Days 19 - 21: Too Long in Nadi

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After flying in from Christmas Island and crossing the International Dateline - not an interracial phone service for meeting someone for the ignorant amongst you - I lost 24 hours, or gained it, I don't really know, but I ended up a day ahead of when I took off. I was a little quiet the whole way into the hostel, I was going from private rooms with private bathrooms to 12 person dorms with one shared bathroom so I was a little nervous to say the least. Having never been in anything like this I was naturally a little nervous, but i met an English lad from Devon called Olly and we had a few beers and he regailed me with tales of his travels.

People who travel really love to talk about travelling, or travellers, or where they've been on their travels, or where they'd like to go, or why they're better than people who don't travel "properly" - I caught myself doing this by the end of my time in Fiji, I was SO ashamed - or how the world would be a much better place if everyone travelled. I sat and listened, occasionally added a piece here and there but since I'd only just arrived in Fiji I didn't have any yarns to spin really. That night I managed to have my alarm go off in my bag and wake up some slightly angry travellers, not a good start and left me feeling a little nervous again.

The next day I got up and walked into Nadi town. It's FAR from the most interesting or beautiful place in Fiji, let alone the world and it's full of touts and craft salesman all trying endlessly to relieve you of your money. I'm ashamed to admit the first meal I ate in Fiji was a McDonald's, but I just went for what I knew and it was on the way to town. I was a little taken aback at how openly racist some of the Fijians were, just slagging off the Hindu-Fijians to random tourists. I was later told by a Hindu-Fijian whilst walking along the Queen's Road back to my hostel that he was genuinely surprised when he went to LA to discover white homeless people. Everyone in Fiji believes that ALL white people are rich, and therefore are the targets of the touts and the rip-off merchant taxi drivers - of whom I was a victim that first day - so you have to accept a certain level of behaviour as simply the result of a misconception. Doesn't stop it being annoying though.

The next day was pretty much the same thing, went back into Nadi as I had nothing else to do, sat around the hostel, got a bit lonely on my own, began to question the value of this whole travelling thing and generally not feeling great. I had to be up early in the morning so I got an early night and hoped things would improve once I was on the Feejee Experience bus.

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