I must have some good karma going for me 'cause...

Sorry about the delayed posting of photos on here...they upload at a speed of about 1 per hour. Next time I'll get some more up to correspond to the stories.

Pretty much everything here in Fiji is exactly how I would have imagined it in a perfect world (minus the lack of white sand beach to lay on). I recently swore in which means I'm officially a Peace Corps volunteer. Here is some video from the swearing in ceremony: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3jiFAo3ysg. The village I'm staying in built me a concrete block house with a tin roof. I have electricity, water, and even tile in my bedroom and bathroom. There is a creek behind my house that runs down from the mountain and 100 ft in the other direction is the ocean. Here are some photos:
Kitchen
Bathroom
Bedroom

Now...I have to apologize for the lack of posting lately. Things have been sooo busy since the end of training and swearing in. Now that things are calming down (supposedly so), I'll have more time to get on here. Our last week in our training villages was bittersweet. I was starting to feel really at home with my family but at least I can see them sometimes when I go onto the main island. Out last free day before moving some of us hiked an hour and a half through the jungle and traditional villages to a beach that only the villages are allowed to use. We body surfed some big waves, had lunch, and roasted marshmellows on a bonfire that the locals made for us. When we got there, within 20 minutes a shed was erected to keep us shaded.
Hanging out under the shed...

Hiking back

Hiking back through cassava fields


One of our last nights in the training village our families threw us a huge party and even got permission from the village elders to buy us wine and let us drink that night (it's usually illegal in the villages). I stayed up to 1 am dancing the night away...
Village going away party

I cannot even begin the express my gratitude to my host family in Nukutubu. They were some of the most giving and caring people I have ever met in my whole life yet live with environmental, health, and other village problems that we as Americans could never imagine if we didn't see it first hand. So...Vinaka vaka levu for everything!!!

There have definitely been some interesting cultural moments since I've been here. I was eating lunch one Sunday with my host brother only to look out the back door at a 3 year old boy marching around like he saw in the army parade the week before. Now this may seem normal, even something I could picture my 4 year old nephew doing on occasion, however, in this boy's hand was a large kitchen knife. He proceeded to run around outside chasing and being chased by other children his age. All the while, my host family giggling at them. If my nephew James participated in this sort of play time I do believe it would mean certain death for him. Good thing he's not Fijian.

I've been eating modestly...generally what the locals eat. Just to prove this point I took a picture of what I ate for dinner two nights ago. It was the daily catch for a neighbor.
Just a reality check...this is not what I usually eat...I'm usually eating canned corned beef and lots of vegetables (I know...you didn't even think I could spell the word :-D). But...still pretty cool.

Over the past 2 months of training, the staff have drilled into our heads that we will not have what we may consider a productive first 3 months at our permanent site. Because of this, I came into my site quite relaxed, looking forward to getting to know the community and their needs...slowly. However, this couldn't be further from the truth. My second day on the island I was at a festival in town and was prompted to teach a group of 20 students what marine biology is. Now that I've had a little longer than a week to take everything in, I've found out that my community is advanced by Fijian village standards. Multiple people have told me that conservation is their number one priority because they know they need it to be successful in income generating projects. Today, I have a student coming in from Fiji National University who is under my supervision as an intern. They've asked us to carry out marine surveys on the reef and terrestrial surveys of the jungle to include the results in a development grant proposal that they ave already done their homework on. So far, it's looking like I will be working...a lot.

I got to snorkel the reef yesterday and saw my first shark! It was a black tip reef shark only a few feet long. I also saw some giant clams (approximately 2 feet across). I spent three hours on the reef and found myself constantly saying through my snorkel, "That's awesome!" and I can't wait to go out again!