FIJI!!!

ula, Bula!
(hallo, hallo

Finally after al this weeks cruising and living in fiji, i ve got the time (or the mood rather..)
to write some down and load some pics up.
First of all: its hot here.
Not only hot, but humid (feucht) also.
that means you shower, and 33 min later your sticky again.
But anyway, thats probably one of the few downsides of fiji.
Apart from that its, for me, a very interesting contry, with contains
2 main island (viti levu and vanua levu) and many smaller ones spread over several
hundred kilometers.
The people (57% fijians, 37% indienfijies,6% asiat and european)live either in the towns or in villages.
Villages have a low livingstandard, means they live in huts and get limited power from
generators or via solarpanels.
Many Fijians from the villages work in one of the by foreigner owned resorts close by.
Unfortionatly due to the current govermental difficulties, the tourism felt back to ca. 50 %
of the usual. New Zealand and Australian Goverment warn people of going to fiji.
I personally, and all yardies we have talked with yet, havent experienced any
problems with the officials, apart checking in to the country.
viele jachten werdenin einer bestimmten stadt beim einchecken um ca. 50-200 doller von den
beamten abgezockt).
There are a lot of christians in fiji. Apart from the indian-fijis (who were brought into the country by the british about 100 years ago, to work on the sugerplantations, but the british didnt bring them back home again…)
who are hindus mostyl.

The last weeks we spend with cruising around up to the yasawas, to remote islands,
to resorts etc.
Yardies are mostly everywhere welcome, but to anker in front of a village, they often have to
pay with “kaba”.
The “chiefs” reign the villages and the kabarute
is given to them as a payment to anker, or visit the village, in the cerenomy called “sevu sevu”.
Out of the rute, they prepare a drink (looks like dishwashingwater, tasts simular) with will be
drunk by the visiters, the chief and maybe some other villagers.
Kaba is one of the cultural items of Fiji.
The land in fiji is mostly owned by privat persons.
Every Fijian is supposed to own land in fiji, but many of them prefer to live in town and work there.

2 Weeks I spent in a settlement (small village) and in town with some missenionarys.
About 7 days I spent in the settlement, living with locals.
It was a good time, mostly I was in the resort “musket cove” and “plantation”
and played drums with some staff (mitarbeiter), who make music every day there(look at the pics).
I met many people form nz and australia there, and got invited by two couples, to stay with them in australia,
when I arrive there in a few weeks.
One of them even offered to get me a job in his company, if possible.

Today we re picking up a friend of another yard and spend then about 3-4 more weeks in fji.
After that we are going to venuatu, new caledonia and finally australia.

Al right, thats it for today,
Im looking forward to here from you guys!!

best regards from fiji!!