The West and the Coral Coast

I made it back from my travels which were part research and part vacation. Austin, Melissa, and I caught the bus to Nadi on Wednesday afternoon. In Nadi, we stayed with a Pentecostal pastor and his family. It was the house where my host brother Bill stays during his pilot training. It was nice to be able to hang out with him. It was a trip to be back in Nadi. It was the city where we first arrived and spent our orientation. It was crazy to see how badly they take advantage of uninformed tourists in the city. You really had to keep your gaurd up and be nasty to certain cab drivers.

On Thursday, I ventured into Nadi town, where I met up with my host great uncle. He drove me out to Momi, which was the location of the best preserved WWII battery in Fiji. It's a project of the Fijian National Trust. We got to the battery only to find the gates locked. I started to panic, because seeing this battery was a big part of my project. My host uncle told me not to worry. He took me to the village where the park rangers work and got the keys from one of their wives. Apparently the rangers were away for training. We headed back to the gun battery site, where my host uncle unlocked the gates and the tiny museum for me. The museum had some historical photos and info that really helped me with my project. The battery itself was amazing. It had been completely preserved. The actual guns were really impressive, and the view from the top of the battery was breathtaking. It was also awesome that I had the entire place to myself for three hours. After that, I had lunch with my host uncle and his family and then he drove me back to Nadi where I spent the afternoon with Austin and Melissa.

On Friday, we caught a bus to a beach resort where our friend Dana was staying with her American parents. We all went together to the Sigatoka Sand dunes, which was also maintained by the national trust. We hiked a trail around the dunes for a couple hours. The dunes were incredibly impressive. The views were amazing. Dana and I had a race to the top of one of them. I won the race because of a frisbee layout dive at the end. It was really fun and a little bit ridiculous. We spent the afternoon in Sigatoka and then caught a bus to a backpackers resort at Mango Bay.

Mango Bay was a pretty nice place to spend the evening. We walked on the beach, swam in the pool that had a swim up bar, and took advantage of their happy hour.

The next worning we caught a mini bus to Taunovo Bay, a super fancy five star resort. We got to spend a day there, because Austin's host sister was getting married, and his family had managed to secure local rates. We met up with some more of the students there. We spent the morning helping get everything ready for the wedding. The actual ceremony was beautiful. It was by a pool near the beach. Everything was spoken in Fijian, but it was still nice. We spent the afternoon and evening enjoying the supernice facilities. I ended up getting really sick in night. I think I had a stomach bug of some sort, but it was a pretty nice place to recover. The biggest downside to getting sick, was that I couldn't go diving in the morning like I had planned. My health keeps getting in the way of that happening. I think I'll still have a couple more chances though.

The next morning I walked on the beach and layed by the pool. We caught a van home about midday and I spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out with my host family. It was a crazy busy few days and now I'm in the middle of my research project. I'm trying to get it done as quickly as possible so that I can travel some more before I leave in three weeks.

Fieldwork fun

Sorry for the late update. I've been really busy planning travel and working on my independent study project. My main contact for the project is Elia, a really nice guy who works at the Fiji Museum. He's been guiding me around alot of the World War II remains near Suva. So far we've been in three sets of tunnels, to three defensive batteries, a radar station, and to the army camp in an unsuccesful attempt to gain access to their archives. Trekking to the remains has been really fun. I wear a headlamp and protective face mask in the tunnels. We found some 1940's coke bottles in one. The trip to the army camp was pretty hilarious. I was a bit nervous because its "the" army camp, that's headquarters to the interim regime, aka, the belly of the beast. We essentially just kept getting passed off to different people until we were finally told we'd have to wait to hear from their superiors, which I'm still doing. I doubt I'll hear from them. They're kind of busy at the moment. Elia has been amazingly helpful throughout the whole process. I'm so grateful he's around and willing to help a lowly undergrad.

This past weekend was really fun. I've been hanging out with my family alot. I played touch rugby in the rain with my host brothers. It was a blast. We were diving in puddles and sliding all over the field. Last night I saw Star Trek with Brian and Austin. It was really good and I highly recommend it. Seeing movies here is really cheap. It's five FJD for a ticket, which is a little over 2 American. There are also tons of dvds for sale around the city for 2FJD. Movie watching is a big part of the city culture.

One part of the weekend that sucked was my brother Danny getting really sick. His intestine ruptured because of a weak muscle and he had to go the hospital for emergency surgery. It was really frightening. I spent a lot of yesterday visiting with him at the hospital. He's doing better now and getting discharged today, which is a relief. Please keep him in your thoughts and prayers.

I'm traveling this week on a mega roadtrip around the main island of Viti Levu. I'm planning on going to Nadi to see a gun battery, Sigatoka to visit some awesome sand dunes, and to Pacific Harbor for a Fijian wedding and some diving. I'll keep you posted.

The Coke Games and a Busy Weekend

This past week was our last week of official classes. I had my Fijian language final exam as well as a couple projects to present. It feels really nice to be done. Now we just have five weeks left. 4 of those are dedicated to ISP, our month long research project. I've been working on mine pretty consistently. I'm hoping to finish early so I can have time to travel. I'm going to start my fieldwork tomorrow by exploring some World War II tunnels attached to the Fiji Museum. It should be a good time.

My home-stay house has been crazy lately. The New Zealand family left for home, which was sad. I really liked a couple of the kids. My two brothers, Dan and Bill, are both back for the week. I love having them home because I have people to laugh and hang out with.

There's also 4 pastors from the Pentecostal Church staying at our house for a huge conference. A few of them are pretty nice, but there is one guy who drives me crazy. He told me the Lutheran Church was falling apart and that Martin Luther's life meant nothing now. He also preached about the evils of Harry Potter. I've decided to just not have anything to do with the conference. One of my friends here is living with an Anglican priest and his family so I've started attending their church. It's a beautiful building and a nice community.

The biggest homestay news is that I have a dad now. He came back from his UN mission in Georgia for this conference. He is super Pentecostal. I haven't connected with him very well yet. I think it bothers him that I don't want anything to do with his religion. He's a pretty nice guy though.

This past weekend I went with my brother Danny to the Coke Games, which is the highschool track and field championships for all of Fiji. It's a huge deal. Everyone wears their school colors and has special cheers. It was definitely the most exciting track meet I had ever been too. Whenever a race was remotely close, everyone would stand up and start screaming at the top of their lungs for their racer. It was intense.

This weekend was also my friend Lindsay's 21st birthday, so we all went out to celebrate. It was really fun. We had a nice spagetti dinner at her house last night. Her dad is a famous Fijian politician who vocally opposes the government and loves to party. It was cool to meet him. He's one of the few Fijians I've met who actively speaks out against what's happening to his country. Overall it was a hectic fun weekend.