Vidi-Vidi

Apart from drinking fantastic quantities of kava (the local, non-alcoholic, mild narcotic brew), going to church and playing rugby, one of the biggest pastimes in Denimanu was playing Vidi-Vidi
For the knowledgeable ones out there, I think this game originally comes from the Indian sub-continent (under the name of Carrom), but that doesn't really matter because on Yadua they've definitely adopted it as their own
It basically has some relation to Snooker/Pool/Billiards, but is played with disks instead of balls.
When I returned from Fiji I was jobless (still am!) and using my boredom constructively I made my own Vidi-Vidi board. It's made of wood and roughly a square metre with barriers along the edge and four pockets at the corners. Here's a picture of my board, which snazzily has a map of Yadua and the major landmarks painted onto it:

The rules aren't incredibly complex, but it's hard with any game to read through the official rules without the fun bit of actually playing, so I thought I would just give a very quick overview of how it is played.
Two teams of two people play, sitting opposite around the board, and take it in turns to flick a cue disk at the other discs on the board. There are 9 black discs, 9 white discs and a red queen disc. You must pot all but one of your own colour discs before the queen, and then win by potting the last disc. If you fail to pot a disc, or pot an opponents disc, then that is the end of your turn. However if you pot the cue disc you must return one of your already potted discs to the board, and even worse, if you pot the queen disc out of turn you must put them all back!
Many of my hours on Yadua were spent around a Vidi-Vidi board, being fed umpteen bowls of kava, so if anyone is ever passing by my house and feels like a quick game feel free to drop by (though you will have to excuse the lack of kava, I think it is illegal in the UK!)

Development and Globalisation

I've just finished reading a fascinating book about the economics of globalisation (Open World by Phillipe Legrain) and it has made me put a lot of thought into the best way to help Yadua, and to analyse my own motivations.
I will try and be concise, as my thoughts could drift on this for hours, and explain myself.
I think it can be very easy for people in the developed world to want to preserve those in the developing world as they found them, but this is not a helpful or fair ambition. We ourselves are developing all the time, just think back ten years and compare the technologies that now pervade every aspect of our life, and consider how you would feel if someone tried to prevent you from using them.
However there is a worthy purpose behind this misguided approach, and that is to protect ecosystems and ways of life in these countries, yet this should happen side by side with further development.
My hopes for Yadua are not to keep the island frozen in the state I found it when living there. Yes, I would like to see the local environment protected and the reefs to remain in the same good condition, but in a perhaps ironic way, without allowing for development this idea is unsustainable. It would lead to an island entirely dependent on outside resources to resist change, and eventually when that cash flow dried up it would be left in freefall.
Instead I would like to see development of the island funded and encouraged to be done in an environmentally sound and sustainable way. Improving the local school will give children greater power over their own future, and perhaps lead to many of them moving away from the island, but if information about local customs and wildlife is taught alongside other subjects then they will be able to make their own choices as to the future of Yadua.
And I think that is perhaps the greatest gift that could be given to the villagers, the power to decide their own fate and the knowledge to make the right choices.
Money I have raised will go to some of the projects the island is working on, of which education is one. Though this could be seen as an unsustainable approach I hope that these funds are merely a way to start up the sustainable development of Yadua, and that in the future this will continue without outside funding.
The specific choice as to how to spend the money should be left with the village, though there are many ex-Greenforce people among others who should be regarded as a valuable resource for help and advice on making any big decisions.
Right now I am still waiting for the bank account details in Fiji so I can wire the money across, so there isn't much news on how it will be spent. However as soon as I find out more I will endeavour to update you all.

The long way round London

On 23rd April this year I ran the Flora London Marathon for the third (?!) time
I did it for two main reasons.
The first was because just over 2 years previously I had broken my ankle rather badly playing rugby. 3 surgeries and a lot of physiotherapy later I was searching for something to prove to myself that I was finally fit again. Having run the race twice before it seemed like the obvious measure of being back where I had started.
The second reason was because since I had left Yadua in 2004 I had felt I needed to find a way to repay the villagers of Denimanu for their hospitality, and help them out in the void left when Greenforce departed the island. The first time I ran the marathon a friend and I raised a significant amount for charity, so I knew it would be possible to raise funds again.
To be completely honest I didn't spend enough time training properly, partly because I was working as a ski guide, but also due to the fact I pick up foot and leg injuries much more frequently now (I think because my right ankle doesn't quite work like it used to). However in the race this was countered by a bit more wisdom as to how to run such a long distance, and as a result I avoided "hitting the wall" and actually registered my fastest time. In fact it was a really enjoyable run for me, though the next two weeks made me realise how much training I had skipped as injuries appeared.
The final score was just over 4hrs and £1,000 (more than 3,000 FJD (Fiji dollars)), a great result. For proof I made it check out:
http://2006race.london-marathon.co.uk/2006/detail.php?_id=494821
And here are some snaps:
Me running through Westminster:

Almost finished, at the Mall:

And finally crossing the finish line:

A few useful phrases

Have been a bit out of touch, so apologies for my lapse in posting stuff here
Now I thought I'd introduce a few of you to some basic fijian words and their pronounciation. Unfortunately I don't have a fijian dictionary so you'll have to apologise for all the errors in spelling and meaning if you are a native...everything I learnt was taught to us by the locals
First a bit of info on the alphabet...it's the same as the english alphabet, but with a few pronounciation differences:

d - sounds like "nd" so Yadua is pronounced "Yandua"
b - sounds like "mb" so Taba is pronounced "Tamba"
g - sounds like "ng" so sega is pronounced "senga"
[thus the little island next to Yadua, Yadua Taba, sounds like "Yandua Tamba"]
c - sounds like "th" so moce is pronounced "mothe"

Now for some basic phrases:

bula - hello/welcome
moce - goodbye
vathaba tico? - (my spelling here is sketchy!) how are you?
setico - well
bula bula tico, bula setico! - extraordinarily well!
sega na lega - no worries
vinaka - thankyou
levu - big
vaka levu - a lot
vinaka vaka levu na [...] - thankyou very much for [insert any noun here]
keri keri - please
kava - the traditional fijian drink made from the kava root...a mild hallucinagen...the locals love it and drink far too much of it!
kana - food

If you ever get to go to Fiji please try using a few of these phrases, you'll be amazed how grateful the locals will be and they will really open up to you (and they all speak english anyway, so once you get past the pleasantries you won't get lost in complex fijian phrases). And you'll almost certainly get invited to share a bowl of kava, or two, or three, or...

PS I will try and add a few more phrases as I remember them