Six Weeks In Fiji

Two big girls from school are we

Oh forget not when you're far away

Fiji Diary

On my return to New Zealand in 2019 after ten years in China, I got an infatuation to visit Samoa. Everyone assured me Samoa was dead boring. I must go to Fiji instead. As my sister put it. "After half an hour, you will have finished your visit to the Robert Louis Stevenson museum." About myself, she was half right. I recall in China, an otherwise dull Kiwi saying. It took him all day to reach a Chinese temple. He walked in, looked around and thought. "I have already seen the museum in a virtual tour guide."

I had since 2001, discovered nations' lives do not revolve around their cultural treasures. They are for the tourists who mostly attend to it as a duty they quickly tire of and slink off to sybaritic resorts. I visited a Japanese palace in Tokyo. In its Imperial garden, I looked around. I was in the heart of Tokyo and I didn't see another person in a palace and temple landscape that stretched several miles. Before my first international tour after babyhood, I had assumed one could scarcely move in Asia because of the crowds. But I forget no Japanese considers himself to be Asian. Like no Kiwi considers himself to be Polynesian.

So Fiji would be my next foreign adventure. Then came Covid-19 and everything went into lock down. My stepson rushed into our apartment with a bottle of fruit juice. "If you come near me, at your age you will die!" he shouted. My masked wife fled from me as I approached her. I kept a straight face. Everyone else appeared to be panicking and I could not take it seriously. They were fleeing New Zealand back to their homeland China. Chinese are total hypochondriacs. I sent a message to my wife. "Your perfumes are in the apartment, waiting for your return." Her reply showed enormous relief. They came back to New Zealand some months later, on the day of the second Covid-19 lock down. I said fuck.

I had planned to make a detour from Fiji to my birth place Kiribati, aka Gilbert Islands. But my landlady Anna of Avondale stole my bond. I gave her two weeks notice and referred to the bond. She gave an Oriental smile and said, "Don't worry." Chinese regard the non Chinese world as fair game. The world is going to miss American landlordism. That at least had universal and humanist ideals. She accused me of staining two of her mattresses. The mattress I could inspect and now slept on had a faint stain at its foot. I screen shot it. My wife brought in a mattress cleaner and she and Anna scrubbed it. That made the stain more conspicuous. I said to Anna. "I am not going to pay any more rent and I am taking you to the Tenancy Tribunal". She looked uneasy and sent a text to my wife, I had to leave after two days. The Tenancy Tribunal was no good because without a written tenancy agreement, I had the status of a settee squatter. The lesson there is: Your Chinese landlady may be a stalwart Jehovah Witness Christian and have a family. But like the cat turned into a Princess in the Aesop fable, she will still dive to the floor to catch a mouse. I recalled later, the father of modern China, Deng Xiaoping had a parallel aphorism, "It does not matter if the cat is black or white as long as it catches the mouse." Hong Kong was his last mouse

I will miss Avondale. Former small towns and boroughs remain real places, not suburban sprawls even though the shops are now almost exclusively Asian. The Asian shop keepers are usually genial, honest people. I will also miss the happy hour every evening of the local tavern with its old identities, the Maori lunatic and the bar maid who had never heard of Robert Louis Stevenson. Historic Avondale is now set to be torn down by a Council agency with a Maori name. The local Maoris sunning in the Avondale open spaces, are most aggrieved and helpless. The sweet side of Anna had got me into the Jehovah Witness. I attended the Sunday English language congregations. Jehovah Witness does not consider itself a Church. It instead re-enacts in every Church session the Jewish Messianic Jesus cult in First Century A.D. In my last attendance before leaving Avondale, the Congregation imagined themselves fleeing Jerusalem to Pella at the invasion of the Roman army. They did it with a literal intensity that warmed my heart after my academic education. When I said farewell to the Pastor, I felt it too flippant to say, this was a useful lesson for my flight from Avondale. I talked to him about my planned detour from Fiji to Kiribati, my birth place. He asked me, "How did you end up being born there." I said. "I have no idea." I partially explained that my father was a school teacher in Kiribati.

On August 12, 2025, my stepson Jim drove me to Auckland International airport. He warned me I was forgetful and to keep a watchful eye on all my possessions. I was glad to be reminded. Since I turned sixty five, I have noticed with alarm, my short term memory loss. Sometimes it has been small events a few seconds before that I have no memory at all. My long term memory seems as sharp as ever. I can name all the British Prime Ministers and the years of their entering Ten Downing street from Disraeli to Blair. My eighteen months sojourn in Outer Mongolia where theft is a part of their culture, has caused me paranoia about loss. To the extent it has become dangerous.

At the check point, I was asked to show my return ticket. I had somehow thought I would be required to show that at Nadi airport. Fortunately, years of traveling experiences have inculcated me to have key documents ready for showing. I rummaged through my travel bag and with huge relief soon found it. The counter lady asked me. "Would you like further assistance." "I replied. "No. I am old but I am not stupid." A genial elderly Fijian man x-rayed my travel bag. I had removed anything remotely sharp pronged. I had no suitcase. Jim had rung me that morning that a suitcase would cost me an extra one hundred and fifty five dollars. I googled for a no extra charge travel bag and Jim got one at an Auckland shop for me. The dark ages of shoe removals and groin squeezing were over.

When I online booked my flight to Fiji, the booking did not show I had been successful. So I clicked at the top of the screen. A message came through my booking had not come through. So I tried unsuccessfully three more times. Then I checked back at my bank account. Fiji Airways had booked me four times for the flight. The next week day, I rang Fiji Airways. I had to accept the bookings. I explained what exactly happened. The Customer Service was immediately apologetic and not surprised. This seemed to be a glitch Fiji Airways knew about. I was promised my three later bookings would be cancelled and I would be refunded. That evening I got an email from Fiji Airways. An apology and refunds were made. Fiji Airways hoped I would enjoy the flight. I was relieved but not encouraged. As Fiji Airways is so desultory about their bookings, how careful are they about their public safety? I googled Fiji Airways and was relieved their safety record since 1947 has been a few tight misses, and no fatalities. It seemed I had already experienced the Pacific Way. Things run smoothly most of the time but unexpected surprises can happen any time.

I got into the wrong queue at the boarding. The Fijian boarding inspector said she would hold my boarding pass. I refused to hand it over. I had visions of it being lost on the counter.

After an apologetic over half hour delay, we took off to the south seas The flight was non eventual. the food was cardboard lite tasting. The melodious Pacific sounds augmented with smiles wafted through the cabin. We were promised coffee and got more alcohol.

The bright sky shone above us. All we could see below us were fluffy clouds. We reached Nadi after a three and a half hour flight. In that span of time, we had flown over the Tasman sea, over the Australian land mass and into the heart of Melanesia. A flight from Auckland to Sydney takes three hours. The time zone of New Zealand and Fiji are the same. We had flown north as the crow flies.

We landed smoothly into a first world international airport. I thought the Pacific sound was overdoing it as Fiji men strummed their guitars in the heart of the airport as stressed out I completed my arrival card and rummaged nervously for my passport. I had borrowed a pen from an air hostess on the assumption I would be required to fill in my arrival card on the aeroplane. I had not flown for six years. I of course could not remember my passport number. She imperiously and rightfully demanded it back immediately after the aeroplane landed. My passport was in my shoulder bag with my wallet. Inside the wallet were my visa cards and one hundred and fifty Fiji dollars. I had become a seasoned international traveller despite myself. A Fiji dollar is about half the currency of an American dollar.

In Auckland, I had consulted AI Microsoft co-pilot. I do that for every bit of public knowledge now. That delightful bot gentleman assured me Fiji was still in the Covid-19 dark ages. I was horrified. Then I checked the Fiji Immigration Department. Covid-19 requirements were all gone.

Airport security and health travel checks were being returned to pre 911 sanity. But the four horsemen of the Apocalypse hovered above Europe, East Asia and the Middle East. In Fiji, Constitution agitation was evoking hideous recalls of the four coups since 1987.

As I had read in Microsoft co-pilot, I was required at the arrival airport to show documentation of my bank records and my Fiji residency. I had them ready at the Nadi check point in my bag. As I anticipated, I was too old and white, to attract suspicion. The genial Indian official asked me where I would stay. "One night at the Bamboo Lodge, and six months at Smugglers' Cove," I blurted out. 'Six months?" he raised his eyebrows. My tourist visa stamp would confine me to three months. "Six nights," I corrected. "Do you have enough money," he asked. "I am on superannuation, the Government gives me a lot of money to have holidays," I gasped. The official smiled. He stamped in my passport the three month visa.

Now I was in the terminal. I looked around for a sim card shop. No sightings. Then I found the ubiquitous taxi drivers that hang out at exit centres. "I said Bamboo Grove" and offered the fare recommended by Microsoft co-pilot. All the taxi drivers demanded a lot more. I was beginning to learn A.I. cannot be relied to be up to date.

I had booked at the Bamboo Backpackers for one night at $30 and at Smugglers Cove for six nights for one hundred dollars. Smugglers Cove was fourteen dollars a night. I couldn't find any economically suitable places to stay in the capital Suva. A bus ride from Suva to Nadi is as low as $2.50 and takes about three and a half hours. So i intended to make Nadi my base.

I took a taxi and before the driving started moving, I started bag rummaging for my wallet. A student of mine in China had told me how a thief had unzipped her bag front pocket and stolen her valuables. My wallet was there at the bottom of my bag. One tucks valuables carefully away and they wriggle to the bottom. The taxi driver told me to relax. Everything was going well for me.

We drove out to the airport highway. I noted the road was not entirely smooth but not dangerously pot holed either. Fiji had had two decades of military rule punctuated with Parliamentary Democracies since 2006.A generation had grown up without personal memory of coups except for their elders' stories. For them Fiji must seem the epitome of normality. We arrived at Wailoaloa beach in the evening after about fifteen minutes.

Wailoaloa Beach. The Purple Shadows Fall

Smugglers Cove at Wailoaloa Beach

Wailoaloa Beach was a sprawl of hotels and cheap resorts that stretched over the shore until fading away into the countryside. It was evening and it pulsed with life and a jam of discordant musical vibes. I after inquiries from strangers found the Bamboo Backpackers. A jovial Fijian man found my listing and directed me to an enclosed space of dormitory tunnels. I left my desktop computer and my passport in his office.

I went out for a walk. A short distance down the road, was a police post. "I said to the smartly attired young policeman. "I am glad to see you." The Prime Minister of Fiji, installed after a tumultuous election, was Sitiveni Rabuka. In 1987, Colonel Rabuka had staged the first coup in Fiji. In its aftermath, the New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs had called him a thug. Rabuka or his spokesman said. He did it to stop the Indo Fjians taking over Fiji and turning the Fijians into Maoris. A perhaps ironical turn of phrase by the New Zealand Minister. The thugees were an Indian murderous sect genocided by the British Empire without ever any apology. Now Rabuka was now an elder statesman of the South Pacific. In the previous week, he ha declared in an interview with the Fijian Times newspaper that all officials of Fiji must set an example of lawful and honourable conduct. The Indian dominated newspaper let Rabuka's words stand without comment. In Auckland, I had promised myself never to let the words Rabuka and coup slip my lips in Fiji even in jest. Their victims might now see humour and irony in them. But I would be a guest in Fiji.

Wailoaloa was once a shore of fishing villages and yes smugglers. Now the Fijian constabulary led by a man who had taken Fiji by gun point, work diligently to remove the riff raff from Wailoaloa shore and make it safe for the world's globe trotting tourists, including myself. I imagined any hobos or beach combers who tried the timeless habit of squatting and sleeping on the beach were quickly taken way to cells by Fiji's finest. They might protest. "Why don't you arrest Rabuka," to no avail. Out in the distant sea in the purple sunset light, were the ghostly images of floating commercial boats. I thought they were fishing boats but I was assured they were for tourists to hire them for island hopping.

I went for a tranquil stroll. I quickly found an open air restaurant. Its prices eliminated any more illusions about third world living costs. But as I got used to Fiji prices, I became aware the Fijian prices and the Fijian dollar value were agreeably less than in New Zealand. I ordered a mediocre rice dish.

I returned to the Bamboo Backpackers. I gingerly climbed up into one of the tunnels. If I was not careful I would break my neck.

The next morning I found my way to the Smugglers Cove. Smugglers Cove is a few minutes walking distance from the Bamboo Backpackers. Smugglers Cove was a hive of frenetic humanity. At the reception my name was soon found. My valuables were put in storage, and I was ushered to my dormitory. My dormitory provided lockers and a Western bathroom. You could get anything you wanted in Smugglers Cove as befitted its name, if not contraband. I found the nice Smugglers Cove bar and restaurant on the ground floor overlooking the beach which was filled up with restaurants and bars. I ordered a Fiji beer. I always select an alcohol ethnic to its location. Outside New Zealand, I have to restrict my alcohol drinking. Outside New Zealand, I drink freely the ethnic ales. That is either because they are brewed as an accompaniment to food rather than intoxication, or they relieve my nerves in foreign language lands. Then I took a stroll down the beach. I gazed at the sun set and recalled the song lyrics of Lisa Lei: the purple shadows fall.

I returned to my dormitory and booked online for Fiji Culture Village for the next morning. The Fiji Culture Village bus picked me up from Smugglers Cove at the appointed morning date.

I was the first passenger on the bus which picked up passengers from several Nadi hotels. I sat next to the driver. We were both chatty fellows. When I mentioned I was a bit nauseous from last nights' Indian food, he carefully said he was Indian. I had noticed a distinctive Fijian appearance which blends in both races so that you usually or often cannot tell. I mentioned the barrenness of the countryside. He said. The land we saw through the bus windows was all farmed by Indians. The Fijians still lived in their villages in the hinterlands. I noticed he said Indian farmers, not Indian tenants. The young people, he said, don't want to work the back breaking land which is suitable only for growing sugar cane. They come into the cities to find work.

I mused to myself. Fiji has become hostage to global tourism. They have missed out on tourist bonanzas because of racial turmoil. Racial turmoil has instead raised Cain from the land.

Fiji Culture Village, featuring indigenous rituals, singing, dancing, kava and a traditional feast

I emailed to my friend Roger. "The Fijians are such a charming people so long as I can spend money on them. They are fabulous rhythmic dancers."

Recent DNA research asserts. The black races never got the Neanderthal gene. They have remained homo erectus while the other races are primarily lumbering Neanderthals. Homo erectus are nimble in tongue and limbs. Neanderthals are the great builders. When the Fijians danced for us Neanderthals, they were not just performers. The land danced its primal dance with them.

At the reception at Culture Village, I paid by visa,150 Fiji dollars. The Fiji lady guide's first instruction was. "Before the missionaries came, Fiji was a terrible country." She said it with pride and a knowing smile. That was to prepare her effete Western

guests for the shocks ahead. But in the age of social media and Trump, she need not have worried. When she spoke of gory tales of human sacrifices at the Fijian temples, a Samoan lady earnestly reminded her. Since our Lord Jesus Christ was sacrificed for our sins, there has been no need for human sacrifices.

The next day, I took a taxi ride to Nadi. The taxi drivers did no have visa card service. From bad experiences, I approached nervously the Smugglers Cove ATM. I had an ASB and a BNZ visa card in case of disaster. A hotel manager sensed my nervousness and offered assistance. I took it gladly. I withdrew over a hundred dollars without mishap.

The taxi drivers who hang out at Wialoaloa Beach are always alert and always very polite. We arranged a modest price for Nadi before we left. I did that every time before I entered a taxi having been stung in China. As we drove onto the highway, the taxi driver enthused on taking me at a bargain price to see the sights in Suva. I declined truthfully that I couldn't afford it. He drove me to a somewhat lifeless dusty town. Nadi had seen much better days and was now in terminal decline. I left the taxi at a sim card shop. I got a Fiji sim card inserted in my mobile. to last me a month. Then I went for a walk. I saw an upstairs massage parlour. I truly had a stiff back from the flight and my dormitory. I knocked at the parlour's door. An old Chinese lady scurried out. She was the only Chinese person I had so far seen in Fiji. Roger who had lived in Fiji before the depredations of Colonel Rabuka told me. He saw many Chinese. They have appeared to have one way or another fled from Fiji to anywhere. I said full body massage for half an hour. She successfully discounted the price for one hour for fifty Fiji dollars. Like Alan Dershowitz, I said to her. "I will keep my underpants on before we start. I emphasised before. She gave the Oriental smile.

As she massaged me, she put her finger to her lips and pointed to my tiddly bits. I declined. If my funds were ample, I would have done the same with an old lady. That would be my only massage in Fiji under her expert hands.

I spent the next six days soaking in the Wailoaloa environment. I found the Blue Water Lodge a short walking distance from Smugglers Cove. It supplied an outside little restaurant. The food was good light breakfasts and lunches The catering by Fijian women was lovely. But I was annoyed to find the restaurant did not provide visa card service. I was acclimatising to digital currency. Soon I mused paper money will seem as archaic as a cart and buggy. In Auckland, I assume paper money is a sign of nefarious activity. Across the road there was another hotel and restaurant, The Beach Club. I was told The Beach Club provided excellent dinners. That promise was fulfilled that evening. A Fiji decor restaurant with Fiji traditional songs, helpful staff, and food and wine that delighted my palate.

On the seventh day, I booked another week at Smugglers Cove. The reception desk could not find my booking. I showed them my booking on my laptop. To their amusement and my horror, we discovered I had booked into another hotel. "Just down the road," they assured me. I fled Smugglers Cove in mortification. I hired a taxi which took me to my new hotel in two minutes. I was to my great relief back at the Blue Water Lodge. The manageress was delighted to see me and my booking. The shock of my hotel displacement made my hand shake when I signed in my booking. My seventy one years were catching up on me. The Blue Water Lodge was a quiet restful hotel where for the rest of my holiday, I had light breakfasts and lunches.

I was picking up on a social pattern in Fiji. The Fijian women with very smart aplomb manage the hospitality. The Fijian men are the hewers of wood and drawers of water. That is they are the manual workers. But they seem happy as their prestigious relatives are soldiers, policemen and statesmen. The Indo Fijians are the technicians and bureaucrats. But buried social temperatures rise and bubble to the surface in coups. They are the steam eruptions that clear the air until normality soon after returns. That contrasts with New Zealand where there is always political friction and social gloom. I am not sure about my metaphors.

The next morning, I took the bus to Suva. The bus station was as befitted a bus station in an efficient but developing country. Not Mercedes nor tuk tuk. I purchased a ticket, either via visa or cash. After much angst and rushing around, I boarded the correct bus. The bus trip from Nadi to Suva was four and a half hours. Travel fatigue ended vague ideas of several more trips to Suva. As the bus grinded through an arid landscape of small town/village settlements to the other end of Viti Levu island, we passed by Cannibal Country Restaurant. I googled it. It seemed a nice regular place. Ethnic dishes were served with no hint of homo flesh. During the first coup, the more fanatical coup supporters dug a cannibal pit outside Parliament House. Cannibalism seems an issue of overt nostalgia in Fiji. In New Zealand, its history is glossed over. The 1960s popular pop song Puha and Pakeha has long been suppressed.

After this tiresome journey, we arrived at Suva bus station. I found a taxi and directed it to a mobile repair shop. I had foolishly taken my mobile into my hotel bathroom. Its rough outdoor nature had irrigated and ruined it. I had my sim card transferred to a spare mobile. But the spare was a Chinese version. No one in the Indian shop could read its instructions. They directed me to a Chinese mobile shop. But they couldn't or wouldn't either. So the ubiquitous Chinese were still around in Fiji when you looked for them.

The night before I had watched a rather scary youtube about taking a stroll through Suva. So I avoided the Suva by ways which the video showed were chock a block with aggressive peddlers. I was in central Suva. I noticed a few kava haunts. If you want to escape the stresses of life in Fiji or plot, you get stoked in a kava setting. The first Fiji coup was conducted via the stupor of kava.

I took another taxi and directed the driver to take me to the Suva Public library. I asked him how much does the cheapest hotel in Suva cost for one night. He said. sixty dollars. For six dollars, I could pay for a room or one hour. I wondered allowed. What can one do in an hotel room for one hour? We both laughed at the nefarious choices in Suva. I resolved to return to Nadi that evening.

Suva Public library, Suva Museum and Fiji Parliament occupied within walking distances central Suva. The night before, I had googled Fiji Parliament. To my disappointment, the Parliament was not in session. I noted Parliament was in session only a couple of months a year. I suspected the Prime Minister and his office is the man. The Parliament website rather plaintively, I thought, stressed its role as Fiji's Democracy. I read on the website, the official history of the Fiji Parliament. It in a single sentence mentioned the first "military coup" in 1987. The three other coups are described as 'political troubles". I had wanted to see Rabuka in the flesh. I am not such a fool as to ask loudly in the Parliament where did the soldiers enter Parliament and exit with the Fiji Government. How official histories gloss over their bad history fascinates me. The Palestine and Haiti Embassy histories end at the last moment before the Balfour Declaration and the overthrow of Aristide. The invasion of the Fiji Parliament was led by a Captain X, still publicly unknown. Colonel Rabuka sat in the public gallery and waited for his men. I imagine without a mobile.

My taxi reached the public library. I was surprised at its small size and backward technology. I had imagined a shining prestigious edifice funded by international aid. Then I felt impressed. Fiji does not boost itself with shining building. Its boosting is its Fiji human spirit and culture. Its public money is spared for the Fiji people even if only in private bank accounts of politicians. They have their relatives and retainers.

Fiji Library still used a card catalogue as i remember in New Zealand libraries fifty years ago. Without mentioning it, I looked for books on the coups. I asked the mostly Indian librarians for books on" twentieth century history". They kept diverting me to Fijian culture. Twentieth century Fiji history was clearly still an open wound. I found in the lacuna. Rabuka's No Other Way. The only other books starting from 1987 I could find, were George Speight's coup in 2000. I read that caused much rioting and terror. Books in New Zealand about Fiji dwell obsessively up to the Speight coup. Then they are almost silent. Speight's coup in New Zealander's eyes put Fiji politics outside redemption into criminality. The Fiji people seemed to have public amnesia about the earlier two coups in 1987 and recall the 2000 coup as a public calamity. Still, the Fiji turmoil was relatively sedate. A handful of people were killed and them mostly in military infighting. Fiji remained a Christian nation. Unlike large Chinese minority populations who have been slaughtered globally, Indian populations seem immune except in pre partition India. The physical attacks on Indians in Fiji seem to be mostly symbolic, letting off steam to continue my metaphor. Like the disciplinary sea captains of old, Colonel Rabuka in 1987 whipped the Fijian Government's ass.

To be continued