Continuation from yesterday”¦

We walked out of the chief’s house and the anticipated downpour began. A woman in a house a couple doors down from the chief called out to us to get out of the rain and come inside. We were quite grateful for her invitation. From the outside, her home was very similar to the chief’s, but inside it had a lot more furniture. She had three comfy chairs in a row along one of the walls, a table near the kitchen, and several different types of linoleum patterns on the floor. We could see a bed in the next room. She asked us to sit in the chairs. Her husband, Lai, sat in the third chair. She sat on the floor amid three big piles of fiber. She told us she was hand weaving a mat.

We sat and chatted with her and her husband for about 45 minutes, until the rain died down. We asked her question after question about life in the village and life in Fiji. She had lived in the villager her whole life. All her children were grown and had moved to cities, one of them in California. We also found out that the chief had recently died and the man we had met was the acting chief until a new chief was chosen.

Mike, the tour guide for the coral coast tour, had explained to us how chiefs are chosen. We had assumed that, like most monarchies, the title gets passed to the eldest son. In reality, all the chief’s sons and all of the chief’s brother’s sons are groomed to be future chiefs, including higher education. When a chief dies, the elders of the village choose who they think will make the best chief out of the pool of candidates. They are very focused on quality of character. We think this is a brilliant system. While there are some blood line requirements, the candidates all have to work really hard to earn the title. It isn’t just handed to them.

She worked non-stop while she talked. To make the mats, they take the fiber from a certain plant and leave it out in the sun to dry for several days. The fiber was in long, wide strips. She was taking the fiber strips and cutting them into what looked to be a dozen or so thin strips, which she would later weave together. We had a nice chat with them. We bought a couple of shell bracelets she had made and she gave us a couple more ripe papaya.

From there, we wandered around the village. The heart of the village consists of three neat rows of homes. Most are bungalows like the chiefs, with a few grass huts in between. There is a church at one end of the middle row. At the opposite end of the middle row is a covered patio where people were hanging out. The rows of homes are separated by plant lined, narrow dirt paths. There are a few homes scattered behind the main area of the village, also with a little dirt walkway connecting it to the rest of “town”. We always find villages with no roads for cars to be charming.

Just beyond the edge of town is the backpackers resort (youth hostel), set a ways back from the beach. If you continue down the shoreline you get to the school. There is also a footpath that leads from the backpackers inland. We decided to check out the inland.

Within a few hundred yards we got to a mangrove swamp. There were millions of crab holes in the thick mud around the marshy water. As we followed the trail around the swamp, Eric commented that this is the ideal movie setting for a horror flick “attack of the killer crabs”. Beyond the swamp is farmland. We passed by several acres of neat rows of what we think is cassava (tapioca). As we walked through the plants, we noticed it was starting to smell bad. We assumed they must have recently fertilized. But at the end of the cultivated land we found the source of the smell pigs! There was a pig pen full of pigs, including itty bitty new borns. We had to hold our breath as we walked by because the pigs stank so bad.

Beyond the pigs is forest. The path began to ascend steeply, so we turned around. Christi was not wearing the right shoes for a serious hike. Back at the shore we met a man who asked us where we were from. When we told him San Diego, he said he had been there. His name is Tooey. When his daughter was small, she had something wrong with her that was beyond the skills of local doctors. Some tourists came through town and took an interest in the girl. The tourists brought her and Tooey to Los Angeles where specialists operated on her to fix the girl’s disorder. The tourists took care of all the medical costs. They also took Tooey and his daughter sightseeing from San Luis Obispo down to San Diego. Tooey loves America and Americans, especially people from Southern California.

Tooey offered to take us on a hike. We asked for a rain check for tomorrow, since looked as if another big rain was coming. In the dinghy, instead of heading straight for Kosmos, we took a little tour of the bay. We scoped out the coral, looking for a nice dive/snorkeling site. We headed to the next island over, Wayasewa. We didn’t actually go to shore since we had no kava with us, but we checked out the village from the dinghy.

The plan for tonight was we were going to go to the show with the crews of Yawarra and Flashgirl. We had invited them over for drinks before the show started. At a few minutes before 19:00 (7:00 pm), we poked our heads outside. It was pouring. Since chances were that the show was outdoors, we all decided to skip the show. The others headed back to their boats. Within a few minutes of their leaving, the sky opened up and the rain became so hard it was like monsoon rains. Eric had to bail the dinghy out after 45 minutes, then again after another 45 minutes. Fortunately, after a couple of hours the rain lightened from monsoon to pouring, so we relaxed and went to bed.