SUVA, FIJI
Suva is looking more and more like civilization: This morning I had my first decent cup of coffee in almost a month, at the Republic of Cappucino on Victoria Parade. It was a special moment indeed.
Afterward, Chris and I decided to follow the walking tour described in my Lonely Planet guide. Only we kind of started in the middle and chose destinations at random, rather than going in order--which I wouldn't recommend, unless you really like walking, or are a dumbass, or both. Anyway, we started at the municipal market, which as everybody knows is the place to be on Saturday morning. It was a crazy place, with hundreds of people buying and selling your typical island fruits and vegetables, along with more exotic edibles like kava, seaweed, octopus, sea urchins, and live mangrove crabs and mud lobsters. (Mud lobster, for the seafood lover in you.)
From there we walked along the harborfront, where a giant Australian cruise ship had just arrived. This meant that the souvenir-sellers were in full attack mode all day ("Hey sweetheart, you from Australia? Take a look at some crafts? Have a look right here. Look! JUST ONE LOOK! HEY!")
We then walked east past the old town hall, the library, and the government buildings, and saw kids playing cricket in Albert Park. Then we visited the Fiji Museum, which is a bit dark and decrepit, but has some pretty interesting things on display, including the last drua (double-hulled Fijian war canoe) ever built, some nice examples of masi bark cloth, an assortment of cannibal forks used solely for dining on human flesh, and the rudder of the Bounty (you know, Captain Bligh's ship, which sailed through and charted these islands way back when).
The museum is in the middle of the city's botanical gardens, Thurston Gardens, which we walked around for awhile afterwards. It's a pleasant enough place, but one that apparently hasn't seen a lawnmower in awhile. It seemed popular enough with the mongooses (mongeese?) scampering around, though, so I guess it's at least free from snakes.
By then we were hot and tired enought to give up on the "walking" part of the walking tour, so we caught a taxi back to the center of town. We considered seeing a movie at the multiplex, but half the movies were in Hindi, Chris had already seen Casanova, and I couldn't bring myself to watch Big Momma's House 2, so we went back to the hotel and watched TV instead. Ironically, we ended up watching a movie on the Bollywood channel, which was also in Hindi, but with subtitles. And if you don't mind gratuitous singing and dancing, it's actually a surprisingly good romantic comedy with some clever twists. So if you ever get the chance, check out Kyun! Ho Gaya Na... I am totally serious.
Suva is looking more and more like civilization: This morning I had my first decent cup of coffee in almost a month, at the Republic of Cappucino on Victoria Parade. It was a special moment indeed.
Afterward, Chris and I decided to follow the walking tour described in my Lonely Planet guide. Only we kind of started in the middle and chose destinations at random, rather than going in order--which I wouldn't recommend, unless you really like walking, or are a dumbass, or both. Anyway, we started at the municipal market, which as everybody knows is the place to be on Saturday morning. It was a crazy place, with hundreds of people buying and selling your typical island fruits and vegetables, along with more exotic edibles like kava, seaweed, octopus, sea urchins, and live mangrove crabs and mud lobsters. (Mud lobster, for the seafood lover in you.)
From there we walked along the harborfront, where a giant Australian cruise ship had just arrived. This meant that the souvenir-sellers were in full attack mode all day ("Hey sweetheart, you from Australia? Take a look at some crafts? Have a look right here. Look! JUST ONE LOOK! HEY!")
We then walked east past the old town hall, the library, and the government buildings, and saw kids playing cricket in Albert Park. Then we visited the Fiji Museum, which is a bit dark and decrepit, but has some pretty interesting things on display, including the last drua (double-hulled Fijian war canoe) ever built, some nice examples of masi bark cloth, an assortment of cannibal forks used solely for dining on human flesh, and the rudder of the Bounty (you know, Captain Bligh's ship, which sailed through and charted these islands way back when).
The museum is in the middle of the city's botanical gardens, Thurston Gardens, which we walked around for awhile afterwards. It's a pleasant enough place, but one that apparently hasn't seen a lawnmower in awhile. It seemed popular enough with the mongooses (mongeese?) scampering around, though, so I guess it's at least free from snakes.
By then we were hot and tired enought to give up on the "walking" part of the walking tour, so we caught a taxi back to the center of town. We considered seeing a movie at the multiplex, but half the movies were in Hindi, Chris had already seen Casanova, and I couldn't bring myself to watch Big Momma's House 2, so we went back to the hotel and watched TV instead. Ironically, we ended up watching a movie on the Bollywood channel, which was also in Hindi, but with subtitles. And if you don't mind gratuitous singing and dancing, it's actually a surprisingly good romantic comedy with some clever twists. So if you ever get the chance, check out Kyun! Ho Gaya Na... I am totally serious.
posted by John Kuge at 9:23 PM
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