Back to Fiji in March
My wife Dot and I are back in friendly Nadi Fiji for two weeks where daily it is hot, humid and raining as there is a cyclone off the coast.While Dot goes with women friends to have a coffee in town, I plan to run at 8 am with my Indian friend, Vijay, aged 57, who runs most days to keep fit. This is a good habit as the older you get, it is hard to keep fit anywhere, but especially in hot Fiji.
He is busy as both a school maintenance man and the Pastor for an Indian Church that he started
We planned a 10 km run along some sugar cane farm roads but as there has been heavy overnight rain it is too hard to run through mud and big pools of water. So we ran to the airport and then back through local shop center. No one else is running as it is hot and humid though many people are walking.
A carpenter working on a house roof calls out encouragement to us
“Thanks for running you are both an inspiration.”
After leaving Nadi we travel 20 km to Lautoka to see Korean, Filipino and Norwegian friends. All of them are inspirational people as they do community work.
I also run with my Korean friend, Daesong, who along with his wife, organizes four free- dental programs each year in local villages. On their last very busy dental program, they treated 100 very grateful people a day, cleaning and extracting their teeth, taking blood pressure and giving medications.
The team commented that some of the villagers had a poor diet not being able to eat enough fresh vegetables. In fact, on these programs, volunteers come from Brisbane, Sydney, New Zealand as well as from a local Redland Bay College.
After Lautoka we took a pleasant four-hour bus trip to visit Dan and wife Va at hot, humid rainy Wainadoi, which is 20 km from Suva. Dan is the Pastor in an Indian village where they have built a church. After Sunday Church we had a great time with the congregation drinking chai and eating samosas.
Our trip has ended and now we are back in Brisbane, inspired to help in our own local community and to keep healthy, eat a good diet and exercise regularly.
Written by Peter Lane Rai, March 2025
