Have a Little Heart

I want to start this post by saying that I have nothing against the medical staff who we met while in Fiji. I am amount to complain a lot, but I feel like they did the best with what they have, and they definitely saved a life.

While we were away, we had a medical emergency which required hospitalisation. We ended up in Nadi Hospital and right away we were struck at the difference. While you can barely walk 10 metres in a hospital in Melbourne without seeing one of those hand sanitiser dispensers, I think we barely saw one there. Patient hygiene didn't seem to be a priority, and it's probably a case of them being understaffed and underfunded. We had to ask to get clean sheets, and ended up changing them ourselves. When the meal arrived, there was no cutlery. When we asked for some cutlery, one of the nurses grabbed a used plastic spork from another patient and gave it to us.

Some of the other things that made us unsettled.

There was a stray cat that was wandering around and went into the pantry (where all the patient meals are kept). We chased it out and closed the door, and the cat hung around outside the door as though it knew what was inside, meaning it had been in there before.

The nurse call button was broken. You can't call the nurse, but if you are able to press the cancel button!

There were holes on the walls all over the place. On our last day, we saw a cockroach nestled in the sheets.

The toilets didn't have toilet paper in them. When we first discovered this, one of the nurses was very kind and gave us some from her personal supply. We quickly learned to bring our own. There was no hot water in the showers, the sink in the toilet didn't have soap.

The above pictured heart rate monitor was shared between all the patients in the hospital, and wasn't quite accurate because one of the cables was missing.

Needless to say, when our travel insurance company said they were going to organise a medical evacuation, we took them up at the first opportunity.

GET TRAVEL INSURANCE!

(Not that I want to blatantly promote them, but Allianz was great. It was a bit frustrating going through all those phone menu options, as we kept running out of phone credit, but once we managed to get through to someone and gave them a number to call us back on, everything went really smoothly.)

As I mentioned at the start, the staff were amazing, and they really were doing the best with what they had. One of the doctors was managing sixteen patients at the same time, and you have to marvel at their ability to context switch like that. Though it also makes you wonder how many people who would have survived if they had access to better healthcare.

Earlier in the year, I wrote about how if I suddenly had $100 million, I'd open a little café and do nice things for the patrons. After seeing the vast chasm in the difference of healthcare between Melbourne and Nadi, it really makes me sad that there are probably people out there who should have lived, if only they didn't have the misfortune of living where they do, and so my little café seems like such a stupid thing to aspire to in comparison. Once we did return to Melbourne, the doctors pretty much told us that if we had waited another day, we'd probably be looking at caskets right now. The Nadi hospital didn't have the diagnostic tools required to work out exactly what the issue was (which is what prompted the medical evacuation in the first place).

Muddy the Waters

One of the other touristy things I enjoyed doing in Nadi was visiting the Sabeto Hot Springs and Mud Pools - better known as the "Mud Pools". For the price of $30 FJD per person, you get assigned a guide for your group (who will show you around and hold your camera to take photos, as it's really hard to take photos when you're covered in mid). The first thing you do is grab some mud from a bucket and starting coating yourself with it. It feels really weird, and a little gross, but it was a pretty hot day when we were there, so the mud was also nice and cool. Oh, you do this in your swimming gear, so don't worry about getting your clothes dirty.

The guide will take some photos of your group after you're covered in mud and they make some pretty funny photos, as depending on how much of your face you covered, you will look like Mr Popo when smiling.

After that, you climb down those stairs into the mud pool. It looks pretty unintimidating, but once you get off the stairs, your feet sink into mud that goes halfway up your calf and you're just walking in this slimey goop. I wasn't expecting it, so I nearly screamed when my foot sank into it. You get used to it after a while, and it also becomes something that's nice and refreshing once you get used to it. You're supposed to wash as much of the mud off as you can while in the mud pool - though it's pretty tough, since the water is also quite muddy.

Once you're somewhat clean, you move into a thermal pool, that felt a lot like the hot springs we went to while in Japan, though not as hot. Our guide told us that the water from the thermal pool is fed in from this pool, which is 73 degrees Celsius. I took his word for it and didn't feel compelled to find out for myself.

You're welcome to hang around in the thermal pool for as long as you like, but if you want, you can hop out and get a message, or look around at some stalls selling handcrafted jewellery. Overall, we probably spent about two hours there (mum and MrFodder got massages).

The locals claim that the pool will heal all kinds of things, from colds to skin problems. I can't speak to the latter, my eczema improved a lot a couple of days later - though it could just be a placebo thing, it's hard to say. The mud pools were about a $20 FJD taxi ride from our hotel in Nadi, and we were lucky that our driver was willing to wait around for us to finish, as there didn't seem to be a taxi rank or anything nearby.

South Sea Island

Pushy sales tactics aside, the cruise itself was amazing.

It's run by a company called South Sea Cruises:

They had a few different cruises available, full-day, half-day, Finding Nemo and some island hopping one. The full-day includes a ferry ride from Port Denaru to South Sea Island and back, buffet lunch, snorkel, paddleboard and kayak hire, the opportunity to do the "submarine" tour, reef snorkelling, volleyball, and if you want to pay a bit extra, scuba diving and massage. There's also a pool on the island, but I didn't try it, as we had this wonderful beach to swim at! The half-day is the same, except you only get half of the day (from 12pm-6). The Finding Nemo tour involves travelling on a boat with a glass bottom, that lets you see the fish underwater. The island hopping one is a ferry ride around a heap of islands in the area, where you can hop off for a brief look at each island.

We were leaving Nadi that day, so we only had time for the half-day.

The island was really nice. It's not that big, you could walk around the entire island in about 5 minutes. The sand was a bit rocky, with bits of dried out coral in it, but mostly it was nice and soft. The water was amazing - nice and calm, really warm, and when we had the snorkelling gear, you could swim around seeing all the fish. My sister got some video footage of some fish jumping out of the water, but we didn't manage to find any of those.

It was my first time snorkelling outside of a swimming pool, and it's more fun than I thought it would be. I had my mask on wrong at the start, and my nose was exposed, so I ended up inhaling a heap of water, but once that was fixed, I got the hang of it pretty quickly. I never quite managed to do that thing where you blow the water out of your snorkel when you resurface, but I just took it out of my mouth and upended it before returning under water. I'm not very good at being a fish. :(

Note: There is a limited supply of snorkels, so if you want to go on one of the reef snorkelling trips, it's a good idea to collect your gear about an hour before you go out. This also gives you some time to practice snorkelling on the shore if you've never snorkelled before, rather than making the same mistake I did and thinking I'd be fine out at the reef.

The most fun I had on the island was kayaking. I somewhat enjoyed canoeing while on school camps, but found it exhausting after a while. Now that I'm a lot more fit than I was back then, kayaking was quite enjoyable - a nice combination of active and relaxing at the same time. It was a bit imbalanced, as MrFodder is stronger than me, so we would never go in a straight line, but it was straight enough.

The buffet lunch included some BBQ meats, fried rice, vegetable salad, bread rolls, potato salad, and fruit salad. During lunch, they had a Fijian musical troupe performing some dances and playing songs. It was fun to watch. I think they like to mess around with tourists, as they came up to us and pretended to hit us with their weapons, stopping just short of making contact.

(He was right in front of me when I took that photo.)

It was fun to watch them dance, and I enjoyed watching their feet and how little sand they kicked up despite how fast they were moving and how much they were jumping up and down. Meanwhile, people were fleeing the island from the amount of sand I was kicking up when trying to move around with flippers on (someone eventually told me that it'd be easier if I just walked backwards).

The had hammocks around the island for you to nap in after eating a filling lunch, as well as some lounge chairs under umbrellas.

I thought the half-day was too short, as we only had time for eating, kayaking, a bit of swimming and snorkelling before we had to leave. I had a great time though, and it's definitely my favourite part of the whole trip.

Vanilla and Chocolate

On our way back to Nadi from Port Denaru, we took the bus to Nadi Market (Central Nadi?). MrFodder were trying to get back to our hotel, and didn't realise that Nadi Market wasn't the same suburb as Namaka, where our hotel was. Hey, we had literally landed in Fiji that morning, cut us some slack!

We left the bus depot, and thinking our hotel wasn't far, began walking. Not long after leaving, a Fijian-looking man greeted us.

Fijian: Bula!
Us: Bula!
Fijian: Where are you from?
Us: Australia.
Fijian: Aussie! Aussie Aussie!
Me: Oi! Oi! Oi!
Fijian: How are you finding Fiji?
MrFodder: It's our first day here. It's nice.
Me: How did you know we're not from Fiji?
Fijian: (gives me an "Are you stupid?" look) Because I'm chocolate, and you're vanilla. Hey, before you go, leave the vanilla behind and take the chocolate.
Us: (laughter)

He said that last line while looking at MrFodder. I was shocked, as I thought he was asking MrFodder to leave me behind and take him home instead.

Fijian: If you're going to catch the bus, only catch it from the depot. I'm a local, so I know where the real things are. There are so many Indian shops here, but you want to shop from a real Fijian market. Let me show you.

We follow him across the road, and even though there are cars coming, he says, "It's OK. Fiji Time!" and the cars seem to stop for him.

Fijian: I'm from a village 2 hours drive from here. I drive in and out everyday.
Me: Wow, that's impressive!
Fijian: If you shop at the Indian markets, they just take the money and put it in their pocket. If you shop at the Fijian markets, we take the money back to our own village. So are you here for a holiday, or is this your honeymoon?
Us: Just a holiday.
Fijian: Ah, practice makes perfect, right?

Note: As we were going to spend a lot of time on the beach, and our wedding rings are still a little loose on us, neither of us wore them on this trip. He took us to the market, and seemed to be pressuring us to go inside, but we said that we weren't interested in buying anything at the moment, and left.

We continued walking towards our hotel when another Fijian approaches us.

F2: Bula!
Us: Bula!
F2: Ah, so where are you guys from?
Us: Australia.
F2: Aussie! Aussie! Aussie!
Us: Oi! Oi! Oi!
F2: So how are you enjoying Fiji?
MrFodder: It's our first day here. It's nice so far.
F2: That's good. So... just do me a favour while you're here - (points to his arm) leave the vanilla and take some chocolate home!
Us: (hesitant laughter)

I realise at this point that he's talking about getting a tan. Also, this entire encounter has a feeling of déjà vu.

F2: There are a lot of Indian craft shops around here. But I'm a local, I know where the local shops are. There's a Fijian crafts shop near here, let me show you. It has things made from my village 2 hours from here. Don't buy things from those Indian shops.

We reluctantly follow him to the shop to be polite. Once we're inside, one of his friends pulls us aside and says he'll perform a traditional Fijian welcoming ceremony with us, free of charge! We take our shoes off and sit on the mat. He begins by putting some powdered kava into a cloth sack and soaks it in a water. He shows us a map and points out the location of his village, and also shows us a laminated yellowed newspaper article talking about the virtues of kava.

Ceremony Man: (to MrFodder) Today you can be the chief. I bet she's the chief at home, so you can be the chief for once.

We go through the ceremony, with both of us passing up their offer of the muddy-looking kava water. They try to persuade us to buy some items in their shop, but we decline and leave.

By now, we realise we are nowhere near the place where our hotel is, and I look it up on Google maps and we are 1.5 hours walk away! Another Fijian comes up to us.

F3: Bula!
Us: Bula!
Me: (pointing to Google maps) Do you know how we can get to the Ratsun Hotel?
F3: Sure. I'll show you on the map in my shop.

We follow him across the road (more Fiji Time Frogger antics).

F3: So where are you from?
Us: Australia.
F3: Aussie! Aussie! Aussie!
Us: (dejectedly) Oi! Oi! Oi!
F3: Do me a favour before you leave Fiji, OK? Leave the vanilla behind and take some chocolate!
Us: (barely a chuckle)
F3: This is a traditional Fijian crafts shop. The only one in Nadi. Don't buy from the Indian shops, they're not as good as not the real thing. While you're here, we'll show you a traditional Fijian welcoming ceremony.
Us: Oh, we already did this at another store.
F3: It's OK. You can do it here, too! (To MrFodder) Today you can be the chief. I bet she's the chief at home, so while you're on holiday, you should be the chief.

He says the same thing about his village 2 hours away. We go through the same welcoming ceremony. We see the same laminated yellowed newspaper article and the same map. SIGH.

We leave that shop without buying anything, I message my sister who tells us that the way home is a yellow bus at the depot we were at. We decide we'll just catch a taxi, but the taxis we find are completely unattended. We see the bus we want driving past us and make a run for it, but miss it. I decided to summon my inner Fijian (after all, I've been doubly welcomed now) and wave at the bus. It slows down, blocking the traffic in the area, and allows us to board. I've finally stopped traffic!

In all honesty, the entire experience has really dulled my impression of Fiji. I absolutely hate it when people try to pressure me into buying their things. Your product should sell based on its own merits, not on slimy sales tactics.

Fun In Jungle Island

When you leave the Nadi Airport in Fiji, you're greeted by the smell of something burning. I felt panic at first, but then I realised the smell was smokey, but had a pleasant sweet undertone to it, and figured it was probably the smell of burning sugar cane. I'd heard that Fiji featured endless rows of sugar cane plants, but nobody mentioned the constant fires. We were on our way home in a taxi one night, and the side of the road was lit up in flames, with a few large bushes burning fiercely. None of the locals seemed remotely bothered by that at all, and everyone just drove past as though this was nothing out of the ordinary. Our driver didn't even seem to notice it, which was odd, as he was in the habit of pointing out various features of the landscape to us.

Fiji was... not what I imagined. I had pictured long stretches of beach, dotted with resorts, but that is not Nadi at all. (Nadi, the city where the airport is, is pronounced "Nandi" - it seems 'D' has an 'ND' sound - so Natadola Beach (where the above photo was taken) is pronounced "Natandola Beach").

The people here are friendly, which seems to be something Fiji is famous for. I guess that's one side-effect of having tourism play a large part in your country's economy. Aside from tourism, one of the main exports of Fiji is, unsurprisingly, sugar.

It is some really nice sugar, and looks like what we call raw sugar in Australia (light brown in colour with large crystals).

Here are some things I've learned about travelling in Fiji (accurate as of 28th of July, 2017):

• "Bula" means "life" and is used as a greeting in Fiji. It's not uncommon for people walking by to say "Bula" to you, and you are supposed to reply "Bula" in return. We were told that saying it is symbolic of giving life to someone else, and it's a friendly thing. It's interesting going to a country where we obviously look like tourists, as it seems people all over the place would say "Bula" to us when walking by, but it seems  the locals only say it to each other when they already know each other.
• "Fiji Time". Fijians are quite laidback, and a result of this seems to be that they'll do things at their own pace - after all, you don't need to stress, everything gets done eventually. This can be quite frustrating as a foreigner, as you might need to make a flight or be somewhere at a specific time. My sister ordered a taxi to pick them up from somewhere, and the guy arrived an hour and a half later than he said he would - with constant updates from him saying he was "only 15 minutes away". This doesn't apply to everyone in the country, and we met plenty of people who were early / on-time, but often when things don't go as planned, everyone seems to just shrug their shoulders and say, "Fiji Time!".
• withdrawing money from an ATM can get expensive. We saw some ANZ and Westpac ATMs, and withdrawing cash from an ANZ ATM cost us $15 FJD per transaction (we have a Citibank card) - my sister says Westpac ATMs are the same. Towards the end of our trip, MrFodder found out that Bred ATMs only charge $10 FJD for withdrawls.
  
• cash is king - there are a lot of places that don't accept credit cards - including the medical centre and the hospital!
• "Bula Belly" (my variant of "Dehli Belly") - we've been told not to drink tap water in Fiji, and I did spend quite a lot of time during the trip with an unsettled feeling in my stomach. None of us got gastro or anything like that, fortunately, but it's a good idea to be wary of water at restaurants, and fresh fruit or vegetables that may have been rinsed with tap water. We carried bottled water everywhere, and also brushed our teeth with bottled water. Is this something to make tourists buy more bottled water? Maybe. But when you're on holiday, I think it's better to be safe than sorry.
• there are taxis and there are "taxis". We saw quite a few people driving actual taxis, with the taxi sign on top of their car, and a meter inside. But there are also quite a lot of people who will drive you somewhere for a flat fee. It was quite scary at first, and there were a few trips where I was sure they were going to drive us to a sugar cane field, kill us and steal our stuff, but I'm still alive, so it didn't happen to us at least! If you do get a "taxi", make sure you clarify the amount upfront, and a lot of them will often upcharge, so if haggling is your thing, go for it.
• wi-fi: not very common in Nadi at least. We ended up getting a free Vodaphone SIM card at the airport, which you can use to get 800MB for $5.99, 1GB for $6.99, or 1.5GB of data for $7.99 FJD, which expires after a week.
• Language: Everyone we met seems to speak fluent English, or a passable amount of English
• Haggling - other than taxis, it seems everything is open for haggling, if you are so inclined. I think of it as the "tourist tax".