37 days in Fiji
English translation by the author.
Versione originale in Italiano qui.
I am sitting here, at the door of a little shack on stilts by a cliff. I am alone, completely alone, the only guest of a deserted island. I couldn’t tell you how big it is, I believe I swam around it in half an hour or so when the light still allowed me to. I guess I didn’t swim that fast, distracted as I was by the stunning reef.
Now it’s dark, pitch dark, my feet dangling a few meters above the black ocean. An infinity of tiny bright dots decorates the black sky, arranged in new, unfamiliar ways. The blackness of the ocean looks uninterrupted at first, but at times, shiny white flecks of light appear and disappear among the waves. Bioluminescent fish compete with the stars, and I am the only spectator. The silence is of a deafening intensity and the waves of the largest ocean on the planet almost seem to slow down to preserve it.
And I am out there, contemplating the beauty of the night, of nature, of life. I am happy, insanely happy. I am exactly where I wanted to be, when as a child I scanned each and every islet on the horizon, dreaming of exploring one and making it mine, for an afternoon or forever. My mind is free to wander and enjoy every moment. ‘Bring a book’ — they told me — ‘you’ll get bored’.
I had never before set foot on a more remote corner of the Earth. My mind plays at visualizing all the steps and stopovers that got me from my doorstep all the way to this incredible place.
Drive 30m to Milano Malpensa airport. Fly 11h 30m to Hong Kong. Fly 10h 15m to Nadi. Ride a bus for 1h 30m in direction Lautoka. Ride 6h more to Natovi. Sail 4h to Nabouwalu port on Vanua Levu island. Ride a bus for 2h till the fork for Labasa. Take another freakin’ bus for 1h 30m till Savusavu. Then another one for 2h 30m to Boca Bay. Sail 1h till the island of Taveuni. Walk 30m to Somosomo village. Ride a bus (!) for 45m to Maravu. Rent a kayak and row 1h 30m till the uninhabited Honeymoon island. Swim 2m till the shack on the north side. Take the wooden stairs.
I wonder what it is that truly drives me to these kinds of places, itching at the mere thought of experiencing something like this. But it’s hard to rationalize an instinct. So confused in the brain, so clear in the guts. If I try hard, I’m led to believe that perhaps it’s a quest for the roots, the essence of life. When we get rid of whatever is not ‘vital’, what’s left? We say man’s basic needs are water, food, and shelter. What we forget — or take for granted — is that before all this we need something to step on. Dry land. Only once our feet are firmly on the ground, we can make ourselves busy searching for water, food, and shelter. Stepping on an islet in the middle of the sea is about playing at building a life from scratch, starting from the sole certainty of a strip of land beneath our feet. And then who knows, maybe beginning to better understand life in the process.
All of a sudden, my train of thoughts and the majestic silence are broken by thunder in the far distance. Nature’s show is preparing special effects. While above my head stars keep shining undisturbed, lightning bolts reveal dark clouds on the horizon. The storm hangs there, far away, but grows in intensity. Some flashes are so bright that they light up the entire scene. For a fraction of a second, I can see the blue of the ocean and the green of the palms from an islet in front of mine. The view is so breathtaking that words just can’t do it justice.
As minutes — or hours? — go by, clouds advance towards me, erasing stars one after another. I crave for a massive storm. Nothing can make you appreciate a makeshift shelter better than a tropical storm in the middle of the ocean. Winds start blowing, carrying with them the scent of the sea. The waves do not respect the silence anymore. At the first drops of water on my arms, I take shelter in my shack. Using my phone as a torch, I spot an old mat and make a pillow out of my hoodie. As I am laying down, torrential showers begin to pour on the ocean, on Honeymoon island, and on the plate roof of my poor shack. Those previously peaceful waves now smash violently at the stilts of my shelter. Between the loudness and the excitement, I already know I am gonna get little to no sleep tonight. But sometimes sleep is truly the last of our needs.
At the other side of the world
After 22 hours in the air and a stopover in Hong Kong, I land in Nadi, Fiji. Spending a day and a half on comfortable seats, with air conditioning, hostesses that serve food at seemingly random hours, and the sun rising and setting at seemingly random hours — alternated with queues at the metal detector, Chinese writings and changes of seats — does not help you realize you just crossed the whole freakin’ planet. ‘At the other side of the world’ is a systematically abused expression, so when you’d actually be entitled to use it, you struggle to grasp its meaning.
As I exit the airport, I am welcomed by the proverbial ‘tropical heat’ and by David, a native Fijian who’s there to give me a ride to my hostel. Two nights in a hostel by the beach and a plane ticket to New Zealand in 37 days is all I planned and booked for this trip. I had not read anything about Fiji beforehand, convinced that getting to know locals and letting the winds carry me would have given me the kind of experience I was here for. The first thing I hear from David is that tonight at the hostel pizza is on sale. I proceed to explain that I am Italian, that pizza is Italian, so that’s now exactly what I was looking for.
I spend the ride glued to the car window, mesmerized by the staggering vegetation. Blossoming trees with overly-saturated colors, tall palms, and all sorts of plants fighting for an inch of land, are there to show you what Nature is capable of, under ideal conditions. It’s gonna take me a week to stop constantly staring at trees looking like a fool.
I drop my bags at the hostel and rush to the beach. I feel a mix of tiredness, hunger and excitement. My biological clock has long given up in trying to make sense of this, and everything around me is just surreal. It’s way too hot as well. The beach is empty, except for a couple of kids playing on the shore, two donkeys, and a guy offering me a donkey ride — my first contact with the ‘tourism industry’. I politely decline and keep walking towards a hut that attracts my curiosity. As I get closer, I spot a charter plane. Two natives, a man and a woman, are resting on a bench. The scene doesn’t make much sense to me. They explain to me that they are waiting for a letter coming from some remote island in the archipelago, which is supposed to be delivered by another small plane. Essentially, I am in front of a makeshift post office.
The woman is called Vasiti and has spent the entirety of her existence in Fiji. I find myself explaining where Italy is, what snow feels like, and what the hell I was doing in Fiji anyways. I explain that, as far as I can remember, I have always been fascinated by remote islands and their inhabitants. My dream was to explore those so small that I could walk all around them. Live there as if I were born on that piece of land. No need to add more: Vasiti starts talking about her village with pride, leaves me her number, and insists that I’ll be very welcome at her place.
Later on I decide to have a look at Nadi’s town center. Frankly speaking, cities are the thing that calls my attention the least in Fiji. I picture them as chaotic places. Places where they try to sell anything they can to tourists. Places where this wonderful Nature was forced to leave room to buildings of questionable taste. But when I get to see what kind of bus was going to get me into town, I feel like a kid that just stepped into a dinosaur theme park. It’s purple and seems to be from a different era. Its engine is the loudest I’ve ever heard and it makes the whole bus tremble with all its passengers. There are no side windows, nor an entrance door. They say they are buses from the Seventies, leftovers from the government of Sri Lanka. Not hard to believe.
My travel bud, for this afternoon, is a Danish guy I met an hour ago in the hostel. Traveling a lot by yourself makes you learn how to connect with strangers in minutes, without too many pleasantries, nor expectations for the future, to satisfy that need for social interactions that’s in all of us. Initially just a bare necessity, it can quickly turn into the highlight of your trips.
Within few hours we already got tired of the town and, having come to terms with the unreliability of Fijian public transport, we resolve to head back to the hostel on foot. Along the way, I spot a hidden track by the river. Curious, we leave the main road and within a hundred meters we find ourselves in a little village in a palm forest. Not many tourists venture this way — I can read this on the faces of the first natives that get to see us. We get scanned with suspicion. I smile, explain that I am exploring the area, and would love to have a look around their village. The villagers smile back and welcome us.
‘No worries, have a look. Beware of the dogs though.’ All eyes are on us. Our eyes on the dogs.
The houses around us seem to be quickly put together with whatever material was at disposal. At every corner natives are sharpening their knives, cutting coconuts, weaving carpets from dried plants. Every few meters someone screams ‘Bula!’ at us — a Fijian word that literally means ‘life’, but it’s also used for greeting people, thanking someone… and probably in some other way as well, since I hear it every couple of sentences. It appears to me to be much more than ‘good manners’: it gets yelled at us from people that we cannot even see, at our backs, or from the window of a distant house. It’s often the start of a conversation, an encounter, or at least some large smile. Bula will follow me throughout my journey, emblematic of the hospitality and the Fijian way of life.
As we keep exploring, we stumble upon some old graves in the forest. Some date back more than a century ago, while others were made unreadable by time. My mind races to the past of cannibalism in Fiji, a common practice here until a couple of centuries ago. I get goosebumps thinking that a cannibal may be buried right here, before my eyes. Our visit attracts the attention of some natives, who share with us what they know about that old cemetery by the village, while they casually take a sit on the graves as you would do in your living room.
Leaving the village behind, we keep walking, and after an hour, some kilometers, and countless bula, we get to the hostel. We mingle back among the tourists and someone invites me over for dinner. It’s still Day 1 for me and I explain that I’ll have to lay down for a few minutes. I’ll wake up 12 hours later. I wasn’t keen on the pizza on sale, anyways.
A guy in the hostel explains to me that villagers can be extremely welcoming, especially if you show genuine interest and respect for their rituals. Following thousand-year-old traditions, many villages are still under the control of a ‘chief’, who’s responsible for the wellness of its community. Apparently, if I head to the town market, buy kava roots — a slightly narcotic local plant — and I offer them as a gift to the chief, I’ll be welcome in the village and perhaps someone will offer me a place for the night. It’s like playing Monkey Island basically, an adventure game from the Nineties where you need to talk to people, collect objects here and hand them over there to unlock the next level. Needless to say, an hour later I am already at the market on my quest for kava roots.
Back in town, I take the chance to talk with other locals. I am looking for local recommendations on where and how to spend my time in Fiji. Unfortunately for me, I quickly realize that too many locals here either work for a tourist agency or have friends that do. As a consequence, I am systematically pushed towards stands where they try to sell me expensive guided tours. Most tourists around here, backpackers included, move around with these guided tours, often heading to paradise islands that are inaccessible to natives, except for those employed by the resorts. I feel disillusioned. It’s going to be challenging to find alternatives to this way of traveling. But the search is surely worth it.
With these thoughts in mind I head back to the beach and, spotting a boat at distance, I decide it’s a good goal for a swim. Another guy I just met follows me. As I battle against waves that push me back to the shore, I realize that my goal was probably too ambitious for my level of fitness. I think of heading back, but at this point the shore looks quite far as well. My stubbornness makes me push through. Some hundred strokes after I start feeling exhausted, but my objective is now at hand. I notice a raft tied to the boat and hope I can at least rest a bit in there. But as we get closer, a figure appears on the boat, weaving us to get onboard. We accept the invite with great pleasure.
We have ended up on a boat of three travelers from San Diego, who sailed across the entire Pacific ocean for months to get here. Few minutes after we are sipping rum, eating burritos, and listening to tales on how to survive a storm in the middle on the ocean. In between stories, we realize we have been on board for more than two hours. I find myself swimming back towards the shore with a large smile on my face, feeling no tiredness anymore, with yet another confirmation of how interacting with strangers is a recipe for my happiness.
In the evening, the hostel folks end up gathering around a kava pot. By definition I am a ‘kava virgin’, but my expectations aren’t very high anyway. Two sips are enough to confirm what someone had already anticipated: it tastes like muddy water, but don’t tell the Fijians.
I end my day by myself on a hammock, contemplating unfamiliar constellations, which help me realize that I am actually at the other side of the world.
I make my way into town once more, this time with another David — an Argentinian I met while sipping ‘muddy water’. We are both quite determined in figuring out how to leave this touristy area as soon as possible, aiming for remote villages on a quest for some authenticity. In Nadi, I am still surrounded by people that push us to their travel agencies or ask for ridiculous amounts of money to drive us through their village. I begin to grow disheartened. I am here to fulfill a dream of a life with local fishermen in a tiny island, of a life far from anything I have ever known, and I seem to be seen as nothing but a walking wallet.
I resolve to buy a local SIM card and call Vasiti, my first-day friend who sounded genuine in her interest and invitation. I end the call and smile at David: we are invited to Vasiti’s village. All we need to do is to get on the bus and head north towards the city of Lautoka. The route covers a good portion of the main island’s west coast. I find myself glued to the side window — yes, long-distance buses have windows. Before my eyes roll deserted beaches, mountains covered in a lush green blanket, villages composed of a handful of sheet metal shacks, occasionally wooden ones, a university, and bus stops that make you wonder about the life of the few hopeful people standing there waiting.
As we get into Lautoka — another chaotic town, but smaller than Nadi — Vasiti is there waiting for us with a big smile. As we pass through the city market by the bus station, literally everyone is staring at us. We are only 27 km away from the international airport, but the looks around us reveal how unusual it is to spot foreigners here, let alone walking around with a local. Namoli is a village just 5 minutes walking from Lautoka’s center, but it’s like stepping into a different world. There are no roads. Only footpaths in a vast tropical garden dotted with colorful houses scattered with seemingly no plan. Once again, all eyes on us. Some scream ‘Bula!’, some shake our hands, others spy on us behind a curtain.
Vasiti’s home is made of wood, painted white and blue. She shows it with pride and announces that it’s too warm to stay inside. So she lays out a hemp rug in the shade of a giant mango tree. Chatting while sprawled under a tree is a common activity over here and it’s hard to blame them, giving how hot it is and how gorgeous these plants are. Vasiti introduces us to some village kids, who join in our makeshift living room with no ceremonies. It’s not entirely clear to me whether there are any kin relationships between them, but I have the impression that it makes little difference: kids run around the whole village and everyone seems to have an eye for them.
In Fiji, school is taught solely in English and this gives me the privilege to converse with virtually anybody, kids included. Their initial shyness is the only obstacle. After a while, they are telling me all about how to obtain kava from the plant’s roots, how to determine the succession of village chiefs, how to work with sugar cane. ‘Wanna try? Wanna try? Wanna try?’ increasingly loud kids leave me with no choice, excited at the idea of making the white man who came from very far experience something new. Within seconds, one of the kids has already uprooted one of the plants and is now passionately arguing with the other kids over what section of the plant is the best for me. As the decision is taken, another kid cuts the plant along the designated section with a rusty machete as long as his arm, and hands it over with a large smile. Any Italian mother would have fainted at the scene.
After having sucked sugar out of a plant as my ‘tea break’, we go for a stroll in the village. Every few meters new people join the convoy and I soon lose the count. We are the attraction of the day, or maybe the month. Many are curious but shy and just keep staring at us, while others jump around in excitement to show us their school, the church, the old cemetery, their playground. At some point we end up on a beach, entirely covered with little holes on the sand. Hundreds of tiny crabs appear to be very busy, probably searching for food. The kids explain to me that, at the end of the day, each crab will get back to its home, its own hole, recognizing it among hundreds. In case of danger though — like when we get too close — they rush to the nearest available hole and they’ll stick to that one till they feel safe. No private property drama.
While kids are all busy entertaining us, older village boys seem to be way more interested in making sure that kava is available in sufficient doses for the next evenings. Pulverizing kava roots is a long and laborious process: the boys will spend a good part of their afternoon taking turns at hitting the roots, with a thick metal bar that I can barely lift. Once turned into powder, the roots are mixed with water and form this traditional beverage, which comes with an unpleasant taste and some light narcotic effects.
As we leave the village at the end of a long day, we stumble upon a car that is carrying a pig in the trunk. Still alive. Vasiti explains that a fellow villager has passed away and, following the tradition, the animal will be cooked for the funeral banquet. Pork and beef are very expensive for locals, and it’s only consumed on very special occasions — typically weddings and funerals.
For David and I it’s time to head back to our hostel. I thank Vasiti from the bottom of my heart and she insists that I must come back. It won’t be hard to persuade me. On my way back, eyes still glued to a side window, I reflect on how lucky I am to be here and experience things like these. So much has happened already that I find it hard to realize that I stepped on this island only 3 days ago. I decide it’s probably worth keeping a diary. This story is the result of that decision.
The blue house by the mango tree
Visiting Namoli — Vasiti’s village — gave me yet another confirmation. To find what I was looking for, I had to get as far as I could from international airports, travel agencies, and asphalted roads. Chatting back at the hostel, I learn about the island of Taveuni, a far paradise that promises some of the finest beaches on the archipelago, even more incredible vegetation than the one I am surrounded by, natural parks and communities of native Fijians that have been inhabited it for millennia — not another amusement park for Westerners, hopefully.
Taveuni lays more than 300 km away from here. The most convenient way to reach it is with an internal flight, but with no hesitation I decide to try and get there the way locals do. It’s probably going to be hard to organize, uncomfortable and time-consuming, but I feel it’s gonna be an adventure on its own. I am already excited about the idea. Again, asking locals isn’t going to cut it, I keep getting routed to touristy channels. So I start browsing the internet on my little quest and, after hours digging into obsolete websites, I discover a ferry that leaves from the port of Lautoka, close to Vasiti’s place. At this point the plan is easy: pay another visit to Vasiti in Namoli and then catch a ferry from Lautoka, first step towards the island of Taveuni.
Time to check out from the hostel. I entrust David from the hostel staff with my largest backpack. I want to travel as lightweight as possible, to have more freedom in moving around. I don’t even have travel companions this time. Truly on my own, I feel like the real adventure is about to begin.
As I hop on a bus to Lautoka, I suddenly realize that I am the only white man around. It is a new and pleasant feeling. I promised myself that I’ll only be back in these touristy areas around the international airport when it’s time to leave the country. Traveling on local buses, Fiji’s main island seems to be larger than what it is. Old buses and roads in bad conditions make the trip from Nadi to Lautoka last almost an hour and a half, for less than 30 km.
Vasiti arranged for me a room for the night. It used to be her son’s bedroom, who’s now studying at the university in Suva, the capital. The room is 3 meters by 2, with no door, a camping mat on the floor, and an old pillow — but I couldn’t be happier. The dream of getting hosted by natives in a village becomes a reality.
The village kids are home for the school holidays and I end up spending the day playing with them. Seeing me now for the second time, they’ve lost any form of inhibition and proceed to teach me any game they know, at the pace of a new one every 10 minutes. Most games involve chasing kids and/or a ball: two hours after I am exhausted. As I try to catch my breath, I get an idea. I had decided to bring a diabolo with me from Italy, cause when fantasizing about living on some remote village in Fiji, I guessed that simple game would have been a great way to connect and interact with the kids. My fantasies couldn’t have been more accurate. Just the time to get it out of my backpack and the diabolo monopolizes the attention of the kids, who’ll be spending the rest of the afternoon playing with it.
At last, even the kids are exhausted and concede me a break for the rest of the day. Vasiti invites me in to drink tea — a heritage of the British colonization that ended only 50 years ago — and eat rice cooked with coconut milk. All this while lying down on rugs in the living room. There are no chairs, nor any other piece of furniture — except for a tiny table in a corner and a broken fridge, now used as a shelf. Vasiti explains that she does not like chairs, whereas she loves carpets. She often spends the night on a carpet as well, preferring it to her bedroom’s mattress.
In Namoli there are no streets, let alone street addresses. Strolling through the village, I got to know the girl who lives ‘in the house by the breadfruit tree’. My address is ‘the blue house by the mango tree’. The system must work pretty well, since by now everyone in the village seems to know where I live.
At the end of another intense day, I get ready to spend my first night in a village, only to find a 7–8 centimeter long cockroach chillin’ on my pillow. The European ones are almost cute compared to this thing. I freeze and call Vasiti. ‘No worries, it’s a sign that it’s gonna rain tomorrow’ she explains laughing. To me, it’s a sign that it’s gonna be a long night.
I wake up in the pouring rain — my first tropical shower. Rain is a boon around here. The thermometers go down a few degrees and the air becomes breathable again, for a while. The cockroach’s weather forecast was spot on.
I promised Vasiti that I’ll cook pasta for her and the two kids that hang around here the most. I opt for a carbonara — yes, you don’t stop being Italian just because you crossed planet Earth. Sifting through the 3 local supermarkets, I manage to get ingredients that will make it look like a carbonara. The two kids fight for a long time with a kerosene stove just to light it up and only an hour and a half later, the dish is ready. It has surely been the most difficult carbonara of my life, but seeing it devoured in 3 minutes made it worthy.
In the afternoon I resume my wandering around the village. By now many are aware of the curious foreigner’s presence and they are glad to have a chat. My pleasant strolling is interrupted by a shocking scene. I just got to an area of the village that seems to be an open-air landfill. Kids are playing on the beach with trash brought in by the tide. Locals put together a barrier made of truck tires, making the view even worse. On the horizon, a cruise ship sails towards heavenly islands, which won’t let down the expectations created by glossy travel flyers. Once again I feel privileged to witness another Fiji, another side of reality few get to see.
My train of thought gets interrupted by a big bearded man: ‘Bula! How are you doing? Have you ever tried coconut juice?’. A minute after, he’s climbing up one of the numerous palm trees that surround his home. He hits a coconut with a stick till it falls off. With incredible dexterity, he carves an opening in the coconut and hands it to me, ready to drink. Coconut juice does not taste very differently from sugar water, but its freshness and the circumstances that brought it into my hands make me feel something special. As hippie as it may sound, for a moment I feel truly connected to Nature and the men in this land.
Some of Vasiti’s relatives had promised to take me to Abaca, where some of their cousins live. It’s supposed to be a village secluded in the mountains, surrounded by waterfalls and beautiful nature — hard not to believe their words. The very same Nature though is offering us a heavy storm now, with thunders that make the blue house shake, and we are forced to postpone. I take it as a chance to go to the port and try to figure out how to exactly get to the island of Taveuni. Websites were vague on the subject and talking to people does not make it much clearer. Obtaining precise and up-to-date information is quite challenging. Eventually, I discover that the company operating the Lautoka-Taveuni ferry went bankrupt. After hours of investigation, I find out that if only I take a night bus to Natovi, then a ferry to the island of Vanua Levu, other two buses to reach Savusavu, and then another ferry… in a couple of days I should be able to set foot on Taveuni island. I feel as if I am taking part in a documentary titled ‘Life before the Internet’.
As the evening comes, Vasiti gathers all my village mates to celebrate my departure. I get asked tons of questions on my future plans, on the places I will visit, on when I’ll be back home. They pray for my health and my happiness. At some point, things get less serious and the kids show me their best dance moves, backed by an Enrique Iglesias’ song that they somehow managed to load into an old phone. But as the scratchy speakers stop and they start singing for me a local acapella song, traditional for farewells, I find myself in a corner battling with my emotions, moved and happy.
I guess this is the key to read my rejection for touristy areas and my obsession with ‘authenticity’. Being in a place where a white foreigner is a rare encounter means some people are as excited as I am to learn about each other. It’s a mutual exchange between human beings, rather than a subordinate relationship between the ‘local’ and the ‘tourist’.
The limits of my imagination
I find myself smiling in my bed. I twist and turn, staring at the mosquito net that protects me from all sorts of insects. My mind is wandering all over the place. It has been 12 days since my night on deserted Honeymoon island. As in that night, falling asleep will be a challenge. It’s another attack of intense happiness.
I’ve started to lose track of all dreams I have been fulfilling in Fiji. It just does not seem real. Luckily I had decided to keep a diary. If in a few years from now my eyes will be shining thinking about these days, I won’t be fooled by the idea that this is just a distortion of my memories, idealized as time often does.
That strong curiosity that as a kid pushed me to swim to far rocks — or at least desiring to do so — is, luckily, still there. It’s that same drive that today makes me sift through maps looking for some barely visible dot that breaks the blue. And, as I look at it closer, I long for being there to discover what kind of life locals built. To live with them and like them for a while, eating with them, playing with their kids, and listening to their stories. These were the images — and the dreams — I had in mind, when I decided I was going to book a flight for some remote dot in the Pacific. After five days hosted by locals in another village, almost 300 km away from Vasiti and Namoli, everything I could imagine came true. And much more.
I spent nights contemplating an incredible starry sky, of those you can only get to see where street lighting hasn’t reached yet. I spent nights listening to stories of guys of my age that never left that freakin’ tiny place — and the thought of leaving doesn’t even cross their minds. I spent nights singing Bob Marley at the beach, interrupted by glasses of homemade pineapple wine.
I played touch rugby on the shore, when the retiring tide donated us 50 meters of playground. I feasted on freshly caught fish, with the whole family, and everyone who happened to pass by at that moment. I made my way through some kind of jungle with the help of a machete. I spent hours and hours listening to stories of the grandma, on what makes the village a community, on the British colonization, on those cruise ships that dock more and more frequently down in town, and on those weird solo travelers that somehow ended up in their village. I spent afternoons playing beach volley, surrounded by palm trees and monumental centuries-old trees, climbed by kids to fight their frustration for not being allowed to play. And as heat and tiredness came together, I patiently waited in a queue to awaken my senses under a nearby ice-cold waterfall. As I think about all this, I realize how limited my imagination had been.
‘Do you need a place for the night?’
Still moved by the farewell, I leave Vasiti and the little world of Namoli in complete darkness to take a night bus towards Natovi, a port town on the other side of the main island. After 6 hours on the road, at the first morning lights, I get on a ferry to the island of Viti Levu. This is how locals move, and I am glad to get to follow their ways. No trace of tourists around me. My ferry ride passes slowly, marked by sleepiness, warm winds, lush islets, and dolphins that play with the waves.
The ferry finally docks in Viti Levu — the second largest island in Fiji. I leave the ferry and make my way on another bus, without knowing I am about to step into another world. I am once again glued to the side window, as we pass by villages immersed in a Nature that would make any European botanic garden look lame and forests that I had only seen in Jurassic Park. The farther I get from populated areas, the more unbelievable the scenery gets.
At some point, the bus drops me in the middle of nowhere. I am told to wait for the next one that should get me to the port town of Savusavu, where I would then be able to finally get on a ferry to Taveuni island. While waiting, a local approaches me:
‘Hey, where are you from?’ — ‘…’
‘How come you’re going to Savusavu?’ — ‘…’
‘Do you need a place for the night?’ — ‘…!’
At the third question, I already got a place to stay — and I still don’t know my host’s name. Josh works on the main island, but from time to time travels back to his family in a village outside Savusavu. I find it hard to believe: I will be a guest in another village, with a guy I met two minutes ago. I imagine that when I’ll tell this story, they’ll think I am exaggerating it a bit.
Savusavu is a small port town, in a picturesque bay, where the few lucky foreign sailors that discovered it dock their boats. Josh and I take a local taxi from the town center and drive up the road that goes above the town. After I don’t know how many stops to greet passers-by, we reach paradise. Nukunuve is a village of a hundred houses, immersed into yet another wonderful tropical forest. The only road that goes through it is so quiet that cows graze on it. On one side of the road lay an uncontaminated beach and picturesque islets that decorate the horizon; on the other one wooden houses here and there, at the foot of palm-covered mountains. I am speechless.
Josh introduces me to his village mates. The plan for the afternoon, as most afternoons, is to play volley. Today we are going to play in the garden of ‘the folks from Kiribati’. When I was still at home, I had read that Kiribati — another archipelago in the Pacific Ocean — was literally drowning because of rising sea levels. Some of the inhabitants that lived along the coast were forced to abandon their homes and the government started buying land in other Pacific nations to relocate them. Today’s match was in one of these new homes.
‘Waterfall?’ — ‘Yes, yes, yes!’
After hours of volley, a crew of sweaty guys, some with flip flops some barefoot, makes his way on a footpath through the forest. Everyone except me knows his way, this seems to be their routine. Eventually we get to a waterfall and people chill and queue to shower under it. The ice-cold water is an instant relief from the never-ending heat and a true joy for me. As darkness falls, we move to some of Josh’s friends to spend the night. I have the impression that doors are always open here — literally speaking — and living rooms always ready to host friends.
The street has no public lighting. Before us only stars, the profiles of palm trees, and the torch of a phone to avoid banging our heads into them. If all this sounds surreal and exaggerated to you, don’t worry. It’s the same thing I thought, as I struggled to fall asleep on a couch.
According to locals, the mountains behind the village host a true jungle. I convince Josh and friends to take me there — they don’t seem to be very busy anyway. My trip to Taveuni can wait, there lies the beauty of not having strict plans to follow. One of Josh’s friends to join the expedition is Sonny. Almost two-meter tall, muscular, wearing sunglasses and army trousers. At first sight, one of those guys I have a hard time getting along with. But it’s enough to speak with him for a while to realize he is a really good guy and the most entertaining I met so far. Very extroverted and always cracking jokes, he’s the kind of guy that knows everybody in a village. My gut feeling on people is pretty good I’d say, so it does not happen often to me to have such a misleading first impression. But when it happens, and the surprise is a positive one, it’s a great feeling.
As we venture deeper and deeper into the mountain footpaths, nature gets more and more alive and arrogant. At some point, the footpath simply vanishes and Sonny makes way for us all with a machete. We are now surrounded by vegetation for which I already ran out of adjectives, interrupted only by rivers and waterfalls. I come across a 10-centimeter spider, luckily harmless — they reassure me. Once again, I am astonished. I am really in a jungle! As a kid, I dreamed of visiting the Amazon rain forest, and this is the closest thing to it I’ve ever experienced.
On the way back, I ask Sonny what he does in life. One of those questions us Westerners have a hard time not asking. He laughs and explains to me that money isn’t that useful around here. Locals inherit the land and a home, generation after generation. The ideal climate makes heavy clothes and heating unnecessary. Many go around in flip flops, swimwear, and a t-shirt, 365 days a year. They are surrounded by trees that are basically an open-air, free supermarket, and the sea guarantees abundant fish all year round. Many choose to work to be able to afford some ‘luxury’, but if you are not particularly needy, it’s not hard to make it through life without a stable occupation. When Sonny decides he wants some change in his pockets — typically for alcohol and cigarettes — he takes his speargun, catches a few kilos of fish, and heads down to the local market in Savusavu.
‘Look around you, we are in paradise. And I don’t think you should have a boss, in paradise.’
At sunset, the low tide uncovers dozens of meters of extra land, which the guys turn into a rugby playground. They invite me to play, explaining that — to my luck — this is touch rugby, a non-violent variant where you don’t tackle opponents, but simply stop them with a touch. Darkness marks the end of the game. The day ends there on the beach, among stars, guitars, and homemade pineapple wine. Indeed, money ain’t that important around here.
Taveuni
The silence is absolute. The village is still sleeping. Backpack on, I walk in the middle of the empty main road, still dark. I’ve got a big headache. I must have slept no more than three hours, and the pineapple wine did not help. I even left without saying bye to Josh, as I figured it wasn’t a great idea to wake him up after a night like this. The colors of the dawn are wonderful and constantly evolving.
I share a taxi for Savusavu with one of the village boys, one of those that actually need to go to work. His holidays are finished and it’s time for him to get on a ferry to some exclusive island, where he will be serving Westerners in some luxury resort. What awaits me instead after the taxi is a bus, a ferry, and another bus. As I hop off the ferry, I discover that the bus stop is 30–40 minutes walking from the port. Under the scorching sun, I walk the distance in the company of a girl from New York, named Jess. I insist to help her, as I see her dragging heavy gear on the roadside. She is a diver and carries all that around the Pacific. She is on a quest for the most spectacular reefs — and for an inner peace that she says to only find deep under the sea.
Taveuni is far from the main tourist routes — at least that’s what I got told — and to secure a place to stay, I resolved to book a bunk bed in the only hostel on the island. To my surprise, the hostel is full of backpackers. After days spent living with locals as the only foreigner, this kills my enthusiasm a bit. The contrast is disheartening. I am surrounded by many spoiled kids that are here for a resort-like vacation, getting served freshly caught fish, getting taken to pristine secluded islets where pictures will surely be Instagram-ready, getting drunk, and complaining about the lack of comfort. Most of them got here with a 60-minute direct flight. I damn that little local airport, because surely these guys would not have spent 7 hours on public transport to get here. I keep telling myself that I should not be judgmental, that, at the end of the day, people travel for different reasons. But I find it hard to swallow that many take such a remote and fascinating land as nothing more than a large amusement park. Luckily there are still people like Jess around, who have a smile for everybody, do their own thing their own way and seek authentic experiences, for something that can enrich them, and perhaps enrich some of those met along the way.
After a restoring night's sleep, I decide to go to ‘town’. That’s how they call the village of Somosomo, the only place on the island with a cash machine and a multi-story building. Taveuni only has a single road that coasts around the island — in fact not even the whole island. That one road is served by a bus three times a day, at not very regular times. I figure this may be a good place to try hitchhiking. Within minutes, I get picked up by the owner of one of the island resorts. A white man of course, who’s eager to tell me that he has never been to Italy, but still owns two Ferraris.
As I get into Somosomo, I am attracted by a crowded little building. It seems to be the social hub of the island. You can play pool, get your beard shaved and your hair trimmed, get your shoes repaired, and buy food. I get smashed at pool by a local kid, for a price of 50 Fijian dollar cents, roughly 0.20 euros.
Once I have run out of places to go to, I head for the bus stop and wait patiently and hopefully. The bus shows up rather quickly, but sets off in the opposite direction. Surprised, I ask for an explanation to my fellow passengers.
‘No worries, at some point it U-turns and goes your way.’
I manage to buy a diving mask and a snorkel and gather with some hostel folks at a shack along the beach. I had learned about a little island called Honeymoon, which appears to be completely uninhabited — and reachable by kayak. Sticking to strict orders from a girl in our group, we spend the next 15 minutes inspecting the kayaks to look for potential spiders. Once she’s confident there is no trace of spiders, we get the green light. The plan is to kayak to the little island and do some snorkeling on the reef that surrounds it. At low tide the water is calm and clear, revealing beautiful corals below us. At some point, as I row contemplating the beauty of Nature, I feel my arm hitching. I turn and see a fat, hairy spider walking on me. I scream and try to kick it off me while trying to somehow distance myself from my own arm. I end up in the water with my kayak capsized. Everyone gets a good laugh and I am forced to concede that the kayak inspection wasn’t a bad idea.
Once I manage to re-flip the kayak, I resume rowing and shortly after spot four islands on the horizon. I am not sure which one of them is Honeymoon, but I am so excited that I leave my companions behind and in half an hour I reach the second smallest island. It’s truly uninhabited. A rocky hill in the middle of the sea, covered by palms and decorated by its own private reef. We spend hours snorkeling around it and climbing the rocks. Then I get intrigued by a stilt house on the rocks, the only construction on the island. I swim to reach the stairs emerging from the sea and take the wooden steps. To my surprise, the door lock is open. It appears to be an old abandoned junk room. It’s full of random things, but my eyes fall immediately on an ugly sponge mat in a corner. What if, one of these nights, I…
The same girl that was terrified about spiders is now terrified about getting caught here by high tide, so we kayak back. I won’t tell her the idea I just got. But I tell it to anyone else in the hostel. I am excited and explain about this wonderful deserted island, about the kayaks, about the shack where we could spend the night. I get more or less the same answer from everybody: ‘Oh, what a great idea! I wanna hear all about it when you are back.’
I met some more folks at the hostel and decided that today I’ll join their semi-organized trip. It’s surely not my favorite way to explore a place, but once in a while it can be fun. The route with our personal taxi driver consists of two stops. The first one is to the International Date Line. The island of Taveuni is cut in half by the 180° meridian, which on paper separates today from tomorrow. A local legend talks about a landowner that took advantage of this imaginary line to make his men work 7 days a week. Whenever a man protested that you are not supposed to work on a Sunday, he’d reply:
‘Go and hoe 50 meters farther. It’s already Monday there.’
Our second stop is in a forest in the heart of the island. Over the millennia, a river carved his way into the rock, creating a natural slide. A great gift for kids in the area, who spend entire afternoons over here. Since this place is a usual stop with these little tours, locals are used to tourists. They explain to us how to slide on the rocks. ‘You’ll only get a few scratches’ — they reassure us. We have to throw ourselves in the water slide ass down and hands on knees. Is that how they do it? Not really. Locals kids get a running start and then make the entire slide on their feet, literally surfing the rocks.
Back at the hostel, I spend my evening with a photographer. He teaches me how, even with my relatively cheap camera, I can take photos of the starry sky. After many tries, I manage to capture some stars, and head to bed happy.
I wake up excited and determined. I want to spend the night on that deserted island. Everyone chickened out, so I’ll go by myself. It takes me little time to realize that it ain’t easy to rent a kayak for 24 hours or more. At rental places it’s the first time they hear of such a request. I try the excuse of wanting to visit a friend in a camping ground far along the coast, but it doesn’t work. There is no way I am going to give up. I keep walking along the shore looking for possibilities, when I spot a kayak tied to a tree. I search for its owner with no success, but asking around someone gives me a phone number. I have no way to write it down, so I walk back to the hostel singing a song I just made up to recall the number.
Back at the hostel, I meet Tim, an English man on his forties that has just finished cycling around the globe, in two years or so. Very often people that undertake trips such as this one are of great inspiration for me. Tim does not let my expectations down. He recounts some of his stories and eventually we end up talking about why we travel. What it gives you, what it takes from you. We are quite aligned on our views. We talk about what happens in the long run, what happens to those that travel uninterrupted for 10 years, and those that seem to be escaping from something. ‘You know, it’s great to have something to go back to’. Turning traveling into a routine kills its essence.
The conversation goes on and on. At some point, he tells me something I’ll never forget.
‘When I go through the thousands of pictures I took over the past two years, I see that the first period is filled with landscapes, beautiful nature, breathtaking views. Then, gradually, over time, landscapes appear less and less, leaving room to more and more faces, portraits of people met along the way. If I pick a random photo of a landscape, even if I try my best, it’s sometimes impossible to tell whether that was South America, or Australia, or who knows where. But whenever I stare at a portrait, I can easily tell you where I took it and what’s the story behind that face.’
I part ways with Tim, with him trying to convince me that, when it’s time to leave New Zealand, I should buy a bike and cycle my way back to Italy.
I finally manage to get in touch with the kayak’s owner. With 40 Fijian dollars and a promise to be back within two days, I got my pass to Honeymoon. It’s a two-person kayak, not very easy to handle by myself. It’s late afternoon and the tide is at the highest. But at this point I truly don’t care, I am in the water already. The sea is quite rough. I carefully watch where the waves break so that I can avoid the shallow reef. Main goals: first, do not capsize; second, do not think about the sharks. My belongings are a phone, a snorkel, a mask, a towel, water, and tuna. The tuna comes in one of those cans without opening — why on Earth they even exist — and obviously, I could not find a can opener. I am in the ocean as happy as ever, rowing, sometimes distracted by the thought of waves, or sharks, or how I am gonna open that tuna.
By now I am close enough to the island and luckily waves aren’t that strong. I study the coastline to figure out where to dock. With some struggle, I manage to jump off the kayak among rocks with intact ankles and a dry phone. I drag the heavy kayak among the rocks, pulling it inland. I want to be invisible to passing boats. The island is surely uninhabited, but that doesn’t mean no one owns it…
Now Honeymoon island is truly all for myself. I climb its rocks till I reach the highest palm. There, cradled by the sea breeze, I contemplate my conquest and the exclusive view it offers. I take in the sun setting and then descend to take advantage of the last minutes of light projected on the corals. At dusk, the only thing left to do is devoting myself to my tuna can. Half an hour of labor later, with the aid of a screwdriver and a half-meter long rusty saw, the can is defeated.
After my survival tasks are accomplished, I sit outside my wooden shack. My feet dangling above the black ocean. The sky is mesmerizing, starry, while the first shy thunders appear on the horizon…
Between the storms and the fear of getting caught, I leave my shack at the first glimpses of dawn. I must have slept for three hours or so. Honeymoon island has no secrets anymore. I drag my kayak back into the sea and row till the next islet. This one is even smaller, with no shelters, but with a sandy beach instead of Honeymoon’s rocks. The reef here is even more beautiful, but I am starting to sense my tiredness.
There is one last islet on this fault. I try to reach it by swimming. Before I am halfway there, I decide it’s wiser to turn back. I am feeling quite tired now and I must save energy for my trip back. Better to circumnavigate it by kayak. This islet is the smallest and the roughest of the group. A bunch of rocks and a handful of palm trees that miraculously make their way through them. Some birds nest on them, undisputed lords of this last outpost of land before the infinite blue.
I hang in my kayak soaking in the wild beauty of the scene for a while longer, then leave it behind me and row my way back into civilization. The trip back is exhausting. Among the scorching sun, the waves, the hunger, and the tiredness, it will take me two hours to get back. As I finally get on shore, I have no energy left and the owner has to help me drag the kayak along the beach. I drag myself to the hostel and pray for my sandwich to be ready soon.
Where the road ends
M y bus drives along the coast, heading north. Within few kilometers the asphalt ends and we get onto a dirt road that cuts through the palm forest. Some more kilometers and the dirt road ends as well. I just got to Lavena village, beyond which the island of Taveuni is still virgin. No roads, no electricity, no phone signal, no resorts.
I stay in a sort of hostel managed by the local community. There’s a small kitchen and 3–4 dorms, few steps away from a beautiful, pristine sandy beach. I can hear the ocean from my room. At the entrance a desk serves as reception, attended in turns by villagers. If I order food, the receptionist goes to talk with someone in the village, who goes out fishing and brings me a delicious fish curry. It seems that the building was donated by some Western organization and all earnings go to the village in their entirety. A wonderful example of how we can truly help a community.
All around me sparse little houses, lush vegetation, and tons of chickens that roam the village. All of a sudden, Lavena fills up with kids in a colorful school uniform. Today’s classes are finished. I take the chance to go and chat with a teacher. Considering this is a village of few hundred souls, in rural Fiji, I am very surprised by the school’s infrastructure. The teacher explains to me that the school had opened only 5 years ago, again thanks to donations. Before then, kids used to walk every morning the whole dirt road to reach the previous village. The round trip makes for 3 hours a day of walk, with a backpack on. Now they’ve got a brand new school by their front door, with solar panels that provide electricity and Internet access.
With no lights, in the evenings here there’s truly ‘nothing to do’ — another expression we abuse in our modern cities. So even a night owl like me can get used to being in bed before 10 pm and waking up at 6 am, as fresh as a daisy. It makes you realize how living your days in sync with the sunlight is not such a crazy idea, even though so far from our habits.
I take advantage of my early wake-up to make the Lavena Coastal Walk. It’s a walking route through the forest, probably built for travelers as part of the same initiative as the hostel’s. As I walk away from the village, the vegetation gets wilder and wilder. In some places the hungry Nature has already claimed back part of the path. Further on, the thick forest clears out and a tiny village appears along the river. Only a handful of houses… and a Catholic church — they truly got everywhere, didn’t they? I spend some time with the kids that are running around. I figure they probably go to school back in Lavena, which to their eyes may look like a city.
Talking with natives I discovered that in the village before Lavena, called Bouma, there’s a protected national park. That’s something quite rare around here, so I am very curious about it. There are no early morning buses to get me there: it’s the perfect chance to walk the same route that kids used to take every morning before their new school was built. Backpack on, I make my solitary walk along the dirt road. By the time I get to the park entrance I am already tired, but I have at least 3 hours of hiking in front of me if I want to reach the third and highest waterfall. That’s what a girl from the village explains to me at the ticket booth, while she hand-draws a map just for me.
Before turning into a national park, this beautiful area was subject to commercial deforestation. Apparently, it has been very hard to convince locals that they should have stopped cutting wood, because in the long run they could have made more money leaving the trees where they are. Now the park is a good source of sustainable income for the village — and this incredible corner of Nature is safe.
Getting deep into the mountain path, the scenery gets more and more spectacular, the vegetation thicker and lusher, the screeches of parrots closer and louder. At this point I am not surprised that Taveuni island is called ‘the garden of Fiji’. The temperature is very pleasant since not many sun rays manage to filter through. I am completely alone. The only tourists I stumbled upon did not make it further than the very first waterfall, just the time to get a few selfies done.
As I get to the top, I reward myself with a cooling swim by the highest waterfall. Then I realize it’s already time to leave. I am in time for the 2 pm bus, the second and last one of the day heading back south. After more than an hour waiting at the stop, there’s still no trace of the bus. Some locals come for a chat, curious about this lone white man that waits for the bus in their village. They explain that often buses accumulate large delays and great patience is necessary. At times though, they get broken and in that case there isn’t much to do.
‘I’ll check back in half an hour. If you are still here, you’d better come for dinner at our place. And you’ll be our guest for the night.’
Shortly after, someone else makes the same invitation. And then another one. I warmly thank everybody. I am speechless in front of the hospitality, the generosity, the spontaneity of these people. I’m in a remote village at the other side of the world, but somehow among these people I feel home.
Eventually, I decide to cover some of the distance on foot, but soon after I get surprised by a storm. I join some natives that took shelter under a majestic leafy tree. All patiently waiting for the rain to stop. They invite me to some food, and at this hour I can’t decline anymore. I am tempted to also accept a place for the night, but at last, a taxi appears out of nowhere. And so it only remains for me to thank them from the bottom of my heart, once again.
Today I decided I’ll pretend to be a local, with a day off to spend in ‘town’. I put my thumb up and get quickly picked up by a van. It’s three men, responsible for water quality monitoring on the island. They alert me that they’ll need to make a detour on the way into town. The van climbs on a narrow gravel road till it reaches a large water tank. One of them pours some chemicals in to treat the water. The second one explains to me how Taveuni’s aqueduct works. The third one smokes. Half an hour later I am in town.
I decide to give myself a second chance to play pool with locals. I lose miserably. There aren’t many alternatives around here, so boys have all the time in the world to cultivate their talent — and it shows. I cheer myself up with chicken curry in a local bar, paying it a third of the hostel’s price. Now, what else can I do here? Oh yes, I can go take a look at the little shops that fill the only two-story building on the island. At the computer shop, locals queue — and pay — to get movies loaded into their USB sticks. Both Hollywood and Bollywood sell very well.
I hitchhike back and decide I had enough of the hostel-resort. I pack my backpack and go see an old woman. I heard she owns a piece of land by the beach and decided to turn it into a basic camping ground. Meaning there’s a wooden shack where you can cook, a sheet-metal toilet, and plenty of sand to pitch your tent. I haven’t got one, so I rent a tent and a mat for the night for a total of 17 local dollars, around 7 euros. My tent is covered by palms and other wonderful trees and guarantees protection from mosquitoes, cockroaches, and all sorts of unnamed insects. A very good deal overall. I fall asleep lulled by the ocean’s perfumes and the calming sound of waves. During the night though, the sounds get a bit too loud and I realize I’d better have a look. The tide has risen and is now a meter and a half from the tent. I hesitate a bit, but finally put my trust in the old woman’s experience in positioning her tents and go back to sleep.
I start my last day on Taveuni doing something I haven’t done since I was a kid, when we used to hire a summer flat by the beach in southern Italy. Waking up and running straight into the water, without even washing my face. What a joy. Now it’s time for me to leave this wonderful island and take a ferry to head back to Josh, Sonny, and the rest of the gang in Savusavu.
The trip will last a few hours. I get to talk with an Iranian that grew up in Sydney. A businessman that at some point sold everything to start traveling with his wife. Then I’ll spend the rest of the route chatting with a Belgian girl, sprawled out on the deck, enjoying the sunset, getting taught some photography, and philosophizing about life, which always comes more natural on ships, for some reason. Opening up to strangers, knowing how to enjoy the moment with people you haven’t met before, and that you probably won’t see anymore, can change your life.
Nuksville’s folks
The ferry gets into Savusavu’s port at dusk. I jump in a taxi to Nukunuve, the village of Josh and Sonny. They nicknamed the village ‘Nuksville’ — the American myth managed to get till here. Everyone seems very happy to see me again. Very few foreigners are seen around here, and those that mingle with the locals are even more rare. Josh, the guy that first invited me to Nuksville, is not even here. He’s in town working. I am not very sad about that though. During my last days in this village, I had bonded much more with Sonny, and it’s him that had insisted for me to come back.
Sonny lives in a wooden house that he boasts about having built with his own hands. He shares it with his mother and his daughter. Even though very far from ‘Western standards’, this house appears more much comfortable than the blue house of Vasiti in Namoli. I am relieved at the sight of sofas and chairs, even though there is still no trace of tables. The grandma explains that her family is half English, and this gives her a privileged position in society — as well as good sofas. I am touched by the hospitality and the warmth of this old lady. She seems to immediately like me and tells me I can stay as long as I wish. She is also a great storyteller. I’ll spend many evenings on her couch listening to stories about ancestry, about the past of the village, and about a German dude that like me had ended up in Nuksville by chance and had been hosted for few days… which became nine months.
Sonny shows me his bedroom. It features a real queen-size bed protected by a mosquito net, a creaking parquet, and a permanently open window, overlooking a garden of dwarf palms and roaming chickens. He insists that I should sleep in his bed, whereas he would crash on a mat on the living room floor. I obviously protest. I cannot accept something like that. But Sonny won’t listen to reason and I am eventually forced to give up. By now it’s clear to me how in this culture guests are gold and how being able to give hospitality is a true privilege, for them. I fall asleep in the double bed while staring at the mosquito net, thinking about how incredible all this is.
At 3 am we are already on our feet. I had insisted to join Sonny and a friend of his for a night fishing session. As we drag Sonny’s rowboat into the ocean, in total darkness, my mind goes back to when it fantasized about this adventure. How much I would have given to be able to experience everyday life in a remote village, doing what they do, whether it was helping to build a hut or going out fishing…
We row to put out into the deep of the black ocean, rocked by the low tide. An hour later, my brain reminds me that I suffer from seasickness. I end up in the water, holding onto the boat and vomiting in the darkness, among the general laughter. At some point Sonny swears something in Fijian. We have just lost our anchor and there’s no way to retrieve it. We haven’t caught a single fish, but it’s already time to head back. On the way to the shore, rain droplets quickly turn into a storm. As the two row, I am bundled in a corner still dealing with my nausea, trying to cover myself up with a towel, ‘praying’ to touch the ground as soon as possible. Once the boat is secured to a palm tree, we burst into laughter. A more disastrous expedition was hard to imagine. Diving back into bed will be a great pleasure.
Sonny and his grandma are just wonderful and soon I feel indebted. Sonny is thinking of opening a security business for resorts, leveraging on his past army experience, on his muscles, and some governmental subventions. I can’t offer my muscles, but I can help develop his website. We go ‘downtown’, into Savusavu, and pay a visit to Sonny’s friends that work in a ticket booth for the ferry service. The booth has air conditioning and a computer with Internet access, so I start drafting the website. Since I am in town already, I go and buy ingredients for an amatriciana.
In the evening I cook for my new Fijian family and the pasta gets devoured in minutes. ‘I could die happy after a dish like this’ says the grandma. How much joy a good pasta can bring! It’s great to feel I can pay back at least a fraction of all the love I am receiving.
A gentle sea breeze and the crowing of roosters give me a pleasant awakening. I think of everything that has happened recently and I am glowing. Without leaving the bed, I reach for my notebook and start writing frantically.
There are many wonderful people out there. Just go out, leave your usual places, find them, surround yourself with them, and never stop looking for new ones. Leave home and enjoy the most wonderful people. And make sure they can always think the same about you.
For lunch, grandma decided to cook fried fish with rice and coconut milk. Where does the fresh fish come from? This morning, while I was pondering over the beauty of humanity, grandma dragged the rowboat into the water, rowed into the deep, and got back with some kilos of fish. All by herself, 70 years old. I think of many of our old ones, that decide to be old, and waste the last healthy years of their life in front of the television.
Eating delicious fresh fish, sitting on the sofa with the plates on our laps, grandma resumes her storytelling. ‘Here we ‘call’ people’ — she explains. If you are eating something or sipping tea and someone walks into sight, you should ‘call’ them, that is invite them to share whatever you are having. Or rather, it’s not that you should, but it’s a custom, a noble habit, a daily pleasure. If you are eating a banana while waiting for the bus and a kid passes by, you offer half of it — automatically, without thinking about it. Houses are always open here — doors and windows are only there to shelter against typhoons — and so it’s easy to imagine how a walk through the village can result in many ‘calls’.
Grandma carries much pride in her culture. She talks with sadness about the shock she had when she went for the first time ‘into the West’, visiting family in New Zealand and the United States. Seeing windows with metal bars, fenced gardens, and realizing that these people did not even know the names of their neighbors. Perhaps this is where the essence of the difference between this world and the Western one lies. While they speak with pride about their communities, we brag about our progress in privacy, in security, and essentially in individualism.
On the way back from our daily volley routine, we are surprised by a stunning sunset. Or at least, I am surprised. First, the retiring tide left behind meters and meters of pools of any shape. Then the sunset light painted them in gold. On the horizon, a solitary palm tree stands out proudly from its rock. It’s there to remind Nuksville’s folks about Cyclone Tomas, which back in 2010 wiped away all palms in this bay. All except one.
For a moment, as if by magic, clouds draw a line that travels parallel to the golden water’s one. Luckily I did not leave my camera at home today.
Sonny got some errands to do, so we decide to go downtown together. With the occasion, we’ll spend a couple of hours visiting supermarkets, street markets, and butchers, trying to put together the ingredients for another Italian pasta. By now they got a taste for it, and I personally don’t mind some home flavors from time to time.
As we walk around the streets of Savusavu, we get stopped every 50 meters. Sonny really knows everyone around here. He is the typical popular village guy, friendly and easy-going, who’s always around and has a word and a smile for anybody. We pay another visit to the ferry’s women at the ticket booth and they invite us for lunch. Then in the afternoon, Sonny was supposed to go to the bank to figure out how to apply for those subventions for his security business. But why bother going to the bank, queue and everything, when a friend that works there invites you to a bar, offers you a beer and hands over an already filled-in form for you?
We leave the bar laughing and Sonny explains something that at this point was quite clear to me:
‘Here is not about what you know, but who you know.’
Money is scarce and people carry on with gifts from nature and a continuous exchange of favors. The social fabric is crucial to get by.
This morning a volley tournament was supposed to take place, as announced days ago. Canceled. Our second attempt to go fishing, after the first disastrous expedition? Canceled. When a Fijian makes a plan, it seems like there’s an 80% chance it will be altered in some way, and a good 50% that it will simply never happen.
In the afternoon, the volley tournament miraculously materializes, but with two teams only. We meet in a prairie in Savusavu, waiting under the trees for temperatures to become tolerable. Someone collects small money to put a prize together. Then the game starts and it’s immediately clear that the level is high. Much higher than on the average beach in the Mediterranean. Given the circumstances, I support my team from the ‘bench’. I make a couple of appearances on the court, just to get my hands smashed by the ball. In 3 sets, Nuksville wins the tournament. We wisely invest the entire jackpot in beer and go party at the beach.
The party then continues in a bar in Savusavu, even though the jackpot is long gone. It’s the first time I hang out in a bar around here. The bar does not look very different from any bar in southern Europe’s seaside towns. There are wooden tables and beer jars, a band that plays rock classics, and an old white couple that improvises a dance. It’s a strange feeling. My senses are very awake and I am living as exceptional something that back home would be the most mundane evening. The musicians are all Sonny’s friends — obviously — and the gig morphs into a sort of jam session where he ends up on stage as well. The vibes are so welcoming that eventually I also loosen up and beat my shyness. Sonny calls me on stage and I sing Hotel California, with my eyes closed. It was my first time in front of a microphone and it made the evening even harder to forget.
Sundays are holy here, at least since the arrival of Christianity. But not ‘holy’ in the sense that you don’t work — it’s rather in the sense that you should not do anything. People don’t drink, don’t make music, don’t play, and often don’t even gather with friends. Definitely against my idea of what life is about.
Luckily Sonny thinks the same, so while Nuksville is in half hibernation, he pulls out of nowhere a guitar and a dusty keyboard. Just the time to find a plug that works, tune the guitar, agree on a song, recall how to play a D minor on the piano, and we are flowing. A while after, a friend of Sonny walks by and we ‘call’ him. How easy it is to connect through music, it’s like magic. I should always travel with an instrument — note to myself.
Grandma had announced that a cruise ship packed with tourists was due today in Savusavu. She would not miss the chance to set up a stall close to the port. We decide to go and give a hand, but obviously on Sundays buses aren’t running either, so we end up hitchhiking — or at least trying to. Dozens of Indian cars speed past us, staring suspiciously. Yet we are not that ugly, I even shaved recently.
The Indo-Fijian culture has very little to do with the indigenous Fijian one. At the end of the 19th century, Indian laborers were brought to the islands as indentured servants by the British colonial rulers to work on sugar cane plantations. When in 1916 the program was halted, they were given the chance to return to India — at their own expense. Most opted for settling in Fiji permanently. Over the years, the Indian community thrived, also thanks to a stronger inclination to business and hard work. Today their descendants represent almost 40% of the Fijian population. The profound differences between the two cultures seem to make any form of true integration impossible and rather limit it to mere tolerance. Young Indo-Fijians walk around with T-shirts saying ‘F.B.I. — Fiji-born Indian’, which says it all.
In some way, Sonny and I manage to reach Savusavu. Today the town appears unrecognizable to my eyes. Streets were it was hard to bump into a white face are now packed with tourists. Mostly Australians and Americans, but also some Chinese and Vietnamese. Savusavu changed its face to welcome them. Street stalls everywhere, live music, a reception at the port with a wooden walkway, a water taxi service, and fresh cocktails. Grandma is all busy selling shells and knit-work. I feel an unfamiliar, beautiful sensation of being on the other side, this time. At sunset, the cruise ship will set sail to some other port, taking away with it all the tourists and a version of Savusavu that in a matter of years may become the new normal, with the tourism machine growing at this pace. I stare at the ship disappearing over the horizon, thinking about how little those passengers will know about life here.
In the evening, when the whole confusion has ended, I find myself listening to music and laughing alone in my bed. It’s another attack of intense happiness…
Sonny and I get on a bus to Nukubolu, a small village somewhere deep inland. Don’t search it on Google Maps, not even Google’s eye got this far. An explorer from Lonely Planet must have been here though. His description of this village lost in the forest, theater of past battles, with old ruins and thermal springs convinced me to follow a tourist guide for the first time in Fiji. Sonny was amused at the idea of playing the tourist in his own land. Before jumping on the bus, we had passed by the market to buy kava roots as a gift to the village chief, sticking to that old tradition called ‘sevusevu’ that I had discovered on my first days in Fiji.
The bus runs on the main road that crosses the whole island of Vanua Levu, revealing how largely wild and inhabited it still is. Eventually, we leave the main road to get on a dirt track — not much wider than the bus itself — cutting through yet another magnificent palm forest. As usual I am glued to the side window, in awe at vegetation that after a month in Fiji still amazes me. All of a sudden, the bus slams on the brakes. In front of us there’s a truck full of rocks that limps his way in the opposite direction. Our driver swears, gets off to evaluate the situation, and then simply declares that the ride ends there. We must proceed on foot. All passengers get off and start walking without much surprise, while the bus sets off on reverse.
In the last village before our destination, we cross paths with three local guys. They stare at me as if they had just seen an alien. Their face makes me infer that very few foreigners pass by here, despite that passage on Lonely Planet. I smile, exchange a few words in English, and their suspicion quickly becomes curiosity — as it often happens. The three of them will end up being our local guides for the whole day.
The last section of the pathway is interrupted by a river. The guys explain that this is the last stop for the bus — when it manages to get here. There are no bridges. Going forward there’s no other way than wading the river, and that’s what men, women, and children of Nukubolu do every day.
As we walk into the village, we are taken directly before the chief, among the intrigued and incredulous looks of the locals. Finally, I will have the chance to experience a sevusevu, and the idea excites me. The village chief lives in a humble abode on top of a hill, few hundred meters from the rest of the houses. When he opens the door to welcome us, before my eyes stand an old man of modest appearance, whose clothing could be that of a southern Italian peasant. Without uttering a single word, the chief invites us into the living room and we sit down in a circle, cross-legged. The scene may sound ridiculous and anachronistic, but in that context, I could perceive its meaning and importance. Sonny shakes hands with the chief, introduces me in their native tongue, announces our intentions and presents our sevusevu, lowering his head out of respect. The chief gives me a brief look, then turns to Sonny and recites something in Fijian. The ceremony is over. We all stand up and the chief finally shakes my hand. As we walk out, Sonny translates the conversation for me: the chief was delighted about our visit and our sevusevu, and gave us his permission to visit the village and the surrounding lands. I feel privileged in having taken part in a ritual from another time and another place.
We’ll spend the day enjoying the surprising nature around us. I swim in streams of crystal clear water, surrounded by horses, pigs, cows and all sorts of birds. I quench my thirst drinking coconut juice. I burn myself while trying to resist more than 20 seconds with my feet in the natural hot waters, among great laughter. Locals immerse their bodies in the springs for hours, to benefit from its healing properties.
Later in the afternoon we decide to make our way back, even though we don’t really know what is the actual way. There won’t be any direct buses, that we know. Our guides walk us back to their village. They invite us to come back one day and give us a warm goodbye. I think I won’t be the only one with a story to tell about today.
Sonny and I resume walking once again, radiant for our little adventure. We don’t care much about not knowing how to get back. Sonny is even happier than me. It’s the first time in his life that he’s traveling in his country not to work, not to visit family, not to party with friends. Like me, today he’s just enjoying the infinite beauty of his land and the heart-warming hospitality of those that inhabit it. I am confident he will remember this day and he will undertake similar adventures in the future, now that he sees its value. Today I gave him something, I transmitted him a different way to look at the world. And isn’t that one of life’s greatest pleasures?
As we reach the river we had waded this morning, to our great surprise, we spot a parked bus. The bus driver is sitting in there by himself and Sonny goes to exchange a few words. Shortly after, the engine starts and the bus gets on the road, with only two passengers on board. I enjoy the silence of the forest and the silence of the empty bus — now that my brain learned to ignore these loud engines that seem to come out of a museum of mechanics. Legs spread out, windows wide open, and a smile that makes my eyes wrinkle, I let myself be lulled by the irregularity of the terrain and the fresh breeze of the forest at dusk.
All of a sudden the bus breaks, next to a handful of houses that open up the thick forest. The bus driver has just finished his workday and got home. He will park the large bus next to his house, ready to start a new shift tomorrow morning. Sonny and I look at each other, shrug and, laughing out loud, resume walking once again. Minutes after we hear a pick-up truck speeding in our direction. A gesture, a couple of words, and I find myself sitting on the back, watching the palms roll fast past me, covered in a cloud of dust. The pick-up takes us until the point where the dirt track merges onto the main road. We say goodbye and take up our journey again. Main road does not mean civilization though. Just two asphalted lanes that cut through an infinite forest. Luckily there’s still a bit of light. It’s enough to make ourselves noticed by a large bus. It’s one of those with air conditioning — like we are used in the West — that stops to pick up two hitchhikers — like we are not used in the West.
All passengers’ eyes are on us. A skinny white man and a native with large shoulders that hitchhike together in the middle of nowhere. Probably not a common scene around here. The bus will take us till Savusavu, almost home. It’s definitely our lucky day, so we don’t feel like we’ll need to walk all the way back to Nuksville. We do start walking and spot another bus, the last one of the day, with another driver ready to go home. The engine is already on, it’s as if he was just there waiting for us. Where does he live? By Sonny’s place, obviously. Sonny shakes his head, incredulous. What a day.
I get home and suddenly feel something in my stomach. This is my last night in Nuksville. I cook a last pasta dish for the whole family and we toast with red wine. For the occasion, Sonny insisted to invite our ferry’s friends as well. ‘This will be probably worth a free ride for you’ — he had predicted. After dinner, we go out and say goodbye to the whole gang of Nuksville. In the utter darkness of our usual bus stop, which they had built with their own hands, someone comes up with the idea of writing my name next to the one of that German guy that lived here years ago. I just wish they will remember me, whether they write my name or not. Surely I will remember them. They pass me the last bong and insist that I take a big puff this time. I collapse into bed. Exhausted, melancholic, and a bit stoned.
At 7 am, a taxi is waiting for me by Sonny’s place with the engine on. It’s really time to say goodbye now. I don’t know how to thank them. Time here flew and how much I’d have liked to stay longer. I can’t find the words. I am not sure they fully grasp what they did for me. I hope they at least understood that they left me with a story to tell and that the people in my life will know about Sonny, grandma, and Nuksville’s folks.
The taxi drops me in front of the ferry. I queue at the ticket desk and when my turn arrives, I am standing before the friend that was at dinner last night. She looks at me, gives me a great smile, and writes me a ticket in a sleeper cabin. Sonny knew what he was talking about.
Hostels, resorts, and actual cities
The ferry ride back to the main island lasts 12 hours. I spend a good chunk of that time on the foredeck. Feet up in the air, listening to music, while the Pacific flows under me and the profiles of distant green dots appear on the horizon and beg me to be explored. I can’t understand how most people prefer a flight to this. Ah, but it’s a matter of timing. People need to run, do things, process their bucket lists.
The ferry docks on the south coast of the island, in Suva, Fiji’s capital. More than Nadi, Suva is an actual city. It will turn out to be quite close to the idea I had of it: a bad copy of a Western metropolis. I am hosted for the night by a German guy I met through CouchSurfing. He is doing research on the preservation of tropical forests, environmental care, and some other noble ideas that will probably get crushed by the urge for progress and Westernization. I will spend the evening with his flatmate — also researcher, also European — in a sort of shopping mall, dining in a fast-food restaurant and ending up in a movie theater with a large screen and air conditioning that blows winter winds. After almost a month outside urban areas, this window on the West appears to me as surreal, bizarre, and a bit pathetic. I am tempted to run out in the streets, stop random people and scream ‘Stop this thing! Let Fiji remain Fiji!’ — as if I were a traveler from the future.
The morning after I go visit the Museum of Fiji, the only reason that convinced me to pass by the capital. The museum displays evidence of the first attempts of conversion by Christian missionaries, documents from the British colonization, and reproductions of vessels with which Polynesians fought the Pacific waters for centuries, sometimes finding new land, more often finding death.
Walking around the museum’s large rooms, while my mind travels to those ancient seafaring tribes, I stumble upon a large piece of wood in terrible conditions. As I start reading the description, my heart starts beating faster. Before my eyes lay what remains of the Bounty, the great English ship mutinied in 1789, set on fire and sunk off the Pitcairn Islands by the rebels for fear of the British forces, and later hanged in some square in London. I knew the story of the Bounty very well, and surely it had contributed to growing in me a strong curiosity for those remote and mysterious places. What I didn’t know is that the ship’s rudder had miraculously survived that fire and, after resting on the sea bottom for centuries, was brought back to light and shipped to Fiji.
In the city the heat is scorching. My expectations were quite low and they got confirmed. Every skyscraper is an eyesore, every honk in the traffic reminds me of the worst of Milan, my hometown. Even the palms look sad and intoxicated. How much they would need a stay in the lush forests of the island of Vanua Levu or to be lulled by the sound of the waterfalls in Bouma’s national park, on Taveuni. I stroll around, thinking about the Fijians that left their families and their villages for the hope of a better future, maybe to end up working as a cashier at McDonald’s. This is surely a reality in many parts of the world, but in Fiji, in the Fiji I experienced, it’s very hard to swallow.
I run away from the city the very next morning, after having left a thank-you note to my hosts, who already left for work. Backpack on, I get on a bus heading west. My plan — if you can call it a plan — is to explore the south coast of the main island, then head north to Nadi, go back to my first hostel to meet David and collect my other backpack, and finally show up at the international airport, in time for the flight that in 7 days will take me away from Fiji.
My first stop is Pacific Harbour. Someone told me there is a spectacular canyon you can descend by raft. The bus drops me off in the proximity of a sort of tourist village, full of bars, restaurants, fountains, and souvenir shops. This is the sort of non-place that makes me shake my head and run away. Because of the low season, there is no trace of tourists, making the scene even sadder. I show up in an info point to learn more about this canyon crossing. A nice smiley girl attends me. She is happy to see another human being and proceeds to illustrate the various activities I could make along the canyon. Apparently, some European pioneers had ‘discovered’ this wonderful area a decade ago, bought the land, and found an agreement with the local communities to share profits and preserve the environment. ‘Fair enough’, I think. The girl then lowers her tone of voice and shyly concludes: ‘For the rafting descent, it’s 170 euros’. I thank her warmly, but I can’t hide my disappointment. I head straight back to the bus stop. I already had enough of Pacific Harbour. On the bus that rides along the south coast, I think about how Westerners will never learn. We just don’t know how to stop before profit turns into speculation.
The next stop is Mango Bay. As I am not a fan of tourist guides, I typically build a sort of mental map of places I’d like to visit by putting together recommendations from people I meet along the way. With time and experience, you learn how to tell whether the person you are talking to shares similar values and passions, and hence ignore recommendations to places that would let me down. (I am still trying to recall who the hell recommended me Pacific Harbour.) The ideal thing would be to get recommendations from locals, but often locals have limited knowledge of their surroundings, because they rarely look at their own lands with the eyes of an explorer. Sadly.
In Mango Bay there are no hostels, no villages where to seek hospitality, so I have to spend the night in a dorm room in a resort. As I get to the resort, they explain that the dorms are under renovation, and thanks to the low season, they offer me a single room at the same price. It’s a luxury I am not used to, a luxury I hope I won’t get used to, but for a night I let myself have it. I contemplate the beauty of the sun that sets on the bay and with all the tiredness I accumulated along the way, I also treat myself with a dinner at the resort’s restaurant. I am surrounded by couples of Australians and New Zealanders that are here to spend a week by the beach. Many of them will step out of the resort only to travel back to the airport. I try to initiate some conversation, but I can’t seem to have anything to say nor find interest in what they are saying. Luckily I find out that one of the staff members plays table tennis quite well. I’ll spend my evening sweating over the table, counting points in the back of the bar.
As I wake up I rush straight to the sea, dive in, and enjoy the wonderful Mango Bay. What a privilege to swim in waters like these. I’ll then leave the resort and get back on the road — but only after having listened to the owner telling me the umpteenth story of the white Australian/New Zealander, that 10/20 years ago had the luck to buy land and build a resort/hostel and marry a Fijian/Australian and have 2/3 kids.
In 3.5 hours of bus ride, I am back in Nadi, where it all began a month ago. I go back to my first hostel close to the international airport, where so many backpackers just returned or are about to leave for their organized tour of the Yasawa Islands. These islands have been taken away from the natives and turned into luxury resorts, practically inaccessible to locals. So emblematic of how a certain kind of tourism can threaten a natural paradise and rob natives of their lands. Thinking about it brings back the bad feelings I had on my first days here. Luckily Fiji is so much more than this, and luckily I did not give up before discovering it.
As the night falls, hostel folks gather around the usual kava pot. Among the noise, the laughter, and the disgust of those that try kava for the first time, I spot a woman whose smile warms your heart and whose eyes conceal a whole novel. I immediately know I need to go and talk to her. She is a hippie in her forties, from Texas. She will give a little show by the beach, making three flames dance in the darkness, while a guy makes a beat with a makeshift bongo. The guys that were busy being drunk are now staring like kids in front of an illusionist. If the hostel staff will value that, she may get a free stay for the night. In any case, tomorrow she will fly away, towards Tonga. She learned about a village where all women, since immemorial times and for reasons unknown, master the art of juggling. She intends to shoot a documentary.
Time for goodbyes, once more
I see the end of the adventure coming. My mind starts projecting images of the life and the girl that await me in New Zealand. But I’ve got one thing left to do. I had promised Vasiti and the kids in Namoli that I would have come back to say goodbye, before leaving Fiji. I get on a minivan for the city of Lautoka, the access gate to the village. These minivans shuttle back and forth between two cities at a very low price. The more runs they manage to fit in one day and the more people they manage to fit in one van, the more dollars they’ll bring home. As a result, we travel like sardines, risking a heart attack at every crossroad, but getting to destination in half the time compared to the usual old bus.
I hop off in Lautoka and enjoy the regained oxygen. As I approach the village on foot, the same kids that on my first visit spied on me behind curtains are now running towards me. They knew I was going to arrive soon and they had gathered by Vasiti’s blue house. Seeing kids that, in a village on the other side of the world, run towards you to hug you, barefooted, clumsily, with a smile bigger than their face, is pure joy. I’ll spend the after running around the blue house with them, learning countless games you can play with a deflated ball. I also get to see the impressive progress they made with my diabolo, which I had left as a present. At the time they could barely hold it.
Vasiti informs me that she does not have that spare mattress anymore. A great night on the carpet awaits me. Never mind. Cockroaches now scare me less than the one — the enormous one — that was chilling on my pillow on my first night in the village.
Between the exaggerated morning heat and the fact that a floor is… a floor, I must have slept five hours or so. Within a couple of hours I have to shower twice. The muggy weather is unbearable today. I let the kids drag me to the city park to play football. They have no clue where Italy is, nor they know anything about it, but for some reason, they know people play football well there. Despite my effort, my sweat, and a couple of goals, I think I ruined that image for them.
More than ‘park’, I should have said prairie. The closest tree is 200 meters from us and the sun shows no mercy. I start feeling strange and decide to head back home. I am getting feverish. I put my pride aside and ask Vasiti whether she knows someone in the village — a relative, a friend, anyone — that could lend me a real mattress. Sleeping on the floor with fever is not the brightest idea, I thought.
Vasiti makes a quick mental scan of her options and finally takes me to her cousins, a hundred meters from the blue house. I show up at their door quite stoned already. Even though it’s the same family, in the same village, this house appears to me as completely distinct, as if belonging to a different culture. There are no walls and floors in raw wood, no fridge converted into a shelf. Instead, there’s a fitted carpet and colored walls. There are sofas, pieces of furniture and even a TV. But more importantly, mattresses. True mattresses. The cousins decide to leave me their master bedroom and sleep all together, Vasiti included, in the living room. I collapse on the large bed. This time I had no strength to protest against the excessive hospitality. I am quite sick. I only give myself one goal: getting on that flight to Auckland in 3 days.
I’ll spend the entire day after stuck in bed. I can barely raise my head. Once in a while Tom, Vasiti’s cousin, passes by and brings me freshly caught fish. Once in a while two rats pass by as well, speeding along the furniture. Once in a while another cousin passes by, visibly worried about my health. ‘You need to rest man, you need to rest’ he repeats. He spends interminable minutes in my room, trying to convince me that I should find him an Italian wife, as soon as I set foot in my country.
‘How are women over there? Beautiful, right? Ah, Italian women. We get married, I make her come live here. This is paradise for you, she’ll be the happiest woman in the world. Come on, promise me. Here, let me write down my number. As soon as you find the right one, you call me. Start thinking about who you can introduce me to. Have you already got one in mind?’
The fever is a bit lower now. Paracetamol arrived here as well, luckily. But I am not fully independent yet, and I’ve got to catch a plane tomorrow. Meanwhile, my planned trip to Abaca was canceled for obvious reasons for the second time. It means I will have to come back to Fiji one day.
I finally manage to get out of bed and go out for lunch with Tom. Tom is one of those that have a real job, in a construction company in Lautoka. He explains that the wage is really good, he can’t complain. In hindsight, having seen his house, I could have imagined that the differences with Vasiti’s house weren’t just a matter of taste. The only issue is that he’s paid by the day and the work comes in waves, unpredictably. You start working on repairing a roof, then they run out of money and stop. Weeks after, new funds pop up and you resume. Then maybe a cyclone arrives, and you start from scratch.
It’s really time to go now. Vasiti gives me lots of recommendations and prays for me. Tom carries my backpack and takes me to the bus station in Lautoka. One more time, I just don’t know how to thank these people. I got another example — the umpteenth — of their incredible hospitality. I gather the little strength I have and give a big hug to big Tom.
‘Take my snorkel and my diving mask, you’ll need them here more than I need them in New Zealand. This way you’ll be able to catch more fish for your next guests. Thank you again, Tom. Oh, I almost forgot! Leave me your address, as soon as I can I’ll send you that picture I took in the living room.’
I walk for the last time into my hostel in Nadi and get the extra backpack I had entrusted David with. Traveling back to Nadi among the sardines of the minivan, with fever, seemed like a heroic endeavor. Now I just need to drop to bed and gather as much energy as possible to be able to stand on my feet tomorrow, carrying on my shoulders all I own at this side of the world. Tomorrow an airplane will take me back to the West. According to geographical maps, it’s only a two-hour flight from here. But in reality, it’s like traveling to another planet.
There are people you already know you won’t see ever again, places you won’t set foot on anymore, smiles you won’t be able to exchange, and colors you will only dream about. But their memory enriches your life, in a way I will never be able to explain.
