New Mailing Address

Anyone inclined to send me something accross the miles... here is my new mailing address:

Dave Crowley, PCV
c/o Pita Novelu
PO Box 1930
Sigatoka, Fiji Islands

Letters and notes are much appreciated! Packages can take up to 2 months (or as little as 2 weeks) and are subject to inspection. It's best to send items in padded envelopes. I'm told they come quicker and less chance of being opened by customs. Don't send post cards - they just end up on the post office wall somewhere. Don't send anything of great value  as everything runs the risk of not making it to me.

If you send something (anything!) let me know so I can keep an eye out for it... and alert my friend Pita to check periodically.

And of course, emails are always encouraged (and cheaper). News and notes from home are priceless!

The New Home

My new village consists of 20 houses and approximately 80 people. Half of those people are children. Except for my college years, I have never not lived in a city.

On the day I arrived, a formal ceremony called a sevusevu is performed. This allows me to enter the village, be welcomed and counted as a member (family) of the community. The ceremony includes presenting to the village elder (sort of the mayor) some yoqona which is a root plant from which kava or grog is produced. Now, grog is legendary in this part of the world. The yoqona is pounded into a powder form which is then wrapped in a cloth, submerged in a big (usually wooden) bowl of water, and squeezed like a giant tea bag until the water is a murky brown. Yes, it looks like dirty water. Grog is served out of a half coconut shell called a bilo (the Fijian word for cup). Like everything in the Fijian village, this is a communal experience. The bilo is filled and presented one by one to each participant who imbibes the mixture in one long gulp. In the formal ceremony, there is a pecking order that is recognized in each round. Guests are served early in each round.

I have participated in many grog sessions, both formal and informal, since arriving on these islands. Grog is called the national drink of Fiji and is featured at every ceremony, meeting, and general social gathering. It’s the Fijian equivalent of “drinking.”  Grog sessions last for hours. They have to. The narcotic effect does not kick in until one has consumed many (20-30) bilos of the stuff. Until then, all you are going to experience is a slight numbness or tingling of the lips and tongue. Yoqona is a sort of pepper root plant. If you hang in there, you may get to the point of feeling extremely mellow and sleepy (aka stoned).

I have yet to experience the full quality of this exercise. For several reasons: like most gatherings in Fiji (and most Pacific Islands) everyone sits on the floor, legs crossed “Indian Style,” and that posture for me has its limits; all that liquid, along with all the water we’re supposed to be drinking to stay hydrated, makes me have to pee all night; most of the conversations that occur around the grog bowl are in Fijian and I get bored and self-conscious sitting there quietly; it doesn’t taste good. I’ve developed the habit of staying for a bilo or two out of respect and then finding a reason to excuse myself.

Honestly, I don’t get the whole grog thing. I keep thinking, “let’s all just have a beer or two and get to the point.”

(I could write gobs more about grog but I run the risk of this blog becoming cliché. I trust many others have written far better descriptions of the experience and suggest googling it to get a more complete peep into this part of the culture. It’s ubiquitous, essential to Fijian culture, and sure to be an ongoing subject in this journey).

After the sevusevu, I was escorted to another home where the women had prepared lunch for me. I sat (on the floor, natch), filled up my plate with the various dishes – typical Fijian fare: fish, kasava, bele. Without realizing, I had taken the fork or spoon from one of the serving bowls and began using that to eat what was on my plate. One of the women said, “Tevita, in Nadroga we eat with our hands.” Maybe that’s why I had pilfered the serving spoon: there were no other utensils in sight.  Good enough for me. I dug in with my fingers, fish and all! In my training village, I had a fairly well-to-do host family and all my meals were served at a kitchen table with utensils. This first meal in my new village signaled a new phase of my Fijian life. I felt oddly liberated.

Another aspect of Fijian meals is that very often, guests will be served along with the men of the household and they will eat and finish their meals before the women join in. I had never quite gotten comfortable with this, even if I did get a bit used to it during training. Many times I would ask my host mom to eat with us. Sometimes she would say, “after.” Sometimes she would look to her husband for confirmation before getting a plate and joining us. Otherwise, she would just sit there while we ate joining in only on the conversation. When we finished, my host father and I would excuse ourselves from the table, my host mom would clear our dishes then call her daughter and mother in to eat what was left. Thankfully, she always prepared plenty and I never felt guilty about eating more than my share. Some of my fellow trainees had remarked that they often felt that they were leaving scraps for the women of their families if food was scarce. If I haven’t written it outright at this point, it probably goes without saying that women’s roles in Fiji are extremely traditional.

Now on this first day at my new village, as I moved from the sevusevu to the lunch, the men stayed behind at the grog bowl while the women sat with me at lunch. And I do mean sat with me. They did not eat with me but watched and talked with me while I ate. Since then, I have shared many meals with a couple of the families and I’m happy to report that everyone eats at the same time: men, women, children, me. I guess at that first lunch I was an honored guest but now I am a member of the community. Family.

My house is a traditional Fijian Bure. Although the floor is a concrete base (with linoleum tile laid on top), the walls consist of a wood frame with bamboo and the roof is bamboo leaves. My bure is one room (with an attached bathroom). Imagine living in a cabin in the woods and that’s my life for the next two years. The bure is a living organism. I share my home with a variety of critters and creatures: the usual spiders, ants, moths and mosquitoes but also some other Pacific Island stalwarts like geckos, rats, and roaches. And frogs! Lots of frogs – which begin arriving at dusk and usually stay for a few hours hopping around my floor until they get tired and head back out into the dark. I routinely scan my floor every evening for the evidence they leave behind: little mushy poops and tiny puddles of pee. I try to detect them with my eye before I catch them under my feet.

During the day it’s pretty calm. Most of the “visitors” come at night. Thankfully, my kitchen is another structure about 20 yards from my bure so I keep very little food in my little one-roomer. What I do have, I keep in a little fridge or string up on a line so it hangs out of reach. I have yet to see or hear any rats or roaches (so far so good). Another volunteer nearby says she plays a game while she lies in bed at night waiting for sleep to come. She calls it “what creature is making that sound?”

I remember overhearing several weeks back when we were merely trainees, one of my cohorts was asking a current volunteer about the bure. Not everyone gets to live in one – depends on the village – and it’s considered a privilege – a truly unique Fijian experience – if one is up for it. The trainee was asking about the presence of said critters and creatures. The volunteer hesitated a half second and answered, “well… it IS a bure, so… it’s alive.” A very apt description. On several occasions, I’ve been lying in bed and noted, if there happens to be a gracious breeze, how the walls billow as the air passes through. It looks as if the bure is literally breathing.

The Fourth of July

On the morning of Monday, July 4, a large chartered minibus pulled into our training village to transport us to Suva, the capital city. Two members from each of our six host families were invited to go with us because our training group had been selected to perform our Meke as part of the swearing-in ceremony. (See blog entry for PST week 3). In particular, we needed the women of our host families to sing the songs and play the lali (Fijian drum or percussion instrument made of wood) that went with our traditional dance. So while we had several host family members accompanying us, we were overwhelmed when dozens of others showed up to send us off.

It was quite a scene! We were half an hour late in pulling out of there as villagers, most of whom I recognized but would have to confess to not knowing all their names, wanted to shake our hands, hug us and make pleas to stay in touch and come back to visit. Many were in tears. Again, we were amazed and touched by how central our presence had become to the life of the village. Even before our real service begins, we get sense through this experience how impactful we can be just by being here. Imagine the possibilities when we actually get down to the work!

In the Fijian culture, families are vast and once you are in, you are IN. I will always be considered a member of this village and have many “relatives” there. If I live to be 100 and return on that day, I’m quite certain that I will be remembered and welcomed as warmly as I was sent-off on this day. When we all finally managed to board the bus one of fellow trainees summed up the moment best: “Wow. That is a lot of love.”

A few hours later in Suva, we were sworn in as Peace Corps Volunteers. Now I’m not one who stands on ceremony and I don’t particularly enjoy formal events but this was a thrill. I don’t usually feel different as birthdays come and go or other milestones, like graduations, occur. My adult life is full of these short chapters (jobs, residences, um… relationships ;) that often find me in state of flux. I like change. But I’ll boast that this moment felt significant. This whole experience of being so far away from everything that’s familiar and comfortable (aka “home”) has heightened my emotional state. I may have discovered pride in a new way.

The President of Fiji attended and spoke at the ceremony. Then the US Ambassador to Fiji administered the oath. We all stood, 25 strong, raised our right hands and declared:

I solemnly pledge my commitment and support to the peoples of Fiji, and in the spirit of peace, friendship, and international cooperation that I will do my best to fairly represent my country while respecting the traditions, culture, and values of Fiji, that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully carry out my duties as a Peace Corps Volunteer.

With that, training ends and service begins. Another chapter closes. The next… I'll start writing that one now. Yes, I feel different. Excited. Anxious. Frightened. Unsure. Very sure. All heightened!  It’s exhausting (physically, I feel fine). I need a nice long nap.

Farewells Fijian Style

The last week of training was a busy blur of sessions, exams and parties. Since our site announcements the prior week, our focus shifted to wrapping up our formal training and transitioning to the “real thing.” We still had a final language test ahead of us and, of course, packing up and saying goodbye to our host families.

Each training village seemed to have multiple farewell events planned and I was able to go to a few of them besides my own. I was touched by the fact that at each if these events, some formal remarks were given that always included a plea for forgiveness from the host communities for any failings that we may have experienced as trainees in their care. This is a remarkable attribute of the Fijian people. Their culture and faith imply that they fall short in kindness and generosity when nothing could be further than the truth. Fijians willingly and openly share everything with each other and strangers alike. I found my sadness at the end of this chapter came from my sense that I had missed an opportunity to match them in this aspect. I felt I should be asking them for their forgiveness.

My final language exam surprised me. I was expecting to duck in just under the bar, that is, enough to pass (a rating of “novice”). Somehow, I managed to score two levels higher. I’m not being modest  - I’m not sure how this happened. Well, actually, I have to credit my host father for spending time with me the night before the exam and teaching me a few sentences that would demonstrate that I had a certain level of confidence with the language: things that weren’t taught to us in the language sessions but would show that I’d picked up a few things from living in the community.

In Fiji, whenever you meet someone they ask you 4 basic questions: What’s your name? Where are you from? How old are you? Are you married? The other morning, I was riding the bus to Suva (the Capital city) and a young man hopped in, sat next to me and rattled off the questions. I answered as usual: Tevita (Fijian name), Washington DC, 46, no. In turn, I asked him his name and where he was going (that’s the 5^th question, by the way, or most likely the first question you get from anyone who already knows you and therefore the answers to the other 4). He said he was going to the university. Amused to be playing this game, I asked him how old he was: 18. And if he was married: a giggle, then no. “Good,” I said, “you’re too young.” We both are, I thought – and may have even said that out loud.

That got me thinking. I knew those standard questions would be part of the exam. And I knew the training manager who was going to be giving the exam was a single man in his 30’s – a very eligible bachelor here in Fiji. Now as part of the exam we are encouraged to ask questions, not just simply answer the ones asked of us, to demonstrate that we can have a conversation. I asked my host father to teach me how to say “Don’t rush. We’re still young.” So I was ready for the “are you married?” question. But as the exam progressed, it didn’t come. At the end, the examiner asked me if I had any questions. Yes, Filipe, I said (in Fijian, naturally), “O iko sa vakawati?”  “Sega,” came the reply. Then I waited.

Felipe:  “O iko?”  (And you?)                       Aha! Here’s my chance!

Me:        “Sega. Se bera.”                  (No. Not yet.)

Filipe:    “Oh. Oi.”              (Oh. I see)

Me:        “Sega na lega. Kua na vaka totolo. Se gone.         (No worries. Don’t rush. We’re still young)

Score! He laughed, brought the exam to a close and scored me at an “Advanced – Low.” Lialia (crazy!)

And so training ended on that high note. We spent the rest of the weekend in our village saying farewells (dinners, church services, grog sessions*) and packing up our things for the next phase of the adventure: Swearing in and transitioning to site.

*If I haven’t yet written about grog, google it (Fiji grog, Fiji kava, or Fiji Yagona).