Having arrived from New Zeal winter, the first impression of Fiji was the heat, however, this was soon replaced when we received a welcome from three Fijians playing guitars in the airport and I decided I was going to love this country.

After a cramped 4 hour bus journey we reached Suva and despite it seeming very sleepy for a capital city the friendliness of the locals again shone through as we were greeted by shout of “Bula!” (Hello) everywhere we went. A day later and we were on camp which had exceeded my expectations and I was very impressed with the new bure (house) built for our arrival. We were quickly assigned roles around camp and various duties. The one which stuck out as the hardest was cooking as I had never cooked for this many people before, let alone on an open fire. Think I did a good job though as everything got eaten.

Other than the amazing diving there have been plenty of things to keep us occupied such as Friday nights Kava welcoming ceremony which was great fun and Sundays visit to church in Qarani. It was here we got to spend some time with our Fijian families and once more the friendliness shone though from the adults cooking for us to the kids wanting to play rugby on the beach and teach us Fijian.

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