FIJI: First four weeks

Well that’s week four over and it only seems like one weeks gone by! After arriving in Savusavu we picked up all our rations and made our way to our new home for the next 10 weeks, Nukubulavu Camp Greenforce. The whole group got stuck in right away and got the whole place up and running and it wasn’t too long before we were all in the water to start our dive training.

Now I don’t know if you’ve ever done any diving but sticking your head underwater and breathing in air is a really weird experience at first. Once you’re over the whole alien aspect of it though it all just feels right and seeing the fish and learning the skills soon came naturally to the whole group, most of who are now qualified Advanced Open Water Divers!

Now that we can all dive we’ve started our science training and just this weekend we had our first fish tests. It is slightly harder than we all expected but the satisfaction of being able to know what we are seeing and that the data we will soon collect will be of use in protecting Fijis marine heritage is totally awesome. My favourite fish that we could see out here is the Spotted Eagle Ray which can grow to three and a half metres across and is often seen at our best dive site, Namena. Namena is our local MPA (Marine Protected Area) where no fishing is allowed and as such the fish get really big and really plentiful....there are also rumours of Hammerhead Sharks out there to, which I can’t wait to see!

Every Sunday we go to a local village for church. We alternate between our nearest village Navatu and the other villages in our local district, Kubulau. In Navatu we spend the day with our adopted families but during visits to the other villages we stay in a large group and get involved in the community en masse. This last Sunday we went to Kiobo which is home to the chief of Kubulau, Tui Kubulau. What made this so special is that Tui is an epic guitar player and he had the whole Greenforce team singing along to classics like Hey Jude, Hotel California and Sweet Home Alabama. Sitting under a tree and drinking Kava with our friends and singing tunes really brought it all home about how special and lasting the memories from here will be.

So anyways I’m off to eat a hearty home cooked meal cooked by my fellow volunteers so its moce (goodbye :D) for now!

Harry Henley