Storytelling, caves and a tabua : My Fiji

Fiji is a culturally-rich nation which has evolved over the years supported, in large part, by the power of stories and the talanoa (communication). With so much negativity out there right now, I sat thinking last night about what is good and specifically, what brought me to live in this country six years ago. It's a positive story, I think, so for no other reason than that, I wanted to write it out. 

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It begins here...

"There are shrimp off an island up north that are bright red." George told me. "They have the color of  being cooked but they haven't been cooked. They're just bright red!"

"I've never heard of such a thing," I remember saying. "I've never ever seen anything like that."

"No, of course you wouldn't have because you can't photograph them. Your pictures will come out blank!"

This was  one of the conversations I had with George over the course of about three weeks. It was February, 1993 and I had been traveling in Fiji for about a month. I met George on an island in the Mamanucas where I had gone to get my scuba certification. As I remember it, we spent a great deal of time doing very little but sitting around partying and talking.

"There's a cave on one of the islands." George relayed during one of these sittings. "It's called the pregnant cave. Huge, fat people can go to this cave and squeeze in without a problem but if your 3 weeks pregnant, no chance. The cave will not let in pregnant people!"

My time in Fiji listening to George relay these stories rank among my top travel memories of all time. It solidified Fiji in my journal as different from any other place I had every been to. Prior to Fiji, I had been in Tahiti and Bora Bora and although I felt the aesthetics of French Polynesia might always earn it top honors, there was a completely different vibration from the Fijian people and the air in this country. It felt as if every person I met was deeply engaged in the conversations we had and that, in itself, was a pretty unusual and special feeling. My conversations with George reinforced that.

"There's another cave on one of the outer islands called 'The Spitting Cave'," George told me a few days later. "You can be inside this cave and scream at the top of your lungs and no one can hear you but if you spit, BOOM!! Everyone on the outside hears it!!!"

Every one of these stories was awesome and coming from the east coast of the US where we don't have pregnant caves and spitting caves and invisible red shrimp, it ramped up the paradise to a whole new level. One particular evening, George and I sat on the sea wall looking out upon the ocean. We were just sitting there, chilling out, not doing very much in particular. It was one of those gorgeous and slightly breezy island evenings with tons of stars in the sky, the lapping of waves on the sand and the quiet scattering of crabs as they run across the grains under the silent gliding of giant fruit bats above our heads. Unmistakably south pacific.

Suddenly, George turned to me and said "Ya know, Jon, when we were cannibals...".

I had to interrupt at that moment. I couldn't let him finish the sentence. In my entire life, no one had ever started a conversation with those  words. I was in heaven.

Expats Guide Towards Surviving a Fijian Coup

The doomsday headline "Fiji military given OK to shoot civilians." called out to me from UPI.com. I'm not sure what was more jarring, actually. Was it that fear-mongering, sensationalist headline or the fact that UPI.com's tag line is "100 years of journalistic excellence"? Some international media outlets use old video footage of the 2000 coup with soldiers in the streets carrying weapons. I don't believe a tiny "file footage" in the corner of the screen is fair, either.

As an expat, I don't openly comment on any of the politics in the country and for obvious reason. I see positives and negatives in everything anyway and there is also enough noise out there from other sources. However, one of challenges Fiji will continue to face when not enabling open communications with the rest of the world are stories such as the sensationalist one above. I've received well more than a handful of emails and messages from friends in other parts of the world who appear to be getting warped views of what's happening in Suva.

"Are you safe?", understandably, is the most common question I hear and I still respond with the stock answer I have always used.

"I feel safer here than on the streets of any big city in the world."

Fiji is a very safe country, even in the face of some rising "petty crime" which include home invasions and robberies. For tourists, though, this is not a risk and the news they are seeing on TV and the warnings from their governments are, frankly, blown well out of proportion. I'm not saying the situation isn't serious, though. It is serious, but things DO NOT feel unstable at all in Suva right now. Could this change? I suppose it could but I'd like to believe it won't. If I felt that there was a real danger, I would not be keeping my kids in school right now.

A laughable headline in the Fiji Sun today "There is no problem in Fiji, says tourist" did send the wrong message. Of course there's a problem in Fiji, but it's not driving and overtaking the lives of the public as far as I can tell.

Embassy warnings that scare their citizens into staying away from protests and gatherings are done more to protect those governments from being accused of not warning those citizens than anything else.

"Honey, go grab the kids and lets join that anti-government protest downtown!" is simply not the kind of phrase you'd hear an expat exclaiming anyway, even if there were such protests.

Again, I am not discounting the seriousness of what Fiji as a nation is facing right now. I'm a part of this community as is my family and I'm concerned for my friends, my colleagues, my business and everything else. It's just a real shame when the entire or partial truth can't get out there and I also recognise that it needs to run both ways too.

Fiji needs visitors now to keep the economy going. If you're planning a holiday here, please do not cancel those plans. The water, the beaches, the interior and the people haven't changed. No one visits a country for its government anyway, do they?

Let me repeat that Fiji is a safe country but it is facing a number of hurtles. When it does emerge, it will hopefully be stronger and better. That written, I would certainly like to see things move along a bit faster towards that emergence. I think most people do.

BlackBerry Storm : Mobile Touch in Fiji

Last week, Vodafone Fiji passed me along a BlackBerry Storm. I don't know anything at all about how they'll be rolling the product out to the public or when this will happen, though. In fact, this "mini review" is really not about Vodafone Fiji at all but I do need to tip my hat and thank them for the opportunity to play with new technology. Much appreciated...

On that intro note, perhaps it's appropriate to start any mention of the BlackBerry Storm with a few comments about its performance on Vodafone Fiji's network. Without a doubt, this is the best sounding BlackBerry I have ever had and Vodafone's 3G service pairs beautifully with it. Audio is crystal clear when making calls. So much so, that I was amazed I was even noticing it. I wish other BB models followed suit. Browsing the web was also quite pleasing and I have no complaints at all about that. 

I promised myself one week with the new model. I would put down my Bold and use the Storm for a single week since I knew that there would be some kind of learning curve with a phone that relies on a touchscreen. I gave up after three days. In the end, I realised that whether I had the phone for an hour, a day or a week, I would never get used to fighting with my phone and that's exactly what I found myself doing.

It's not all crap...just most of it. I liked the updated 3.2 MP camera a lot. I also liked the form factor of the Storm with its slick and curvy shape. Unfortunately, it  felt slippery and heavy and unlike some of the other BlackBerry models, the Storm didn't feel as if it would be so forgiving if dropped. I didn't test that theory, however, even as I wanted to smash the unit against the wall a number of times. The only other praise I can give the Storm is for the screen. It's very bright and colors are very vivid. However, I was constantly having to clean the thing of fingerprints.