When my plane landed in Fiji for the first time, 8 months ago, and I walked out the doors in the pre-dawn darkness I was almost knocked down by the heat and humidity, then as I acclimated there was something else that about knocked me down………Mosquitoes. Mosquitoes here are different than the ones back home. [...]

Read the info below and check out the pictures of one of my favorite fruits in Fiji!  The first person to guess correctly gets a round trip flight to….oh, sorry not quite…but what you WILL get is a personalized post card from me from Fiji! One rule though, if you are from Fiji or have … Keep reading →

Since about the 21st of January we have had a series of “weather events” around the Fiji group and after 2 full weeks of warnings, rain and all that is associated with it I am going to tell you all … Continue reading →

“Bula Alicia, you are looking very fat today!” “You look different today……..you look much fatter than yesterday.” “Alicia, your cheeks are chubby, Why does your face look so fat?” “Are you pregnant? Then why is your stomach sticking out?” “Have you worked out lately? No? I can tell…” “Why are you on a diet? Is [...]

The 2012 Gala Fundraiser will be held on Saturday, September 15, 2012 at the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association facilities located at Ballston, Arlington, Virginia. Volunteers are being sought to play vital roles in the planning and logistics of the event, including ticket sales, the lovo and banquet preparation, fundraiser raffle and silent auction.

Well it has been a good long while since these blogs really updated anyone on the work I have been doing here, so here is a blog to remedy that.   Village Development Plan: Our village recently completed a 5 … Continue reading →

If you’ve never been to New Zealand before you may be asking yourself “What the Feijoa?” This fabulous fragrant fruit is showing up all over New Zealand and is fast becoming the nation’s favorite behind the kiwi. The fruit, sometimes referred to as the pineapple guava, has its native origins in Brazil and other S. … Keep reading →

The months surrounding Christmas and the new year are what volunteers in Fiji refer to as 'the slow months'. The name comes not because time moves more slowly, which would make matters infinitely worse, but because everyone in Fiji seems to do things at a pace more ponderous than usual. This, coupled with the fact that everyone here is already on 'Fiji time' to begin with, makes getting anything done nigh impossible. I don't know the cause of this phenomenon, but I think it's a combination of the heat, holidays, and the fact that it's the middle of summer. It's going to take me a while to get used to the inverted seasons. I'll be surprised if I can adjust to 95° heat in the middle of January by the time my service ends.

You might be wondering what exactly the picture I posted above is. If you guessed Macrobrachium rosenbergii, or freshwater prawns, you are correct. Aquaculture is a modestly sized industry on my island, and a fair amount of people have fish or prawn farms. In early December I went and helped a farmer to harvest his prawn pond, it was interesting. Harvesting the prawns was really easy, he just drained the pond and we scooped them up out of the mud when the water level was low enough. There's a link to some more photos under the 'photos' tab, up there^.

My office gets a lot of requests from farmers and villages for aid in setting up prawn or fish ponds. My office is rather understaffed and under funded, so we can't respond to many of them. Even if we could, they would have a difficult time stocking the ponds as the only source of fry and post larvae (baby fish and prawns, respectively) is a hatchery located on the bigger island to the south of us, Viti Levu. The current prawn and fish farmers get their starting stock shipped to them from there, but never in the quantities they want. The guy who owned the prawn farm that I helped to harvest started with 2000 post larvae, which yielded 64 kg of prawns. Last season he was able to get 4000 post larvae and harvest 140 kg, but that was still less than he wanted. Ideally, he wants 10,000. I've talked to a few other farmers, and this is a common problem. The Ministry of Fisheries has made a few tentative attempts at starting a hatchery on this island, but lack of funding and a formal development plan have stalled their efforts. I just started working on a project proposal to get the development back under way, its going to take a while though. Good thing I have 18 more months. Well, 14, discounting the slow season...

Why yes, they do.

The largest religion in Fiji is Christian (the second being Hinduism) and the largest denomination of which is Methodist. Every village has a church that everyone attends every Sunday and sometimes other days of the week as well.

Do they celebrate Hanukah? No, most Fijians have never even heard that term before and I think that most of their exposure to Judaism is through foreign volunteers. I visited another PCVs village during Hanukah where a group of us fried up a bucket of latkas (made with cassava instead of potato) with apple sauce to dip and some jelly donuts (stuffed with banana jam) and shared it with some of the villagers as a cross-cultural/religious event. They loved the food and my friend was even able to tell the story of Hanukah in Fijian!

We also baked a pumpkin pie on the stove top…but that was just for us.

The crust we made from mashed bread fruit, which tasted pretty good but took far too long to cook. Do you string up coconut trees with Christmas lights? You mean like the Corona commercial? Well, first of all, have you ever actually seen a mature coconut tree? Like, in real life? Most of them are absurdly tall even with a lopsided direction of growth (which most of them have-maybe from the wind?). There are no branches except the palm fronds on the very top. I don’t know about you but I was never very good at the “climb a thick, bare, and absurdly tall tree trunk like Mulan” exercise in gym class. However, that’s just me… and probably all the other white people in Fiji. Native Fijians, though, are amazing tree climbers. It’s nothing out of the ordinary, for instance, to be walking along a village road and pass under a giant mango tree that a dozen or so Fijians have scaled in order to pluck the best fruits from the most unreachable locations and drop them down to their partners waiting below. And I have indeed seen eleven year old kids monkey their way up coconut trees to cut down the fronds for making brooms or to knock down mature coconuts. I’ve seen this in person so you think I would be able to explain to you how they manage to do it, but I can’t—they just sort of shimmy up using only their hands and feet. Unfortunately, there are no extension-cords long enough to travel the same height for a string of lights and even if there were, having a place to plug them in is an even rarer find. So, then, the answer is no.

But that didn’t stop me from decorating my own house with some cheap baubles I found in Suva. I had all the village children come over to help and we made a big event out of it one night a few weeks before Christmas.My front door :)

The morning sun makes this one rather hard to see but there are several ornaments hanging!

Do you sing carols?

Only in church…or I suppose I do when I’m in the shower.

Church getting out on Christmas day. Do you give gifts or cards? No, people just provide ample food and grog and share it all around. Usually, food with family and anyone walking by that wants to come in and grog with everyone.

What do you actually do on Christmas? 1) Eat lots of food that you usually wouldn’t get in an everyday meal. This includes beef, pork, and chicken, which are generally only slaughtered and eaten for important events (holidays, weddings, and funerals). We also were treated to juice. Typical meals in the village will often be abundant in whatever food is available but almost always lacking in beverage. I’ve noticed that Fijians hardly ever drink any liquids (except for tea and of course grog, which is actually a diuretic), so if I ever dine at another’s house I’m sure to bring my water bottle. However, special events usually mean that we’ll get to drink juice. Juice means Tang. And usually they add sugar to it. Indeed their taste for sugar can be so strong that they would prefer this powdered drink with extra sugar to a mash up of passion fruit, mango, papaya, and banana mixed with some water and honey, which I once made and brought to an event...it stood more or less neglected next to the nearly empty jug of tang. But I drank it so that it wouldn’t feel sad and unwanted. Also, alcohol is not permitted in the village.

2) Go to church. We do a lot of singing in church including some songs that I know from home (aka O Come All Ye Faithful, which I almost started crying to when they began singing in church) but naturally it’s in Fijian. No where else in the world will you hear women capable of such dazzlingly high soprano voices or men with such incredibly low baritones. It’s always an awkward event for me since I can usually sing best when I’m following someone else’s singing and since I can’t even remotely reach these two extremes I end up croaking out some noise somewhere in between and hoping that no one is standing near enough to hear it. 3) Drink grog. All day and all night…and if you’re still drinking grog into Boxing day that is perfectly acceptable as well…or into the day after Boxing day. But usually by that point most people slip into a grog coma, upon waking up from which they start drinking grog again. But it is a big village wide party in the chief’s house where everyone is dressed nice and the children are running around, the women are selling chasers (lollipops and the likes), a couple people are playing the guitar, the ukulele and singing, someone is walking around putting baby powder on people’s faces, and everyone is drinking grog. It’s usually a downright raucous party that everyone enjoys and gives everyone ample opportunity to joke around. Lots of color.Drinking grog can definitely be a challenge...especially when you are on your 32nd bowl.

Baby powder gets everywhere.

Passing out the grog.Well in case I haven't said it yet: Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah and Happy Holidays to all! And to all a bright sunny tropical day! :)

  Over the holidays I spent a lot of time talking with other PCV’s. Thanksgiving and New Years, when big groups of volunteers got together, and there were so many different conversations going on between people, I found it interesting that most of them covered the same topics. Stick a bunch of volunteers together in [...]

How do you store food in Fiji?   Well lets look at how food is stored in America for a second… the first thing that pops into my head is a refrigerator,  where dairy products, meat, produce, condiments, eggs and … Continue reading →

What does one eat when they go to New Zealand you ask?  Well, everything you can’t get in Fiji of course.  I started by eating my way through the produce section of the local market…. cherries, apricots, nectarines, strawberries and kiwi. I wanted to cook for my host so I whipped up a brunch of … Keep reading →

Happy 2012!!!!!!! Happy almost end of the world!  Hope everyone had a fabulous New Years back home. Fun fact: Along with the other South Pacific islands like Samoa, Tonga, and Kiribati, Fiji was one of the first countries in the world to celebrate 2012, a full 19 hours ahead of everyone back in my hometown! [...]

Well. Christmas is over. Honestly it felt like any other day here. I almost didn’t even care that it was Christmas. Fijians do celebrate Christmas, a vast majority of them were converted by missionaries (starting after some of those first … Continue reading →

Well. Christmas is over. Honestly it felt like any other day here. I almost didn’t even care that it was Christmas. Fijians do celebrate Christmas, a vast majority of them were converted by missionaries (starting after some of those first … Continue reading →

The holiday season has come and gone already! This is my first staying in my town - as much as I would’ve loved to go home for the holidays, my sister is getting married in 3 months, so it just wasn’t feasible. I miss everyone very much -Thankfully my parents and sisters sent packages to me, so I have presents to unwrap Christmas morning.

The holiday season started off with Thanksgiving. Twelve of the volunteers got together at a local resort & rented a house. It was a nice time, but the weather didn't really cooperate & it rained the whole time. Everyone made a dish & the food was delicious. My favorite part was having a spa day with another PCV, I miss doing girlie things.

Here is what’s been happening around town during the Christmas Season:

Decorations Many of the stores have decorated for Christmas – blow up Santa’s, balloons, streamers. And you can’t miss all of the Christmas music with a Fiji flare.

I also decorated my house a little. I had lots of pipe cleaners that have been sitting at my house for a year and a half, so I put them to good use. Then I made my Christmas tree & my parents sent me a stocking, Santa hat & small tree. I even put a “wreath” on my front door!

2. Parties

The nursing school had a Christmas party for the second and first year students, lots of dancing, skits, a gift exchange & delicious food. The students are really fun & I could tell they were excited for break.

The ladies from aerobics took me out for dinner and clubbing for Christmas – it was really fun (I had to leave early b/c I was not feeling well). They are so good to me, I am really going to miss them when I leave.

3. Cookies

I organized a cookie making day with some ladies from aerobics & the nursing school. Only a few people showed up & we had a great time (and made tons of cookies!). We made sugar cookies with icing, peanut butter cookies & delicious oatmeal cookies. Some who were not able to make it have requested another cookie day. I love sharing this part of our American culture!

4. Scenery

I am really missing the snow & cold weather right now (we’ll see how I feel this time next year). And even though we don’t have any snow, we have some very beautiful flowers all around town!

5. Last minute shoppers

Well I made the HUGE mistake of going to town Christmas Eve – it was the last day the store will be open for 3 days, so it was PACKED. I needed to get some cheese, and I waited about a half hour in line, with sweat dripping down my back the whole time. The people here aren’t very good about lines either – one woman tried to push her way in front of me after I had already been waiting for a while. Luckily all I had to do was look at her (the same way my mom used to look at me when I was little & misbehaving in public) and she knew not to even try it. But there were a few good things about going to town – I got 4 avocado’s for 50cents each! And I was able to stop in and wish Merry Christmas to some of my favorite people – Chetna & her husband (she does my eyebrow’s & comes to aerobics), the Chinese man at Color Dragon & Prim and his family at the shop across the street from my office. Oh, and I also got to see all of the goats for sale!

My Christmas Eve consisted of; trip to town for food, dishes, lunch, more dishes, watched the Christmas episodes of The Office, did some laundry, cleaned the house up a bit, developed a new method of removing the frogs from my house (trap them with my broom, put on a thick plastic glove, pick it up & throw outside), contemplated going to church – but decided I don’t want to go outside because of the mosquitoes & made my dinner- All the while, listening to Christmas music.

Christmas Day I woke up excited to open my presents. I called my mom while I was opening them, then called my dad & got a song from my nephew. I hung out around the house until it was time to skype with the family. My nephews wrote me a rap & it was awesome. I went to the pool for a few minutes, but it got cloudy & rainy pretty fast. Later that day I went over to have dinner with some other volunteers.

Next is the New Years adventure. To save cost, I decided to take a boat instead of flying. That was the last boat I'll ever take. It started out good, I tried to keep a positive attitude because I know how quickly my mood can change into something terrible. I was with couple other PCVs & had a great time talking and hanging out on the boat for a while, then it was bed time. We had to sleep on benches because the private rooms were more expensive than a flight. And we were stuck up in the top of the boat where the AC doesn't work, so it was very hot. Ok, so here are the things I was dealing with that evening: 1. Hot room 2. Cockroaches and other bugs crawling everywhere - I even killed one on my chest 3. People snoring 4. This one creepy guy who looked naked when he was sitting down, and would get up and say things to me like "you feeling sleepy?" in the morning he said to me "you didn't sleep all night, I was watching you" - weird. 5. Rocking boat- it was very rocky once we hit the open ocean. I still had the rockies when I went to bed the next night! 6. In the morning people were brushing their teeth (which is a very disgusting sounding thing here, trust me!) and blowing snot rockets into the sink by my head. Needless to say, I was not a happy girl by the end of that trip. I went straight to a computer and booked a flight home!

The next day we made our way to Dunarau to take the boat out to Funky Fish. 22 of us got together over the weekend & had a great time! It was so relaxing & the staff really took care of us. My favortie part was finally cutting another PCVs beard! He looks so much better! Other than that, I did nothing but lay by the pool the whole time, exactly what I needed.

2011 Holiday season was a success!

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The spice vendor at the market recently convinced me to buyhis mixed dahl. The mix consistsof a variety of different lentils and small beans and looks very colorful inthe re-used peanut butter jar on my shelf. I asked him how to make dahl when I bought it, “just to besure I am doing it right.” Actually I’ve made dahl soup, the spicy yellow concoction usually servedwith rice, many times – to varying degrees of acceptability – but this hasbecome a bit of a hobby for me and I’m looking for the recipe I like best. Mixed Dahl on the shelf

The thing is – everyone makes dahl a littledifferently. Even at the samerestaurant the dahl will be different on different days. Although this makes it hard to recommenda restaurant based solely on the quality of their dahl, I’ve never had a badone and I rather enjoy the variety.I’m in pursuit, not only of the perfect dahl, but ofperfection in all of my Indian cuisine. I am relatively new to this kind of cooking because for most of my lifeIndian food was something you would order at a restaurant, not cook foryourself at home on par with kung pow chicken, tom yum soup, tempura shrimp andother things that ordinary Americans don’t know how to cook. Now that I’m attempting to make Indianfood on a more or less daily basis I have two stipulations: (1) it must bedelectable (or close – based on my tastes) and (2) it should be less than 50%oil – or at least – healthier than the stuff at most of the restaurants. I realize, of course, that these areare competing aims – but not only am I a perfectionist, I’m picky. The difficulty of the task at hand, however, has not stoppedmy experimenting. And I must saythat I make a lovely bhindi curry (okra) with optional nutrella (soychunks). My vegetable pulau isalso pretty great and I recently made a wonderful palak paneer – with thepaneer from scratch. This actuallymight sort of be cheating since palak paneer isn’t a dish that’s usually cookedin Fiji. In fact, most of theIndo-Fijians I’ve asked haven’t even heard of paneer, though maybe it’ssomething lost in translation. That’s another thing I find interesting and fun – Indian foodin Fiji is nothing like Indian food in America – or – at least – there arestriking differences. Of course there are differences based on vegetableavailability (I’d never heard of taro leaves being used in Indian cuisine inthe states) but there are other differences, too. For example naan is pretty much non-existent here, but isubiquitous at home to the point that many Americans don’t realize there are othertypes of bread in India. Hereeveryone eats rot – which – if you have to forgo naan – is probably the bestthing and in some cases it’s even better than naan since it can be used as awrap like a tortilla. One of mynew favorite things is to go to an Indian restaurant and order the vegetablecurry half rice and half roti and make burritos out of whatever shows up –usually it includes tomato chutney which could sort of compare to salsa. Taro leaf curry, dahl, tomato chutney, rice and roti ready to be made into burritos!

And this is just the tip of the iceberg! Living in a traditional Fijian villageI am not exposed to as much Indo-Fijian culture and food as I would be if Ilived in (or near) a settlement. I have to rely on other volunteers to invite me to their homes andintroduce me to their friends or make some Indo-Fijian friends in town. Having experienced Diwali I realize Ihave heaps more to learn. Indiansnacks and sweets, too! But that’sa whole other ball game – one of overindulgence, pleasure and pain – and can besaved for another time.

You may be asking yourself “How does one celebrate the holidays in Fiji?” Well….let me tell you. First of all, MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU ALL! Hope you all had a wonderful weekend with your loved ones. Second of all, yes, Christmas IS celebrated in Fiji. The missionaries made sure of that when they converted pretty [...]

So I have been really bored these past few days and listening to the radio in lot for fear of a cyclone warning… it has been raining quite a lot for the past 3 days and low lying areas have … Continue reading →

Get out your dental floss folks because we are making popcorn balls! I had the semi-genius idea to make a popcorn ball Christmas tree while half asleep/half awake one lazy morning.  It felt brilliant, like the kind of recipe where I needed to run to town immediately and gather all items necessary. After growing up … Keep reading →

Well, now I’m just sure that when I say Christmas Party everyone back home things of friends, family or work buddies milling about a festively decorated house drinking specialty cocktails (red and green naturally for the season…) and eating great … Continue reading →

I wanted to give a few of my Peace Corps volunteer friends a little holiday treat for being the awesome women they are so I was perusing one of my fave food sites, the Whole Foods Market online recipes (see blogroll link on right). Having limited access to many foods, I needed to choose wisely.  … Keep reading →

Bula! So most of my posts so far have been pretty positive, I’ve been trying to do the whole “find the good in everything, Fiji is awesome, just keep smiling” crap.  Fair warning, this isn’t going to be one of those posts. First of all, it’s HOT in Fiji right now. We are currently in the hot, [...]

It has been entirely too long since I actually posted something. I can’t lie, I have started writing things but it seems that with the ever  increasing heat and humidity of this summer season, my capacity for extended attention has … Continue reading →

Despite its amazing connectivity ability I’m leery of giving an organization mounds of data to make money on. Here’s an excerpt from a recent USA Today Article on the topic: To meet rising expectations, Facebook must increase its annual revenue,...

The December issue of the Foreign Service Journal has a good article on blogging in the Foreign Service. I’ve recently experienced some of the conflicting messages discussed in the piece and it resonates strongly to my beliefs in an open...

Searching for a church home in DC led us to the Eastern Market area this weekend. We visited National Theatre Church's campus located in an old single screen theater. The music was great and vibe definitely young and urban. There...

This blog is meant to express my love and adventurous sense of all things related to food.  It will follow me as I move and play in different parts of the world.  It will be an eclectic expression of what I’m craving and what’s local and in season. Currently I am a Peace Corps volunteer … Keep reading →

Did you know Fiji's right on the international date line? Well, on the 180th meridian, anyway. In fact there's a tiny corner in the east of my island, Vanua Levu, where it is permanently yesterday. Actually the date line was moved in this area of the South Pacific and now passes to the east of Fiji, it kind of jogs around Fiji and Tonga the same way it does to the west of the Aleutian Islands in Alaska, but some of the maps show the dateline going right through the island. In any case, Fiji is supposed to have the first sunrise in the world, though I think it's a silly thing to boast about (Kiribati - pronounced KIRR-i-bas by the way - moved the dateline to ITS east in 1998 or so and now has the first sunrise rather than the last).

While Fiji may be big on it’s premier sunrise location, onthe things Fijians are not big on is punctuality. They call the standard tardiness “Fiji Time.” But tardiness isn’t the point. The point is that there are things thatare more important than being on time. Plus, there isn’t much to do today that couldn’t really be donetomorrow, so too brief encounters with friends and relatives or hurrying off tobe in another place are unnecessary.This is something the new Country Director of Peace Corps –Fiji realizes. He came up northrecently to talk with the volunteers and the divisional heads of variousgovernment departments. He kepthis schedule very flexible and stressed to the volunteers that he may notarrive on time, depending on whether there were customs he needed to observe(drinking grog) at other sites. Asfar as I know he was on time everywhere, but I’ve heard there have been otherPeace Corps staff that have missed meetings altogether because of such customsand the notion of Fiji Time. At a tikina meeting (like a meeting of all the mayors in acounty hearing about goings on at the national level) I was sitting with anewly appointed Roko (a representative from the National Government to thepeople at the local level) and he told me that he enjoyed the drinking grog andsocializing part of the meeting best because he could get to better understandthe people. He mentioned thatbecause of this part of the meeting they never knew when they would gethome. They could drink yaqona forhalf and hour or for three hours – but they weren’t doing nothing. At the time I was a little antsy,however, because I was getting a ride with the Rokos to Savusavu where therewas a Rotary Club meeting I needed to be at. In the end everything worked out and I realized I justneeded to embrace another Fijian truism: “Maka Leka” or no worries (No wonder“Hakuna Matata” plays constantly on the radio here). But it is difficult for me to give up my notions of finitetime. This, I believe, has much todo with latitude (and climate and other stuff…) Besides in the cities and townswhere people have schedules, jobs and deadlines, time passes quite differentlyin Fiji than it does anywhere I’ve been. Days seem to roll into one another; weeks and months glide by withoutbeing accounted for. And suddenlyI’ve been in Fiji for six months. It’s my theory that being so close to the equator and with no realdistinction between seasons (at least not like the planting, growing, harvestand rest cycle of the North) and with the same staple foods available yearround, it would be easy to oblivious of time. If food is available, if you have no need to make stores forthe winter and if everything is good – then there is really nothing that NEEDSto be done at any given time, nothing that couldn’t wait a day, a week, a monthor 15 years (which is how long it took to build the church in thevillage). And so Fiji Time isborn.Being from a land twice as far from the equator withdistinct seasons, time here feels stale as if it has been summer too long. And I feel like I’m constantly waitingfor fall. Yesterday I heard aChristmas song on the radio and was shocked to realize the holidays are rightaround the corner despite having Thanksgiving plans for next week. I’m not sure if time here sneaks up onFijians as it does me. But as faras I know there are not traditional seasonal celebrations (at least there weren’tbefore Methodists brought Christmas and Easter). It leaves me wondering what time was like in Fiji beforeEuropeans brought their calendars with them.

What a lovely Sunday evening! Breezy cool weather, quiet in the village, great songs onthe radio and delicious seared tuna with a pineapple teriyaki sauce and acitrus cocktail. Ok – it’s orangecrystal lite, but I really did have sushi grade skip jack tuna for dinner. This is how it happened:One day in Savusavu I talked to a guy who was having troubleprinting something from his iPad (not a Fijian). Turns out he (Jeff) and his wife (Susan) are from New Mexicoand live near my village, well, a long walk away involving swimming across themouth of the largest river on the island, but close. They gave me the business card for their guesthouse.Besides seeing Susan once from the bus I didn’t see themagain for four months. In themeantime I planted a decent garden and built and stocked an AWESOME kitchen (byFijian bure standards).Last week another PCV and I finished a proposal forimproving the library at our local school and wanted to present it to theSavusavu Rotary Club. It turnedout that they weren’t having their weekly meeting but a party instead and wewere invited. Of course we sawJeff and Susan there. In fact theyinvited me to come over some time and also offered advice and help on a coupleof projects I’ve been contemplating.In typical fashion, it was only when I got home from theparty that I found my parents had emailed the dates they were thinking of visiting(they had wanted to stay with me in the village for a week, but I wanted themto stay at Susan and Jeff’s guesthouse… for innumerable reasons…). I ended up calling Susan about datesthe next day and she repeded her invitation to come over. I, of course, took her up.And o it was that Bubba and Michelle (the two PCVs fromneighboring Wailevu Village) accompanied me in swimming across the river and trekking(literally through the jungle at one point) to Susan and Jeff’s. Their property is as different from thevillage as you can get and I’m very happy that I’ve convinced my parents tostay there! Plus Susan and Jeffare great hosts. Before we left (togo home the right way – which does not involve trekking through the jungle)they’d invited us on a deep water fishing trip the next day. I had to decline, but Bubba andMichelle went and this afternoon they stopped by with their catch – 4 skip jacktuna!After a quick fillet lesson Bubba left me with one fillet oftuna – much more than I can handle in a night – but the cooked fish should lastuntil tomorrow morning (I hope). Bubba and Michelle had sushi for dinner, but I didn’t have wasabi orpickled ginger or mirin for the rice, so I improvised with some leftoverpineapple from lunch and concocted a lovely teriyaki sauce. It would have been even better on a bedof brown rice and with a different vegetable, but the only thing I had in thegarden was green beans. Itsufficed. Yeah, I’ve had betterseared tuna, but I’ve never had a more gourmet meal in Fiji!This is the kind of thing that makes me think I don’t havethe stereotypical Peace Corps experieonce. I may live in a rural village, but I have the opportunity tomeet up with generous expats (whom support Peace Corps projects) whenever Ifeel like it. Just living so closeto other Peace Corps Volunteers is unusual, too, and I feel spoiled. But I feel like it’s also affecting theway I integrate into my village. On the other hand… if there wasn’t a generous local Rotary Club I wouldn’tbe able to apply for assistance improving the school library or to pick theirbrains about previous projects that are similar to things we’re working on inthe village. So I continue workingon integration and maintain my friendships with my fellow kaivalagi (foreign people),too.Bubba With a Skip Jack Tuna

What do you think it’s like never to have experiencedHalloween? Is it like never havingseen the ocean or snow? No, Idon’t think so, because most people know those exist even if they haven’t seenthem. It’s probably more like menever having heard of Diwali (see previous post). And I think that’s even better because when you do find outabout it you are filled with wonder at all of the other awesome things thatprobably exist that you know nothing about. It makes you want to explore! Or – it would make me want to explore, anyway.The children in my Saturday Kid’s Club had never heard ofHalloween. I spent a week tryingto build hype about costumes and lollies. Still, I wasn’t sure how it would go over, as they didn’t have much timeto get costumes together. I wentout and bought candy and pumpkins in Savusavu (if any of you have ever carriedtwo big pumpkins plus candy and other stuff for half a mile on a dirt road, Iapplaud you. It’s hardwork!). I gathered knives andbasins, I passed out candy to ladies in four houses and I hoped I was ready.Pumpkins Pre-CarvingAt 8 in the morning Saki came by and asked, “It’s ok I weargirls sulu (clothes)?” “Yeah, ofcourse, that’s great!” I said. “I’m going to be a pufta!” he added, excitedly. Wow – a little more wild than dressingas a girl, he was going to be a transvestite. I’ll have to tell you all about puftas sometime.Anyway, I emerged onto my steps at 9:55AM and children weremilling about in all kinds of costumes waiting impatiently for Halloween tostart. I started snapping photosof my favorite costumes and, as always happens when a camera is around, theymobbed me. Here are a few goodcostumes.

Then it was pumpkin carving time. I showed how to cut the tops and scrape out the guts. They took it from there – basing thefaces on drawings each group had (one by me and two copies by some industriousgirls). There were rookiemistakes, like getting the mouths too low on the pumpkin, but it didn’t matter,later that day I passed out the pumpkins to some families and they were turnedinto soups and curries.

From carving we headed off to trick-or-treat. I gave them two rules, knock and say,“trick-or-treat.” I should havegiven them more. It’s one thing todole out candy to 5 or 6 kids at a time over the course of an evening. It’s something entirely different toorganize 40 screaming kids in order to give out candy without being bowledover!

Everybody got candy, though, and everyone had a greattime. Saki’s pufta costume wasadmired by all as the best costume.Saki on a normal dayAnd then on Halloween

There will be adjustments next year – more organization,more pumpkins, more candy and a costume contest! I know it’s a year away, but I can’t wait!!

Can you tell what my costume was?

I know some of you (probably most of you) have never heardof Diwali. I had no idea that itexisted before I came to Fiji, which is ridiculous because it’s AWESOME. But then there are only 10 countrieswhere this festival of lights is an official holiday. Here in Fiji Diwali is a one-day holiday that signifies theend of the old and the beginning of the new year for Indo-Fijians, but it’salso a religious holiday in honor of Lakshmi. Even though the holiday is based in Hinduism, in Fiji’smulti-cultural society, most people commemorate the day in some way andeveryone enjoys a day off from work.Diwali Things For the Peace Corps Volunteers who had invited me to Labasa,the holiday was very laid back, social and entertaining. We got up late and struggled to wrapourselves in sarees until we gave up and went next door to have an expert helpus. Aunti is a cheerful andmotherly grade school teachers who looked lovely with her short frame wrappedtidily in a saree. Her daughter,Jiijii , an enthusiastic teen with her heart set on becoming a doctor, quicklyarranged a plate of Indian sweets for Folami and I to snack on as Greta turnedand held pleats and was pinned into Indo-Fijian perfection. I was next and found the process alittle daunting. In fact my sareewas one of the most difficult parts of my Diwali as it constantly seemed to bein disarray. While Folami wasbeing twirled into her lovely attire, we were casually invited to return in theevening to celebrate with the family and we were delighted to add another houseto our tour!The Girls in our Getup All gussied up we headed out to our first stop, picking uptwo more Diwali dressed girls on the way. Monica hadn’t had help with her saree and forgot the pleats making italmost impossible to walk. Luckilythe daughters at the first house were able to sort her out. Chris was the luckiest of all wearing ashalwar kameez, a tunic and pants set that is much easier to wear but doesn’thave quite the appeal of being draped in yards upon yards of soft silk (or inthis case polyester or something). We chatted for hours with the family and ate our fill of both the sweetsand savories presented. Myfavorite is a savory snack of taroleaves prepared much differently from anything in the village. Before we could leave we were presentedwith lunch: potato curry, puris (a small flatbread) and rice with nutrella (aspongy soy product). It wasdelicious, but I was already full from the sweets!After LunchWe visited four more houses of Greta’s coworkers, neighborsand friends, everywhere happily chatting away, drinking tea or juice and eatingsweets and other Indian snacks. Diwali is more than just food, though. As the festival of lights, each house is decorated withstrands of electric lights (like Christmas lights), candles and tiny oillamps. Many houses had ricepaintings on the porches where colored rice (died with crepe paper – if you canfigure that out) is arranges designs with a lovely simplicity. In some neighborhoods each house triesto out do the next as there is a competition for the best display. Everywhere you go the air smells ofsulfur and black powder with the hundreds of fireworks going off allaround. Lighting oil lampsRice Design

And the fireworks are GREAT! There is no organized firework show like we have in the USfor the fourth of July, but Fiji doesn’t have the restrictions we have inOregon, either. If you have themoney you can buy the fireworks to make an awesome show in your own yard. Little boys hold fireworks that sproutthose large twinkly displays that you see over Disneyland and something thatseems like just a little twirly thing on the street will suddenly shoot off amajor display. The cab drivers areextra cautious and ask us to roll up the windows, but I’m suddenly hit, again,with my long held secret aspiration to go to China and apprentice myself to afirework master.

Just sitting on the porch of a friendly neighbor’s housebundled up in my disastrously (by now) draped saree, snacking on halua,enchanted by the fireworks, I feel like I am exactly where I should be. Walking home from the last house, wherea newspaper photographer took our picture, I couldn’t help but thinking howmuch I’d love it if Diwali were everyday. Of course if that were the case I would never get anything done, wouldbe enormously fat with all the sweets and would always be tripping on my saree! Still, far and away it was the most funI’d have in Fiji in a long time – the best festival I’ve seen in my six monthshere. Probably one of the bestfestivals I’ve been included in ANYWHERE! So if you see me, somewhere down the line, dressed in strange clothesand peddling Indian sweets one day in late October or early November – it mustbe Diwali – join in and have a great time.

Our Labasa Diwali Adventure

  (The views expressed in this article do not represent those of the Peace Corps or its affiliates.)                 I see the bilo being passed to me, as it usually is after the Chief and the Priest have taken the first drink. The tall Fijian man approaches me to hand me the cup. I clap [...]

So much has been happening recently that choosing a topicfor this blog was a tough decision. Ura, though, has been an overarching theme for the past month orso. They’ve grossed me out,intrigued me, nourished me and have been an endless source of amusement forvarious villagers.Ura are Fijian indigenous freshwater prawns (Macrobrachiumlar), not unlike the giant Malysian prawn commercially farmed in many parts ofthe globe. I think these Fijianprawns tend to be a little redder and denser of flesh, but maybe that’s justme. I first heard about ura fromanother volunteer. I had heardthat there was interest in farming freshwater prawns in the area and heinformed me that there were already local prawns. As I was in the mood for some tasty shrimp, I did someresearch.Ura - Not only delicious in FijiAsking around the village I quickly ferreted out the bestshrimp hunter in the village – a woman named Ateca who grew up in a village bythe big Nasekawa river. I havesince befriended Ateca (pronounced ah-Teh-tha) and discovered that she is thebest fisherwoman, the best broom maker, the fastest mat weaver, the most industriouscottage industry entrepreneur, a grower of outlandish flowers and a very goodcook. Basically she’s the closestthing to a renaissance woman there is in my village. However, I have yet to convince Ateca to take me prawnhunting.Ateca weaving a mat in her homeMy first taste of ura did come at Ateca’s hand. Her husband, Domoniko, another of mygood friends, was having a birthday party. In Fiji this is basically an excuse to drink a lot of kavaand get your friends to bring you Bula shirts (like Hawaiian shirts, but we’renot in Hawaii, yo!). We drank fromabout 3 o’clock in the afternoon until nearly ten. It was my first experience getting really grogged. I was sort of a guest of honor, so Iserved some of the grog. It wasquite a party and everyone was sad when the grog ran out (well, I wasn’t toosad – I was already feeling grog-drunk). Ateca had packed up some dinner for me to take with me, and afterstumbling home (I fell in a ditch because I was looking at the stars and not myfeet) I treated myself to delicious prawns with noodles. I instantly knew this local prawn was alovely thing and that I had not had my last of ura.My next ura experience came quite unexpectedly on the day wewent up to the dam to clean out the silt. We’ve had water pressure issues in the village and were trying to find asolution. Personally my showerdoesn’t do more than trickle, so I usually bath with water from a tap about twoand a half feet from the ground and sometimes I don’t even get anything comingout of my tap. The dam was in abad way – it turned out silt and mud had covered the pipe that supplies waterto the village – so we were on a mission to clear it out. Honestly, our effort didn’t do much formy water pressure, but it was a windfall of prawns! When about half of the water had been drained from thereservoir a bunch of guys jumped in and started grabbing prawns. They tossed a bunch up at me that Ikept in a bucket. The things weresquirming all over the place and snapping their big pincers at me. I have no idea why, but some of theseprawns have REALLY long spindly pincers on one side. In any case, I took them home. Cleaning out the dam and hunting for uraSo – what do you do with LIVE prawns? I didn’t know. I tried calling my mom and dad, butthey were in Canada. I triedanother epicure, but he was in Canada WITH my parents, so that was nohelp. Finally I tried Michellebecause she’s smart, but she said what the Fijians had – boil them. I didn’t really want to do that becauseI was planning on pan-frying the things so she had another option – just pulltheir heads off. Ick. By the time I got around to preparingthe shrimp most of them had suffocated, but two were still squirming and I gotto experience the decapitation of live prawns. It worked really well – even if I felt like I could hearthem scream. I peeled the tails,didn’t worry about deveining them and made a delicious shrimp fried rice. (Further research has revealed that theappropriate way to kill freshwater prawns is to soak them either in ice wateror chlorinated seawater. I mighttry seawater next time – minus the chlorine – since there’s about an ocean’sworth a few steps from my house.)My association with Ateca and Domoniko has led to a fairnumber of random and fun events. Ateca gave me a frozen half-fish (tail half, luckily) which I turnedinto lovely fish tacos, Dominiko occasionally brings me seeds for my garden(bell pepper and passion fruit, among others), and the two of them accompaniedme on a lumber-buying excursion to town (to build my new kitchen cabinets – myfirst attempt at designing and building a kitchen from scratch – possibly alsomy last). Ateca had been lookingforward to this Friday, though, for almost a month. And, really, I had, too.

It was the ura soli (fundraiser) in Nabalebale (Ateca’s homevillage). We got up early and tookthe eight o’clock bus to the village where Ateca’s sister hosted us forbreakfast before the soli. Ateleven we headed over to the village hall for the ceremonial opening of thesoli, an offering of a huge heap of raw kava from the village to the chieffollowed by the most traditional kava ceremony I have seen – with the poundedkava root filtered through dried plant fibers rather than cloth and areligiosity to the presentation I’ve never seen. After the ceremony and a bit of tea, the regular grogdrinking started in earnest as the village head man called each man up todonate the expected FJ$50. By thetime lunch was ready they had raised $2,914. I didn’t stay till the end, but I know they made it past$3,000. I had chipped in tenbucks. Ura wasn’t the only thing on the plate for lunch. There was giant sized eel (known astuna), chicken curry, fish curry, fried fish and a whole heap of taro, morethan most people could comfortably eat (though if any of you know Kory Rice, Ibet he could have handled it). This wasn’t my first soli, though, and I knew by then that most peopletake home leftovers from this sort of thing, so I’d brought a Tucker’s icecream box for the leftovers. Little did I know that when I left Ateca in charge of the leftovers as Iroamed around taking pictures that she’d fill the box full with a whole new plateof food! And so it was that I haddinner for both my dog and me that night. Ura Lunch at Nabalebale Day SoliWe left the soli before the grog was gone, so the music wasstill going full tilt. Two groupsof men with guitars and ukuleles were having a good-natured battle of the bandswith an island lilt. Domoniko wasone of the singers, and we left him to drink grog, sing and make merry as weheaded home. It was the end of theday, but not the ura, and definitely not the fun. Ateca has promised to take me with her to catch ura one ofthese days, but not before she, Domoniko and I head out again for more goodfood in the village and around. SundayI was treated to another big plate of prawns served with fried pumpkin! It’s good to have friends. It’s even better if they feed youprawns!

Now, you might not think I’m a shy person, but I’ve always felt that way about myself. No matter how much I might talk or approach a perfect stranger for directions or suggestions for good restaurants or whatever – I have a hard time getting up the courage to go interact with a new community, find it difficult to make new friends. This could be considered a problem given my choice of occupation for the next two years.

After a good five weeks I realized that I’ve been spending a lot of time in my nice, comfy little bure and still haven’t gotten to know many people in the community. I decided to take action. So, one Saturday after sweating through most of the exceedingly hot day, I decided to take a walk in the cool of the evening. I didn’t get far before being invited to a grog party, and, considering the motive of my walk, I really had no choice but to accept.

Actually it turned out that we got in a bit of trouble. I was drinking mostly with the youth, some of whom who had been drinking beer since lunchtime. We were talking and laughing and making fun of the (exceedingly) drunken boys. Some boys were playing guitar and singing. Even though we were on the edge of the village, we were making enough noise to attract the attention of the Turaga ni Koro who came and gave us all a talking to. That was the end of the music. Oh well – didn’t stop the party! I’m planning on joining in again, but honestly, I’m not the biggest fan of kava, so it might be an occasional thing.

On Sunday I’d planned to take family photos of people in the village. Mostly this was an underhanded selfish attempt to learn people’s names and family relations, and a nerdy attempt to make an age distribution analysis (population pyramid). Unfortunately, I had other things going on, too, and didn’t really get much done on the photo taking front.

I got up at five to help Na, Ta, Cabe and Vili with the lovo (earthen oven) and the palusami (taro leaves and coconut milk), vakalavalava (coconut and tapioca sweet) and taro we would cook in it. The lovo is easy enough to start – you make a small fire with coconut shells and husks, then build a frame of sticks around and above it on which you place a bunch of river rocks. As the fire consumes the sticks, the flame-heated stones fall through; this is the base of the oven. We put a metal grate on the stones, then piled the food on top, covering the whole thing with first coconut leaves, then really giant leaves from a plant they call “mother of taro.” The whole time I was thinking about how I would recreate a lovo in my parent’s back yard without the tropical flora. Seriously, what is with my family and collecting traditional methods of cooking with fire? The neighbors already think we’re pyromaniacs.

Piling stones on a flaming tower of sticks

Covering the lovo with leaves Well – I almost didn’t have time to eat breakfast between getting the lovo ready and heading off to church. Luckily I made it work – because church was LONG! The weekly decision is not so much whether to go to church or not – like it can sometimes be in the states – but which church to attend, since it’s a given that everyone will attend somewhere. I picked this Sunday to head up to the Christian Methodist Fellowship with Vili, partly because my cousin from my training village was going to be there. This was my first chance to see Tubuna who had lived with my host family the whole time I was in training and I wasn’t going to pass it up. I liked the CMF service. It was upbeat, included singing and dancing, and, at times, had side commentary from the German couple who regularly attend there. But it was after noon by the time I had a chance to chat with Tubuna and after one by the time Vili and I got home to have the lunch we’d worked so hard on in the morning. I’m not sure I can make CMF a weekly thing considering the distance to CMF and the length of the service versus the village’s Methodist church which is close by and has a short service, but I’ll definitely be back.

Considering the lateness of our arrival back in the village, most of the other families had finished lunch and were off doing various Sunday activities (limited to not-work and not-exercise) with friends. This made taking family photos quite challenging. In fact, that day I only successfully got three family photos. But I haven’t stopped my efforts. Every day I get a few more photos and write down heaps more names and ages. Sometimes I even get invited to lunch or dinner. By far the best idea I’ve had since moving to the village, these photo-taking sessions start all kinds of interesting conversations. It’s still a challenge to get out and talk to people every day, but it’s getting easier, and hopefully soon it won’t be a new and different community but my village, my community, my friends.

One of my families in the village

Sometimes I wish I had taken at least one class in anthropology. Actually – a lot of times I wish that. Maybe if I’d taken anthropology I would be better able to analyze another culture, compare their values to mine and understand those things that confuse me. Maybe I’d be better able to emulate them, better able to make friends, better able to communicate. But I didn’t take anthropology. Instead, I took microeconomics. In microeconomics I learned nothing about how people actually behave but I learned a lot about how they (theoretically) aught to behave. For instance: if some random person (who has taken microeconomics) has a choice between fishing on the riverbank for three hours and catching, on average, two small (hand sized) fish (to eat for dinner) or, alternatively, engaging in an income generating activity for three hours which will allow that person to buy enough fish for a family of four for a week, the person would take the latter option because the opportunity cost of fishing is too high. If you haven’t taken microeconomics, you should look this up. It could change how you make decisions.No one in my little village has considered microeconomics. And they take me fishing. This is Fiji time. And I’m regretting not taking anthropology, again.On Wednesday I went out cutting copra with Na, Ta and Vili. Everyone in the village goes cutting copra at least once a week. Well, pretty much once a week. Copra, if you don’t have a dictionary handy, is the flesh of the coconut, which is dried and then cooked into coconut oil. This is one of very few income generating activities in the village. Ta had gone out on Tuesday and collected a bunch of coconuts in piles so when we hiked out Wednesday morning we just set up camp at one pile after another and got to work. When the coconuts come off the tree they don’t look like they do at Albertson’s. There’s a thick husk that makes cracking them open fairly difficult. In order to crack the coconuts Na brought a hatchet. She can crack them open in one swing. It took me all day to get down to one swing, and I still couldn’t do it consistently and my back was seriously aching! We tossed the halved coconuts in a pile and Ta and Vili cut the copra with special knives. Since they do this every week they’re super fast and can get it out in one whole piece. I could barely get my knife through the copra, so I was relegated to cracking open the coconuts, which was fine with me. After we finished a pile we’d pack all the copra into a bag (about 40kg after one pile) and head on to the next pile. After 5 hours we headed home, piling the bags on the road to be picked up and hauled to the dryer. At 40¢ per kilogram we wound up with $72.80 FD. It was quite a payday! That’s more than enough money to support a family of four for two weeks. I estimated the rate to be about $3.50 FD an hour. But there aren’t enough coconuts to do this much every week so you can’t always go cut copra instead of fishing and there’s not really much that pays as well as cutting copra in the village.I heard once that ceremonies are important to anthropologists. I think that’s because a ceremony is like a concentrated dose of a culture. There’s a lot more to analyze in a small amount of time. Personally I think that makes it harder. It’s easier for me to take in one thing at a time. At ceremonies there’s so much going on that I get confused and end up tuning out most of the “noise” which is probably the important stuff the anthropologists look at.Last week there was a ceremony in the village. I’m not entirely certain what it was about but I know it had something to do with a girl from my village that got married to a boy from another village without asking permission from the girl’s parents first. Someone was apologizing to the girl’s parents, but I’m not sure if it was the couple or the other village. In any case, an old man from the other village presented a tabua (the tooth of a sperm whale tied on a cord, an ultimate honor in Fijian culture and worth more than a pile of money) to the elders of our village. He gave a speech and clapped in the traditional manner. The elders from our village accepted the tabua and gave speeches, too. What confused me was why neither of the girl’s parents were involved. The father is the headman of the tribe, too. You’d think he’d be the one accepting the tabua and giving speeches. There was a lot of congratulating, some crying and, of course, tea after the ceremony. Then we went to drink grog. At this point the traditional relationships started coming out. There’s this thing called “Tau” in Fiji which allows you and encourages you to play pranks on people from certain other provinces depending on which province you are from. Similarly, “tauvale” means your joking cousin, the child of your mother’s brother or father’s sister. One of the women I was drinking grog with saw her tauvale playing ukulele for the singing and the pranks began! Tossing baby powder on each other’s hair and faces, making them wear funny clothes, serving them undrinkable large bowls of kava, it was craziness. But it was late, too, and me being a lightweight grog drinker, I headed back to my bure wondering what would happened if I did that at home.I’m not sure what an anthropologist would make of all of this. After all I’ve never taken anthropology. But what I think is that people in Fiji enjoy life. Maybe they’re going fishing to chat with their friends and spend a few hours by the river. If they need some money – they can go cut copra for a day, but they’re not going to spend their whole lives worrying about bills. And if they have the chance, they’ll go out of their way to play a joke on you. So be prepared. If you’re like me and haven’t taken anthropology, you’ll wind up in the middle of joke not having a clue what’s going on. My advice: Laugh.

I’ve been reading this book about the Zombie World War. It’s pretty diverting for those times that I don’t have the energy to go out and meet more new people. I’m having enough trouble remembering the names of the ones I have met! Anyway, zombies basically invade the whole world and everyone is scrambling to get away. A lot of the book is devoted to how people survived without transportation, communication, electricity and supermarkets. You know, the stuff most of us take for granted, well, that is, unless you’re living in a bure by the beach in Fiji!I’ve only been at site seven days and really haven’t had a ton of time (or energy – got another head cold) to explore, but one thing that’s impressed me is how little you really need to live (sort of) comfortably here. Yeah, the water pressure might be low, but we all have toilets. Why do you need a gas stove (which I have) when you can cook on an open fire (which I don’t have). The kaivalagi wants a compost pile? Send some boys over to make one from spare bamboo poles (took them less than a half hour!). Not sure what to have for dinner? Go fishing, gather some clams, pick some eggplant from the garden, have it with some taro leaves (delicious!) and some cassava. All this within 100 meters of my house!There is electricity in my village, but not every house has it. I don’t yet. Cooking in the dark with a kerosene lamp is something that’s not quite routine for me yet. Nor is washing dishes in a plastic basin and going outside to dump it. I can’t say I’m anywhere near good at fishing – let alone cleaning, scaling and cooking the fish! But these are those minor adjustments that make the Peace Corps awesome. I wouldn’t change it – especially when living this life means I get to live here!I finished the zombie book and am trying to decide what to read next. Compared to training I’ve got a ton of fee time and I’m not feeling particularly productive – especially as much of my energy is devoted to learning this new style of housekeeping. I’m thinking about picking up the Peace Corps issued book on community assessment. That’s what I’m supposed to do these first 3 months anyway.Until I finish my assessment: my initial impression coming to the village was the overwhelming generosity they showed to a complete stranger. My house, a one room traditional thatch bure right on the beach was so lovely I couldn’t believe they’d built it just for me. The welcoming celebration lasted all night – fueled by grog (kava), music and dancing. Since then there has been no end to the random gifts of bananas, papayas, cakes and full meals, and it seems every day someone is coming to make adjustments to my house. The children are curious and always eager to play. Everyone else is curious, too, just not so openly. I know they’re all waiting to see what I’ll do. I’m just curious to see if I live up to their expectations!

My view and the views of this page are my own and do not represent those of the Peace Corps or any of it’s affiliates.

We finally got site announcements! The staff surprised us with it a day early and it was truly the most exciting day in Fiji so far – beating out even the opening ceremony of the new US Embassy and meeting the Ambassador (last Tuesday). It turns out that none of us are headed for Kadavu or the Yasawas or Lau. The 25 of us are spread out over Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, the two main islands, with three on Ovalau, a smaller island between the two (and the site of the former capital of Fiji). I’m right on the coast on Savusavu Bay (Vanua Levu). I’m the first volunteer at my village (most people are replacing a volunteer), so no one knows anything about my site!Embassy Opening - Some of my PC friends are visible in the audience.This morning when I went for a long run (for which I got disapproving looks with pursed lips – girls aren’t supposed to run alone – especially when it might still be dark out), I headed up to Toboniqio where some other PC trainees live. Dan and Colin had already left on their run for Naikawaqa Koro to watch the sunrise. A week before they’d presented a Sevusevu to the village headman for the privilege of running there and watching the sunrise. By the time I arrived, the sunrise was in full glory mode, shining rays of light through the clouds onto the ocean below. We sat around on the cliff overlooking the mangroves the outer islands and the Pacific watching fruit bats glide down below and talking about leaving for our sites on Monday. This was the last chance we’d have to visit this amazing place. In a few minutes we headed back down the hilly, muddy track, just a twenty-minute run back to Toboniquio not looking back at the small town we may never see again. We’ve been here only six weeks and I already feel like I’m leaving so much behind.Sunrise in NaikawaqaYesterday I borrowed a phone and called Bubba. He’s the Peace Corps Volunteer serving with his wife in a village near where I’ll be heading next week. When I called he was on a bus with the village head man of my new village and had some news about my house. Apparently they’d just finished tatching the roof and walls and were hanging the doors that day. Bubba went to have a look today to make sure I’ll have electricity. Most importantly, I hear there’s a beautiful white sand beach just 10 yards from my bure!I’m being torn in two. I can’t wait to get to site! Can I take pieces of Naitasiri with me?At a grog circle in Kasavu

The other day Sia came over to the house to hang out with my Na. She is a really cool lady – originally from Kandavu, she moved to the United States for law school and passed the bar. She moved back to Fiji, though, and is lawyer here, one of the best if you ask the magistrate I met in Nausori last week. Anyway, Sia invited me over for drinks at her house and we got to talking about her experiences being the only Fijian in a big state school in Alabama. She couldn’t believe the things people thought about Fiji. Once a girl asked, “I know Fiji is a really small country, so do you all live in caves?” Guess what? Nobody lives in caves here, but Fiji is a really small country in the middle of a big ocean. Sia couldn’t even find it on the map when she tried to point it out in class to her fellow students, so she had to draw it on!So, here’s the map of the world that I use to show people where I’m from and where other places are. See – Portland’s there! (It’s got Eugene and Medford, too, but not McMinnville). Can you find Fiji? Here’s a hint: it’s more than 15˚ south. Here’s another hint: the embassy in Fiji also serves as an embassy for Tonga, Kiribati, Tuvalu and Nauru. Do you know where those countries are? No? Never heard of them? That’s O.K. I don’t think they usually cover the South Pacific very well in High School geography. A close up of my area of the South Pacific is down below. It’s got all of them on there if you look closely enough.

Being in the South Pacific is awesome. Really. However, there are some things to watch out for. The other day I went for an afternoon walk with Kim and Christine, two of the other Peace Corps trainees in my village. I thought it would be a short walk down the road and back, so I just put on some flip-flops and headed out. Soon, though, we were climbing a muddy trail up a steep incline through the jungle and the flip-flops had to go. I hiked the rest of the way barefoot (and cautiously). We figured we’d loop back to the road, so we kept on, up and up, further into the jungle, having a glorious time. Along the way we met Ta Jack, an old farmer tending his cows. He mentioned some people from our village were ahead of us, so we continued on. Later, rather than sooner, we realized we weren’t going to get back to the road, so we turned around and headed back. When we met Ta Jack again, he opened some young coconuts for us to drink from and invited us to come back some time, earlier in the day, and he’d show us the other trails. We sang and joked on our way back, getting really muddy and having a blast. It wasn’t until we reached home and related our adventure to our local friends that we realized the danger we had been in. “The danger,” they said, “the danger is that it is evil!” We hadn’t known that there are evil spirits lurking in that part of the jungle, lying in wait to possess young girls and turn them mad. Needless to say, we’ve been forbidden to return to the jungle on our own.Regardless of your beliefs, there are more tangible threats than spirits. Yesterday I heard a story of a Peace Corps volunteer in this area being harassed by sharks while kayaking in a river. Yes, bull sharks can swim up freshwater rivers. People keep telling us that there are sharks in the Rewa River here by the village. But that doesn’t keep us from swimming in it! Actually, our first time in the water, Kim and I were more scared of bacteria than sharks, but it was hot and we jumped in anyway. Yeah, the water was brown, but it was great! We bailed out an old boat and rowed over to the opposite shore, Brian joined us, paddling over on a bamboo raft called a bilibili. The shore was pure mud, the kind that you sink into to your thighs. When a few more friends from the village showed up with a rugby ball we had quite a time thrashing around in the mud for a game of touch rugby. Later we “cleaned off” by playing a very poor game of water polo before swimming back across the river. What a spectacle we made! Half the village must have come out to watch. The other half asked if I really swam across the river. Anyway, Kim’s been swimming in the river every day since and has yet to see a shark OR get sick. I guess we’re just lucky. :)

Would it be disingenuous to say life in Fiji is not that much different from home? From outer space you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. It's the day to day realities, big and small that set it apart. I mean, did you know there's not one zoo in Fiji? None of the kids here have ever seen an elephant, tiger, or any kind of monkey! I get asked every day if those kinds of things are real (or Dr. Doolittle or vampires).

I live with a host family in a pretty decent sized village. My Na (mother) and Ta (father) are a bit different than your average Fijian family: both have jobs (primary and secondary school teachers, respectively) and they're both in Master's degree programs. I've got two host brothers (Tuvula - 13 and Tuisoa - 3), a host sister (Dilama - 11) and a cousin (Tubuna - 18) living in the house. Each morning is a whirlwind of getting everyone off to school on time (which usually doesn't happen), getting Tubuna out of bed and to the teitei (small farm) and Una coming over to take care of Tuisoa. Usually somebody - or everyone - is late - a symptom of "Fiji Time." You get used to it after a while - even the Peace Corps events rarely happen when they're planned to - things just happen when they happen.

Our village has about 85 houses jam packed into seven acres. That's 12 houses per acre, and that doesn't even count the church or the open space around the church! Technically 500 people live there, but a lot have apartments in the capital, too. We're lucky to have municipal water from Nausori. It's always cold, but it's so warm here that cold showers are refreshing! The pressure is more of an issue as it can vary wildly and your nice shower can become a trickle or a raging torrent in just a second. There's not a waste treatment plant, so most people have home made septic tanks... And grey water goes into drainage ditches around the village and out into the river. The trash does pretty much the same thing... Needless to say I'm a little hesitant to swim in the river!

We're also lucky to have constant electricity - that is - if you remember to "re up" your account. It's similar to pre-paid cell phones. Everyone has a tv, dvd player and radio. Electric ovens, kettles, blenders, irons and washing machines are not uncommon, but they're often too expensive to use. My family even has a computer, but they keep it locked up. It's really hard to have stuff that's much nicer than the neighbors because of "KereKere." Literally meaning "please," this is how people refer to the practice of indefinitely "borrowing" from family members - which could be anyone in a village or even visitors. Most of the time the borrower doesn't even ask. Luckily it usually doesn't extend to Peace Corps volunteers, but I do keep my peanut butter and coffee in my room, and sometimes my snacks for tea break, because if I don't they'll just all disappear before I get a chance to use them!

In the village family is very important, and all Fijians have to be tied to a village somewhere, even if they live in a city. The way this works is through mataqalis (clans - pronounced matangali). Our village has seven clans - the different clans have different traditional land holdings which cannot be bought or sold. They have different responsibilities in the village, too. They are part of the governing system of the village with each having their own head man who speaks for the mataqali in the village meetings. Most people live around other people in their clan, so that's mostly who they interact with, too. This system is partly responsible for a bunch of different extended family relationships that I haven't quite grasped: some people aren't allowed to talk to other people based on their family relationships, others are required to have joking/taunting relationships! This extends to different provincial relationships, too. I haven't got it all figured out, but I do know I'm in the highest cheifly clan in the village!

There are always a ton of people in the village. Most people don't have real jobs. They might have some role in the community, like taking care of other people's children or running one of the village stores (more like a very small, necessities only, market), but more commonly the women make money diving for and selling kai (freshwater clams) and men grow and sell dalo (taro), tavioka (cassava), roro (taro leaves), vudi (plantain), jaina (banana), ota (wild fern) or other vegetable, fruit or animal products. There are youth (18-35) in the teitei, mowing the lawn with weed whackers or making a new volley ball court, children under 5 running around all over, women cooking in the houses, and men sitting around sharpening their isele (machetes) or telling stories. Everyone knows everyone and everyone invites you over for tea. It's a very interactive existence! I'm doing my best to make friends: telling stories, drinking grog (kava), going swimming, playing volleyball and more. I'm always hearing, "Milli! Lesu mai vei?" (where are you coming from) or "Lako i vei?" (where are you going). I've just recently gotten quick enough to respond!

Months after my nomination to serve in North Africa/The Middle East I received a phone call from Washington informing me that my program had filled and could I swim.

A few weeks later I was invited to serve in Fiji! I never really believed it until they sent me the information for staging in LA and the itinerary for the flight to Nadi. But here I am, nearly a month "in country."

After a one day orientation session in LA we boarded a non-stop flight to Nadi, Fiji. Arriving at 5AM, we walked off the plane to be met by the Peace Corps country director for Fii who helped us pass immigration and customs. A long bus ride took us to Pacific Harbor and another 2 day orientation, immunization and water safety session. On the afternoon of the second day we packed up again, this time headed for four days of training in Nadave, a technical (mostly ag) school near Nausori.

With all of the whirlwind training sessions, new friends, new foods and new environment, I hardly noticed I was catching cold until it kicked me on my butt. Instead of meeting my host family that first Monday, I was the first in my group to travel to Suva and the Peace Corps office. The adventure was a bit wasted on me, though, as I slept through the whole thing!

A good rest was all I needed and I headed to my host family's home and back to training the next day. Since then I've been living and studying in a Fijian village by the bend in the Rewa River just a few minutes drive from the "city" of Nausori.

More soon! Happy Queen's Birthday!