the meal for all of us, Abdul and the rest of the men went to pray in the mosque for an hour or so. The meal was the most delicious meal I have ever tasted. We sat on the ground on mats and ate with our hands. We had soup, rice, chicken, fish, vegetables, salad and many other things. The women could not eat with us because in their religion women have to wait for the men to finish eating before they can eat. We sat around all night eating, laughing, playing with his grandson’s and having an amazing time. We all left with such a great sense of welcoming. I loved the sense of community and family I felt when I was there.

Here is a picture of the mosque down the street.