We’ve met so many locals over the past month.
A few weeks ago walking back from the Wongs house we were called up to drink Kava with another family of Indian and Fijian mix. There were so many family members and I was so tired I can’t recall their names at the moment, but I will have to make an effort to at some point because we were told we’d be invited back for Curry Night soon. They had us laughing for the two hours we were there. They are hard working people and a smart bunch. They read anything they can get their hands on, which is usually a range of formulaic spy and romance novels to the odd literary classic. It turns out their one daughter of about 15 or 16 is not only an avid reader but also has a passion for writing. Her mother told us she can tell when her daughter is thinking of her stories because she goes quiet with this far away look in her eyes. The father told us she also stays up writing to the middle of the night writing with pen and paper by candlelight.
Just after New Years we were called by Stephen Wong to go to a place in town called The Planters Club. It’s a place where you have to either have a membership by purchase, be a guest of a member, or as the sign says outside the front gate, be a Bona Fide Visitor to Fiji to gain access to the club. Since we were guests of Stephen and only temporary residents all was well and we entered the old establishment. This is a club that’s been around since the mid 1950’s, established by a group of British settlers including Smiths, Haynes and Simpsons. There’s a deep sense of heritage to this club and on the right half of the building, where there’s a large dance area mostly filled with rowdy rugby viewers, the walls are lined with photographs of the original founders and the progression of the club over the years. Each picture is accompanied by the names of the individuals and always a remark about them ‘enjoying a cold beer’.
The left half of the club is were the bar is, and at the back of the bar area is a large open window to serve drinks to anyone playing on the snooker tables in the back section of the club. From the side and stretched around the front of the building on the bar half is an open air, covered balcony. On a Friday or Saturday the Planters Club is hopping with music, and a group of people knocking back a few and eager to chat until your jaw hurts and your ears burn. We were pleased at the eclectic group of individuals we’ve met so far at The Planters Club. So far we’ve met a Czech who’s an engineer and can fix pretty much anything that you could possibly bring him. He also is very sure that his opinion is correct about everything even if he is wrong. But damn is he funny and has a gift to keep a conversation going that sometimes borders on exhaustion. We’ve met two Americans, one a Conspiracy Theorist who once lived next to Area 51 and can fill your head with so many ideas and confusing and conflicting theories your eyes start to cross…and no it’s not just the Fiji Bitter. The second American is a friendly guy who has a shifty and shady background mainly because that is what he’d have you believe, especially if you’re a woman he’s trying to impress. We’ve met a Chinese man named Sing Lee, who is a mechanic for all size engines. He’s a good friend of Stephen Wong and one Saturday evening after an afternoon at the club we were invited up to his house for Kava and beer and great conversation. Most visits to anyone’s home in Fiji consists of endlessly entertaining the ever present curious children of the house and it was no difference at Sing Lee’s. And although it’s exhausting, nothing could be more fun and fulfilling. At the Planter’s Club we’ve also met a British man named Malcolm who, after several hours of conversation, invited us up to his home in the bush a few miles outside Savusavu, but we’ll talk about that later. Regardless, everyone we meet there is a character from one classic novel or another and certainly among the most memorable of people a person could ever meet.
The Planter’s Club is a great place to go to be social and meet the locals, but there’s another attraction. They have what they call the Joker Draw every Saturday at the club. How it works is every week you buy as many tickets at 2 bucks a piece that you want and if your name is drawn you go to a cork bulletin board under lock and key. Behind the glass is an entire deck of playing cards pinned to the board face down. If your name gets called from your ticket it grants you the privilege to turn one card. If you turn the Joker, you get the jackpot. If you turn anything else, you win a sigh of relief from the crowd thinly veiled as a disappointed groan, and afterwards some pats on the back and kind words of sympathy and often some free rounds. The catch is, for every week there’s a loser there’s one less card to choose from and the larger the jackpot grows. Right now it sits at an impressive $4800 and only 4 cards…We are sooooo going to be there next Saturday afternoon.
The weather’s been all over the place. A week of sun and then a week of rain. A week ago Monday we woke at 5:30am to winds just screaming through the trees and around the house. Blowing our laundry off the line. A tropical depression was heating up directly overhead and by the time it left Savusavu Bay and shifted westward it was given a new status and a name. Cyclone Gene. It caused some wind damage and flooding here in Venua Levu but was far less forgiving on the main island Viti Levu. Flooding and wind damage was widespread and merciless and 6 people died as a direct result of the storm. As well, because of the stormy weather, the fishermen can’t fish and the ferries have been postponed, one is reefed indefinitely. So needless to say the cost of living in Savusavu has been skyrocketing and will likely remain that way for a few weeks.
Tara’s former workmate from New York, Anna, was able to come visit us. She’s been living and working for the past 2 years in Sydney Australia (lucky her). So being such a short distance away and on her vacation time it was only natural she come. We were worried that, although Cyclone Gene had done its damage and moved on westward beyond the islands, her flight would be delayed or even canceled. So it was a great relief when we checked in on the flights that morning and found Anna’s flight was only delayed by a half hour. Anna arrived last Saturday morning at the tiny little Savusavu Airport and were we picked her up and took her directly to Aunty Lilly’s Café for breakfast of egg, sausage and taro. From Aunty Lilly’s we came up to the house and relaxed and chatted during the day before going to the Planter’s Club for the Joker Draw. Poor Anna. It was a bit of a baptism of fire on her first day as all these elderly gents we’ve come to know as harmless old inebriated flirts converged on her as the fresh single blood in town. That was last Saturday, the day I met the Brit named Malcolm.
The thing about Malcolm is, Tara had already met him a few weeks before while having coffee at the Copra Shed one afternoon while I was here at the house writing. But, that Saturday at the Planter’s Club, Malcolm had no recollection of meeting her when Tara reminded him.
He asked her, ‘Was I drunk?’
Tara said, ‘No.’
Malcolm goes, ‘Uh oh!’
I’m guessing he probably was.
But we all had a good laugh over that and continued chatting. We talked for some extent about literature and writing, which we share a passion for, as well as global politics and philosophy. He informed me that a few years back he and two other yachtie ‘blokes’ formed and founded the Fiji Philosopher’s Club. They met once a week with hand-written notes of whatever ideas and thoughts and theories that came to them throughout the week and discussed them in the livingroom of Malcolm’s home over wine. He chuckled a little when he explained that the club dissolved when the two yachties ended up doing what yachties do when they eventually set sail and left Fiji. Before we parted ways Malcolm invited us up to his home. We told him we’d love to come up and visit him and his Fijian wife Filo (fee – low) and Malcolm suggested we make plans right there on the spot for a day and time or it might never happen. So we decided on Wednesday at 11:00am. We met him and his wife at the Copra Shed, bought some supplies, and headed off to their home. It was interesting and heartwarming to drive through a few villages and have children and adults alike smile and wave to you through windows and from doorways as they watched with curiosity when we passed through. The rough and muddy roads reminded us how fortunate we were that Toby extended us the use of his Toyota 4x4. But it was great fun.
It’s strange, but anything you’ve never experienced before and is new and exciting and adventurous in some far away place, it always feels like a scene from a movie you’re acting in but just don’t realize it. It’s like in that one moment you’re the audience and the actor.
Once you drive up to Malcolm and Filo’s and park there is a large stream you walk over on a small cement overpass bridge. Then up a slight hill and over another stream. This one you cross by walking across a 2x8 plank. Then its up a grass path and walkway walled by various hedges and egg plants and orchids and gardens as far as you can see on either side growing every vegetable and fruit imaginable. Finally you reach the modest and simple home. Around the back of the house is a short path that leads to a shaded creek with a large clean pool for bathing or swimming. We met Filo’s mother and her two nieces they have been taking care of while Filo’s sister is off getting her education in Suva. After a light lunch we took a walk further up the mountains and into the bush. We were shown several crystal clear streams and creeks that all connect and run together down the mountain to the Savusavu Water Reserve. On the way up the view was stunning as the sun burnt away the fog and mist and slowly exposed the layers and layers of surrounding jungle covered mountains. We reached the goal of our walk which was a natural water reservoir in the flowing creek, deep enough to swim in and exposed enough to also get some sun on the large black volcanic boulders surrounding the creek. The little 3 year-old girl Victoria stripped down to her undies and dove in…she was the bravest and the smartest of all of us in that moment and we were all envious of her.
We were invited back anytime to go swimming in that fresh water creek and you can bet you’ll be reading about it here sooner than later.
It also turns out that Malcolm plays the banjo and has a friend that plays mandolin and ukulele. So now I’m dying to get my hands on a standard acoustic with steel strings and go rip up the airwaves over Savusavu with some good old fashion hillbilly blue grass and delta blues.
Tara’s photography has been stunning. To me they look like the kind of photo’s you’d see in National Geographic. Be sure to take your time and look at each one carefully. There’s a little story behind each one…
