Tee hee!
Isn't it astonishing that the rest of the world is only just now realising that they can't continue being so mean to Fiji. Nor can they continue to be so ignorant of our vanualoma. We truly are the nicest folk on earth, and Varaq may be a democracy-hating dictator, sure, but he's really a very good and righteous fellow with a heart in the right place and with a determination to serve Fiji's best interests. Although I must say I really don't like that he's allowed that American casino into our country nor that he is in discussions about letting America have land for a US naval base.
Shudder!
This US naval base has been on and off the drawing boards since 1986 and everyone is now noting crossly that the Rabuka Coup happened around the time it was first proposed. I'm sorta going "Mmmm, no, I don't think so!" because I have other theories about that coup, but I do think these other folks' theories shouldn't be totally dismissed because, well, what was particularly strange about the Rabuka coup was ...
... the land in Vanua Levu the US wanted to build their naval base had dad's land slap in the middle and one of the acts of this coup was to confiscate all our acreage. Strange, right? Like, why it would even be on their coup radar? And then the Yanks were finally turned away and dad heard nothing more about the confiscation and had to take it to court to find out whether or not he still owned this land. And, as it turned out, he did! No problem whatsoever! Very strange, right?
Things that make you go mmmmmmph?
But anyway, I just HATE what America does to any country it touches so I'm hating that Varaq is actually letting them in. It's just wrong!
JUST SAY NO, FRANKIE!!!!
However, I'm not siding with China either. They are one hellva scary nation, even while they're trying to be so nice to us. And they are being incredibly nice to us at the moment.
We had this enormous eye-opener on the power of China and why you don't want them in your country only a few years back, when I was last back in Fiji.
What happened was it started out with me just being me. I'd recently read that British artist Vanessa Bell's masterpiece - wall-panel murals of the story of the life of Christ all done with Pacific Islander figures in traditional clothing, including Christ, and in a tropical setting - had not been seen since WWII ... but I recalled as a child seeing a set of murals that exactly matched this description on the walls of a cathedral in either Northern or Eastern Viti Levu. Along Kings Road anyway! Naturally, I was very curious, so, back in Fiji, when Molly asked me what I wanted to do that holiday, I told her I'd like to find that Cathedral and look again at those paintings.
Not remotely a problem ... or so we thought!
Fiji's main island of Viti Levu is circled by two roads: Queens Road in the South and West and Kings Road in the North and East. Should I find a map to explain? No?
Anyway, Queens Road between Suva and Lautoka is a real highway while Kings Road, back then, was little more than a dirt track. The upshot of this was that Fiji's main island had very unequal development, with everything modern, infrastructure-ish and comfortable situated in the South and West, while, because the North and East were so difficult to navigate, that side of the island remained a sad little backwater, all jungles, deserted beaches, poor little villages, rotting old colonial buildings, decrepit plantation houses, and shabby sleepy little towns.
However, about four years back, dah dah!, along came China. "Let us build you a highway in the East" it said. "Oh, OK!" said Fiji. But then the arguments started. China wanted to bring in its own team while Fiji wanted them to hire Fijians for the job. Big stand-off! Finally it was decided that Fiji would start at one end at Lautoka while China would start at the other at Nausori and they'd meet in the middle.
So this is what was underway when Molly and I drove along Kings Road to find the old cathedral.
Nadi to Lautoka was a journey we'd done often since they were on Queens Road, so no surprises there. But after we left Lautoka and hit Kings Road it was much more unfamiliar territory. We hadn't been anywhere near the North since the days when we used to holiday, as children, with the MacDonalds on their island of Nananu-i-ra off the coast of Raki Raki. Since this was the way we always came, we vaguely knew this stretch and it was so nice seeing it all again.
In fact, the new highway was so nice, we felt very proud of the job Our Fiji Side was doing. And already it was opening up the North. New buildings. Development. New subdivisions. Fiji Water bottling factory.
The formerly sleepy little town of Ba, when we passed through, was actually bustling. However, although there were churches and temples, there wasn't the cathedral we were after.
Then came the little town of Tavua and it was just so sweet. We were astonished that we didn't know the place better; that it totally wasn't on our radar. Such a glorious old hotel, such stunning views, lovely old buildings, really very lovely. "You know, I'd like to get land out here for a retirement house." we both said simultaneously.
Then we passed through the even smaller town of Raki Raki and again it was lovely. "Fiji really is very beautiful." we both decided. But, again no Cathedral.
Beyond Raki Raki was very unfamiliar territory. Our only jaunt through the east EVER, apart from those many times we went to Lodoni, near Korovou, to catch the ferry across to Levuka, when we always took the south road, was a single three day journey we took as a family when we kids were very young; a camping holiday when I was six or seven. And trying to recall how young I was when I saw the paintings - scratching through shards of little memories, visualising myself walking in the interior of the dim cool cathedral, sea breeze coming through the side doors, marveling at those paintings on the walls, trying to get my mind around the concept of 'Christ the Fijian' - it felt about right; that, yes, I would have seen them when I was about six.
So, YES!!! We were on the right track. Somewhere along this eastern stretch we'd find our Cathedral!
What a lovely time we were having. Gorgeous weather. Everything exactly right. Exactly what I love. A quest. A mystery. Beauty so profound it practically hurt. Tiny tingles of things remembered. Lots of "Hey, isn't that the beach where ...?" Not yet a Cathedral, sure, but the fabulous new highway was making our search so very easy.
But then just past the village of Borutu, the highway suddenly ended. Bam! No road. Just like that. And, to make it much worse, where the road had once been was suddenly a swamp. Seriously. And then we noticed that this former-road and current-swamp had been planted out with taro. "Typical Fiji!" we both said. "When life hands you lemons, plant dalo!"
We slowly and carefully drove through the centre of the new swamp over the sharp rocks placed to give traction and it was truly awful. Bumpy and dangerous, a single misjudgment and we'd be bogged and walking, and with those sharp shards we were definitely in fear for our tyres. It was all so unpleasant we were angry within minutes, which was a shame because we were traveling through the mountains, alongside the upper reaches of Rewa River and it was all so very pretty.
And this went on for several miles until we discovered the reason for the swamp. While they were cutting back a cliff to widen the road, Our Fiji Side had sheared through natural feeder lines for an underground water supply and the cliff face was now a series of harshly spurting waterfalls that were washing away what was left of the road and sweeping it into the now muddy brown river.
There was so little road left for a brief moment we thought of turning back until our "What the hell!" adventurous spirit kicked in.
Skin-of-our-teeth time, but, tah dah!, we made it!
After that obstacle, we came across another one. All along the swampy-road were the giant yellow road-building machines. Our Fiji Side had clearly just walked away and left them ... except they weren't deserted. Naughty teenage boys from a nearby village had obviously hi-jacked the machines and were playing all sorts of games with them, scooping up the road and either making mud castles or driving at each other and dumping the load on top of each other. "Bloody TYPICAL Fiji!" we said, although we had to smile at all the cheerful laughter and calls of "Bula!" as we inched our way between them. These boys were having a lot of fun and it was infectious!
Ah, so cute! When life hands you a lemon, just play, play, play!
Beyond that, we had many more miles of infuriating, bumpy rock-filled, taro-filled swamp until eventually the road hardened again. "You do realise we passed the Cathedral several miles back." said Molly once her temper was restored.
"Whhaaatttt?"
"It was on the ridge, up the side of a mountain above that big village we passed."
Ridge! Mountain! Looking down on a village below! It all suddenly came rushing back; the afternoon I saw those paintings!
"That was it! Why didn't you stop!"
"Because I just want this whole nightmare to be over!"
"But you've just made this whole journey pointless!"
"Tell someone who cares!"
And she definitely wasn't turning back.
Very cross, I didn't notice for miles that there was something very mysterious afoot all around us. At each village and at all the Indian shops and service stations, white guys in aloha shirts driving rented 4X Land Rovers appeared to be interrogating people! And everyone local seemed unnerved but conning their way out of it by playing their "No Engaleesh. No Engaleesh." card.
At first, we wondered if these were Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses, except everything was wrong about them. Men with obvious body-counts and army training don't join religious organisations, do they? Or at least not in large numbers! Besides, these guys had different mana! A horrible mana! All dark, mean and callous energy. Those bottom-line, what-ever-it-takes sort of men who tend NOT to have religious affiliations ... unless, you know, they're Catholic Cardinals or something!
Curious, we stopped off at an Indian service station that had one of these cars parked in front, and went in. The white guy, obviously trying to pretend he was a simple tourist and failing miserably because he was so creepy and scary, appeared to be questioning the Indian guy who obviously hadn't played his "No Engaleesh. No Engaleesh." card in time and was now obviously in a situation that was making him very uncomfortable. If they had been Chinese, I'd have thought this a Triad shake-down, because that is exactly what it looked like, but in the brief seconds before he saw us and it instantly all shut down, we noticed the man had a strong American accent.
"What do you think?" I said as we got back into the car after filling the tank. "American Mafia or C.I.A.?"
"Same thing really." shrugged Molly.
"But what on earth would they be up to?"
"Just being American is my guess!"
She wasn't wrong but there had to be a lot more to it, but what that was I still have no idea, although what happened only several miles later, just outside Tailevu, may have had something to do with it.
It was terrifying. Marching side-by-side in absolute perfect unison, were about 30 men who were clearly Chinese Red Army, not armed but looking like they should and could easily be, spread out and looking menacing right across the road and beyond. Behind them came a row of giant yellow machines, again totally and precisely in unison, scraping out a huge swathe of new highway, and behind them was a row of giant yellow gravel spreaders, and behind them came the row of steam rollers, and behind them were the giant yellow tar-spreaders, again in perfect alignment and moving in unison, and behind them was the new highway, stretching back in a straight line as far as the eye could see.
Totally intimidated, we drove off the road and waited for this giant juggernaut to pass us by and were shocked at the stony faces and the complete lack of anything resembling even the smallest sign of humanity. Machines and people who act like machines!
It was all raw and intimidating POWER! And if this is how Chinese build highways, no wonder they didn't want Fijian crew. No way on earth could we have given them that frighteningly robotic performance. And also, let's admit it, it's undoubtedly why Mainland China has so many millions of miles of truly great highway.
However, what we witnessed that day was that China is clearly not a good fit for the Pacific. We do things differently and that's the way we want to stay. And if only the Americans had stayed out of it and, whether Mafia or C.I.A., not showed their harsh, scary, interfering and also-wrong-energy selves to Eastern Viti Levu, that frightening Chinese road-building juggernaut passing through our lives, would have meant Fiji would have realised exactly whose side they should be on.
And after that, it not even worth talking about. It was, we must admit, a great highway, and we were proud to be its first-ever travelers. Tailevu. Korovou. Kasai. Nausori. All without a single problem. And then finally Suva and our stop for the night.
So that's really what Hillary Clinton should know. Really, if she just keeps America's ugly face out of our lives, we will always choose her over China, no matter what lovely things they do for us.
Later: Fiji Museum has so very kindly linked me to the photos in their album taken at the site of this church we were hunting for.
I'm told that the cathedral is St Francis Xavier's Catholic Mission, above the village of Naiserelagi, outside the township of Ra.
St Xavier's Cathedral!
One of The Black Christ murals
NOT painted by Vanessa Bell.
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