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