Isa Lei...

I'm writing this from LAX, where I landed from Nadi a few hours ago and have another few hours before I'm getting on a plane to Boston. I don't know if my medication is affecting this, but right now I feel seriously depressed. I'm shivering while wearing a fleece outside in LA, all of a sudden there are white people everyone that are all dressed up, and the FOOD there's hundreds of restaurants with anything you want. People everywhere, walking quickly, yelling at each other, not saying hello to strangers. I kind of wandered down the middle of the terminal in a daze staring at everything. This is ridiculous. I talked to Tyler on the phone and started bawling because I can't stop thinking about how dull and brown and dead and cold and sterile everything looks outside. Even the palm trees are like this. Everything's just been muted, like I was walking around outside all day and then put on a pair of thick sunglasses. Or if you had a vibrant photograph and kept sticking layers and layers of scotch tape over it until it only looked like fuzzy shadows of what it used to be . I'm crying because I'm scared that it's going to be like this back home too, and it probably will.

I'm sure that in a week or so once I get settled, seeing friends and family, going around familiar areas in Massachusetts, Fiji will be just another positive memory. But for now all I feel is real sadness about leaving that place. I hated it at first, grew to love it, and now it's painful to think about leaving it. I'm not in a good place here, sitting in terminal 48A.

Then again, this is probably just because all my drugs are refusing to wear off and these are the rantings of someone heavily dosed by Valium. To go on with the emotional mode that I'm in right now, here's the Fiji Farewell Song:

Isa, isa valagi lasa dina Isa, Isa you are my only treasure
Namu lako au na rarawa kina Must you leave me, so lonely and forsaken?
Cava beka ko a mai cakava As the roses will miss the sun at dawn,
Nomu lako au na sega ni lasa. Every moment my heart for you is yearning.

Isa Lei, na noqu rarawa Isa Lei, the purple shadow falling,
Ni so sa na vodo e na mataka Sad the morrow will dawn upon my sorrow,
Bau nanama, na nadatou lasa Oh forget not, when you're far away
Sonaisali nanuma tiko ga. Precious moments at Sonaisali.

Vanua rogo na nomuni vanua Isa, Isa my heart was filled with pleasure
Kena ca ni levu tu na ua From the moment I heard your tender heart greeting
Lomaqu voli me'u bau butuka Mid the sunshine, we spent the hours together,
Tovolea ke balavu na bula Now so swiftly those happy hours are fleeting.

Domoni dina na nomu yanuyanu Over the ocean your island home is calling
Kena kay wale na salsalu Happy country where roses bloom and splender,
Mocelolo, Bua, na Kukuwatu Oh if I could but journey there beside you
Lagakali, Maba na rosi damu. Then forever my heart would sing in rapture.

Peace out baby. I hope I can come again. Thanks to anyone who took time to read this blog (even if just for a minute) - I write it mostly for myself, but to hear that other people like reading it makes me very happy to know that someone's learning about some tiny aspect of the amazing life that I've had here.

And Moce Fiji.

Cliff, laying in the hammock on the beach in Nadi. He left to go to the airport about a half hour after that, to join up with everyone else from the US (their programs set up their flights) on their trip back home.

Today was surreal. When we first arrive in Nadi I had a whole debacle with losing my wallet and then battling with Indian cab drivers to get it back, which was ultimately successful but made me hate Nadi a bit more. My problems with Nadi are mostly that you get hassled to buy things, along with the leering towards all women, and it makes me sad that spending my last few days in Fiji in Nadi has made me want to leave Fiji. But, I know that that's just a consequence of being here before I leave, and won't sour the overall experience at all.

Last night everybody in our group spent our last few hours together, punctuated by drunk foreign backpackers bothering us. But we still had quality time together. Then, a taxi van came, everything got packed up, and boom, they were gone. Now it was just me, Joel, and Junior (a local boy from the Solomon Islands who's gotten to be good friends with us and came to say bye). We were all sad so we sat up on a porch drinking fiji bitter stubbies until we saw their plane go off over us, and I got too upset and went to bed.

Having people leave in phases is helpful, I guess. But it leaves a awful empty feeling when you're one of the only ones left, in a place that isn't even really Fiji anymore. I'm not sure what to think. I'm next.

Moce Mango Bay...

A smaller group of us went to Mango Bay on Wednesday, and were joined by the rest of our group for dinner. During the day, we spent a lot of time laying on the beach, and got to go snorkeling right off the beach (I saw 3 white tipped reef sharks and lots of other colorful fish, but unfortunately the strong current threw us down the beach so we had to get out of the water and hike back). That night the girls surprised Eli with a birthday cake and got everyone to make a big embarassing spectacle of it. We had a long dinner and joked around a lot, but then I had to say goodbye to the group that wasn't going to Nadi with us (they were flying out of Suva rather than Nadi). That was painful. I think that studying abroad is so strange - you meet a group of complete strangers, in an entirely new place, and spend every minute of everyday living with them so you grow to love each other and then all of a sudden you split up and probably won't see each other again. I love the American and Australian friends that I've made here, but I doubt I'll see them again unless anyone comes up to Boston. I made a lot of local friends in class who were very helpful and sweet, and they don't have facebook or any way to keep in touch with them so I will leave without saying goodbye to them. It's a very strange way to meet and then have to say goodbye to people, I think.

Hammock in front of the sunset by Mango Bay. This was our last night on a legitimate beach in Fiji. I'm sure that I will never be able to go to most beaches and feel impressed in any way shape or form, since the last few months we've been completely spoiled by Fijian beaches.

Moce Suva...

Last day in Suva. I'm freaking out. Had errands to run with Nichole, and brought the camera along with to try and document some of the everyday things that I'm going to miss so much here.

Sacks of various lentils at the market. I have a newfound appreciation for the diversity (and deliciousness) of lentils.

Part of the seawall, where I go running every day. There's a great breeze coming off the ocean (as long as it's not low tide, which makes it stinky) and I usually go in the afternoon when all of the school buses are flying by blasting their reggae type music, and I never get to work out in a place like that ever again.

My last bus ride. Buses in Boston are going to suck very bad without the tons of crazy stickers and bells and beads decorating the driver's seat. And, worst of all, there won't be bus music.

I'm all packed up to go to Mango Bay tomorrow. But this is finally happening. I managed to fit all of my crap back into my suitcase (and a small gym bag that I bought here), and left a lot of things behind to give to our housekeeper Marama. We found out that she makes 60$F a week, and she works 10 hour days, so we figured we'd give her our old things and some extra cash/change we had laying around. Hopefully she can give herself a week off or something with everything we gave her. She also got a lot of my clothes, shoes, and my soccer ball, pump and cleats to bring back to her village. Tomorrow we head to Mango Bay, a place on the Coral Coast, to spend a few days there before going to Nadi.

The Best Celebration to Finishing Exams

Today I had my marine biology final in the afternoon, which means that I am officially finished with school at USP. It hasn't been reasonable, and it hasn't been easy to get simple things done, but I'm glad that I've experienced it so that now I can really appreciate how things work back at home.

A few of us went out to a last dinner at the Copper Chimney (our favorite Indian restaurant across the street from the university) to celebrate. A couple of the girls had a whole bunch of leftover lotions (sunscreen, cocoa butter, aloe vera, etc.) so we did the logical thing: we carpeted the floor of a living room in mattresses and had a lotion wrestling tournament for all of the girls.

All of us after we were finished. Cliff's in the front because it was his birthday. We made a bracket and went all the way to a championship round - we took this very seriously. It was one of the funniest things we've done as a "we're bored and don't feel like doing work" thing. Everyone was really energetic and had a great time, so it was a great success. Plus, no one got injured, which is an improvement over one of our last trips. I faced Natalie in the first round and got knocked out, in part because I had done a sprint workout before eating a ton of Indian food, but mostly because she was surprisingly scrappy. She was the eventual runner up so I'm proud to have lost to such a fine competitor.

I went back and showered, then began packing for home. It still doesn't feel real - I kind of think that we're just packing up for another fun weekend trip, except this time we're going home. I'm having trouble with this. I ended up pulling my mattress out into the living room and falling asleep snuggling with Kirsten and Nichole while watching the Portugal vs North Korea game (I passed out after the first 5 goals). Tomorrow will be spent doing last minute souvenir shopping, finishing packing, and soaking up as much of my last day in Suva with my friends as possible.

Yasawas: Naviti

After my second exam on Friday, I rushed to pack up some things and then got a minibus with a couple of friends to spend the night at a backpackers in Nadi. Despite the Celtics losing and staying awake for the terrible joke that was the Germany game, I was still excited, because we were heading out the next morning to go to an island in the Yasawa island chain to the northwest of the mainland.

These islands are extremely touristy, and swarming with British gap-year students (who I've grown to be very annoyed with since they come all the way to Fiji and spend a few months lazing around and drinking rather than doing anything). They're a lot like the Mamanucas, with sort of a staged effort to try to make it seem like an authentic experience. I might have been okay with this and enjoyed it at the beginning of the semester, but at this point I just get annoyed. Enough negativity! The island was very beautiful and relaxing, and it was a great way t break up the weekend between exams.

We did a dive there that was really cool: there were tons of sea fans, feather starfish, a few sharks, big schools of colorful fish and even a couple of nudibranchs. The dive instructor got really excited when we told him we were from Suva, since he lives in a town nearby. He complained about how much he didn't like living on the islands, and how he was excited to head back to Suva next week and wanted to get in touch with us so we could meet up before we left. The dive was a little bit of a mess - there were 2 French kids with us who didn't speak much English and didn't really know what was going on, took forever to get down to the bottom, and we had to cut the dive short because one of them actually ran out of air (how are you not looking at your gauge for something important like that?). We still had fun though, and passed out early in the night to catch up on sleep that has been neglected during exams and traveling.

The next morning, we studied for an exam on Monday a decent amount while waiting for our boat transfer back to the mainland. This is the view from my study spot. I think it beats staring at the walls in Schow back home at Williams. We grabbed pizza at a great place in Nadi once we got back, then had another minibus ride all the way back to Suva, where we promptly passed out. It was a busy and travel-filled weekend, but I'm still glad that we got out to the Yasawas before I left. As touristy as it is, it's very beautiful, and I'm sad that I missed out on some of the cool things there (swim through caves, manta ray snorkeling, stuff like that). I've still gotten the opportunity to see and do a lot of great things since I've been in Fiji though, so I can't focus on the things that I didn't get around to...

F, I Never Actually Learned S....

Finals week is upon me! Nothing like Williams, but I've still been stuck inside spending a lot of time studying when all I want to do right now is soak up as much Fiji as possible before heading home (in a little over a week...oh my god). I had my first exam in Physiology this morning. Exams are administered in sports centers (stadiums, gymnasiums, etc.) so you're in a room with about 300 people (at least this was in one of the smaller venues) and you're next to people taking different exams than you. For such a relaxed school, they've got a lot of professors and proxies patrolling the aisles looking out for cheating. One great thing about here is that they've got the finals from the last 3 years for every course at the library, and you just have to pay about a dollar to get them all photocopied. One good thing about academics might save the whole semester? Physio went well, but tomorrow I've got invertebrate biology and Fijian...let's say I'm not looking forward to tomorrow. All of our Fijian tests have been conducted as open book up until this point, so I really haven't learned much other than useless phrases, and now that our final is closed book I'm a bit concerned. I might try to get away for the weekend, and then I've got marine biology on Monday, and then I'm free to go where I please for the last few days here.

I've got a job working with a vet in Brookline this summer, so my procrastination from studying has involved scouring Craigslist for potential subletters whose roommates are least likely to turn my summer into a B-grade horror movie. It's not that fun. I've also been trying to catch as many world cup games as possible, which kind of sucks when you're in the middle of exams and the games are shown at either 11:30 at night, 2:30am or 6:30am. I've been dedicated to watching the US and Germany (uber alles!) as much as possible though, which is keeping me sane. For the really late games we've been restricted to watching grainy broadcasts on our TV that white out every time something interesting happens and during subsequent replays. I'll be back home for the later stages, but it really just won't have the same charm of trying to keep up with things in Fiji. Also since we leave in a week I've resolved to eat everything in my kitchen to leave behind as little as possible, which kind of sucks because all I've had this week are tuna sandwiches and packed noodles. Oh well.

This post sucks, so here's something truly fascinating that will blow your mind:

A fat toad. A cane toad, or boto (although that also means boat) to be exact. These have invaded everywhere in Fiji like they have in Australia and other countries, and the land is pretty much theirs at night when you can't take a step without one hopping away. There were massive ones on Vatulele, and I accidentally kicked one while running 120s a couple of weeks ago. Actually it was more of a punt, since the toad was in mid-air when my boot hit it and sent it flying...the animal loving part of me was very upset, but the biologist part figured I was doing Fiji a favor since these have crowded out a lot of native species. I guess I break even.