Celebrating our last night in Fiji - in Nadi

Here you have it! You are witnessing us celebrating our last night in Fiji - on the beach in Nadi. Here we are drinking & watching the islanders dance! What a terrific show it was & so much fun!

My interpreter clearly had a good time & enjoyed herself very much! (As you can see in the photos! Hee!) And an Irish traveller who we met at the bar. And I too had a good time!

After this fun girly night out, we retired to our hotel rooms to have a nice long hot shower & a deep sleep in our own double beds which we havent had in a while. Just blissful!

Making & drinking Kava for the first time!

Well here I am finally experiencing some Kava!

First of all, we saw some men outside under the street light pounding away grinding kava in a tall narrow pot with a very heavy heavy steel pole. When the pole hit the ground - the ground vibrated!!! My friend says one must be careful when grinding the kava or it will hit the foot & cut it badly. This is why the street light is needed - when doing it at night.

After this we went knocking on a neighbours door for a few packets of grounded kava.

Then finally in my friend's house to begin making the kava.

Making the kava started off really well! It started with a little puppy dog lapping up our fresh water in the green bowl! Ha! We had to start again & change the bowl with some more fresh water. After this, the kava (grounded root from a special tree) was put in large strips of fabric & dipped & swirled about in the water. Then the water was stirred until it became clear & muddy & of a smooth texture.

Then the the kava was ready to be drunk & was poured into a coconut cup. The cup was passed to me first - gulp! I had to clap my hands 3x times & sign 'n' say 'bula' before drinking the cup in one mouthful. But I confess I couldnt drink it in one mouthful cos it tasted so strong & muddy!!! But I did manage to drink it all & passed on the cup to my friend & then his brother to drink.

Suddenly my lips felt numb - I couldnt feel them! And then my tongue felt all tingly! A few more cups later - I began to feel quite mellow & relaxed!

Much later & a beer later - my chest had the strangest feeling ever. I had to stand while the beer went down my chest past the scratchy feeling of kava in the upper chest. A nice but strange combination!

Definately drinking Kava is an acquired taste. I didnt like the Kava much but am glad to have tried it & really enjoyed the ritual that goes with it - clapping hands, saying bula to each other before drinking & passing on the cup. I think I would drink it again cos it really does give a nice mellow relaxing feeling later!

What a great way to remember my last night in Suva & my last day of university!!!

Fiji Association of the Deaf (FAD) farewell party for us

Here we are having a little farewell party for us - held by some members of Fiji Association of the Deaf.

Lots of special thanks were given to my interpreter for her support & training for Fijian sign language interpreters. A big thank you to my interpreter for her big heart & advice to help the Fijian interpreters find ways to improve on their service.

A funny moment at this party! When the president of FAD was giving a signed speech - I tried to watch & pay attention but hard a time concentrating! Because the little boy in the red shirt sitting next to me kept blowing air at me through his straw!

After the party & some good chats, my interpreter left to have dinner with her host family. And I left to go taste some Kava with a deaf fijian friend - my aussie girlfriend's boyfriend. As this was going to be my last night in Suva - I had to go try out famous Fijian drink - Kava!

Swimming at the olympic pool with my deaf students - last day!

And here I am at the olympic swimming pool in Suva on my last day at school - with my deaf students from Gospel Primary School for the Deaf. We had a great time!

The children were keen to show me lots of tricks in the pool, swim laps with me & we all dived off the divers block to see how far we could swim after diving. Ha! I felt like a kid again diving off that block but they wanted me to do it - so I had to do it or else I would have been a boring Aussie girl to them. Ha!

When we finished our swim, the children played with my hair - put loads of gel in it & styled it with their fingers! Ha! They also posed for lots of photos! And gave me lots of hugs to say goodbye. They really hope I will return to visit again this October to watch their performance for the school 10-year anniversary event. I said I will try to visit but cannot promise as there are things I must do upon my return to Australia. It was a sad moment to part & leave. Some tears too. I have grown so fond these gorgeous happy & generous deaf children!

After bidding farewell to these children - I caught a taxi back home to get ready for a night out to celebrate end of Fiji project & end of university with deaf friends of the Fiji Association for the Deaf.

Farewell to Gospel High School ... & presents!!!

My last day at Gospel High School! And my last day of university!!! Whoah!!!

A sad but lovely day! So many beautiful farewell speeches from students & teachers. And so many gifts!!!

Here you see photos of a special farewell morning tea event held for me & my interpreter. All the school staff (about 40x staff members) bid us farewell, said prayers to god to wish us well, & also invited us to return to the school anytime in the future. A lovely feast of tea & snacks were provided for us - but as I was so busy chatting to everyone I had no time to eat!!!

The gifts I received was a lovely wooden art piece with an image of Fiji & 'bula' engraved on it. Also, some clothes from a teacher colleague & Indian bracelets!!! And a gorgeous surprise gift from my students - a fijian 'masi' print wall hanging & a folio of all their wonderful hand art images. I was so moved by this!!! I did not expect to receive so many gifts!

I was rather tired on this day - as you can see in the photos! This last & final week at the school was rather exhausting as I tried to make sure I had time with each & everyone of my students & colleagues before leaving. And I also had a few nights out socialising with my new fijian friends.

Last 2x photos you see below are images of my interpreter (& me behind the camera) saying goodbye to Gospel High School (at the back of the school) & to Gospel Primary School for the Deaf (behind the high school on same block of land).

We were very sad to go but at the same time I was very excited in knowing that university is over at long last & was looking forward to a night out in Suva to celebrate!

Rhythm & Art Class with form 3 students

Here are some images for you to view - from my form 3 art class at Gospel High School last week.

We explored rhythm & movement in line drawings & used music for inspiration - in particular the 'meke' music of Fiji.

Lots of diversity in the drawings here!

Some students struggled with this task as there was lots of freedom with this topic. However, I thought the task was useful & beneficial to the students as they dont get many opportunities to explore & express themselves so freely.

Enjoy the photos!

It's showtime! Deaf drama at Gospel Primary School for the Deaf

And my last task for today involved putting on a semi-polished 'Deaf Awareness' performance for all the deaf children at Gospel Primary School for the Deaf. Including the deaf performers, there are about 55x deaf children at this school.

The children performing were so excited & nervous - including the deaf & hearing teachers who are performing in this show also! All have never done this before! In fact, they have never done drama before!

They loved it, were such great performers & signed beautifully. The audience had a really great time too!

We also invited the school principal from Gospel High to come & watch the show. She was impressed & said they are so good at it! Oh I do hope they will do more drama at the school now because it is a wonderful way for the deaf students to express themselves! I am glad I found the time to put this show together with the students - within 1-week (approx. 2.5hrs per group)! Now the students have a good excuse to do more drama between now & October. They will need to rehearse this show up until October - to give their final & best performance at the school's 10-year anniversary event - which will be held on 'World Teacher's Day'.

Something interesting for you to know. One boy is 20y.o in this school. This boy only started primary school when he was 17y.o - just 3-yrs ago! Up until he was 17y.o he might have been isolated in a Fijian village somewhere. But it is better late to start school than never! So this is why some of the deaf students at the primary school look so big! There really is a need to get more deaf awareness out in the villages so we may get deaf children into school earlier & so they may learn language asap - as like hearing children do. If deaf children are left in the villages, many will not develop language skills. So this has been one of my challenges when working with deaf primary school children - communicating clearly because some have only just been introduced to language & are only just learning to sign. But having worked with the children a bit now I can see they do pick up the sign language very quickly, go on to be smart & very keen learners! This is clearly evident amongst deaf students who have been at school for at least a couple of years.

Tomorrow, the deaf children are thrilled to know that I will finally be joining them at the olympic swimming pool in town. They are so excited & have been asking me to join them for awhile now - as part of their regular Friday sporting activity. I have not been able to attend before because up until now I have been teaching at the highschool on Fridays. The children were keen to know what I will wear. I told them I only have bikinis but will cover up! They giggled & laughed. So the trip to the pool will be a nice way to finish my last day in school & my last day of university! Yay!