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...

down to the basics.

I’ve been in Lautoka for about a month now, and it is a much better fit for me than my previous assignment. I’m working with FRIEND (Foundation for Rural Integrated Enterprises ‘N Development) in the programs department mainly focusing on the programs for at risk youth. We’re currently wrapping up training for a peer education theatre group that will now be going out into communities doing a play about relationship between races in Fiji and the history of how it has gotten to where it is. They’ll then engage their audiences in discussion around this topic. We’ll also be doing a youth employment workshop soon that will hopefully provide at risk youth an opportunity to gain self esteem and understand job skills such as resume writing, interviewing, and customer service. The hope is that this type of participatory workshop would empower the youth to pursue jobs they are interested in instead of continuing in victim mode of always needing to rely on others to survive. I’m hoping to implement some informal way for youth to access services at FRIEND since the workshops require a big chunk of time and only allow for a small number of participants at a time. There is another youth volunteer coming to the organization in March, so once she gets here it will be more clear what my longer term role here will be.

I moved into my new home last week, and am waiting for the Australian volunteer to move in with me in March. I also brought my puppy home with me this past weekend, whose name is Maggi. One of the other volunteers saved her for me from a litter under his house, and she and I had an interesting 2 hour trip back up to her new home. I packed the poor furball into my backpack, travelled with her through town, got on a bus, and then arrived to Lautoka which has much more hustle & bustle than her birthplace…she’s still adjusting to the sound of cars & people, as well as not being able to run into the woods whenever she pleases.

I see a lot of the next group of Peace Corps Fiji volunteers have been perusing the current volunteer’s posts. To those of you arriving in May I would say don’t stress too much on your packing. You can get any basic thing like toiletries and clothing here. Of course, bring some of your own…things you just can’t live without while here, but you can find village appropriate wear at the second hand Australian shops around. Think about what it is you really love to do at home…or something you’d like to do while here and use your packing room for that instead. I wish I would have brought more art material, more books, and snorkel gear to begin with (I had it sent from home after I arrived). I was wondering about internet access and phones—contact with people at home before I left. You can rest assured that even those deep into the rural areas have phones they got here, and have access to e-mail fairly regularly (I may stand corrected, but I believe all volunteers can access internet at least once a month…). Have fun in your last three months at home, we look forward to meeting you at Nadi International Airport very soon!

A Day to Celebrate.

"What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility -- a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character than giving our all to a difficult task."-President Barack Obama

Today I awoke at 4:00 am to watch the inauguration of the 44th president of the United States. I was with a couple other volunteers who also sacraficed sleep to celebrate at the same time as evryone back home as Barack Obama took the oath and became the president who will lead our country for the next 4....(8?)....years. It was a beautiful occassion, and regardless of your own political views, I think we can all agree that today was a monumental day in history. Today marks a day of gradual political change as our leadership transitions to someone with fresh ideas, and energy to move our country forward both domestically and worldwide. I'm excited to see the way foreign relations transform, how social welfare programs evolve, and how we begin to attack the huge economic deficit our country is currently in. For those of you who believe that American politics only affect Americans, I can say without a doubt that even many of the locals in this tiny island in the pacific have made the American election personal to them. Many have been asking questions about who the next presidnt will be, and almost everyone I've spoken with has been excited to see President Obama take office.


Today also marks the day I have been given an official assignment. I've been without work or a permanent home for 2 months as the office worked on developing a new assignment for me. I'll be moving to Lautoka on Monday to do youth development & support with an organization that focuses on alleviating poverty and empowering communities to gain the skills they want/need to support themselves and their families. I'm not sure of all the details, but I'll be sure to fill you in once I am.

The Island is Drowning.

As many of you may have seen from the news, Fiji has been experiencing lots of tropical storms and much of the island has flooded. Last I heard, these floods caused about 35 million dollars of damage...not including the damage to private property. There are still plenty of evacuation centers up and running for teh families who had to evacuate and now have no home to go back to due to the floods and landslides. All of the volunteers are safe and most are going back to their homes this weekend.

I'll let you all know when I finally get re-assigend somewhere...but I know some of you were worried and sent e-mails asking what was going on, so I thought I'd let you know. We're all good, but there will be a lot of work to do to reconstruct all that was samaged including homes, businesses, crops, and villages. You can see photos and get news from the link to Fiji Times on the right.

Bahut Dhanbaad for your concern.
I miss you all dearly.
S

Hamaar matajii ke Fiji aayaa rahaa. (My momma came to Fiji)

Now, if these photos don't make you want to drop a grand or two to come visit me...well that's another sure sign that ya'll are living in the middle of a recession.
We spent one night at a nice hotel in Nadi...it was kind of a shock to my system with comfortable beds and air conditioning and water pressure I had forgotten existed, and breakfast buffet with real bacon...I almost felt guilty staying there.

At the Beach House where we stayed the majority of the trip.

Our hike up to the Sigatoka sand dunes...

Just a small tenth of the dunes. And beautiful weather I might add.

"This country doesn't take a bad picture..." even when the sky is full of ominous clouds.

We took the trek to a waterfall that belongs to Steve's village.

Mom had her first taste of a Fijian coconut...she was also awed by our ability to open it so easily...

...a couple whacks with a machete will do the trick.

her village experience...a tame one by our standards--But now she can testify that life in Fiji isn't just a vacation in paradise. It's hard work, I promise.

Sayin' good-bye at the airport. Now it's your turn to visit.