The hill that divided two worlds

by Camilla Egeborg Møller (Denmark)

Making a local connection Fiji

I get a warm welcome at the tiny island Waya. A small group of Fijians are singing and playing ukulele on the beach, and my feet have barely touched the sand, before I’m handed a coconut cocktail with tropical flowers on the side. A beautiful woman gets me a chair and a fresh towel for my sweaty face. Infinity pool, postcard beach and sunbeds everywhere. The resort is just what I imagined. Ahh, and hammocks between the palm trees. As a hostel-traveler and couchsurfer, this is an unusual environment. But even paradise can be boring. After a bit of small talking around, I realize that most of the employees are from the only village here. It is called Nalauwaki and has a few hundred inhabitants. I overhear two of the waiters talking about the Sunday service. “You are very welcome”, the younger one says and explain me how to find the small path to the village. I’m not religious, but I enjoy attending services whenever I’m travelling. Sunday. I walk for about half an hour and the village appears. Naked children are running around, bathing in the running water from a hose. They are getting ready for service, with their finest clothes. I enter the light blue church. A man hands me a rather shabby bible, and the children are curiously staring at me. Suddenly, the church is bursting into a beautiful hymn. I look out of the window, where the waves are coming slowly to the shore. The pastor spots the only white tourist in the crowd. ”Welcome, I hope you will enjoy the singing. God bless you”, he says in English. All the women are standing up to go and sing by the alter. After an hour of singing and blessings, the service is over. I walk around. Most of the small houses don’t even have doors, only colorful curtains. The people are visiting each other without knocking – you can’t knock a door that isn’t there. They play cards and listen to the radio, and even the smartphone made its way all the way out to this remote island. A woman asks me where I’m going. Her name is Sarah. ”Nowhere, really”, I answer. And then I’m invited for lunch. The pastor is hosting the Sunday lunch, but I’ll have to cover the last part of my ankles, she tells me. Sarah lends me a longer, traditional skirt called sulu. ”Now you are ready to meet our honored pastor”, she says and pats me on the shoulder. His name is Pony, and his house is just by the ocean. The whole family is sitting on the terrace preparing food: Delicious, freshly caught ’mahi-mahi’ with even fresher coconut milk and spices. ”The children’s task is to collect the best coconuts around the house”, he explains. We sit on the floor and eat with our hands. Pastor Pony wants to know everything about Denmark. “Do you have any good men that far up north? You should marry a man from Fiji”. Pony laughs. I tell him that my ticket back home in two days might be a problem. On the way back, I meet a woman with bright eyes and gray hair. She presents herself as Emily, a chef at the resort. Today is a 10-hour shift. We walk over the steep hill that separates the tourists and locals on Waya. “I haven’t seen my husband in a month. I miss him”, Emily tells out of the blue. He works on the main island. Suddenly a pig and her piglets pass us with a happy ’oink’. “This is where we slaughter the pigs. The resort will get the best of them, and the rest we share in the village”, she explains. We enter the resort and part ways with a big hug. Emily will change to her work clothes, while I put on my bikini. I have never experienced a bigger contrast between two small societies like that. I’m the privileged tourist, who paid a fortune to stay at a resort. Despite that, I felt way more at home in Nalauwaki, where I could chat with the locals with no serving tray or money between us.