Work. Scuba. and more Work. hurray!

Today I can finally say, after almost a year in country, that I have some sort of direction and am actually doing some work with my counterparts. In this post I have included some photos, compliments of Maya, from our scuba adventures...which have been awesome breaks from really busy weeks.

At FRIEND, I've been working on getting awareness campaigns, and youth development events off the ground. By May we hope to hold the first Lautoka Poetry Slam--there is one in Suva monthly at USP, and we're hoping to provide the same opportunity for people in the west. The staff here brainstormed a great idea to motivate youth and provide them an opportunity to gain leadership skills and experience. I'm currently working on a proposal for a youth leadership retreat over December holiday that would focus on youth leadership in the community. This proposal should be finished mid-April, and hopefully posted to start raising funds by May.

Other than that I've been doing things like working on upgrading our website, designing awareness factsheets on health and environment issues, and doing staff capacity building during our daily morning trainings.

Now that work has picked up, the time here is flying by...I can barely believe it's been almost a year...and I foresee the next one going by even faster.

fan coral.

Shark dive. They may look scary, but they are beautiful creatures.

"Let the Colors Shower Joy"

Happy Holi everyone!

We celebrated this Indian festival last week with colored dye & music. The office staff went most of the day with colors on our faces & clothing...and we were visited by some men from a local temple that sang some songs for us. Later in the day the youth theatre group performed in a settlement where they had been celebrating holi all day. Everyone was covered in dye & their spirits were high when we arrived to perform the "Birds & Bats" play.

What is Holi?

Well, In some parts of India, specially in Bengal and Orissa, Holi Purnima is also celebrated as the birthday of Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (A.D. 1486-1533).

However, the literal meaning of the word 'Holi' is 'burning'. There are various legends to explain the meaning of this word, most prominent of all is the legend associated with demon king Hiranyakashyap.

Hiranyakashyap wanted everybody in his kingdom to worship only him but to his great disappointment, his son, Prahlad became an ardent devotee of Lord Naarayana. Hiaranyakashyap commanded his sister, Holika to enter a blazing fire with Prahlad in her lap. Holika had a boon whereby she could enter fire without any damage on herself. However, she was not aware that the boon worked only when she enters the fire alone. As a result she paid a price for her sinister desires, while Prahlad was saved by the grace of the god for his extreme devotion.

The festival, therefore, celebrates the victory of good over evil and also the triumph of devotion. Legend of Lord Krishna is also associated with play with colors as the Lord started the tradition of play with colours by applying colour on his beloved Radha and other gopis. Gradually, the play gained popularity with the people and became a tradition.There are also a few other legends associated with the festival - like the legend of Shiva and Kaamadeva and those of Ogress Dhundhi and Pootana.

All depict triumph of good over evil - lending a philosophy to the festival. (http://www.holifestival.org/history-of-holi.html)

The colors are meant for pure enjoyment, a celebration of joy and goodness. And of course, my favorite part of most Indian holidays...we got to eat Indian sweets all day long. It's celebrated by Hindus & non-Hindus alike, and a feeling of brotherhood & unity despite religious, socio-economic, and personal differences is celebrated.

I hope to one day celebrate the holiday in India where it originates!

Thandai (A thick beverage consumed during holidays)

Ingredients:

250 gms sweetened condensed milk

1 1/2 litre milk

10 almonds, soaked in water and peeled

6 pepper corns

4 cardamoms, crushed

2 tsp fennel seeds (saunf)

1 tsp khus essence (poppy seeds)

Few ice cubes, crushed



Method:Grind well the peeled almonds, cardamom and fennel seeds to a fine paste and mix with the rest of the ingredients. Strain the mixture well. Take crushed ice cubes in a glass till half and fill the rest with the above mixture. Serve garnished with rose petals. Makes for 12 glasses Preparation time: 5-10 minutes

Let's Talk About Sex.

This week I went to another volunteer's (Steve's) village to do an HIV/AIDS & other STI workshop with his recently formed youth group. In typical Fijian fashion, it was postponed from Thursday to Friday due to a church session that went two hours past when it was supposed to...but eventually we did have the workshop, and I was incredibly impressed by the way the youth interacted and took seriously the issue.

You see friends, in this culture talking about sex is taboo, so usually the first thirty minutes of any workshop having to do with anything remotely related to sex is a bunch of giggling and uncomfortable twitching...occassionally some comments about how I, the facilitator should practice condom use on one of the male participants. His youth group was completely opposite. From the beginning they were interested, asked intelligent questions, and took part in all activities.

Around the grog bowl we discussed things like what HIV stands for (the first guess for "H" was homosexual" so we cleared up that myth on the spot, discussing that HIV happens to everyone and in Fiji of the 300 reported cases, less than 10 are the result of homosexual relationships), how it's transmitted, what the risk is in various sexual activities as well as the villager tattooing that is a cultural norm here, how we can tell if someone has it (FYI, you can't. testing.testing.testing people), and how to prevent it.

I realized at the end how much I take confidential health care in America for granted. The biggest concern for the youth in getting condoms is that the health center they would normally get them at is the employment center for others in the village as well as relatives and as soon as they accessed this free service, the entire village would know. They plan on talking further about how to confidentially access condoms...the most viable option seems like when they take a trip to Suva two hours away they will go to the adolescent reproductive health center there because they can be assured of confidentiality.

Next week is a busy one, the youth theatre group at FRIEND begins performances, my roomate moves in, and I go on several dives over the weekend...