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Fiji and New Zealand
"We learn a great deal by new experiences"- printed on a Sushi food cart in Nelson, New Zealand.
New experiences are what travelling is all about. Trying to embrace a country's culture is becoming harder than ever because of the saturation of American popular culture. In the past month, I've been able to sample a small flavor of Fiji and New Zealand ranging from the throat numbing Fiji root drink Kava to New Zealand McDonalds' Kiwi Burger (a quarter pounder cheesburger with beets and eggs).
My number one objective during my week in Fiji, a small South Pacific cluster of islands, was to get certified in SCUBA diving. Once arriving on the main island in Fiji (after an eleven-hour flight) I had to take two more flights, truck across an island, then boat for an hour and a half just to make it to the resort where I was staying! I made it to the island of Kadavu at the resort Matava, where I lived for a weekin a buree. (basically one of those huts on Gilligan's Island) During the first night, a tropical cyclone hit the region. Massive floods struck the main Island of Viti Levu while most of the flooding on our island seemed to be inside my buree. However, with the use of my raingear, I was able to position myself in the bed in an area where the thatched roof held off most of the downpour.
During my SCUBA training, I made five dives. One dive brought me face to face with four large manta rays circling in the water. Their eyes were the size of my fist and their mouths the size of my waist. Gracefully gliding through the water, the manta rays circled within feet of my touch. On my final dive, the dive master was able to lead us to two small sharks and one larger, white tip shark. It looked massive to my surprised eyes, but to the guide's estimate only about 4-5 feet long.
Before heading off to New Zealand, I spent a night in Suva, Fiji's capital city, on the main island of Viti Levu. It was in Suva that I began to recognize the strength of American culture on the rest of the world. That night out on the town I swear I could have been in any college town USA and would not have seen a difference. Also, in Suva, I did catch an American movie at the local theater. Even though we have created a worldwide culture, the translation still doesn't come across. In English, the movie "The Thin Red Line" showed scenes of sadness only to be met with a huge response of laughter from the Fijians. Oh well, off to New Zealand.
In NZ, I hooked up with a backpackers tour group called Kiwi Experience. The idea behind this tour group is to run throughout the country, hitting the major attractions while stopping along the way to swim the surf and rivers. I made my way from Auckland in the North Island to Christchurch in the South Island. North Island is very lush and heavily populated with sheep. Tourism and sheep have to be NZ's biggest moneymakers. In each town, I stayed in a hostel where the number of roommates ranged from 1-16 and the average cost was $7.50 US. In the hostels, I would meet people from every country, but rarely would I meet someone from the US. The only thing I could conclude was that many Americans haven't even seen their own country, let alone choose to spend time traveling abroad. But even though many Americans don't travel abroad, our culture is established at every turn. Referred to as the American Embassy, McDonalds can be found in most towns. The real treat comes in the bigger cities, where you get caught in the great fast food triangle, McDonalds, Burger King, and Kentucky Fried Chicken within finger lickin' range. One of my more interesting experiences had to be watching a club full of New Zealanders and tourists from around the world singing in harmony to "Sweet Home Alabama, where the skies are so blue" (ok, so maybe it wasn't in harmony, but very few, if any, actually knew where Alabama is in the US.... Oh by the way...factoid: New Zealand is east of Australia in the lower part of the Southern Hemisphere below Asia (please look for it on a map since everybody's impression here is that Americans haven't the foggiest idea where NZ is located) Here's another culture example lost in the translation. One New Zealander heard a joke on a TV show about a Twinkie.... she asked, "what is a Twinkie?" So, I took it upon myself, as the great ambassador, to describe the make-up of a Twinkie. It took 15-20 minutes, but the group on the bus listening in on the description now had a grasp of one of America's greatest junk food inventions!
Throughout North Island I traveled almost everyday, saving up my extra days for South Island, which many Kiwis (term for New Zealanders) say is the most beautiful part of NZ. North Island is very tropical looking with dormant volcanoes creating the mountainous terrain. The town of Rotorua is very similar to Yellowstone National Park, with geyser activity, bubbling mud, and the stench of sulfur. Also in Rotorua, our tour group received a little taste of the culture of the Maori People, the first settlers of the area. Traditional dances and a traditional meal were put on display for us. It was a glimpse of their past that has quickly disappeared just as the culture of Native Americans has in the United States. Brave, large warriors, the Maori people, can now be seen most often playing rugby for New Zealand.
Crossing to South Island, I broke away from the tour group for several days to backpack through the Abel Tasman National Park. Described as one of the best walks in NZ, the track hugs the coast, taking hikers and sea kayakers to an endless number of white sandy beaches. I spent two days on trail and half of a day sea kayaking the park.
Hooking back up with the tour group and traveling a couple more days down the road, I found what I saw as the most impressive experience in NZ-ice! The Franz Josef Glacier is an expanding glacier in a sub-tropical rainforest. I spent a day hiking on the glacier with metal clawed boots and ice axe in hand. Close to sea level, the glacier is very hiker friendly. Every day, a guide service carves steps into the ice, which by day's end has melted away. The steps help you cover a lot of territory which helps you make it to the most beautiful part of the glacier, where walls of ice shoot 30-50 feet high, creating a maze of ice canyons. We traveled through small ice caves and huge cracks using the ice axe to pull us up and the boots to latch onto quickly carved three-inch steps. The best part of the journey was the endless directions your guide could lead you with the sense of discovery at every turn. If someone had traveled through one or two days before, their footprints had already melted away. The glacier is a destination must in NZ and for the less physical, but wealthier traveler, you can fly over in a helicopter and land in the heart of the glacier.
Onward I traveled down the westcoast through towns smaller than the previous ones. All during my stay, NZ really pushed itself as the adrenaline country. Skydiving, white water rafting, bungy jumping, and jet boating were usually offered at every corner of the country. But, it was Queenstown, the adrenaline junkie paradise, that awaited my arrival.
Feb 16, 1999
The Pipeline. It's the largest bungy jump in the country of the country that invented bungy jumping, second largest in the world. It's 102 meters above a river, (that's 340ft), the length of a football field. I was to launch myself off a bridge with nothing more than an oversized rubberband attached to my ankles. The same elastic holding up my underwear was now being used to stretch adrenaline from every willing soul. Bound at the ankles, I hopped out on the small launch pad. My mind seemed to go blank. I knew that I was not going to turn back."5,4,3,2,1", the guy yelled out. "Here I go," I thought, and leaped forward, attempting to do a swan dive into the river 340 feet below. Thoughts flashing into my head were fractions of seconds. "I'm falling.... Oh God, I'm falling... Why am I doing this?" I feel the bungy pull on my legs after free falling for what seemed an eternity. "I'm safe, Let's try to milk this spring back up to 70 meters for everything it is worth...." boing..boing...another boing "That wasn't so bad." I did it, The Pipeline in Queenstown, NZ!!! Too bad the truck ride back through the winding canyon road made me carsick.
So, now here I sit in Christchurch, awaiting my departure from NZ onward to Australia, where I will spend 5 weeks working my way up the coast. More beaches and sunblock than a pale white guy can handle. Type to you later, feel free to drop me a line and let me know what is happening back home.
cya
Jonathan Adams