An experience not for the faint-hearted

I spent a week in Fiji. There’s only one experience that’s really worth writing about. I spent a night, two days in the Fijian mountains with a Fijian farming family. Here are the characters of the story:

The horse man. His job is to sell horse rides on the Wailoaloa beach, where the backpacker resorts are. This is how I ended up going to the farm in the first place.

The nephew, though a few years older than the horse man, who is his uncle. The nephew’s daughter, two years old, and his wife, who did not speak English. 

The old man, the horse man’s father, living out his days with his family.

The horse man’s brother, the owner of the place, I never met; he had had an asthma attack and had been taken to hospital in Nadi the night before I came to the farm. He stayed there for several nights. His wife, who sold vegetables in the market and could understand English but did not speak it.

One prearranged morning I met the horse man at Bamboo Backpackers and we took a taxi into Nadi. We walked around the market, he bought some food and bartered for a carrier to the mountains. Riding in the back, I got a glimpse of Fijian life; gravel roads, no seat belts, a cooling breeze going through the compartment. 

That first morning nothing much happened. It was hot, we lay in the shade and talked and napped. I put on suncream and insect repellent. The nephew’s wife made us food, with lots of chilli, and we drank milk tea from tin cups. We sat on the floor and ate with our fingers. We dipped into the river to wash off the sweat. It was, as the locals call it, Fiji time.

The family was of Indian descent. They spoke their own language (which they themselves called “Indian”) and didn’t distinguish between ‘he’ and ‘she’. They were Muslims, though the only external indications of this were the veils that the women wore and the calendar of the Fiji Muslim League on the wall. The food was Indian: curry, roti and puri, dahl soup. With so much fresh chilli. My stomach roiled for two days afterwards.

Roti, rice and spinach curry.

Making puri on a wood-burning stove.

The house was large, built of corrugated iron sheets and stone. The kitchen was a separate stone structure, to reduce the risk of a fire spreading to the rest of the house. The toilet was a pit, with slabs of concrete around the hole to squat on and corrugated iron sheets as screens. The house was definitely not mosquito proof, but more about that later. This experience was definitely not for the faint-hearted.

There were five dogs, definitely not pets. I didn’t see anyone touch them, not even the little girl, and the dogs got out of people’s way as soon as they approached. Chickens roamed the place, getting shooed away if they tried to come indoors. The chicks were kept in a cage until big enough to roam around with their parents. Goats had a large pasture to roam in during the day, being shut into their goat house at night. The small kids could squeeze through the fence, but they didn’t wander far.

In the afternoon the nephew came back from the hospital, where he had stayed with his father. He was the farmer of the family. He loved his goats, his bulls, his horse. He loved the mountains. He had worked in Suva, the capital, for a few years, but then came back to the land he loved. 

He took me to the waterfall that was the promised attraction of the trip. I rode bareback and with a rope halter on a 23-year-old mare. We left the horse tied to a tree at the top of the waterfall and clambered down, barefoot, over rocks and on an overgrown path to the bottom, where huge boulders sat in the stream. It was the beginning of the dry season and it hadn’t rained in a while, so the stream was only a trickle. We followed it down a ways, it was beautiful. He had a drink from the stream, I was too paranoid about catching a stomach bug.

 

View from the top of the waterfall.

Following the river.

Riding back from the waterfall.

In the evening, we had more Indian food and after that, kava. Kava is a popular drink in Fiji; it is made from the roots of the kava plant and has sedative and anaesthetic properties - and according to Wikipedia, also euphoriant and entheogenic properties, but I didn’t experience these. I could, however, feel my tongue going numb. 

Kava roots being sold in the market in Nadi.

I had been told that kava is the most disgusting drink ever invented (or words to that effect), but I didn’t think so. I actually rather enjoyed the taste; the earthiness of it brought me closer to the land. Spiritual nonsense, perhaps.

I didn’t sleep much that night. As the house was not mosquito proof, I hid underneath my blanket. And when I say hid, I really mean it. I only kept a small opening through which to breathe, otherwise I was covered head to toe. The problem was that it was incredibly hot. A few times I sat up for a few seconds to cool down, then it was under the blanket again. Once, I got up and went outside. It was blessedly cool. The landscape was hidden from view in the dark, but I could see the stars and the milkyway. It was beautiful and peaceful and if it hadn’t been for the mosquitoes I could have stayed there for hours.

Spot the Southern Cross.

The next morning, the first task was to fetch water. The nephew caught his working bulls and harnessed them in front of the water drum, which sat on an old car tyre. Then he drove the bulls to the waterhole. Literally, that’s what it was: a hole dug into the ground which tapped the water table. A well, in other words, though with no supporting structure around it. The nephew drew water with a bucket. The water looked clear despite the muddy environment and I felt obliged to have a drink of it for courtesy’s sake. I did not get ill. 

Fetching water.

After that, it was ploughing the field next to the house. The bulls pulled the iron plough round and round the field. I had a go at it and, unsurprisingly, it was hard work and required a substantial amount of coordination between directing the bulls (especially around the corners) and keeping the plough upright and digging into the ground. The nephew told me that his dream is to have a farm with one tractor and one car.

 

The horse man had a three-hour nap after “second breakfast” (a meal around 10 am), so again it was the nephew who took me for a horse ride. We went up the road to a high spot, from where you could see the whole mountain landscape. We sat there, the horse tethered to a tree, and talked about life in Fiji, families and marriage, plans for the future. The brother, who was still in hospital, called his son and wanted to talk to me. He asked me whether I had had a nice stay to which I replied, “Your son has taken good care of me and I love the mountains.” I wished him a speedy recovery. 

That afternoon a carrier picked up me and the horse man and he returned to Nadi, I carried on to the next valley and the (by comparison) luxurious Stoney Creek resort.

Privilege. I know this next list may seem like a list of clichés, but I’m trying to give you a sense of my own feelings when I spent two days with a farming family in Fiji. Even though we know what poverty is and that, for the most part, our own material existence is pretty well guaranteed, being surrounded by constant reminders of small and large privileges has a curious psychology. How to balance the feeling of powerlessness with the urge to do what you can to help? How to maintain respect and build friendship rather than succumb to either pity or anguish? 

Privilege is having two pairs of shoes and a pair of flip flops - and that’s just with me on the trip. Washing yourself in a hot shower rather than a river. Having another set of clothes to sleep in. Privilege is having a washing machine and owning a headlamp. Having a carpet rather than a sheet sewn together from old bags of “Punjas Flour”.

Privilege is having to say “I don’t actually have a smart phone” (which I had to repeat over and over in Finland) and digging out an old Nokia with a broken screen because I prefer it, rather than because the Nokia held together by tape is the only option. Privilege is the feeling of relief that I left the smart phone at home, so I could pretend I didn’t have one. 

Privilege is being able to flick the lights on without having to first turn on the diesel generator. And not having to listen to the noise of my electricity being produced. And being able to charge my mobile phone at any time of day rather than only in the evening, when the generator is switched on for lighting. 

Privilege is not having to worry about the $15 that the asthma inhaler costs. Claiming to be “the poor student” on holiday in Fiji.

Privilege is being able to walk to the supermarket and buy cucumbers, rather than having to wait until the ones you planted are ripe and picking them in the dark using a borrowed headlamp. 

Privilege is being handed the pencil when writing down a phone number is too arduous for a 36-year-old man who only went to school for three years.

There is a certain kind of privilege also in living in Fiji time, owning a waterfall and being surrounded by gorgeous mountain views. I still know exactly which kind of privilege I would rather have.

Mine is the privilege of choice.

Sugar cane and the house.