Newsletters from Fiji

This month children and teachers at Nadi Christian Academy got a nice treat on June 9th when American volunteer Sia Boima celebrated her birthday in Fiji at her placement! Just days before the end of her one month Teaching placement at the primary school in Nadi town, Sia generously hosted a birthday party at work in order to share her special day with the kids and teachers she had grown very attached to very quickly.

The end of April also brought with it the end of the first school term. This meant that the first two weeks of May were designated as school holidays for children and teachers. However, in order to continue their worthwhile work and satisfy the hunger for knowledge that so many of the local children display, Projects Abroad volunteers opted to host a special Holiday School for Nadi’s most enthusiastic students.

For ten days in April Projects Abroad Fiji was lucky enough to have a visit from Projects Abroad Australia marketing staff member Kathryn Kirk. Kat was visiting to see how things run on the ground in Fiji and learn about the placements in order to better help potential Australian volunteers prepare for their time abroad. Kat is one of two staff members in the Adelaide-based Projects Abroad office in Australia.

Canadian volunteer Eli Schwartz joined us in Fiji back in January for a 3-month Teaching placement at Nadi Airport School. He had never done any teaching prior to arriving in Fiji but immediately settled in and has since won rave reviews from all the staff and students at his project! Supervising teacher Mrs. Chandra has reluctantly been “sharing” Eli around with the other classes but his specialty has become the Remedial Class (also known as Reading Recovery) for Class 4.

With the Summer Holidays over at the end of January, February marked the beginning of another school year term. Volunteers are back at regular school in and around Nadi and those at Nadi Christian Academy face some particularly tough challenges but have had the opportunity to do some very valuable work.

The end of January saw the end of Summer School after 5 weeks of hard work from our volunteers. It was a great success with volunteers teaching the children a variety of topics and doing many different activities. During Summer School, ex-volunteers Charlotte Jorlov and Daniel Granot brought their families, who were visiting Fiji, to see the children - they were greeted with such enthusiasm from the pupils.

For many of our volunteers, Christmas this year will be very different from their usual festive celebrations. In 30 degree heat, it seems bizarre to see Christmas trees decorated with fake snow, and little snowmen with scarves on. However, Fijians fully enter into the Christmas spirit: Christmas songs are played everywhere, including the favourite ‘Feliz Navidad’.

Fijian meke is the name for the traditional dance of the indigenous people of Fiji Islands and is pronounced 'meh-kay'. Men, women and children all participate in the meke, which is a combination of dance and repetitive rhythmic chanting telling the stories of everyday life, or of ancient gods or of battles won.

‘Fiji Week’ is a week of festivities culminating in Fiji Day on 10 October (the anniversary of Fiji's independence from British colonial rule in 1970) annually. A different theme is chosen every year, but common elements include religious ceremonies and cultural performances. This year was 39th anniversary of the nation’s independence which fell on Saturday. In Suva, thousands of school children and others paraded through the streets and there were many other celebrations throughout the Fiji islands.