chase the light

I’m in a kayak floating on the blue seas of the South Pacific paddling from one white sandy beach to the next white sandy beach. The photo is of the northern coast of the island of Kadavu. Kadavu is an island about an hours flight south of the main island of Viti Levu. Basically picture me paddling a kayak along that coast and stopping at the beaches along the way. That’s pretty much it! It’s an island that is made up of villages that is the traditional lifestyle of the ethnic Fijian. Indo-Fijians (those who can trace their roots to India) are by and large not present on Kadavu. Of the 12,000 that live on the island only a handful are Indo-Fijian and work for the government. After a successful coup in 1987, and a government kidnapping and second coup attempt In May of 2000, it threw the Fijian government into disarray for a few years. As of late 2004 the government is now led by an ethnic Fijian and the opposition party by an Indo-Fijian. In 2002 the leader of the attempted coup was sentenced to life in prison. So, what did we say…? HEY, I KNOW! Let’s go to Fiji between coups! There’s not another one scheduled until 2013! I even read about an entrepreneurial Fijian who was selling t-shirts at the airport that had a picture of a terrorist holding a gun and wearing a ski mask to cover his face with the words “I SURVIVED REBEL COUP IN FIJI. MAY 19, 2000.” Below is a chronological set of photos from Oct. 24th to Nov. 4th of 2002. It’s a mammoth 248 photos but never the less a document of the whole journey. The participants were me, Jill, George, Lance, Lopsie, Nicole, Dave and Hyeseung. After a long push to get Lord of the Rings out the door we deserecved a holiday. We even got to meet up with some fellow Weta employees at the end of the trip when we found them staying at the same hotel. Anyway, blah blah blah… Au sa liu mada…

I leave you with two guilty pleasures. With all of the new video podcasts coming out there are two that just crack me up. You’re either gonna love ’em or hate ’em. “Tiki Bar TV” and “The Mary and Karla Show”. If you have a current copy of ITunes installed just click HERE to subscribe to Tiki Bar TV and HERE for The Mary and Karla Show. MmmmKay…