26.11.11-27.11.11:

I was rather expecting the old Southern Pearl to be leaving today, but its ETA in Suva has been pushed back by a day so it wouldn’t be leaving until Monday… at the earliest. Ah well, thinks I, so long as Sandy doesn’t object to the strange hairy man from the other side of the world staying a couple more nights… On Saturday night, Sandy and I headed back over to Peter and Ann’s for round two of my Kava Initiation ceremony. Losana from last night was there (laughing at my drunk n’ disorderly behaviour the night before) along with a few others who had popped around for Kava and the Super Sevens Rugby, in which Fiji was doing remarkably well. So remarkably well that they went on to beat New Zealand and take the first round of the international tournament: and deservedly so – where else do you see grown rugby men cry during the National Anthem? Christ, if only English footballers could muster that amount of passion, we might actually win something.

The next day, it being Sunday, Sandy invited me around to her mum’s house to hang out with her family. Nephews and nieces running about getting up to no good and enough food to feed a passing army. We talked shop, ate birthday cake (happy birthday Wah!) played cards, played chess and watched a wonderfully godawful film on TV (The Next Best Thing: AVOID). All in all, a perfect Sunday afternoon. All that was left at the end of the day was to thank everybody for such a good time and head back to Sandy’s place for one of her massive cups of tea and one final push to get my blogs up to date before I left at 7am tomorrow.