Where's Bruno Gerussi?

    The title is an inside joke for older Canadians: Bruno Gerussi was born in Medicine Hat, Alberta, and was the popular star of The Beachcombers. Shalon dropped us at the Anchorage Marina where a tender picked us up and took us to the Beachcomber Resort on one of the islands.  It was quite a long boat ride.  

    We stayed in a small but clean and comfortable room with our own ensuite shower. The room was pretty, with mat walls and lots of wood, and louvred glass windows which could be opened to get a bit of cross-breeze (we were in a corner unit, thankfully). There were hibiscus blossoms throughout the room when we were ushered into it, one of which Deborah promptly put behind her ear. 

    There are two or three buildings of “lodge rooms” which are like a two story motel. There are two dormitories of bunk beds for backpackers, in two stories with a girls side and a boys side and we counted about a hundred beds in each; and the kids get charged $122 for a bunk! (That’s about $75 CAD). Mind you, an ocean-view buré is about $300 CAD a night; and we paid about $200 CAD a night for our “lodge room”, which included three meals but no drinks, not even pop or juice – just water, and your own kettle in the room with coffee and tea packets.  There are about two dozen “burés” which are private small bungalow cabins, each with its own hammock and a bit of patio or veranda. 

    It was extremely hot and humid on the first day, and I could only manage one snorkeling trip with the backs of my legs uppermost to the sun, and one fish-feeding ride in the boat with the sun bouncing off the water, without risk of overexposure.  

    Later I rested in a hammock in the shade in front of one of the vacant burés and recalled what it is about hammocks that makes them so ideal in this climate: it curls you gently, your feet higher than your heart, and rocks you (even better if you have a little string to tug on when you slow down), and the breeze cools your back, unlike lying on a mattress. Oddly enough, although the hammock is such a traditional item you’d want to experience while in Fiji, and they are durable and not that expensive to provide for guests, none were provided for the backpackers or the “lodge room” residents like us, which is why I had to commandeer one at a vacant buré. 

    The snorkeling was great. The coral was healthy and varied, and the water very clear. We saw lots of fish; one girl photographed a shark, one boy saw two puffer fish. We all saw sea cucumbers, parrot fish, sergeant major fish, large orange cod, blue jellyfish as large as a top hat, blue starfish, and many others. 

    I saw what the guide called “sweet lips”, a very large yellow-orange fish with black spots which I didn’t identify. On my last day I saw a fleet of thirty cuttlefish, all curious about me, just out of arm’s reach, and talking furiously in the coded language of colours and patterns they display on their backs. 

    The buildings are situated in pretty dense trees and brush, and the leaf litter is an extreme challenge for the staff. You also hear a few loud bangs every so often which are the sound of coconuts slamming down on tin or wood board roofs; some fall directly on the pathways, and I was reminded of the statistic that more people are killed in a hurricane by flying coconuts than by any other cause. 

    The resort has quite a low occupancy rate. There were only about 35 people at supper, and thirty of them were young single Europeans – Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, German – but no Fijians. I figured they had beds for 350, so that’s only 10%. They have to pay for lots of staff who basically sit around most of the time, bartenders in particular; and a pretty good band that plays through lunch and dinner, and well into the evening for the young drinkers still capable of dancing without falling down. 

    Fiji just won the Hong Kong International Sevens Rugby tournament, so on our first evening the staff announced an official victory celebration; the customers would have a beer party, and the staff would have a kava party.

    I began imaging what I’d do to manage the resort more profitably and productively, offer better deals to customers and still end up making more money. Prices don’t seem to fluctuate according to demand. It isn’t as all-inclusive as Caribbean resorts; drinks are not included, and are very expensive by Fijian standards – basically what you’d pay in a Canadian restaurant for a bottle of wine for your table. Bounty over-proof rum costs $25 Fijian ($15 CAD) for 1.125 litres in the duty free, but a “Bounty and cola” is $6 at Happy Hour; all cocktails are priced at $12.50 even during Happy Hour, more during the rest of the day. Internet is $7/15mins or $14/hr while it is only $1/hr in town (but staff use it for free, of course). 

    Just two nights here cost us more than a whole week in Cuba in November and again in January, and that price included airfare, taxes, meals and alcoholic beverages.  The buffet selection was several times better in Cuba, which is saying a lot considering what people usually say about Cuban resort food. To be fair, we do know how to source last minute vacation bargains in Cuba, Mexico and other Caribbean destinations. 

    They have a few jet skis and a dive shop here, but there aren’t any special activities here without dollar signs attached except for snorkeling and fish or turtle feeding; and the books that backpackers finish and leave behind aren’t in a “take-one, leave-one” free bookshelf as they are everywhere in N. America at campgrounds, yacht clubs and resorts; here the staff collect them and sell them to you for $5 for each second-hand book! 

    There are no such things as ping-pong tables, paddle boats or canoes, but there are “paddle canoes” you can rent by the hour, as you also have to rent a lounge chair, a beach umbrella…everything seems to be a la carte.  There are no “animators” to engage customers in games and competitions, no volleyball, or language classes. There is nothing for children to do, no toys or playground area, so families wouldn’t want to stay overnight; there’s one $2 coin-op bar table for pool that was enjoyed by a couple of teenagers. 

    There’s a little putting golf course set up with greens situated around the resort, but no clubs and balls on offer. The signposted “Plant Nursery” looked interesting for those with a passing interest in botany, but it was in a terrible state of neglect and disarray. Little observations like that as you poke your nose around your new surroundings reduce the attractiveness of a place and restrain word-of-mouth advertising and recommendations to friends. 

    Even something as simple as a fish identification poster on the boat or back at shore would give the kids and their parents something to talk about with their friends – people remember and describe things they have names for, and that includes fish, plants, flowers, and so on. 

    If you’re just here for peace and quiet, or some really good snorkeling either with a boat ride to the nearby reef, or just walking in right off the beach, and the cost of getting and staying here doesn’t bother you, it’s all good. It is well sheltered for snorkelers, and the currents don’t seem extreme. 

    The staff were especially kind and friendly to Deborah and me, scrupulously honest, very conservative, and devoutly Christian (these are the original Fijians, not the more recently arrived Indo-Fijians) – we even heard them singing in the chapel across from our room before they began their work day. It was odd to see them push drinks like all resort staff must do, when they don’t drink themselves, by and large; and they seemed very respectful of my constant requests for “just water in a glass, maybe some ice”.

    Shalon thought we might have our fill of the experience after only one over-night, and he was right; I bought one of their backpacker book left-behinds to get me through the second day, Kurt Vonnegut’s Galapagos. It is scenic and beautiful on the island, and we’re usually so ‘on-the-go’ when we travel that this is definitely a change of pace. 

    The lunch and dinner band is smooth and easy to listen to – Fijians all seem to be born with natural, effortless pitch, and their voices are almost Hawaiian in quality, but at Viseisei one woman insisted that their ancestors came from “Tanganyika”, and Shalon confirmed that this is one of the prevailing theories. The singing alone could draw me back to Fiji, or make me move there. 

    I was told that the Beachcomber is the “party destination”, with a disco, and that resorts on the other islands only have traditional Fijian dances for evening entertainment; they are said to be quite quiet in comparison, and cheaper. Mind you, we got our boat ride included in our price to this resort, and usually the boat transfer itself is a big part of the expense – they don’t seem to have a “local ferry” any longer, and our island is an hour’s ride out from the marina near Lautoka. 

    Bed time was amusing. The check-in girl told us that a maid would be in our room while we were at dinner to “turn down our bed”. Sure enough, when we got back, one corner of the sheet had been folded over neatly, like the dog-ear on a stamp…that was the extent of her important visit to our room, except for the fact that she’d also closed the glass louvres and the curtains, so the room was stiflingly close. 

    This anachronistic ritual comes from the days when a maid would turn back the bedclothes and heat the bed with a warming pan, in a much cooler climate. Mind you, the heat from a warming pan might also send the bedbugs scurrying, I suppose, and bedbugs are a scourge in Fiji in the backpacker dormitories, but they only get a bare mattress, so they don’t get their bed “turned down”. I don’t think she actually used a warming pan on our bed, but she did make it up for us on the second evening. 

    

    I’ve never seen bedbugs, or been bitten by any – I suppose I should look for an opportunity, so I’ll know them when I find them in a place we want to stay.  Our host Api, in Viseisei, was unscrewing a headboard and putting the pieces out in the sun while we were there; this was to kill bedbugs that were hiding behind the wooden uprights that were against the upholstered part. 

    I opened the louvres, and later I opened the curtains too, to cool the room down enough to sleep; there was no air conditioning. A cacophony of birds announced the imminent arrival of dawn, several hours too soon…they don’t have wrist watches, I guess. But mostly their calls were interesting and attractive noise, so I didn’t mind it too much – it was better than the disco track we’d escaped from after dinner, which had hurt my ears when I was trying to listen to a young Danish fellow name Mas who’d struck up a conversation with us. 

    Mas has done some island hopping, staying in the backpacker dorms at each resort. He said that although the islands are each a little different one from the next, none of them have very much to do apart from the snorkeling or scuba diving, and he meets the same young travelers over and over again; they usually end up just over-imbibing beer each night because there’s nothing else to do and that’s the only way to be convivial. 

    All the resorts suffer from the same low turn-out, according to Mas; he stayed at one which had twelve guests the first night, and only six the second night. After breakfast on our first full day there we were already tired, sitting in a chair and dozing outside our room, wishing for a hammock instead, and recognizing a general malaise, a lassitude, which comes from a hot, humid environment. Deborah proposed that we keep looking for a winter destination with good coral reef, but “less lassitudinous, with less lassitudinicity”, which seemed rather a good way to put it. 

    We snorkeled and fed fish and turtles, however – rare five month old Hawkesbills that the resort keeps in a small pool and protects (until they are large enough to eat?); the sign says “Please do not touch the turtles”, so our guide handed them out to all the kids, who promptly dropped them on the ground when they flapped their flippers. Of course they kissed them better before they returned them to the pool...(can you say “salmonella”?). 

    Just before Happy Hour we had a more traditional kava ceremony – not too much different than enjoying beer together while singing songs around a campfire, but involving clapping three times repeatedly as people are served from a communal bowl, and saying “Bula” and “Vinaka”. Bula means hello, and also welcome; and both host and visitor repeat it to each other; and it also means something like “thank you” when you accept the kava bowl from the master of the kava ceremony; and “Cheers” and “Well done” and “Good health” from the others around the bowl when you’ve downed your bowlful. It means all of those things, at least; a very all-purpose word. 

    Vinaka means thank you, and also “no, thank you”, and also “you’re welcome, don’t mention it”…and “Vinaka Vacalevu” means “thank you especially much”. 

    Like the first time I'd tried it, after about five bowls of kava (a kind of pounded up wild hibiscus root) I still felt nothing unusual.  I could still focus and read my book, and could detect no discernible effect from the pounded and powdered root and stem of the kava plant. It seemed no more potent than a relaxing tea, and in fact it is used as a relaxant at the end of the day by many Fijians, but sometimes they drink a dozen bowls or more and I’m told the effects become quite noticeable when you consume that much.  It is often considered a social problem if used to excess. It doesn’t appear to be addictive per se, however. As an aid to relaxing with a guitar and harmonizing some favourite songs around the kava bowl, it seems like a very positive herb to me. 

    At 9 p.m. we enjoyed a Meke, traditional Fijian entertainment. The “rugby victory party” the night before didn’t quite cut it for me (mostly just an excuse for the bar to sell more drinks), but this was fun. Because it seems every Fijian can sing, they didn’t even have to bring in an outside group like they do in Cuba; the staff got dressed up in Fijian costumes, and performed some traditional songs and dances, including a farewell song – a nice touch. 

    The final day included sunshine and more snorkeling, and relaxing with my book; Deb also picked one up: The Secret Letters of the Monk Who Sold His Ferrari. 

    Did I enjoy my stay? Yes, indeed I did. Would I come back? Probably…at the right price, but probably not for more than one night at a time, and I noticed that a large number of people, especially those with children, just pay for their boat ride and do the islands as day trips, for the snorkeling, sun and scenery. For the closer islands, that's about all you'd need, and it'd make a lovely day's outing. Here are photos of our Fijian resort experience.

Next post: Fiji Finale