I Have Been a Snob

I admit it. I have been a beer snob, a food snob, a wine snob, a music snob, a comedy snob…you get the idea. Here is the thing. In a previous version of Brian, there was good music/humor/etc and bad music/humor/etc. In Fiji, innovation breaks new boundaries for non-existence. Something is good if it adheres to what came before it. Listening to contemporary Fijian music sounds almost exactly like Fijian music from 1970. Jokes get told and retold and told again and every time get uproarious laughter. Here is the problem—the music and the jokes aren’t particularly good (copy that for the beer and food). Upon arrival, I did a lot of not laughing and plugging my ears on the bus.

But over time, something has been happening to me. I find myself laughing at the joke I have heard countless times. Worse, I find myself telling the joke. I now have my favorite set of Fijian songs and have learned to play and sing them myself. I love the food here and even the beer…nope the beer is terrible. In looking back I realized a few things about this change. The first is that in the US, we have a bunch of musical choices and for some reason, we have decided to tie our identity to a particular style. If you live in rural parts, you listen to country. If you are black and live in urban America you listen to rap. If you live in Portland, you listen to whoever no one else has ever heard of. But there is no middle ground. I listen to rock not country or I listen to jazz not rap. Well, the good news is that in Fiji, there is just Music. There are not styles. Everyone listens to Music and everyone loves music. On a bus, you can hear Christian rock, pop, reggae, and rap all in a row and everyone sings along, young and old.

It was this very music that I scorned. Occasionally, I would find myself in a bar where this steady stream of “bad” music would be played, and the previous version of myself would sit and scorn the music poking jabs at the song’s lyrics and contrived melody. Meanwhile, people are dancing and having a great time. The same is with the retread, basic humor. The old me snickers at the people not the joke, because how can they think that this is funny. Well, here is my lesson for the day. When I refuse to enjoy particular music that is on or to laugh with others at a stupid joke, who wins? Me? Who is having a better time, the one dancing or the one mumbling something about how much they hate rap? What have I proven by not enjoying myself while others are? Am I better than they are?

I don’t want to be a music/food/humor snob anymore. (I’m keeping wine and beer; good wine is good wine and bad is definitely bad). I want to laugh and dance, preferably with others. The music and the joke are just the medium for us doing the things that give us life anyway: laughing and dancing, preferably at the same time.

Things around here are going well. We just had a visit from the Regional Director of Peace Corps. He is sort of a big deal. There are only 3 PC regions in the world and he runs the one that includes the Pacific and Latin America. He came to Fiji and wanted to visit one village. So, they sent him to our village, and the village did it up right. Of course, their excitement over his arrival came about a little dishonestly. You see, when I told the village who was coming, I explained that he was just under the Director of Peace Corps and that the Director answers directly to the President. That is all true, but you can see the natural thought flow if you do that in reverse. It goes Obama, PC Director, Regional Director. The second in line to Obama is coming to our village!

I tried to explain that there are many government agencies, not to mention Congress, but it didn’t matter. The word was out. So, as far as they knew, one of the most powerful men in the world was coming tomorrow. The whole village turned out, we sang and danced when he arrived, exchanged whales teeth, exchanged kava, had the official kava ceremonies, etc, etc. It went on and on but culminated in a big party with a huge lunch and lots of singing and dancing. The latter is pretty big because dancing is not allowed in our village. The ban was lifted for that day alone. He was there for four hours and had a great time, but really his coming revolutionized the village and the pride they took in that visit is hard to explain. There is talk of making the anniversary of his visit a yearly holiday for the village to celebrate the occasion. And I was there the day that the 2^nd in line to the US Presidency visited Fiji.

Here is Mala, a friend of mine, who this day is acting as an bati, or bodyguard/warrior to make sure no one tries to eat the Regional Director.

I am flaunting my newly-acquired mad ukulele skills upon the arrival.

This is the official welcome for big-timeys like the 2nd in line to the US President.  It is called a vakasobu, which means kneeling before and the chief (kneeling) is offering the whale’s tooth.  Poor whale.

Here are the cannibal-preventers preparing the yaqona (kava).

The women (including Sally) doing a meke, traditional dance.  She was pretty good.  I was playing the ukulele and was pretty good myself.

This is us with the Regional Director, Carlos Torres.  By the way, I did the math.  Since it goes Obama, PC Director, Carlos in the line of succession, I myself am 6th in line to be President.  A long shot to be sure, but if Ford could become President, why not me?

Best Day Ever

Getting married was pretty cool.  So was graduating from college and the day that I got recognized as one of the most innovative teachers in the US.  Being the best man at my best friend’s wedding ranks up there as does the day I got the Rotary Fellowship.

But today goes down as the best.  The Giants won the World Series.

Who came up with ‘shoes’ anyway?

Yesterday, I successfully pissed off the chief.  As you can imagine, that is something you aren’t supposed to do.  It doesn’t sound like much; I invited a government agency to come and do a workshop on micro-finance and saving.  I cleared it with the turaga ni koro (mayor) and was under the impression that he would clear it with the chief.  Well, even though they are brothers, they don’t speak to each other.  So, no one told the chief and he got his feelings hurt…really hurt.  Fiji is weird in that it is extraordinarily easy to offend someone and equally easy to get forgiveness.  The chief would not talk to me and when he did, it was clear that I was on the fecal list.

Basically, I had to make a formal, public apology.  One might think that when the white guy screws up in a cultural way, some lee-way might be given.  Nope.  So, I brought the kava and using some newly-learned phrases gave my apology.  I said my piece, gave him the kava, he said his piece, everyone around agreed that it was really the turaga ni koro’s fault and all was forgiven.  Problem solved.

Well the rains came and when the rains come around here, look out.  Now it rains all of the time.  Last week, I went to town and I wore, get this, shoes.  I realized as I was putting on those shoes that this was the first time that they had ever been worn.  I bought these shoes on the way out the door to Fiji and hadn’t worn them for a year and a half.  (In the name of full disclosure, I also have a pair of running shoes that have a bit more use, although not nearly as much as I would have liked.)  One thing about wearing shoes after not wearing them for a long time.  THEY SUCK!  Shoes have no business in this country.  I was wearing them because of the rain, but ultimately, my feet got good and wet anyway and then since there was so much stuff for absorbancy purposes, I then had to cart all of that water around with me.  Flip-flops are the only way to go around here, rain or shine.

Well, if you are anywhere near California, I am sure that you are aware of all of the issues that are in the news.  Of course, you have seen all of the ads and the various opponents and have probably made up your mind who you are supporting by now.  I am also sure that you understand how important this year’s contest is and are approaching this November with the gravity with which it deserves.  That being said, the way that the Giants man-handled Texas those first two games has got to make you feel good!  (Of course I was talking about baseball.  Why, is something else going on.)  If you have read my past blogs, you may remember me babbling about the Giants finding their way to greatness when I don’t live in the country.  At that point I threatened that if they went to the World Series, I would be moving permanently out of the country.  Well, friends and family, it was really nice seeing you while it lasted.  Perhaps I will try to visit the US during the off-season, but I can’t stay for long as I don’t want to risk the Giants reverting back to mediocrity.

Here’s some good news!  Sally and I are heading to New Zealand in February.  You should come too!  That will be our first time away from Fiji since we got here and, suffice it to say, we are pretty excited.  I love it here, but a western nation break sounds pretty good.  We managed to get a ticket with Alaska Airlines frequent flier miles.  I love Alaska Airlines and that I can get a ticket from Fiji to New Zealand using their miles, and not very many of them, for that matter!  We could make that trip 2 more times and have miles to spare.  (We won’t, I don’t think.)  I am telling you this because we are actively recruiting joiners.  You should come.  February 13-26.  I am taking the GRE (again-they expire after 5 years) on the 12th so will be pretty happy by then.  You can buy me a drink by way of congratulations.  Doesn’t that sound great?  So, good you probably want to buy me another one!  Aw, shucks, you are too kind.  No--Gordon’s gin, please.  Oh, they don’t have any?  Beefeater is fine, thanks.  I can’t wait to have that conversation with you in Christchurch!

The Rain Came

Well, be careful what you wish for.  If you have been reading, you know that Fijian has been in the grip of a serious drought prompting a state of emergency, rationing, and the like.  After a decent stretch of being largely unaffected by the rain shortage, my village also ran out of water.  We had access to one tap not too far from our house where we could fill up buckets in the morning before that went dry.  Then the rains came.  For two glorious days, we had as much water as we wanted.  There was even enough water pressure to take a shower!  Then the floods came.  The floods washed out the pipe.  Then the water shut off entirely.  So, I started collecting rain water in buckets.  Then the rain stopped.  Thank the good folks in China who made my toilet seat cover.  You don’t want to know what is in there.

Otherwise, things are good.  The Giants have made it to round 2 of the playoffs, basically proving my theory that I need to be out of the country for the entirety of the baseball season for the Giants to succeed.  So, it was nice living near you all while it lasted, but I am sure that you understand.  I am a team player.  The next question is whether this effect on the Giants’ success is dependent on hemisphere or distance from the US.  I am thinking of Anchorage for my PhD, and am thinking that living off the continent may be enough of a distance to make the Giants at least competitive.  Oregon clearly was too close.

Back to the water, that is now one of my main projects.  I have been working with the government to try to secure funding to fix the water supply so that it doesn’t get washed out every time it rains.  Slow and steady on that front.  At the last village meeting, we were still in the drought and were out of water.  I gave my big speech about water conservation and how we need to fix all of the leaky taps in the village.  (“Leak” is a relative term.  Every tap leaks here.  It is only a problem when it is broken enough so that it can’t be turned off).  Naturally, it is pretty frustrating to me when there is no water at my house and up the pipe are 20 taps that can’t be turned off.  Amazingly, they community had not yet made that connection.  So, it was decided that in two days time, a group of us would do a survey of all of the taps in the village that needed repair.  Then we would have a fundraiser to make the funds to fix them and we would get to it.  Well, the next day the sky opened up.  That was the end of any talk of water conservation or fixing the taps.  One might be tempted to think that it will be a matter of time before there is another dry spell, but Fijians will be damned if they are going to think ahead.  So, there will be no fixing of taps until we are out of water.  We were so close.  I just needed that drought to continue for a couple of more days…

Sally is on a girls weekend in Taveuni so it is just me and the cat, only the cat hates people.  So, it is just me.  I don’t understand how the only cat that manages to live of our string of cats turns out to be the worst pet in the world.  I have never been so thoroughly used for food before.  Sure Stu bit someone every once in a while, but at least I knew that he liked me.  This damn cat (Kalima, Fijian for 5th)refuses to be touched and bites you if you try.  There is no cuddling, no sitting on laps, and certainly no purring.  He just comes in for food and then leaves.  His days as “our” cat I think are numbered as Sally has begun the kitten hunt again.

On the success note, the Regional Director for Peace Corps in the Pacific region is coming to visit Fiji and wants to see a successful site.  So, they are bringing him here!  Cool, huh?  The village is pretty excited and is planning to do a serious sevusevu (kava presentation) ceremony, do a meke dance, and make a bunch of food.  It should be a good time.  Since Sally really does all of the work around here, I will need to figure out a way to look busy while he is here.  Then I am going back to Suva with the director for a fancy-shmancy dinner at our Country Director’s house.  Thank you tax dollars!!  (By comparison, the US spent more per day in Iraq than it has spent on Peace Corps in all of the years combined in the entire Pacific region since 1968.)  I will enjoy my trip to Suva and my free dinner, thank you.

And as some of you who bother to write or email to me may know, the Grad school hunt has begun.  The long list now includes Montana, Montana St, Stanford, UC Santa Cruz, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, University of Alaska Anchorage, Colorado St, and Cornell (wrong coast, I know).  The short list looks more like Montana or Alaska but things can change.  I have been emailing with a number of folks at a number of schools and I am excited and encouraged and scared numb.  That means that if you have an opinion, you should speak up sooner than later.

I had planned to include some photos of our latest dive, especially because they would have included a video of a hammerhead shark that we saw.  WHOA!  Alas, Sally took that camera with her on her  trip so it will have to wait.  Plus, my internet connection is incredibly slow.  Next time.  I promise this blog will be more entertaining next time.  Does anyone even read this besides my sister?  Thanks Danielle for keepin’ it real.

Things I Used to Like

Here are some things that I used to really like that I now hate with unyielding passion:

1. Children: Yep, you heard me right. Go ahead and call me a monster. As my friends and family create a small army with their offspring in my absence, I have come to despise the little creatures. Some of you may remember that I once taught children and that I really enjoyed it. I really loved being around kids and shaping their minds. To be fair, I should probably be a little more specific about the kinds of children that I would choose to purge. They are 7-12 year old Fijian children. I won’t be able to explain this in a way that doesn’t make me out to be the worst person you know, so I won’t even try. Nothing is required of children in this country as far as following rules. It is a remarkably safe place so there are no reasons to put restrictions on your kids for the sake of safety. As such, children run free in the village, which is great. The problem is that they do whatever they want in these marauding bands just looking for trouble. This usually results in destruction to my garden.

2. Dogs: This one is really sad for me. I really like(d) dogs. A lot. I now hate them. Passionately. Dogs here are treated like…well…dogs. I now know that when you treat dogs like really stupid children, showering them with attention and good food, they turn out to be pretty cool (Stu’s biting problems aside). However, if feral, starving dogs just sort of hang around the village they breed like rabbits and then start to resemble marauding packs of children (see above). They are emaciated, mangy mutts that are in no way cute or useful. They are scavengers that destroy compost bins and keep you up all night with their fighting, barking, and general mayhem.

3. Chickens: Many of you know that I generally like birds, spending inordinate amounts of time money on equipment to preserve their likenesses. I also love the idea of chickens, with their gifts of fresh eggs and amazing ability to turn kitchen scraps into fertilizer. But God help you if your neighbors decide that they always lacked a rooster and get one. In movies, roosters crowing in the distance to wake you up just after sunrise makes them seem quaint and useful (saving electricity on the alarm clock). This is a lie. Roosters have no idea what time it is; they just make unholy noise at all times. It is amazingly loud. That isn’t the worst of it. Chickens take garden destruction to a new level. In their single-minded determination to find each and every seed that ever fell from a plant, they dig, scratch, and peck at every square inch of ground in a half-mile radius. My neighbors’ new chickens are much closer than that to my garden. Destruction has ensued.

4. The sun: OK, it is easy to shoot holes in this one. This isn’t nearly as expendable as children to our survival. We need the sun, I get it. The problem is that we have seen way too much of it lately. I haven’t really been around for too many seasons in Fiji, but I am told that we are working on the driest year on record. That would make sense; it has rained something like 3 times in the last 3 months. After feeling pretty lucky that our water hadn’t run out in the village, the water ran out. Now we have no water for most of the day. There is a period right around the middle of the day when we do have water and then I fill up as many water-holding containers as I can. Showers are out—now I take bucket baths and daily I find new ways to decrease my water usage while washing dishes. Please sun, go away. Come again another day.

This was fun. A couple of weeks ago, Sally and I went over to the neighboring village to go to a wedding. It was pretty cool. Mostly, the clothes were cool. Thanks to Christianity, the actual ceremony was approximately as one would expect it. After church though, the party got started. Dancing isn’t allowed in many Fijian villages (like ours and this one) but sometimes exceptions are made. Weddings are a good excuse. I don’t know why dancing isn’t allowed. Everyone loves it and as far as I can tell, the gates of hell do not open when people partake, but someone told someone 150 years ago that Christ doesn’t like dancing and so it got banned (along with bare breasts, which was a loss of equal severity). Anyway, we got to dance and nothing gets the crowd going more than whitey dancing. It was a good time. Of course, there was a lot of food and plenty of kava but for my money, I’m going to weddings for the dancing.

And with every wedding, there of course has to be a funeral. There has been a fair amount of death in the village lately. Our neighbor died last week. She was an elderly diabetic so it was not a huge surprise, but I just came from a meeting to talk about the upcoming funeral of the father of a very good friend of mine, Mala. This was more of a surprise, and I am pretty floored by it. People just up and die here. Whenever someone gets sick or injured in the US, there is great tumult until a solution is found, death only coming when all possible efforts have been exhausted. Here, death just happens. People don’t rush off to the hospital; they die. I feel awful for my Mala and his family and am once again reminded of the fragility of creation’s walk on this world—excepting children, chickens, and dogs which seem indestructible.

GO GIANTS!!

It is another postcard day here in Fiji.  In fact, we have now had a few too many of those as the government just declared a state of emergency due to the persistent drought.  This is supposed to be the dry season but I am pretty sure that in the tropics, dry doesn’t mean no rain for three months.  We actually did just get a little rain but it wasn’t nearly enough.  The funny thing is that since this was called a “La Nina” year, we are supposed to get much higher than average rainfall.  We were promised buckets of rain by some high-ranking meteorologist.  He was wrong.

We are actually OK in the village as our water comes from a spring.  Our pressure is low so we don’t usually get showers—just bucket baths.  In other areas, there is no water at all.  Since much of the cities’ electricity comes from a hydroelectric dam, rolling blackouts have started there.  Our lack of electricity is nothing new and can’t be blamed on a water shortage.  We are holding steady at 3 hours a night!

Interestingly enough, I am now working on a water project to fix the water system here so that there is running water in the village, even when it rains!  I bet you didn’t think that was possible.  A couple of years ago, a flood took out part of the village’s water supply and it was fixed "”Fiji-style.”  That means that every time it rains, the pipe gets clogged and/or a section of pipe that now runs through another river comes apart and washes downstream.  Usually when it happens, it takes a few days to get it repaired and for the tank to fill back up.  So, I am hunting up money to get that fixed.  I am hoping that the government is game.

Otherwise, the farming continues!  I have just figured version 2 of my Backyard Gardening book and Peace Corps has now sported the money to publish it.  Version 1 was done in-house as a manual.  It has been a pretty big success (by Fijian standards) so Peace Corps is going to actually publish it now.  I am pretty excited.  Sadly, the illustrator for the book had to return to the US due to knocking up his wife.  I just heard from him—in a couple of weeks time, he got a job, bought a house, and two cars.  I realize that sounds an awful lot like normal life to most of you, but it sounds like some fantasy land to me.  I haven’t driven a car in well over a year now and I can’t imagine setting an alarm clock to get to a job on time.

The last time I lived abroad was in 2002 in Australia.  Of course, you immediately recognize that year as they year that the San Francisco Giants went to the World Series, getting within three outs in game 6 of winning it.  You all remember it, I am sure.  Well, here I am living abroad again and here go the Giants again making a run at the playoffs.  If they go to the World Series again, there is a good chance that my years of living stateside are over.  If I have to live in tropical paradises to ensure that my beloved Giants go the the big show, I will gladly accept my role.  I have enjoyed my time in the US, but you understand I am sure.

Man, this is some nice weather

Seriously, it is like paradise, the weather here right now. Funny thing is that it is winter. Now, I haven’t written in a little while, it’s true. I now have a computer again and even have figured out internet access at the house. After we fixed the electrical system in the village and then the village fixed the problem of figuring out how to pay for the fuel for the generator, we even have pretty steady electricity now (3 hours every evening, more or less). Point being, I have no excuses for not blogging other than that life here has sort of turned out like life, you know dull for the one who lives it.

When I got here and started living this life, everything was so new and entertaining, disgusting, sad, etc. Now it just feels like life. It is just what I do and I don’t think that there is anything to write about. Hootenanny, I know. There are actually all kinds of cool things going on.

First, we are getting some work done…or at least started. Getting started on something seems like a decent accomplishment here. First, water. The cyclone in March washed out a section of pipe for the main water supply that comes from a small catchment in the hills behind the village. Well, the village fixed that with some silly putty and spit so now every time that it rains, the river washes out that section and the village goes without water for a few days while we try to find the pipes and put them back together (with new spit). Now we are going to get some cyclone relief money to fix it right.

Farming: as always, I am keeping my hands in the soil. Evidently, there is something of a green revolution happening in the village now. They had no idea that one could just up and grow food by your house, or so they tell me. Either way, after laughing at me for a few months for trying to grow veggies in the village, I am now swimming in delicious veggies. WHO’S LAUGHIN’ NOW!! Me, that’s who and now everyone is planting like crazy. Now, I sort of make the rounds, checking on folks’ gardens, answering questions, and working with them. It is really fun, because a lot of these veggies, Fijians have never seen grown and didn’t know that they could be. A number of the new gardeners are poised to start making some mad coin from the veggies in the near future. That will be fun to watch.

I am also working on a larger scale vegetable farm with a family and we are going to get some funds from the Ministry of Agriculture to get serious: plowing, irrigation, nursery, etc. We are well on our way and have planted a large area but are sort of stuck at this point as it is becoming unwieldy to try to water it by hand hauling buckets from the swamp. The nursery will also allow them to cover an area to grow some things during the wet season when the market price is the highest. I can’t wait for that because it will also mean that I won’t have to go without tomatoes and bell peppers next Jan-March!

Down the road, I am looking to try to figure out a hydro-power setup for the village’s electricity, but I have run into a series of roadblocks there. Namely, no one want to pay for it. So, I have put it on the backburner and we will continue literally burning money to run the generator.

On a fun note, Sally’s aunt Pamela and her cousin Melissa came for a short but sweet visit. Actually, they hung out with us for five days as part of a larger trip including two other countries: New Zealand and expensive Fiji. It was great having them here since it is always great to have family and friends here. It is basically the only time that we travel so we get to take a little break. And of course, with our gentle prodding, they usually arrive with appropriate amounts of alcohol and chocolate. We went up to Taveuni, hung out on the beach, did some snorkeling, and went on some waterfall hikes. It was great. I sure do live in a beautiful country.

Oh, and I have picked up the ukulele. It is a really fun little instrument and it makes me famous, being white and all.

Here is me impersonating superman!