Fijis independence day and the economy of a small island
Salsa af Stavsnas
Ellinor Ristoff Staffan Ehde
Thu 9 Oct 2014 05:06
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Today we celebrated Fijis independence from UK in
the early 1900. Here in Fulaga it is celebrated with the school cildren
competing on a oven hot play ground in the middle of the school yard. As the
children do that the adults sit in the shadow created by tarps that are
stretched between poles, there they drink kava and smoke cigarettes. We sat
under a tarp provided by the Australian Aid, according to the text and logo on
it.
To be honest it is strange to see the principle of
the school drink kava (it is a drug) and smoke a cigarette on a school ground.
But things are done differently here and that is what makes travelling so
interesting.
Erika and Andreas participated in the games and the
team Andreas was put in did actually suffer some from his attendance. He had a
hard time understanding what was going on. The biggest shock to him was probably
when he though he was in a game of soccer and actually got the first ball in the
game, he kicked and worked his way forward and was surprised to find himself
pulled to the ground and somebody took the ball in his hand. You would think the
shape of the ball would have given him a hint but I guess it did'nt, he looked
at us like "WHAT HAPPENED HERE?!!!" Well it is called rugby and we do not play
that in Sweden (well some do).
After the games we were served a lunch on the floor
and there was sea cucumber spliced and filled with some other creature, fish
with everything ( I mean everything that comes in a fish), kasava, noodles with
curry and rice. Today for the first time they made no difference that we are
palangis (foreigners) so we had to eat with our hands. To be honest, that is a
strange feeling. Try it next time, not with hamburgers but with a fish stew and
noodles, you are going to want to clean your fingers all the time. Like eating a
sugar donut without licking your lips.Good luck.
In front of me the monthly supply boat is just
about to lift the anchor and leave. Another busy day by the village landing
place.
What's interesting to see is how the economy works
here and how it is affected by a big town like Suva.
Let's look at their monetary economy and as written
before today they can manage with 300 FJD per year, wich is about
120Euros.
A small sum of money but they will get more and
more involved and the importance of money will escalate. One thing the
goverment has done here recently, actually just finished when we arrived, is a
solar panel project were every house has been equipped with a set of panels, a
pole and a battery bank.
It is all good for just a couple of light bulbs and
a radio. With an inverter you ca probably run something around 150W for a
while.
This program is not volontary, everybody had to be
part of it and now they have to pay 18FJD per month to the
goverment..
In contrary to most other pacific islands were we
have been this village is still doing well from nature resources around the
island.
They go out fishing for their needs, they collect
clams in low tide, they have their small fields where they grow kasava and other
roots.
In the trees they have mangos, bread fruit, bananas
etc.
They have a few pigs, plenty of chickens and
sometimes they can eat a turtle, but on this island they claim not to be
oriented in killing turtles.
I'm not saying it is an easy life, I'm just saying
they are pretty self sufficient. BUT there are things they have learned to
appreciate, an outboard engine on the village long boat makes life easier, so it
needs fuel and so does the chain saw. In their kitchens they still burn wood and
it is amazing how good they are in cooking over open fire.
Other things that make life easier is rice,
noodles, flour, yeast and those things are brought to the village with the
supply ship. To buy these things the village needs dollars.
So they trade and it can be interesting to know how
much they get part of something sold in Suva, for instance a wooden traditional
kava bowl that takes about 2 man weeks to make, hard wood work with hand tools,
that is paid about 150-300 FJD. Imagine what an enormous amount of money it is
if you look at the yearly spenditure. BUT that same bowl is then brought to Suva
and sold for 1000 FJD.
There are a few middle men here.... Anyway that is
one way to pay for your konveniences. The other is that when they know that the
supply ship is coming they will start fishing with frenzy, now they have
to take more than they need themselves, so they use their longboat, yamaha
engine and a big net to catch 80 fish in one draw. As soon as the supply boat
comes in it goes in their fridge, the village has none.
A day or two before the boat arrives the collection
of clams take a big leap upwards as a lot of the villagers go out to find
them.
Crabs of course are in danger, but the village will
also sell off their kasava so they need to take down more forest to grow more
than what they need on the island.
So without being critical, far from actually as we
are part of this system, but it becomes very obvious in this small scale
community how things actually evolve in front of our eyes.This community is
really a fragile small system that is just about to get into the "modern" world.
Which actually means taking more from the earth than it can actually
produce.
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