Some Faraway Beach

You’ll have noticed that there is less action here than in your average monastery.

That’s because I had to return to the Land of the ( wet ) Moa early in July. On July 29, I returned to Fiji, this time to Wailoaloa beach. Think of it as Denarau for the unheeled.

Since then, I’ve regressed to a shameless and barefoot lack of work. A daily ocean swim, a little online teaching, much more talk than usual, and a lot of good food has been the order of the days.

The major entertainment has been the local wildlife – the staff and guests at the B & B I’m staying in.

The 8 or 9 rooms have housed guests from Algeria, Czechoslavakia, the Ukraine, Togo, the UK, Sri Lanka, Egypt, and of course Aussie and NZ. The guy from Togo , for example, works for the United Nations managing disaster areas, and is now kicking around the South Pacific organising cyclone backup systems. Or something.

The staff at the BnB ( “The Ideal Bed & Breakfast” ) are all Fijian, and nearly all effortlessly laid-back and as funny as a fight. They laugh a lot.

Wame is the Main Man. He’s served in the army, and been part of the Presidential guard. There’s steel, and smarts, under the big smile and the endless jokes. Napoleon, the cook, has taken to calling me  ‘the Young Man’. He’s worked in hospitality on the tourist islands, and it shows in his true Fijian-style cuisine. Knox, cook and general hand, has a sly wolfish grin. He found himself stranded on an island during covid, and survived hunting the wildlife and growing crops. Tuvili is endlessly kind and patient, and also ready with a joke – “get behind, Satan” when offered a rum.

I accidentally became a kind of minor celebrity by booking the longest stay ( 21 days ) in the BnB’s two-month history.

It is literally a “bed and breakfast”, and my attempt to stockpile food without a fridge hasn’t really worked. I’ll explore the local cafes a bit before I leave.

I have four days left here, before I start acting my budget, and return to the Nadi Back Road, about 5 km inland.

Internet

One of the challenges of Fiji in my short time here has been internet speeds. Only one of the three places I’ve stayed in so far had anything like decent WiFi, and that was the Namaka BnB in May.

Hot-spotting my phone using a local data connection has been the best option.

But here in Wailoaloa, I’ve discovered over the last 2 or 3 days that the cafes and restaurants get good speeds. No good for online teaching, which demands privacy, but better than the dial-up-like speeds otherwise on offer.

Dogless

There are packs of stray beach dogs here, and these are no problem. But because this is a tourist hub – maybe two dozen local hostels / hotels / apartments – there are few dogs which are locked up. And of course, that means the nights are mostly a bark-free zone.

Righto. Lunch time.