Final post

Finally back to Australia after the 3 days of my non-work holiday. Got a cold after diving, but it still worth it to see the beautiful underwater world of Fiji.  It is so cold in Canberra,miss the hot weather in Fiji, miss Suva so much. I am still on my Fiji biological clock, weak up in the early morning and fall asleep very early at night (which is good for my health). Still feel like I am in Fiji and want to say bula to everyone on the street. Still on my Fiji time, push everything to the very end and just get it done before the deadline.

 I think the most valuable thing I learned from the days in Fiji is patient. You will never know when will the boat come, you will never know what are you waiting for and you just wait. There will always be a way to solve the problem. If you cannot change something, there must be someone can do that. That is the Fiji way of doing things and I found that is a very positive attitude to our life. Fiji has the most friendly people in the world, you can see all the people smiling on the street. I found that sometimes I pushed myself too hard in the past several years. After this Fiji trip, I should re-consider about my future, what is the thing I really want for my life, live happily like Fijian and take my time and enjoy my life.

Finally thanks for all my group members, Vinaka Vakalevu! See you next year on campus.

Farewell Dinner+Morning Tea

It comes to the end of the journey, get ready to go back to Australia. The plan for the last week is just one day work to finish up our projects, farewell dinner, farewell party and the farewell morning tea at the department.

The overall experience of the trip is incredible, it is great to have this opportunity to visit Fiji in this way and see Fiji from a different angel. Thank you for all the staffs in FAC and all the conservatorium students to be here with us for the 3 weeks. I feel like I didn't do much to change financial situation in FAC, but I tried my best to get my work done.

I really enjoyed the time I spent in Fiji, although got around 90 mosquito bites and the Fiji timing drive me crazy at the very beginning, I will say that I love Fiji! I am going to miss the days that wake up at 7:30 in the morning, going to work at 9am with other 8 friends, working with the loud Indian music and Christmas coral across the street. I am going to miss out those nights sitting in the living room and having the circle of laugh. I am going to miss out the days play pool with boys. I am going to miss the annoying cat, although I am a cat hater. Finally I am going to miss all the staffs in FAC, my supervisor Tulia and all the com students. Thanks for the morning tea at the department. I know that people make all the cakes from the evening of the previous day and finish making the cakes just before the morning tea! Thanks for the gift, the lovely fan, from the organisations. I am really grateful to be in Fiji for the 3 weeks.

Vinaka Vakalevu!   

farewell dinner

with Tulia, my supervisor

family photo for FAC

last day,last photo at FAC

farewell morning tea at the department

Levuka

Levuka is the old capital of Fiji which located on Ovalau Island. Levuka is founded by traders and settlers as early as 1830 and becomes the capital of Fiji in 1874. As Levuka is a small town and has problems to growth as a capital, the capital move to Suva in 1877, in this case, Levuka is  the capital of Fiji for only 3 years.Although I know that Levuka is a small town, I was still shocked by how tiny the town is. The town centre is only one street with several supermarkets and restaurants there and it only takes 10 minutes to walk along the street.

Waiting for the ferry,Levuka is on the other side of the island

Ovalau Island

Mosi is running a lodge in Levuka, it is a nice place called Mary's Lodge. We saw Mosi when we get off the bus. The amazing thing is that most of the people in the bus know Mosi, I think that might be  because Levuka   is so small that everyone knows each other.

Mary's Lodge

Levuka is the place that Fijian used to be. There are less tourism and commercial. It is pity that the weather was very hot on the second day we arrived Levuka. I was staying at the lodge for the whole day, sitting in front of the fan and go through the history of Levuka. Levuka is famous for many fiji's firsts,It was the site of Fiji's first bank, post office, school, private members club, hospital, town hall, and municipal government. Fiji's first newspaper, the Fiji Times, which is still in operation today, was founded in Levuka in 1869. Levuka's Royal Hotel is the oldest hotel in the South Pacific still operating. Historians have not ascertained its exact age, but records show that it was in existence by the early 1860s. Levuka Public School, opened in 1879, was the first public school in Fiji and many of Fiji's leaders in the years leading up to and following independence in 1970 were educated there. 

Picnic

Vadrai village, the name of the village we went to have picnic with Conservatoire students on Wednesday. Which near the beach that World War I and World War II that the army first landed Fiji, it is also the place that Indian first landed and the first beach in Fiji to have resort. The village is also the home village of Master Lai.

Master Lai is the son of the chief of that village, but when his father pass away, he was overseas and only 20 years old. His father's brother took over the responsibility and became the chief of the village, but when his uncle pass away or out of the village, Master Lai needs to take over the responsibility of the chief. 

During the time we stayed in the bus for other people to do the savusavu to the chief as tradition, one of the conservatory students told me some mystery things. Because there were many people dead during the War near the beach, some nearby villages can hear the cry at night. I think that is the reason that I didn't swim on that day....Although the sands are soft and the water is so warm. 

Because I didn't go swimming on that day, I had a talk with Master Lai of whether he likes living in Suva or living in the village. He said, sometimes when he wants to get out of the life in the busy city,he will just go back to the village, lay down somewhere near the beach and under the coconut tree, read a book, no one is going to push you to work and you can get up whenever you like and you do not need to cook, just enjoy your life. That sounds terrific to me. Quite Fijian lifestyle, take your time and relax. But I know that I can never be a person like that.I think the most important thing I learnt from the 3 weeks working experience is patient. And take my time to do things. Everything will have a solution at the end, just no rush, go with the fallow and be positive with every  difficult I meet.

yummy lunch

It is sunny for the whole day, I can see everyone's smiling face. The lunch is very yummy and I think the two kids had a fun with us as well. This is my best picnic experience ever.Thanks for the hospitality of the conservatory students and thanks for master Lai to have us in his village. Although I got sun burned, still a lot of fun there.


Here I want to correct a mistake I made in my second post. According to Master Lai, Fijian needs to be at least 18 years old to get married. 

Beach House

The criminal things can not ruin my life, Friday afternoon, all of us pack up our stuff, leave the sulu and long skirts behind, escape Suva, the busy city we worked in for 2 weeks, running to the Beachouse to enjoy the pure relaxation for the weekend. The Beachouse Backpacker resort is located at Coral Coast, which is one of the popular tourism spots in Fiji.

Tourism is Fiji's fastest growing industry in terms of employment creation and foreign exchange earnings. The industry provides employment directly and indirectly to an estimate of 45,000 people which is more than 5% of the total population in Fiji. And the tourism industry generate 25% of Fiji's GDP for every year. While the largest part of GDP in Fiji is generate by exporting sugar.

Going to Beachouse is one of the things that I expect before I went to Fiji. And I was surprised by the beautiful view of beachouse. It is great that just lay on the beach, go swimming when you feel hot and play pool ball with some random guys there. One thing I found interesting is that the Coconut cafe actually has no fresh drinking coconut.

One highlight of the trip is that I went to catch the sunrise on the first morning. While I didn't planning to do that but I was locked out when I went back from the bathroom. It is about 5:30 in the morning and no one else is near the beach, only the two dogs and I. I was blocked by the two dogs on the way to the beach through the Bar. But finally I found a way with no dog block me and saw some lovely baby crabs. It is lucky for me to see the sunrise, although I cannot see the sun actually. I feel so relax at that time and also feel like I own the whole beach. That is quite a memorable experience and I really like the trip to the Beachouse! 

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baby crab

sun rise

sun rise

good morning!

Lost my wallet.....

After enjoying my Fiji time for the whole week, finally something happened to me. A sunny Friday morning, just finish working for the 2nd week and ready to go to Beach house, the horrible thing happened.

I decided to get 200AUD changed to FJD after our work and spend these money on the Beach house weekend. We went to a Money Exchange store near the FAC, on the way to MHCC, It was a bit strange that the door of that Money exchange is not closed. Normally Banks and Money Exchange Center will lock their door and a security guard just stand next to the door. It was strange but I didn't think much about it because we have 5 people walking together. I think I became a target for the thief the moment I walk out of the door of the Money Exchange Store.

It was crowded at the gate of MHCC at that day and a kid just stand in the middle of the gate to block people. And yes, they succeed, they separated all of our 5 people and use something to cut my bag to get the wallet out. I realized that just couple of minutes after that, when Lauran wants to get some money out from the Westpac ATM. The wallet I lost is not my original one, that is the one I bought from one of the lady at Kaba Island, there are only 2 cards, one Australia Credit Card, one China Unionpay Card and 353FJD I just changed from the Money Exchange. I was quite clam at that time as I remembered. This is not the first time of me lost my wallet, last time it happened in Chinatown in Melbourne when I was in my year 11. 200AUD is not a large amount for me but it is annoying when you know that someone just cut your bag and take your wallet out!

The funny thing I found is that my iphone 4s, my old phone and all other things are stay in my bag, those are  much valuable than just the 300FJD!! I called my bank in Australia and China to stop those two cards and send a new one to my home and followed a security guard in MHCC to see the security tape of the moment I walked into MHCC. There is one thing to mention that I was moved when my friends said that I am not by myself and they can get money for me if I needed.

That was the first time to walk into a Control room of other country's shopping centre. I was standing there for 5 minutes and watched a thief to stole something and get caught by the security of MHCC. On the wall of the control room, there are many pictures of the thieves with the stuff they stolen from the supermarket. I will say that Suva is not that safe, while everywhere around the world is not that safe as well.

After going through the security tape, it didn't catch the moment that the thief cut my bag, but we got some suspects eventually.I went to the police station to lodge my report as well.

police station, Suva

My Statement

I think this experience is worth to remember, I got many good friends out of it, I learned how to solve the problem overseas by myself and I know that I need to take care of all my stuffs when I travel around. I do not expect that I can get my wallet back, but I really appreciate those helped me and called me at that time. 

Fiji time!

"Hey, this is Fiji! You are here for holiday not hard work! Just take your time and relax!" This is what Venah said the other day and always saying when we ask more work to do. I know that we are not on holiday, we are here to work and study but I still cannot get into the Fiji time.

First of all, I want to talk about my trip to Kaba, which is the first workshop I went to with the FAC people. FAC is running the workshops in many villages to help the local villagers to learn how to make the arts,  pass on their traditions and make some money to build their own villages.

It is a long way from Suva to Kaba, I didn't mean the distance, I mean the time length. From the trip, I really find out how Fijian enjoy their life. As the traditonal way, chief guests will go before us, by becoming a good follower of the fiji time, we waited 1 hour for the boat to come, another 0.5 hour in the boat under the sun to wait for the chief guest to come and finally we get off the boat and need to wait for another boat to come!! The FAC people are still clam and happy, they are used to these kind of thing. I was getting a bit worries at that time. I was thinking that we might not go to the workshop today. But finally, we did it.

The chief guest we waiting for 1.5 hours

That was my first time went to the village, drinking kava as the tradition, I will say that it wasn't that bad! I like it. I found it interesting that Fiji people and sit there for a whole afternoon and drink kava for the whole afternoon. 

kids from Kaba island

The development in Kaba is not that good. Because they are far alway from the Viti Island, they just got the electricity in the recent years, the money of building the road comes from the women club. Women make crafts using the natural materials and sell them to the market to support their own villages. In Fiji, it is hard to separate the culture and economic.


Comparing to Kaba, Bau is much richer and people lives at a better life condition. The history of Fiji was starting at Bau, the chief of Bau is the highest chief of Fiji. I will say that the rules in Bau are quite strict than any other islands I went to for the past few days. We cannot wear shoes, cannot tie our hair at Bau. Girls should walk after boys and walk in a straight line, this shows the power of man is greater than woman.If we say anywhere in Fiji maintain the most of Fiji's traditions, I would say Bau. But the thing is that the chief of the Ratu village is not that strict as I think. He was smiling all the time and use the camera to take photo of us, checking his mobile phone all the time when other people are talking. He is nice, fashion and funny.

The chief of Bau is the first one to accept the Christianity, which has a significant influence on Fiji culture for the recent 200 years. After accept the Christianity, Fijian believe that this will help them to say goodbye to the old ages and have a bright future.

"family" photo with chief from Bau

A day out to the Museum and Craft Market

Pricing the arts pieces is part of my project. It is a challenge for me because I have never done the similar thing before. Actually I have never done any practical work before, what I can do is just the analytical work, tell stories based on the statistics collected from the Statistics Bureau.

My craft market research journey starts from the Fiji Museum. Tulia, whose the financial manager of the Arts Council has already contact the museum person before we were going there, because I need to ask some questions relate to the inside trading strategy. The museum shop is running by an Indian guy at the moment. He is so nice that answered every question I asked. The arts in the Museum Gift shops are with high quality and the price are relatively much higher than the craft market. I found out that a lot of Indo-Fijians are those with higher management skills, most of the shops in Suva are running by Indo-Fijian.


After visiting the gift shop in the Museum, we took a short tour in Museum and saw many beautiful arts works and some traditional things that the indigenous Fijian used back to the old ages.Masi is one of the traditional fiji arts and still be used today. Masi is the Fijian word for tapa or bark cloth and it is also the name of the paper mulberry tree.  Masi can be used as wall hanging and can be used as clothes for some formal traditional events. Women also use the painted Masi to design their own clothes.

                               Fiji traditional wedding wear, made from Masi and Magimagi

The next stop of my pricing research journey is the craft market.On the way to the craft market, the student from the conservatory told me that the life they lived after quitting Commonwealth is not as good as the life they live before. The currency devalued twice and I think Fiji will get less Western Countries support after quitting commonwealth. Those things reminded me of the financial condition in arts council.The government grand is 150000 each year towards to the arts council and there will be a value added tax which is 15% of the grand amount. Left over is only 127,500. Which is the only amount that the arts council will use to pay the salary to 6 people and the other expense to run the organisation  Which is far away from enough. The income for each person is quite low and there is only one person has an annual income exceed 15,000 and needs to pay the income tax. By looking at some statistics online, I found out that the GDP per capita in Fiji is only 4000 USD which is 10% of the GDP per capita in Australia.

The arts which sold in the craft market is different from those sold in the Museum. They have lower price and the customers are mainly Fijian. They make the Masi sell the Masi very quick and we can see many women making the Mat and doing the paint on the Masi just at the market. The hand made arts are very impressive. You can find many Fiji style jewelries and some small things at a very low price. I think if I am not an actuarial student, I would like to be a craft arts buyer, I can learn a lot from the arts and that would be very fun.

                                          the lady is doing the painting on the Masi

                                                           Making Mats

Welcome ceremony and get started

First Monday of the 3 and half weeks’ internship started with a cultural orientation and a traditional ceremony which organized by the department of heritage and arts, Fiji Museum, National Trust and Fiji Arts Council which are the organizations we are going to work with for the coming 3 weeks.

                                  

We all dressed up with t-shirt to cover our shoulder and the long skirt to cover the knee to show our respect to Fijian. From the culture orientation we know that the one important principal which the traditional Fijian culture based on is RESPECT. And the respectful protocol is a fusion of what has been passed on by the ancestral traditional way of living an and the influence of early Christian teachings. Also we learned about touching someone’s head is rude and the “tulou,tulou” thing as well.

At the museum, we are welcomed by the director of Fiji Heritage and art. The music students performed Savusavu in the most formal which lasted about 18 minutes!

                                  

                                                                    Performance

After the traditional ceremony, we went shopping with the music students. They are the friendliest people that I meet for the past 20 years! Not kidding. Fijian would like to know your background and relate their personal experience to yours to show that we have something in common. When they knew that I come from China they were trying to talk about some experience they got when they were performing for the 2010 Shanghai Expo. One of the girl even told me that she got a Chinese name Feifei which is named by the Chinese tour guide they had during the Expo.

On the way shopping, she pointed out the court house and the Suvavou house for me. The Suvavou house has many government departments in it, one of them is the marriage department. The law for marriage in Fiji is quite different with the one we have in Australia. Feifei said that people get married when they feel to do so. I think there is no age limitation and no difference between the people living in the villages and people living in the city.

I am going to work at the Fiji Arts Council for the next 3 weeks. The first day to work, I have already get some basic idea about what I can do and what I should do for my project. I will help the financial manager of the arts council to do some accounting work and help with the pricing work. I am really pleased to work in the FAC’s office with all the arts pieces around. I have never thought about being an arts student before and basically have no idea about arts. I think I will learn a lot from this internship experience.

some random shot from the arts council, the boat is the wining piece of 2010 Shanghai Expo

Bula Fiji

It is already a week since I arrive Fiji, but I would like to talk about the story from the very beginning. Actually my Fiji trip just starts 15 hrs after my last exam, but I couldn’t wait for it since a long time ago. This is my first time to Fiji and the first time I am traveling for a study program. Hopping it could be a meaningful experience in my life.

                                                                                                                       

I was taking the Air Pacific flight from Sydney to Nadi (which is the Fiji Tourist centre of Fiji). The flight trip wasn’t that bad but it was cloudy when I landed Nadi.

                           

                                                      Prepare for landing

The Republic of Fiji is an island nation which forms by 322 islands and the I taukei , Indian, Chinese, European and people formed the multicultural population.

I used to work in a fast food restaurant which owned by a Fijian that makes think that Fiji is not a poor country before I was doing the research. But when I actually landed, I feel like the time back to my hometown in China around 1990s. Everything is quite undeveloped, the car, the road, the traffic system, the department stores…..but anyway I was amazed by the hospitality of Fijian people. From the “bula” session at the airport to the smelling of the people at the hotel, I can feel that although they are living under a condition that I will concerned about, they can still being happy for everyday!

                               

                                                      Namaka Market in Nadi

The traffic condition is one of the interesting I found out in Nadi. There are rare street lights from the airport to the hotel and I didn’t see any traffic lights in Nadi, even in the town centre. People just across the street randomly but I didn’t see any accident happen on the street, which is good.

At the time I arrived colonial lodge was already Saturday night. Everyone was there reading, playing games and waiting for the dinner. This kind of residential hall lifestyle is something I was looking forward to for the past 2 years of my uni life. The host family is really nice and the cat is so cute!! Hope everything will be fine for the next 3 weeks.

                                

                                     first night at the lodge,playing the card game