| Mike Martin, the Welds and I took a 3PM bus from NTC into the countryside along with locals with all their market goods and chickens. It seemed like all we did was go up and down until we stopped at Korovou for a ten minute break. The driver stopped along the way for people to buy from road sellers and to drop off packages
and letters. It seemed to be the big event for the day to those people - a connection to civilization. It was a 4 hour journey to Rakiraki over narrow mountain dirt roads. Jeremy and Linda got off at the Rakiraki hotel [ed. - 3 years later, I would go there
with Gail for our honeymoon]. Mike and I got off at Vaileka where Gary Mitchell (Fiji II) met us. It was 7:30PM and dark - no electricity. A cab brought us to his place. Walked into town and ate supper at a Hindi restaurant.
A real scrungy place with equally bad food. A filthy sink at back where one washed one's hand that is used as a fork/spoon. But it was dirt cheap and it had a light (fluorescent). Home to play Scrabble by Coleman lantern. Mike blew his mind when he saw
Gary's piano. I stayed in another teacher's room, who was away, and Mike made a bed out of straw and mats in a third bedroom. |
