The Land of the Kiwis

Wally

Well, we've gone from our lovely tin bungalow on a pristine island, to living in a van down by the river. We've just spent the last 3 weeks putting 4,000Km on our rented camper van, affectionately named Wally. We parked and camped on the cliffs of mountains, to the shores of lakes, on the edge of river mouths, and even in supermarket parking lots.

Our poor tropical Fijian-ized blood had a serious shock with some parts of New Zealand measuring in at a lovely 2 degrees Celsius (36 F). Chilled to the bone, we bought ourselves some serious winter wear, and made it through the night only with the love of 2 hot water bottles.

Our first snow in 3 years!

Damian, a friend from Uni (as they call it here) picked us up at the airport and let us stay with him in Auckland while we attempted to acclimate to our first " real winter" in 3 years. For those of you who didn't know, Drew did a study abroad program in New Zealand for one year at Massey University in Palmerston North.

A view from Auckland's sky tower where we had Drew's Birthday dinner.

If you could sum up New Zealand in a sentence it would have to be: "California as it's own island country with rolling green meadows speckled with sheep, deer, & cow, while all the kiwis (the people) stay happily physically active while enjoying their breathtaking outdoor scenery."

Well, at least that was my first impression. Everyone here was genuinely kind, from the bus drivers to the punk looking high school kid behind the ice cream counter. There doesn't seem to be a lot of overweight people, and everywhere we drove you could find kayakers traversing river gorges or cyclers racing up mountains.

Franz-Josef Glacier

Oh and the landscape was just gorgeous! Sunrises and sunsets beautifully sinking into the ocean all within a days drive. Glaciers, thermal geysers and pools, volcanoes, bays and sounds of islands, hundreds of waterfalls and beautiful sets of waves. Drew scored Raglan, one of the most famous waves in the world.

Raglan

My one mission for New Zealand was to see Penguins and oh did we ever! We camped out at a reserve and watched these 2 foot chubby birds surf in on their bellies, pop up and waddle to their nests. The next morning, at sunrise, one by one they looked like someone tied their shoelaces together as they wobbled down the Big Sur looking cliffs to the beach. Several of them came within a few feet of us as they left for a hard days work of fishing. It was one of the coolest discovery channel moments I have ever had :)

Liss discovering she can no longer eat lamb after this cuddly experience.

Mount Taranaki

The best part of it was that this country seems to really cater to the outdoorsy tourists. With up kept trails and national parks at every turn, immaculate public toilets (my personal favorite), to tons of comfortable campgrounds where your often the only ones...this is the place to go if you want a beautiful budget holiday.

Drew tapping his own beer at Speights brewery.

It wasn't only the cold that had us in shock here, but the never ending rows of restaurants, supermarkets, and shops. It all seems a bit surreal to find ourselves in this fairyland world of luxury again, and to think that we won't be going back to our primitive island again any time soon. We keep finding ourselves in a mix of emotions of excitement for the future and nostalgia of what we've left behind. Don't get us wrong though, we are thoroughly enjoying the civilized world again!

We had an amazing fast-paced adventure in kiwi land, and now

we're ready to slow down on the Sunshine coast in Australia.

Catching the sunrise and penguins at Bushy Beach Reserve.

Last Projects in Fiji

Teachers and us at our farewell party at the school The Compost Toilet Opening Ceremony The World Map: all paint was donated by Bob and Ann Styles (Gramma and Grampa) The finished compost toilets. The money was donated by

• Susan and Tom Loganbill (mom and dad)
• The Massy-Greene Family
• Friends of Fiji, Madison Wisconsin

Thank you again for everyone who helped make our Peace Corps experience a success! We very much appreciate all of your love and support!

Last Imagaes of Fiji

Our farewell dinner

Our little church at our very last day project painting the water tanks

Liss giving her last dental presentation

Liss and Pita making sand villages

Drew preparing all of our things for raffling

Titi and Manasa

Farewell Feast: Fresh pig, fish, and palusami

Drew holding our gift to the island a Peace Corps Rugby Cup, which Drew got to present with his Dad.

Melissa Loganbill and her Mom Viri

The last view from our last boat ride leaving Vatulele

Moce Fiji!

This is officially the last update from Fiji! Can you believe it 3 years and 2 months in this country and we have packed up our bags to move on to the next adventure. We left Vatulele on August 7 and it was one of the most difficult moments in our whole Peace Corps experience. On our last day in Vatulele, we took a run across the island with our dogs, took one last swim in the pristine turquoise ocean at Liku beach, and then we held a raffle to give away everything we owned to the villagers. We went to church for the very last time, and then it was 8 hours of drinking kava and listening to our village sing beautiful songs until 6am. Traditionally in the Fijian Village departing friends and family must stay up all night before they take their leave so that you spend every last minute with the ones you care about. It was a long, tearful goodbye for everyone! We spent a few days in Suva finishing up paperwork and saying goodbye to our office and friends. Our chief is here with us at the airport saying goodbye. He is a very sweet man for making a trip out just to see us...he is 75 years old! He keeps telling everyone here that he's with his Peace Corps :) We were finally able to show him this blog right now and he loved it! We are sure going to miss this place! Well, it's off to New Zealand....Let the adventure begin!

Day to Day

Many of you have recently been asking us what we are doing with our last few months on the island. Of course we have been busy with projects, but our island life is so full of day to day chores that most people don't realize we even have. We thought we would give you a glimpse into our daily life and what we have been doing behind the scenes living on a tropical island for the last three years .

Every morning a truck rolls down our one island dirt road to the last village to pick up employees of the resort. This is the village's cue to rise and shine and start getting the kids ready for school. We usually take a wake-up jog down to the next village with our dogs, Tave and Qisa, to get us ready for the long days.

Running down the beach towards the sunrise.

Before hitting the bucket bath we try to get in a few chores like mowing the lawn or washing clothes. Washing clothes in a big basin and scrubbing them on a piece of plywood took some getting used to. It isn't all that bad unless it's your turn to wash the sheets. It is so hard to scrub every single inch in a small tub.

Drew using his machete, the typical Fiji lawn mower.

What makes it more challenging is you have to walk down the village a few hundred yards to get more water to rinse your clothes. After a good rinse you get to hang your undergarments high and proud for all to see with your other clothes and pray it doesn't rain or else mildew begins to set in.

After cleaning up and breakfast, Drew is off to the Teitei, his plantation to garden. After many months of hard work we are finally eating this season's harvest. He has beautiful yams and lettuce growing right now.

Drew and the Fijian yams, Uvi.

A box of his fresh picked COS lettuce.

Melissa’s off to work at the little health clinic down the road. She gets to help patch up munchkins all day and help out the health workers.

Hanging out with Tagitagivula, and Tai Malakai.

Usually Melissa and Drew meet at home for lunch, but Drew takes a longer lunch break to stay out of the hot sun and get some extra chores done.

He gets to go to the bush and cut down dead tree branches for our firewood and then prepare it for baking over the fire. He also gets to go to other side of the village to feed the pigs our left over food.

We both get home around 6pm and finish up our chores around the house. Everyone in the village makes their own brooms from coconut leave stems to keep their houses clean. Melissa sweeping with the local broom, a sasa.

We switch off washing dishes. We had to get a good system going with 2 basins all done in our little shower room. We usually have to do our dishes each night or else the food will attract more mice and cockroaches from the jungle behind our house.

Then we get to prepare our dinner which usually consists of a couple of fish either Drew has caught spearfishing or from our generous neighbors. Melissa loves her fish filleted so she can marinate it in one of her many homemade concoctions. Drew is a big fan of the local coconut milk cooked with fish. He usually scrapes the coconut with a grater then he squeezes out the fresh milk to boil with the fish.

Drew scraping coconut flesh in our kitchen.

After dinner we usually wind down by the lantern reading or playing with our pets. Then it's off to bed to dream about doing it all again tomorrow!

This is the latest progress on the four new latrines at the school. Hopefully, they will be done this week. We will be having a grand opening ceremony to commemorate all of the effort by our village and the school for completing them so quickly.

This is the latest picture of our namesake, Melissa. She is sporting a new dress from the Styles' Family, and mini tennis shoes from Z'aree Loganbill, Drew's cousin. This was taken after her baptism last Sunday.

Oso Oso....Busy!

Well, the last stretch is in sight and we are already beginning to pack up our tiny house! You would be amazed at how much you can get into a one room tin shack over the course of three years! Although, Melissa's pack-rat ability is highly exceptional on an international level, our goal is to give as much as we can to our villagers.

In the last month, we unfortunately learned that Peace Corps will not be replacing us with new volunteers. Although they equip us with state of the art GPS, a satellite phone, life jackets and a cell phone, after three years they've decided our unpredictable boat situation is too risky. At this point we agree with their decision, but of course the village is deeply disappointed.

The school compost latrine project coming along nicely.

We also celebrated Mother's Day in the village on May 18. Melissa was promoted this year to play the queen in the annual Mother's Day play in church. Although technically she was demoted because her previous part for the last 2 years as the King's servant actually had lines...2 to be exact.

All the mothers of Lomanikaya.

Melissa with Salote and Ana giving a performance of a lifetime :)

As our departure date is approaching the villagers have become more sentimental and we find visitor coming by more often for tea, chatting, and even dinner- We actually just introduced our chief to chicken tacos..His reaction " ooh, na tokoo is nice."

We also have been trying to teach computer lessons as often as we can. This year we are combining our efforts so one of us can focus on individual typing lessons while the other gives an environmental or heal

th lesson to the rest of the class.

Melissa with Talica and Jone, sixth graders.

The best surprise this last month was our associate pastor naming his daughter after us and bringing her home in May. Melissa Loganbill Naivau was born April 28, 2008 weighing 3.8 Kg. She is just beautiful and we are so honored.

Melissa, holding Melissa, with Drew.

Change of Seasons

Traditional Fishing with one big coconut net

As Drew and I anchored on our sandy beach of Vatulele we were greeted by a tanned aging man, and a camera crew. He introduced himself as Jack, working on a documentary of the traditional fishing techniques in Fiji for Jack Hanna's Into the Wild TV show. Unphased, Drew and I shook his hand, as we do with all visiting tourists, and continued to unload our supplies from the boat. We both went on our way, and unfortunately, it wasn't until we came in and googled him that we realized that we had been graced with a celebrity's presence!

Spearing the fish onto shore

We thought we would give you some picture footage from Into the Wild Fiji, which should be coming out on TV in the next couple of months.

Flopping Fish

Mr. Hanna and his crew filming the action

Besides the "Wild" excitement Drew and I have been busy entertaining fellow volunteer visitors, attending week long Methodist church conferences, and enjoying the cooler weather. The last few months of our service will be in and out of the main island doing trainings for the next group of volunteers so we are pushing hard to finish up our village projects.

We officially broke ground for the new latrine facility at the primary school. Drew has also been working hard with the school kids to finish up the world map mural. Below is the headmaster painting Fiji on the map. All of the kids are always so disappointed to find out Fiji is so small compared to the rest of the world.

Aside from projects, and trying to figure our next chapters in life we have just been trying to savor every minute with our villagers.

Pita, Moni, and Tai Mala enjoying papaya in our backyard