It’s the beginning of a beautiful day when we catch up with our two friends once more. The sky was without as much as a scratch and of the purest blue. The air was warm but not too warm, it was just perfect. It was the kind of weather we can only dream of in these cold winter days. The soft stroke of the sun and the gentle nibble of the bedbugs slowly shook the two from their morning slumber. Yawning loudly they began to get dressed and started their morning routine, which consisted of drowsily walking to the restaurant and ordering some toast and fruit; all the while scratching the occasional bedbug or sandfly bite which were subtle reminders of the fact that they were quite far from home. The heat of the sun made them lazy, I’m pretty sure it was the sun, and many a day was spent by the side of the pool. Every now and then a bus would stop by the resort and unload its herd of backpackers and other tourists who would spend a night at the resort only to leave the very next morning. Having adopted the relaxed island lifestyle our two friends steered clear of this rowdy bunch and generally went to sleep before the festivities reached full swing. This time however the two were startled by a sudden yell. They turned around and saw sitting at one of the tables two girls that seemed strangely familiar. They were the same girls they met about 4 months earlier in New Plymouth, the ones that promised they would give the couple a ride should they ever come to the south island. Right away the girls reminded them of this asking “Hey, why did you never call us when you were on the south island?” The two looked around uncomfortably and produced a few varieties to the ever popular “erm….” The truth of the matter was that our two friends completely forgot about this promised ride and subsequently had no good excuse. The girls however seemed to forgive them for this. It turns out that they were staying in Nelson, the very same place that had given our two boys so much trouble a few months earlier. If they had only remembered to call them it would have saved them hours and hours of walking and waiting for a car to pull over. The girls had to unpack their bags and settle into their room so they left while our little friends ordered and ate their delicious and nutritious meal. In honor of their two friends and because of the coaxing by Sasha, one of the waiters, the two decided to finally attend one of the parties hosted by the FijiExperience. Having heard a tale or two of the kind of games they played here the two were dreading the signal that would start them off. The first game started ominously as the players were given an egg and a spoon, but it turned out to be a simple egg and spoon race, who would have thought! Surprisingly the taller of the two even won a prize. Relieved that the games weren’t as weird as they feared they would be the two were much more confident for the second game. This game was musical chairs, only instead of sitting on a chair you had to grab a partner and act out a sexual position. Awkwardness galore as the two did their best to get eliminated as fast as possible but somehow always seemed to be grabbed by someone else and used in their vile attempts to win the game. Luckily they eventually managed to get eliminated and were allowed to sit down. During the party they got to chatting with four sassy German girls; Esra, Kathrin, Katharina (whom everyone called Katy) and Sandra. The girls were there on their holidays and were not with the FijiExperience like the others; they would stay at the resort for another week or two so. Soon it was way past our duo’s bed-time and they turned in for the night.
The next few days were spent hanging around the pool and playing piggy in the middle with the girls. Eventually the two boys decided they wanted to go snorkeling (since they were too poor to go diving again) and wouldn’t you know it, Esra and Sandra were just going to do a discovery scuba dive and the boys could tag along and snorkel out on the reef. The weather was beautiful, as it had been all week, and the visibility under water was great. The boys jumped in and started snorkeling with Kathrin and Katy while Esra and Sandra suited up for their dive. The reef consisted of several hill like formations that extended to just under the water surface, making it an ideal spot for snorkeling. The boys spotted all sorts of wondrous and colourful fish, one of which was called a parrot fish. This fish was not only odd because it had such bright and vivid colours but also because it ate the rock hard coral, producing a gnawing sound in the process. Take a few hundred of these fish and it sounds like there’s a drill hacking away at the reef. When the boys got tired of looking at the fish they tried to find Sandra and Esra but it wasn’t until they were coming back to the boat that they found them. They tried diving down to where they were but failed miserably as they couldn’t even come close, all attempts to attract their attention were in vain as well as the girls didn’t even notice them until they were back on the boat. The girls were very enthusiastic about their dive and it wasn’t long before they decided to do their open water. All the while days came and went, all spent by the pool and in the restaurant, all spent basking in the sun or cooling down in the shadows. Because Esra and Sandra were busy with their open water training the others went on a canoe trip to a neighbouring island. There wasn’t much to see on the actual island but a local boy came by to have a little chat, which was nice. The way back turned out to be infinitely harder than the way there as the wind was blowing full in their faces. After what seemed like ages they arrived back at their own beach where they sat in the sea cooling down. The fish were not scared of them at all and would actually swim under and over them.
After a few days another FijiExperience bus arrived, which meant another party. The boys weren’t particularly keen to join in on their silly games, but the girls insisted that they join in, so they were left with no choice. After the same “musical chairs” game there was a game where the group was divided into two teams and the team that would pass a ball through their legs to each other and where the last person would run to the front as soon as they had the ball. First team to have all people be in front won and the losing team would have to do something embarrassing. The team that the boys were in was doing good but not quite as good as the other team and was lagging behind slightly. When one of the boys was standing at the back waiting for the ball to be passed through the legs of the person in front of him the team decided to do something drastic and throw the ball rather than passing it on. Unfortunately the boy was not aware of this and looked away to see where the ball was at the very second that they threw it; as a result he missed a ball and kept waiting for the ball for at least 10 more seconds before the rest of the team decided to look back to see what the hold-up was. Needless to say they lost horribly and had to do something embarrassing; perform a routine from the movie “Moulin rouge”. None of the people in the team had any idea what to do so instead they decided to display the worst “sexy” dancing ever witnessed by mankind. After a while the winning decided that it was perhaps more punishing to have to watch the dancing than to perform it and allowed them to stop. After it was all over one of people from the FijiExperience came up with a new game for everyone to play. It was a simple game since all that was needed was a cardboard box. The box would be placed on the floor and everyone would get a turn to try and pick it up with their teeth; nothing other than your feet was allowed to touch the floor. If you didn’t manage to pick it up then you were out of the game. Once everyone had a turn a piece of the box would be cut off and the next round would start. This continued until the box was nothing more than a flat piece of cardboard and one of the boys and two other girls were the only ones left in the game. Because they could all pick it up a race was suggested where everyone would get a piece of cardboard and the first person to pick it up would win. To his own astonishment the boy actually won this round and was allowed to pick up a free drink at the bar.
Time flew by and soon came the day when the girl had to pack their bags and go back to their jobs in New Zealand. They were leaving really early in the morning and they didn’t feel like going to sleep at all, so our two friends hung out in their room and soon a furious pillow fight broke out. It got so bad that Jasper fled to the top of one of the closets. Eventually though the boys said goodbye and went to sleep. The following morning the girls were gone and the boys didn’t know how to entertain themselves anymore so they just sad by the pool all day being bored. In the evening they played some card games with some new people who had arrived with the new bus. A few days later the boys also hopped on the bus and went to Nadi to spend one day there spending their last money before catching the plane to NZ. Their trip through town started off nice and gentle and they felt very welcome as the people in front of the stores smiled and greeted them, asking where they were from. When they refused to let go of your hand and insisted that you check out their amazing store with all sorts of wonderful cheap wares they began to get a bit uncomfortable. After the third person had done this they felt like throwing away their bags and fleeing back to the taxi central as fast as possible. After they were done shopping and had bought some clothes that they would probably never wear again they headed back to their hostel. The night was quiet and boring and the boys were having a hard time enjoying themselves. Good thing they were going back the next day!
The following morning they got up really early so that they wouldn’t miss their plane and hopped in a taxi to the airport. When they got there their planes was on the board but two hours later than their ticket said it would be. Because it was the same flight number the boys figured the flight had just been moved to a later time. After an hour of waiting they could finally check in for their flight! They dragged their heavy bags to counter; one was still rearranging his bags when the other handed over his tickets to the lady behind the desk. The boy at the desk suddenly went quiet and turned around, shoving the tickets under the nose of the other boy. “Look it says may 6th” “Hmm, that’s strange it’s not Thursday the 6th, it’s Thursday the 8th… Oh no wait, it’s not Thursday…” “Fuuuuuuuu!!!!!” They had missed their plane by two whole days; it seems they took “Fiji time” a bit too literal. When asked what they should do now the lady replied that they should go to the service desk, which they did. The service lady looked at them strangely when they said they had missed their plane. By two days. But agreed to see what she could do for them. She typed in our information and made a weird face at what the screen said. She grabbed a calculator and made some calculators; again she made a weird face. She showed the calculator to a colleague of her and said something in Fijian to which the colleague burst into laughter. This was not very promising. The lady turned to our two brave adventurers with a worried face and said “If you want to go on this plane it’ll cost you 400 New Zealand dollars”. This wasn’t good. The boys didn’t even have that much money left on their accounts! So they asked what it would cost if they went the next day, luckily this would only cost them 130 New Zealand dollar (around 70 euros) which wasn’t ideal but at least they could afford it. They could pay for them now if they wanted to, there was an ATM a little further up the airport where one of the boys went to get money while the other stayed to watch over the bags. When he got there it turns out that it was out of order and the closest other ATM was at least 10 minutes away by car. Things were as they always had been for the two. They agreed to pay for the tickets the day after and took a cab back to their resort where they were the laughing stock of the staff. Having barely enough Fiji Dollars left to pay for their meals they were bored out of their minds all day. Tropical paradise isn’t always all it’s cracked up to be. The following morning they left early in the morning despite the fact that their plane wouldn’t leave till 4 pm, just be sure nothing would go wrong. But of course the ATM was still out of order so they had to ask the taxi driver to take them back to another ATM and then back to the airport again. By the time they were all ready and waiting by the service desk the tall one asked “Hey! Where’s my jacket!?” It was gone. After frantically calling the resort and the taxi company hundreds of times they had to accept that the coat was gone, and so was the camera that he had in it. Gone were the photos he had taken of Fiji. They had plenty of time to muse over this as the service desk didn’t open until 4 hours after they arrived at the airport. Eventually they managed to get on the plane back to New Zealand.
In New Zealand they spent their last money on souvenirs for the people back home so were forced to live on cheap food for their last remaining days in Auckland. To pass the time they visited the girls they met in Fiji and they even went out once. But this was on a Wednesday night and there was nobody else there… After a few days their trip was at an end and it was time to go home once more.
And so ends the tale of our two friends, back where it began, in a plane to Hong Kong. Soon they will pick up their normal lives and slowly start to forget the experiences they had and the people they met. Such is the tragedy of travelling; the traveler is allowed a taste of ultimate freedom; a true escape from modern day life with all its woes and limitations. But in the end the traveler is forced to go home and pick up his old life. No one can run far enough to escape reality.
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