Sanasana and Natadola

Wowzers is Fiji ever different than what I expected and what I was used to in the Americanized world of Oz and NZ. This place is running like c America and is very slow. Everyone is on Fiji time permanently but i think it is really just an excuse to stay up every night till 2am drinking kava. Yes, that's the national drink and a murky, earthy, rooty substance made from the root of the pepper plant i think. The stuff really only makes your tongue numb and a bit sleepy but the people of Fiji swear by it and every kava shop that you see is a 24 hour establishment. It was good news here recently that Germany made the stuff legal to use in medicines and whatever else they want i suppose so it is turning into a profitable export for these guys.

I got into the Nadi airport at 5:30am and was greeted by hundreds of locals trying to sell me rides among other things and one lady got me to go with her to the travel agency and set up a home stay in Sanasana village. I found/chose/was recommended this because i wanted to go and stay on Natadola beach for awhile. Turns out i find a home stay with a family there for $30 a night including all meals. The travel agency had an employee that ended up being the mother of the family that i stayed with and that is why it was so easily recommended. Good stuff. Beautiful beach. Picturesque Fiji without all of the tourists that i expected. This place is dirty with everyone littering but that can't really take away from the natural beauty. The kids on the bus are taught to throw their soda bottles or ice cream wrappers out the window instead of dirtying up the inside of the buses that don´t go over 40k per hour or the transports that are all mid 1980 model years.

I get dropped off by the bus at the intersection of the main highway around Fiji (queen´s highway) and the road to Natadola beach. The place is deserted except for a Hindu temple, a bus stop, and a taxi. The walk is 8k to the beach so i opt for the taxi even though Tiki´s uncle David is supposed to be there to pick me. After this fat Indian drops me off the price changes from 7 to 9 dollars and i pay because he won´t leave and they tell me just go ahead and do it. I really don´t like getting ripped off because i´m a traveler but i guess sometimes it comes with the territory. The guy doesn´t know Tiki, who i am looking for, and doesn´t know of any homestays in the village so he starts yelling out the window. We get lucky and Suli is coming back from the field with his horse and he happens to be Tiki´s brother. Shows us the way and Tiki comes out to greet me. Seems like a bit of a fruitcake but has good English and all is well. First thing he tells me about are the 4 American girls from Colorado that left that day and that they had stayed out till 5am drinking on the beach. I got there at about 930am and he looks tired. We decide to have tea and then i take a nap to give him the chance to recover. More tea when i wake up and then to the beach for awhile. Gorgeous and the villagers want you to ride their horses and buy their shell necklaces etc. More tea and reading and sunset and dinner of curry and 3 fried fish. They whole family was quite impressed with my eating skills and i got quite the reputation for eating before i left. 3 fish is unheard of apparently but if i am paying for it and they say eat till you are full that is just what i will do. Same with the biscuits at tea time. They put out a whole pack of chocolate ones and say to eat them all so i certainly try but only get through about half of them. Is lucky for me i later find out because grocery shopping is a once weekly kinda deal and i wouldn´t have had any had i eaten them all the first day.

This house and all in the village have no water or electricity or anything like that. The family that i am staying with does have a propane stove but most don't and cook by wood fire in a separate building. The buildings are all corrugated metal with trees for the supports and dirt floors. Most have rugs covering the floors but not all. They all seem to live very simply and share all that they have. At least with their clan. Next day Tiki accompanies me to the Sigatoka sand dunes (about 50m dunes covered in grasses) which were a little disappointing but good with a visit to Sigatoka town and the market for some cabbage and cucumbers. The dunes cost me $8 to get into Fiji´s first national park and cost Tiki nothing because he sweet talked them in Fijian and said i was his guest and he was showing me around. Worked out well i suppose because he got to see something he never had before as well. The trek included a walk on the windiest beach of my life where i was told that if i went in the water i would get eaten by sharks almost without a doubt. More great food from Tiki, Cali (his father), and Suli. The rest of the villagers are all cousins, aunts, uncles, etc even if they really aren't. Saturday went to Sigatoka for the big provincial rugby game for 2 cups the Fiji cup and the Benson and Hedges (national cigarette, B&H) cup. It was Nadroga (us) vs Talevu and we pulled it out 23-15. There was a lady yelling crazy things behind us such as love for the referee and certain players. I of course don´t know any language but English so i had no idea what she said but Mani (an uncle) told me all about it. He accompanied me to the game even though about half the village went. We got lucky on the walk up the highway to hitch a ride with a tourist with a truck and we ended up getting all the way to Sigatoka for free in about a third of the time it takes the bus. He loved it even though it cost $10 which was probably more money than he could afford. Before the game he haggled the price of a horse bit which started at $4 for about 10 minutes so ya know...On the way home we catch a transport full of people from the village and are cruising along, music blaring, driver passing everyone, till something happens and everyone is curious and then laughing. We ran out of gas just because he didn´t check it. Not for any real reason. So we sit on the side of the road and wait for him to hitch a ride to go get gas. When he returns we stop again at the market and i pick up a loaf of bread for .60 to munch on for the remainder of the time (and in case we never got home).

Sunday we went to church (Methodist) and didn't understand a thing but I wore a sulu (skirt/sarong) and nice shirt and went with a German couple who came to stay with Suli. Cali is really into his religion and is in the choir and kept asking if i had any questions on who Jesus was and things like this. Also quite interestingly there was a Jewish couple in the village that were missionaries. I didn´t know that Jews had missionaries but hey, why not? Went to the beach to relax the rest of the day with Tiki, Samantha (the daughter of the original travel agent! who was 5) and the German couple. Felt lazy so i ran down the beach and then just slept and watched the 8 or so surfers that were trying to catch waves.

Cali showed me around to a cave out on the island where the villagers keep their pigs and goats. This cave was inhabited by cannibals fairly recently but i forget the dates. Quite a nice hideout for these guys since they had been chased by the Fijians with their clubs ever since the Christians came to the island and taught them that cannibalism was wrong in the late 1800s. Also got shown the ´magic´rock which when you throw a stone at it and chip it it conjures up a big storm so the attackers can´t attack. The week before i got there there was a surf competition at Natadola and the coordinator asked to conjure up a storm for big waves and he got it. This kind of magic really does work i suppose.

First night had a welcome kava ceremony where i bought the kava and shared with about 7 people. We sit on the floor in a circle and mix it in a big bowl. It is ground and squeezed through a bandanna thing to make the brown milky liquid. Drank about 4 big bowls of it. You drink one at a time out of a coconut shell and pass it back. Before you receive it you clap once and then say Bula (which you get hella tired of in this place if you are at the tourist places) and then drink it in one gulp and then clap 3 more times. The stuff really just makes you sleepy but they love it. We had a wash down with a bottle of run i bought duty free at the airport in the same manner drinking one at a time out of the same glass. Mixed this 58% alcohol rum with some water. Tasted like shit. The whole time everyone there kept wanting me to talk to a village girl called Mary who they thought i needed make my girlfriend. She had graduated and was to become a bank officer (teller) which is a killer job for a girl from the village. They kept telling me to have very good conversation with her and take her with me to the islands or America when i left. It turns out that she got embarrassed and thought that i was too long anyway and didn´t finish the lolly that the aunt brought to the kava. You always need to have sweet like a lolly, or spicy like jalapeno peas with kava to keep your tongue awake. Had another big grog drink Saturday night and an Irish and Kiwi guy showed up really drunk stumbling all over the place. Good fun. Now on to the Yasawa islands. More later. These computers are from the 80's.