The Fijian Diversion

Well before we start this excursion a short explanation of why we went is perhaps appropriate.

Being in Brisbane and some 4,000 kms closer to Fiji than Perth, if we ever were to go, surely now is the time. The objective was the revisit old haunts of the 70's when we lived in Fiji and hopefully meet up with Asantha the lady who helped in the house at Suva. Mike's view of that was pie in the sky - we knew her name and originally came from a village near Nandi.

The images below show that in the main all of our aims were met, except that there was no Fiji holiday in the normal sense.

The first major success was the revisiting of our old house. Old being the operative term, in our eyes it was a place of joy and happiness, since our time in Fiji certainly gave us that experience.

However now our lovely house on the hill with 2 acres of orderly wild Fijian bush has been transformed to a plot accommodating 6 new large houses all with walls and gates and our house sits atop the hill in a state of disrepair waiting to be demolished and replaced with another modern dwelling.

This is progress but we were glad to have made the pilgrimage.

There were many more photographs taken but this tells the current story, the past is long gone.

The weather during our stay was not all sunshine and tropical warmth, no in true Fiji style we experienced the full gamut of sunshine rain and storm.

This view was taken at 0800

This was 0810

But by 0820 normality had returned.

This is a picture taken from outside the local prison and demonstrates that prison life is not one any sane person aspires to.

The front wall extends some 100 meters alongside the main road from Suva to Nandi

It was when this image was taken that a strange event occurred.





Katherine was determined to have record of this wall so that we had a record of the artwork and ancient nature of the prison. Twice before we had tried to stop and take the photographs but either traffic or weather intervened.

This time whilst Katherine was taking the photographs a Fijian lady stopped and basically passed the time of day with Katherine and during the conversation it emerged that Katherine was looking for Asantha. The Lady was a little startled to say that this lady was her Auntie living near Singatoka.

Telephone calls later we met up with Asantha in Singatoka on our way to Nandi - Any explanation of the event would be welcomed??

The nature of our visit was to see Fiji as well as the nostalgia reasons, to this end when we arrived at Nandi it was pick up a car and turn left and keep going until we reached Nandi again.

This was the real Fiji not the expensive hotels or Suva commercial area. Just water, tropical trees and grass.





The next images are from the Suva Commercial area.

Fortunately or unfortunately it was a Sunday, all the other days we were there it rained nearly continuously.

Therefore the hustle and bustle is absent.

High rise is new

The gives a little more insight into the weather across the harbour.

Anther image of the Harbour with a Library boat moored to the dock.

This is a boat with over 60,000 books on board that travels around the world offering books for sale and promoting the word of the Lord.

Difficult to rationalise this on a financial and moral point of view.

This shows how one can enjoy the Pacific Islands in a very laid back style.

We visited the Suva Yacht Club that we were members of in the 70's. It was the same but different, still full of expat's but had changed from a sailing fraternity to a power boat type club.

Interesting conversations with the members though.

Again this shows the South Seas in it's rough state.

The view from the Crows Nest Hotel outside Singatoka was taken just before we dinned with the Fijian national rugby team.

Huge appetites but only drank soft drinks, they were in training for an upcoming international game, we were told after the game things would be different.

We cannot leave the impression it was all wind and rain this was poolside at Rakiraki, a tough Sunday breakfast here.

Finally our last drink in Fiji was poolside in Nandi.


Like the pool - reflections was the order of the day at this poolside.

Definitely glad we went since the reminiscences and joy of the Fijians gave us a great deal of pleasure.