The Adventures of Michalina: Goodbye to Laura and off to Fiji

Some last farm photos... Picking beautiful kuri squash in the garden.

Feb 24:

As per usual, Laura and I stumbled across a food festival in Auckland…. Well this was actually the Chinese New Year Lantern Festival (in our favourite park!) but it was heavily food-oriented, aka trillions of stalls along the street by the park. I got some stir fry and a pork bun and we shared some pan fried dumplings. The place was packed; it would take half an hour to walk a block! There were beautiful floating lanterns strung up among the big gnarled trees, and there were giant fabric lanterns dotted around the park too. There was a main stage with entertainment. First there was teeny bop kids dancing to mashups of hit songs-including gangam style. Then there was an acrobatic group and a magician! Then there was an amazing girl band that played all types of cool instruments. They were kinda like asian musician rockettes. Last was my favourite, a Chinese rock band. They played kinda lame poppy-rock, but they had a trumpet and a sax so I approved. They reminde me of Brasstronaut for that reason, so I suggest they change their band name to Brasstrasianaut, or more simply Asianaut. My mandarin is a little rusty, but from what I could tell the lyrics were going on about the guy losing his dog, so he went to buy a cat, etc. Laura didn’t believe I could understand and she got mad at me. I also realized that as much as I love awkward in-between-songs banter, it is at least 20 times as better in a language you can’t understand. I just shouted Ni hao ma (Hello) and Gong hai fa choy (happy new year: rough translations) after everything (did I mention I was completely sober?).

The next morning we met up for breakfast at an organic fair trade café. Then I went off on my lonesome to fathom the jungles of Fiji. Bonus Travel Tip: there is absolutely no problem bringing biohazards into Fiji. I don’t think they even looked at my sketchy declaration saying I brought feathers, teeth, shells, used camping equipment, and had been on a farm and forest and around farm animals… I’m not really sure what they are looking for if they don’t care about those things they listed… So feel comfortable on your next trip to Fiji knowing that any dead animals, diseases or other biohazardous paraphernalia you bring over will be safe!

I just got to my hostel/resort and it’s lovely! I got upgraded to a private room since there is no one else here (except a bunch of the sweetest rescue dogs and the friendliest rescue cat with 3 legs named Pebbles!). Turns out it's the rainy/off season here (who knew??). This place is out in the country/jungle, and it’s one of the top rated hostels in Nadi. The downside it was POURING rain when I arrived. And windy. So my dreams of biking though the jungle to the hot springs and orchid gardens may have been dashed. The rain is warm at least so if I decide to go and get soaked it won’t matter much. I’ll write my touchstone reading summaries and just hang out with Pebbles! She followed me into my room (she kinda wobble-walk-jumps due to lack of leg) and onto my lap for some scritches before dinner. She’s too cute! Michelle (the owner) made me chicken enchiladas for dinner! She is too kind! This place is ridiculous! There are also a TON of big-eyed frogs that hang out on just outside my room. I almost stepped on one. They are really easy to catch. Maybe I will smuggle one home if I’m already smuggling Pebbles home…

Today is a bit overcast but still sunny and hot and not rainy! The owner will give me a ride to the store later where I can get some groceries, and I'll probably swim in the pool later tonight. It reminds me of Mexico a lot here. Very fun! I'll pretend to be Frida Kahlo and do some art in my sketchbook.