Tuesday 28 October 2008

Hello again from the Sugar City

Helen: Yesterday was Diwali. In Edinburgh, where it's almost conversation-worthy when you see someone who's not white they're so few and far between, Diwali is an excuse for a big outdoor party - they build a huge bonfire and burn two enormous effigies of Hindu gods. There's lots of loud Bhangra music and dancing and curry flows all night. At the medical school my mother teaches at in London, the Hindu students prepare an all-singing-all-dancing extravaganza for months before the big day. So, I think we should be forgiven for thinking that, in a city of 45,000 people, half of whom (at least) are Indian, Diwali should have been a big deal. It wasn't. It really wasn't!! Apparently people decorate their homes with lights (and there is a competition to out do your neighbours like there is in the UK with Xmas lights) but that's in the residential areas. In town, shopkeepers had put nightlights outside their doors, with orange flower blumes, and they had chalked drawings/stencilled patterns in coloured flour on the pavements (presumably for good luck). But that was it. So, C and I sat in the cockpit of Yamana with our beer, listening to Bhangra watching the fireworks erupt around the city (reminded us of watching the fireworks from Calton Hill on Nov 5). I think it's interesting that people seem to make the biggest fuss about their cultural identity when they are the minority (Edinburgh and London) and not when their the majority as they are here (it's the same in the Borders in the UK - they sound much more Scottish in the Borders than they do in Inverness - probably because they are closer to the English and want to emphasise their differences?) People are strange.

Other things to tell you (you'll have to endure bullet format I'm afraid as everyone else is champing at the bit to get to lunch):

- we went to the cinema on Monday after all - we plumped for a spoof called Disaster Movie instead of the horror flick (I just can't cope - they give me nightmares for months) or the Bollywood film (C just downright refused). Don't go and see it. For the love of God, don't go and see it. It was so unimaginably bad that we actually left half way through. We have never left the cinema before the end of a film before, despite talking about it often. This time we did and it felt good :). We've taken two long bus journeys recently too (back and forth from Suva/Lautoka) and been treated to in-bus 'entertainment' both times - where do all these awful films come from? I just didn't realise they were out there. I thought it cost millions and millions to make a film. How can there be so many bad ones out there? Who pays for them? Who buys them? C also thinks the same about the music here - it is drivel - it really is - it's all soft R&B rubbish. But then, I pointed out to him that if you spent a few months in the UK and only hung out in places where they played popular radio (shops, hotels etc...) you might think that all British people liked Will Young and Britney Spears...

- we went to the dodgiest tattooist ever in Suva - it was dark, creepy. Oooohhhh horrid. God knows what we would have ended up with if we had got a tattoo! Probably some nasty disease... (Interestingly, tattooing doesn't seem to be a very big thing here - it's huge in French Polynesia and Samoa, but not really here - girls used to get their upper thighs tattooed as a rite of passage to woman hood, but, you guessed it, this got banned when the missionaries arrived and it never really got reintroduced like it did in Polynesia)

- we finally managed to find (after much effort) a copy of Time magazine in Suva - so now we're all up to date with Obama vs McCain... Fingers crossed. Also found an old copy of American Scientific which C thought would be interesting, but after a couple of hours reading it he was seething that it was all 'soft science' and worse than none at all!! There's no pleasing some people...

OK that's all. Did a massive shop today (at the spectacular market) and now all stocked up with tins and fresh veggies for the big passage. Apparently the weather looks good for leaving tomorrow, so if you don't hear from us for a while we're probably out there sailing!

Bye for now
Lots of love
H&Cxxx

PS. I realised yesterday that it's just over a year since I left work (Oct 26th). Can't decide if that seems like a short time or a long time away....
PPS Lautoka is the Sugar City - they are famous for their sugar cane here - its piled high by the side of the road, and gets shipped into town on a minature railway. V cute.

Sunday 26 October 2008

Suva

Helen: Here we are in the Big Smoke - well, everything is relative - this is the biggest city in the Pacific...and it's not even as big as Edinburgh! Still, have managed to get new glasses (woohoo, can actually see clearly for the first time in several months) and been out to dinner. Thinking about going to the cinema too...but can't decide between average Hollywood horror flick or Bollywood film - think when in Rome we ought to do what the Romans, or in our case, Indians, do...but having a hard time convincing Mr P who thinks (probably rightly) that it will be full of dancing and singing. Never been his strong point!

Thought we'd get to do some shopping too...but have discovered cameras and laptops are fiendishly expensive here compared to the internet so will wait. Oh well. Oh, and we went to the Fiji museum too - C predictably made a beeline for the exhibits on canabalism. Strangely, even though the museum was a history of Fiji, there was no mention anywhere of the huge Indian influx which happened 150 years ago.

Not much more to tell - heading back to Yamana in Lautoka tomorrow.

Hxx

PS bus journeys here are most amusing - great big Fijian ladies next to tiny wee Indian ladies - makes me think of Fattypuffs and Thinnifers :)

Friday 24 October 2008

Lautoka

Helen: Short post today - not feeling particularly inspired - but thought I ought to write to let you know that we're not in Suva after all. No, we did what cruisers are wont to do - we listened to gossip on the cruisers' grapevine that said Suva was a big, stinky, rainy waste of time, so at the last minute we went north instead of south from Ovalau, dodged numerous reefs (God knows how people survived here without GPS) and ended up in Lautoka on the west coast. It's a big, bustling Indian city full of palm trees, colourful saris and yummy curry smells. Not much to do here, but people watching is fun and it should be a good place to spend Diwali - the Hindu festival of Light which is on Tuesday. We might even set off a few out of date flares to join in with the merriment.

C and I might embark on our own overland trip to Suva for a couple of days (not sensing much enthusiasm from Mr P though - he is 100% focused on getting to NZ at the moment and anything not furthering that cause is surplus to requirements) and then it's off for a few days swimming at Musket Cove (near the island where Tom Hanks filmed Castaway apparently) before we finally set sail for NZ (Horribly aware that I've said that several times now - hope we're not still here for Xmas!)

OK, said it would be short
Lots of love
Hx

Tuesday 21 October 2008

Fish and moldy cheddar

Helen: It's been a while since the last post because we've been out and about exploring remote Fijian islands - some of them are so removed from civilisation that the settlements don't even have electricity let alone internet access. One place we stopped (Kioa island) had a generator that ran on coconut oil, and they only had electricity from 6-11pm. This didn't stop them offering to turn the generator on as an exception for us so that our American friends could watch the Presidential debate betweeen McCain and Obama on TV! (Alice, the skipper's wife, keeps calling Obama 'Osama' - bit of an unfortunate slip of the tongue!) A bit further up the coast we stopped at Albert Cove which was even more remote - only a handful of thatched 'bure' (houses) and no power at all. But, the women were still enormous. Like huge beached walruses. How they manage to get, and stay, so fat is beyond me, when it seems that all they have to eat is fish, papaya, taro and banana. I guess they just don't do any exercise at all as there is nothing to do?

Now we're in Levuka, on the island of Ovalau, about 80 miles from the capital Suva. We were all excited about arriving as the guidebook waxed lyrical about historic buildings (this town used to be the capital of Fiji) and things to do. (One of the historic buildings, The Masonic Lodge, was burned to a crisp in the 2000 coup becasue the Methodist church told the locals to revolt as the Masons were in league with the devil and had tunnels from the Lodge in Levuka, through the centre of the earth to Masonic HQ in Scotland. Surprisingly, the guidebook says, these rumours turned out not to be true! (As another aside, when we were in Savu savu we heard that the only people allowed to hunt and eat turtles were Methodists so some enterprising bod had printed a load of t-shirts that said 'Save a turtle - eat a Methodist'. Unsurprisingly, these t-shirts were promptly banned)). So, where was I? Oh yes, full of excitement for arriving in Levuka... What the guidebook didn't tell us was that the whole town smelled of fish!! There is a big fish processing plant upwind of us, and, in the same way that Edinburgh smelled of hops/marmite/baked potatoes from the brewing, this place smells of fish. Reminds me of Unhygenix from Asterix...

C is causing quite a stir here with his dreads and tattoos - but everyone is v friendly. It's much more Fijian here than Indian. C said yesterday that Fijian faces are much more African looking than Polynesian - sure there's some interesting history there.

OK, that's probably enough for now. Heading out to explore Ovalau today and then setting off for Suva tomorrow night (we think). Then it's provisioning and getting ready for The Big One - we'll be watching the weather closely and could leave for NZ any time in the next couple of weeks. Exciting...and scary...

Lots of love
H&Cxx

PS. Meant to say earlier - being on Yamana is a bit like being on a Vogon spaceship at times :)

PPS. C just reminded me of something else I have to tell you about - when I first came to stay with the Panks all those years ago I never used to get the hundreds of in jokes (inspired by Blackadder, Reggie Perrin, Monty Python etc...). Well, I didn't get where I am today without making up a few of my own - Yamana is now well and truely Pankified and probably a complete mystery to the uninitiated. When we first got on Ruben had designed a 'ranking system' based on cheeses - from 'Moldy Cheddar' through 'Camel-Bear' and 'Rock-Fall' all the way to the heady heights of 'Wensildale'. After a week of promotions and demotions on this system at his whim, C created his own based on cars, with Ferrari F50 at the top and Trabantz at the bottom. A month on and we have 5 different ranking systems (for 6 people!): Cheese, Cars, Supermarket chains, Flowers and Fruit. The latest area of interest causing promotions and demotions is ability to cut slices of bread - within specifications (eg. 5mm) and with as little variation as possible. Pete is today searching for the vernier calipers so that he can adjudicate more accurately than the ruler allows.

Sunday 12 October 2008

Treasure hunting and other thoughts

Helen: Still not feeling 100% and now C has joined in too. In fact the whole boat is awash with snotty tissues - we arrived back to find the rest of the crew had got ill too. Yuk. What I really need now is my Virgin Atlantic pyjamas (for lounging about in when I'm sick) and my Asterix tapes (yup, TAPES - remember them?). Ever since I was a little girl whenever I felt ill my mummy used to put on tapes of Willie Rushton reading Asterix adventures. Wonderful stuff - Asterix rescuing Getafix from the Circus in Rome or Julius Cesar beating the Brits because they refused to fight after 5pm or at the weekends, and kept stopping for 'hot water' breaks as they hadn't discovered tea yet.... Only problem was, I usually fell asleep before the end of a side, so I only know the first parts of each tape - never the endings!

But, never ones for sitting still we've still been out exploring. There's a great web site called www.geocaching.com where you can look up hidden treasure. People hide treasure and then enter the 7 figure GPS coordinates so you can go and find it. You take something along and swap it for some of the hidden goodies. Did it with the kids yesterday - ended up in a lady's garden digging with her, her son, her sister and, finally the gardener (who had found the treasure and moved it!!) Lots of fun - very Indiana Jones :)

Two other noteworthy things have happened - I dragged C along to 'Bollywood Night' at the yacht club - I thought it would be lots of Indian music, food and dance, with lots of locals and cruisers. Oh no. Got there (wearing my fantastic new trousers, that C says make me look like a genie) and didn't recognise a single person. Felt a bit like being back at work and turning up at a conference. Took a couple of deep breaths and then just launched myself into a few conversations. What a wierd bunch of people! It turns out they are all the ex pats who own all the resorts on the island. You never see them in town, but they have their own seperate community. None of them are sailors, but they seem to congregate around the Yacht Club. None of them were very friendly either so we didn't stay long - but it was interesting to see this whole other culture that we didn't know existed here. Made us wonder if we could ever really live anywhere other than the UK (or somewhere similar in culture) - if we did would we end up gravitating towards the same ex pat community? Hope not...

The other thing that happened was that we met a man who really challenged my thoughts about him. He is a white South African, and has seen some horrific things in his life - rape, torture, war, family members murdered, that sort of thing. In the course of talking to him about these things he uttered the words 'I hate all Blacks. The only good Black is a dead one'. I didn't really know what to say or do after that. My middle class upbringing didn't really have an answer. C challenged him on it by saying he didn't like to be judged by the colour of his skin and so didn't like doing that to others, but we soon steered the conversation onto less controversial topics. But it made me think. In other respects the man was pleasant enough. I could have spent an evening chatting to him. But, knowing what I know now about his unrepentent attitudes, I'm not sure I could just gloss over that part of his character and carry on as normal. C and the rest of the Yamana crew said 'oh, well, it's understandable after what's happened to him' - maybe it is. And maybe I'd've turned out the same way if that had happened to me. But, surely, that doesn't excuse his attitudes? Hope I'm making myself clear - it's really got me thinking....

Right, time to go. We're off to a few little anchorages and should be in Suva by the end of the month in time for Diwali (when we're going to set off some of our out of date flares - hope they won't be noticed among the other fireworks for the Festival of Light!)

Bye for now

Hxx

Sunday 5 October 2008

Feeling snotty in Taveuni :(

Helen: Well, it had to happen sooner or later. I haven't been sick for at least a year and now, one measly week after the kids on our boat went to school with OTHER PEOPLE and came home all snotty, I have a horrid, stinking cold. My head hurts, my nose is running and I have a sore throat. Not a happy camper today :( But a camper nonetheless - we are having a week off from the boat (yes, that would be a 'holiday from a holiday') and have made it to the island of Taveuni. We're camping about 6 feet from the high tide water mark on a beautiful white sandy beach with a reef and clear blue sea. Only problem is it rains. It rained all last night and most of today. It's not like this on the main island. Just here. Think it's because of the big mountain here... We couldn't go hiking today as the roads were all slippery from the rain, but we did get taken to see the 180 meridian. Not the world's most exciting tourist destination...but we had our picture taken by the sign (and then C got his handheld GPS out and found out where the 'real' 180 degree line is - about 20 feet to the right (but then, this is the same handheld GPS that told us we were 12 metres above sea level one time when we were sitting on the beach with our toes in the water...)

It's lovely to have some time off the boat. The people we're with are great...but there's only so much time you can spend together without going mad. C has been alright this last week as he's been fixing the rudder with Pete. They get on really well and also have a job to do - I don't have any focus though, and not much in common with Alice, I reckon she feels my offering to help clean or sew or whatever is my way of saying the boat is dirty or needs repairing. It's not like that at all, I just want to help, but maybe she just feels that I'm trying to take over her home. Anyway, for whatever reason, I've been bored silly the last week (there's only so much sewing one woman can do) so it's good to have a project again. It has made me think about what I want to do when I get home too - made me realise that not having anything to do is not fun. At all. Neither is working all the hours that God sends. But doing nothing sucks - which is not an intuitive thing to say and an important lesson to have learned. So, as is so often the way, compromise is the way forward.

Actually, we're learning things about ourselves all the time. For example - Mr P needs to be less negative. We got the bus and a ferry here, and all C could say about the journey was that the bus was late and overfull and dusty and uncomfortable. It wasn't until other people started being seasick that he started to perk up (when I pointed this out to him though he said 'well, I'm not nice, am I - you knew that') I, on the other hand, tried to enjoy the different smells, sensations, views and ways of life. For instance - to you and me, a packed lunch is a sandwich, an apple and a packet of crisps or something similar. Out here, even on a dusty busy bus, lunch is a full on curry with roti, served out of several containers onto plates with knives and forks. Fried fish at 8.30 in the morning anyone?!

OK, probably better go. Sounds like it's stopped raining.

Lots of love
H&Cxx

PS did I mention that I'm writing this at a computer in a supermarket? Wierd.