Trip to Bau

On Saturday we travelled to Bau village, where the highest ranked chief in Fiji lives. It was an insight into the more formal, traditional indigenous Fijian culture- we had to assemble ourselves into a straight line with boys leading and girls at the back, we had to carry our bags by our sides instead of on our shoulders, we were bare foot and we weren’t allowed to wear sunglasses or huts (so I was as always very sunburnt at the end of the day!)

The Kava ceremony was strangely relaxed compared to what we had witnessed at our welcome ceremony on Monday. The chief of Bau was very involved and interacted directly with us, asking questions and laughing alot.

The tour of the village provided an interesting insight into the conversation of Christianity that occurred in Fiji. I have been reading a book titled “Fiji Times: A History of Fiji” by Kim Gravelle which details the conversation to Christianity using a range of archeological sources and local myths. The conversion was very much a top- down conversation, as Gravelle describes “Cakobau’s religion became the people’s religion.” On Bau it was possible to witness the very visual changes that occurred as a result of this conversation. For example, all the ‘heathen temples’ on Bau island were destroyed with only one remaining as a meetinghouse. Symbolically, the island’s first Minister was the only person allowed to live in land above Cokobau’s house. Another example is the use of an original killing stone transformed into a baptism stone.

Remaining 'heathen temple' used as a meeting room.

This adaption of Christainty now influences almost all aspects of indigenous Fijian lives. At work this week I have been amazed by the amount of prayer, singing and devotions that are incorporated into the work environment. During the week at the National Trust workshop (more about this later!) the staff created a Jesse Tree- this is a unique advent calendar to visually show the genealogy of Jesus Christ. Each staff member was provided with a symbol and a biblical passage and they had the task to create the ornament and describe the relevance of the story to the work place- the end result was an emphasis on the biblical values of fairness, equality, justice, loyalty and kinship.

Sorry to be sidetracked! After our tour of Bau island, we went to a village close by, Lagilagi. We have recently found out that we are the first non- Fijians to visit this village- this made the visit even more special! They organized a huge feast for us- one of many examples of how welcoming and generous Fijian communities have been during our trip.

Kava root drying in the sun