A story of Fiji.

Bula,

If you talk for one moment with a Fijian, you are stuck talking with them for an hour or more. It’s great because they all have their stories, so I decided to write a few down.

If you ever have the chance to talk to Fijians, who are born on one of the islands of Fiji, and not the big island of Fiji, don’t call them just Fijians. No they are the island people of Fiji. And if you ask the people on the big island; they are just Fijians. So don’t ever assume all the Fijians are Fijians.

When I was on the Island Tavewa, the place where I learned diving. There was a guy called Josh, he worked there. The first day after my dive in the night it was a bit storming. So he told me a story about what happens when it storms and you are in the water, it goes as follow:
Many years ago, there was a man called Kualio, he was the chief of one of the islands of Fiji. His island lived very happy and they had enough food on the island and close to the island there were many fish. Suddenly it started to storm and it stormed for days. The people had to stay inside, but the food got emptier and emptier, till it was gone. Kualio and his island they were not cannibals, which did exist in Fiji, so one of the people had to go and find food. So Kualio and his best men looked over the whole island for food, but all the food was destroyed, so they came back empty handed. But the storm didn’t stop and they already hadn’t had food for days. Then Kualio’s son told his dad ‘I will go in the water and look for food’. Kualio told his son ‘No, I will go, because the lord is with me and you have to protect the people from this island and you can’t leave your wife who is pregnant. So Kualio left with his boat into the big waves. There was no fish at all around the island, so he had to go further. In the storm he fighted as hard as he good and he got some fish. Then the waves took his boat and Kualio. The boat was destroyed and kualio hold on to his fish and prayed to the lord to get back safe. Then the waves took Kualio further and further into the sea. Then suddenly Kualio felt something trying to get the fish he catched. He looked and he saw a huge animal he had never seen before. It had sharp teeth and it was grey. He was so surprised and he realized he had to catch this fish. But this fish kept attacking him, till he let loose of the fish. He was very hurt and you saw a lot of blood. Suddenly there were more of these strange fishes. Kualio felt unsave, he had no power and was bleeding and he was in the water. He prayed to god and asked god what kind of fish this is. He didn’t got any answer. But when he was thinking of a way to survive. He decided to give the fish the name; a shark! Then he prayed again, he asked for help. A few moments later, a turtle with a lot of fish around it showed up. They all protected Kualio. Then the fish and the turtle brought Kualio back to his island, together with a dead shark. When he woke up, he was all alone. He felt so good and took the dead shark with him to his people. They had enough food for the whole storm and even after it.
Kualio told the people about his adventure and they all prayed to god to thank him. But God said; ‘You don’t have to thank me, thank the sea and everything in the sea’. So kualio thanked the turtle for protecting him and making him feel all right again. When Kualio died, a turtle always showed up the day he died. His son, the new chief, prayed to god and asked ‘Will the sea always protect us’ and god answered ‘No, your dad will’.
Ever since this story is told by many generations, Kualio is the chief of the turtles. He will make sure you have luck and protect you from that what hurts you.

Then the people from the main land of Fiji are very friendly and love to talk about drinking kava and how they work the village. So one of their stories goes as follow.

My friend Aparoso (or Roso) is such a great friend, because he went playing rugby with me yesterday. Our team was called the black beans and the other team was called the red bird. Sadly we lost. But it doesn’t matter because we love drinking kava. And kava makes us happy and then we can sing a lot of songs. And on and on..

This was a story of their personal life, they really love to make up some cool stories.

I hope you will love my next story.

Moce & Take Care,

Joëlle