The Longest Journey Home…Ever!! Part 2

After the passport drama I got some extra cash out for the next couple of days, and bought some shower gel from the airport shop so I could wash myself. And then I got a taxi back to Bamboo. I figured arriving back would take them by surprise but they were the best accommodation still at an affordable price so I didn’t care. Of course, a few of them were like ‘Hello Chris, you didn’t get your flight?’ They had heard about the flight being delayed but obviously not sure why I had returned completely. I told them why and they probably thought the situation rather odd. Probably laughed about it too when I was out of earshot but I didn’t care, I would have too.

I text the parents ‘Hello, Can you go on Skype? I’m fine but just need to chat’. That was enough to send Mum into a panic, I don’t quite know how I could have worded it differently though. The way she went on anyone would think I’d sent a message stating ‘Help me! I’m stranded in Fiji all alone, and don’t know when I will get home again!’ Spent a while chatting to them (very useful free wifi) and explaining the situation and checked into my old room again. There were people in it this time, I wasn’t alone but I decided I didn’t want to make any more friends so kept myself to myself.

I went to the beach and sunbathed for a while, then took a dip in the swimming pool. I had lunch at Bamboo, three whole egg sandwiches, so I was pretty stuffed. And then I decided to take a walk along the beach. It wasn’t as pretty as the Yasawa’s and I might as well have been walking along the beach at Weston Super Mare but I needed the walk to clear my thoughts really. I remembered as I walked along that it was a public holiday, evidenced by the amount of Fijian locals on the beach, swimming or playing with their kids. I was trying to be inconspicuous but it wasn’t so easy when I was the only white man on the beach.

Did I mention before that many Fijians are actually Indian? The story goes that when the white man settled there and wanted to set it up how they wished, they ‘employed’ the Fijians to work on the land. Apparently their ‘Fiji time’ attitude didn’t quite adjust to the European mentality where everything has to be done NOW, and eventually thousands of migrants were transported to Fiji from India, who were seen as more efficient workers. So the Fijian is now a mix of natural settlers and Indian migrants. But they all seem to accept each other as one, and as far as I know there has never been any conflict between the races which is nice to hear. But I don’t really know the full story so can’t state that as gospel truth.

It was an Indian/Fijian woman who approached me on the beach now and invited me over to join her family for their picnic. I declined at first making an excuse that I was walking along the beach further down and would stop again if I came back that way. I had sort of been hoping that I could find a route off the beach but only a few more minutes down the beach and the water had completely cut off one side from the other. I could have waded and swam through it but had stupidly bought my camera with me, so turned back, and deciding it was meant to be, joined the family on their picnic.

There was a large mix of people including sisters, brothers, in laws, cousins and the mother. At least 10 of them in all and I got asked all the standard questions about where I came from and my travels, and what job I did etc. I tried to keep conversation about them, partly because I feel awkward speaking about my life which is so clearly more advantageous than there’s will ever be, full of opportunities. For example, none of them had ever even visited the Yasawa’s which they wanted to know all about. I couldn’t say oh it’s crap because that would have insulted their intelligence. They obviously knew it was beautiful from all they had heard over the years, I felt sad knowing none of them might ever get the chance to go.

I thought it would be more interesting to learn something about them, but then there’s only so much you can ask without being intrusive. I learnt that they all knew and were taught from childhood each other’s languages, the Indian, Fijian and the national language which was English. They had relatives abroad including a brother in Canada, and a sister in California. It sounded to me like these other relatives were funded by the Fijian family when studying, and to get them their visas in a better country. And then after a while the relative would send money to them and the roles would reverse.

Of all the Fijian people I met, who had relatives abroad, particularly their children, including a taxi driver and someone at the Bamboo lodge, none of them mentioned Australia or New Zealand as the place of destination. I wasn’t sure if this was coincidence or an indication that migration to those countries was much harder. They were a lovely family and said that today was one of only a few days a year when they could all be together, which made me feel bad for now intruding in on their family time. They kept trying to fee me, and it must have seemed I wasn’t keen as I couldn’t eat much, what with still being stuffed by the egg sandwiches. I recall most distinctly this tuna onion rice dish which must have been smothered in chilli. They ate everything with their hands too which made me a little suspicious of hygiene. But I could hardly say no.

Then when I was so full the men kept trying to make me drink the beer. After a few glasses I thought I was going to be sick and then I started to feel a bit awkward when they wanted to add me on facebook and seeing that I had a camera decided they would like a picture taken with all of them, almost one by one. But they were a good laugh and it seemed a good consolation prize for having got delayed for two days. I got the standard have you got a girlfriend or a wife, and would you like one question. Awkward laughter, brush it off, brush it off – you can imagine!

And then when I decided it was time for me to make my way back to the hostel, one of the guys asked if he could join me for a drink later. I was quite happy not to but didn’t quite say that. Instead I said was getting a flight that evening, thinking how I would now have to hide myself for the rest of the evening in my room to avoid being seen. He was a little pushy about it and I’m worried that I offended him by being so vague about meeting up again later. I made my awkward goodbye to all of them and then sped up my pace back down the beach. The tide was in at this point and so I had to walk slightly off the beach and take another route around this building, which looked like a storage place for boats and vehicles.

Coming round the side of the building I entered a little sandy path full of rubbish and dodged my way around it seeing at the end of the path access back to the other side of the beach. Just as I was reaching it a guy stepped out of the bushes and well pretty much blocked my path. He seemed harmless enough and I couldn’t realistically see him as a threat as we were so close to the beach, I could hear kids running about etc. But he was clearly quite drunk, a large box of Fiji beer standing next to him. He quickly stated how glad he was to have company, having just got out of prison after a 7 year sentence and having nowhere to live due to being disowned by his family. I didn’t ask him what he had done. He just sort of kept talking and pushed a bottle of beer into my hand and demandingly requested that I have a drink with him.

This was not how I had envisioned my walk along the beach concluding. He was obviously nuts but I didn’t feel scared, just very unsettled and eager to get back to my room. I decided then that the following day I wouldn’t go on any more adventures down the beach, and would stick close to my hostel. He kept blabbing away giving me no room to make my excuses to leave and I guess I was slightly fascinated too by what he had to say. He was certainly an interesting character.

He then gave me the lowdown on Fiji women and how he had one arriving soon. He said something along the lines of ‘Fijian women, they love anything, they don’t mind it here in the dirt, they’ll do it anywhere, they just want my dick’. He told me all of this as he made drunkard thrusting movements. The thought of what was due to happen made me feel sick for the girl, and thankful for having an excuse to escape. Then he wanted my facebook details, so I made one up and finally his phone started ringing.

I saw this as my chance and pretty much dashed to the beach and back to normality. I was back at Bamboo hostel within five minutes, had a shower and then went back to the beach to watch the sunset. After that, I had a chicken pasta dinner and then read in my room and began watching Prison Break season 1 on my laptop. Time to go home now please! The next day was very low key. I didn’t bump into any more faces - new or old - read my book, wrote up some of my blog and then chilled until it was time to get a taxi to the airport. I left a little earlier this time, just in case the flight had been cancelled again and I could be at the front of the queue and get accommodation first.

But finally everything ran smoothly. No delays, I checked in as though none of the events of the last two days had ever happened, sat watching prison break on my laptop in the departure lounge until it was time to board the plane. I didn’t get a window seat as I had on previous flights but could hardly complain as I was thankful just to be on the bloody thing. I hardly slept on the flight and instead read a large chunk of my book, but the time passed smoothly enough. Landing in LA was a total nuisance; I only had two hours between getting off the plane and boarding the one to Heathrow.

And it took 1hr and 50 minutes to get onto the next plane. The customs in the states now is so severe. They scan every finger and thumb print on each hand, two photographs, plus an eye scan, and then interviewed me on where I was going on my journey. Home! They wanted to know why I didn’t have an address in the states where I was going. ‘Because I’m going home, to the UK’ (you moron, I wanted to add). This took almost an hour to get through. Then the queue to get our luggage scanned through these massive machines took another 20 or so minutes. I kept asking how long it would take to get through as I had a connecting flight to catch, but they all seemed confident I would be fine.

Then I had to drop my luggage off at the transit flight zone. I felt a little dubious about this because the guy didn’t feel me with confidence as he took the bag off me and dumped it on a conveyor belt with dozens of other bags. Then I found my way to British Airways check in which had a massive queue full of American school kids. After a while someone walked around saying ‘anyone for the 3.50 flight?’ Yes me! She looked instantly concerned and pushed me to the front of the line saying I had to get through check in as my flight as I still had a long line to get through at security. She was right, that took another twenty minutes. But I wasn’t so worried at this stage as there were other faces I recognised from my Fiji flight, who were obviously getting the same connecting flight. I got there five minutes before the gate closed and to be honest was quite happy that I got there in the nick of time. It meant I didn’t have to hang around waiting.

I got a window seat on the plane and there was a free seat between me and another girl. Her name was Kate and we seemed to hit it off well. She came from Thame in Oxford, same place where the sister lives, and was travelling for a bit before returning to her job as an emergency nurse. I think if meeting under different circumstances we would have become good friends, but it was nice to meet someone I clicked with right at the end. We were both returning home so shared that feeling of nerves and excitement too. We started chatting when the air stewardess explained that there was a couple who would like to sit together and as we had a free seat between us would either of us be willing to move… We both said no. I wasn’t giving up a comfy seat on an 11 hour journey. That’s their tough luck. Kate agreed. I think the air stewardess was on our side anyhow as the lady of the couple was very irritating.

We ended up walking together off the plane and through customs and our luggage turned up on the conveyor at exactly the same time. We said half joking and half sincerely how nice it was to have had someone to share that last walk with as we headed towards the exit sign and out to our families. And typically but not surprisingly when I finally saw Mum and Natalie I was happy and smiling but none of us got emotional or cried. We kissed and hugged and then the first thing Mum said was:

‘Have you got your bank card on you? We need you to get some cash out so we can pay for the parking.’

Welcome home! xxx

p.s. thank you for reading it all this time. Hope I didn’t bore you too much :-)