An apology...

Hi all,
This post is an apology to Carl and his family.
When I wrote my last entry I was expressing alot about how I personally felt about what has happened here in rotuma, without thinking that what I wrote might offend anyone. I tend to get carried away when expressing my feeling and thoughts, and should have been conscious that some things aren't apropriate to publish on the internet for anyone to read.
I also failed to aknowledge that altho what Carl's couzins did was really bad, they did do alot of good too, and they too sacrificed alot of their time and energy in helping Carl persue his dream. They're not all bad, and I do know that... what I wrote came from a place of anger, and I should have kept it to myself.
So mainly to Carl and his mum, I am truely sorry, and have learnt a good lesson from this...
X N

We are back!!!

We are back!!!!!!!

A very long time has passed since I last blogged, and many many waters have flowed thru many rivers, I'm sure.

It was August last year when I managed to get that miracle flight out of Rotuma and returned to Sydney, thinking I will stay a few weeks and go back, but the kids and I ended up staying in Sydney for 7 months, doing our thang, doing the ups and downs of life, and coming out stronger than ever.

Carl returned to Sydney in October to come save US and see us, and returned to Rotuma at the beginning of Feb.

When he left here last year, he made sure he packed up all his gear and specifically told his relatives here not to touch or use or lend or borrow any of his gear, and left them with instructions of what work needed to be done while he was away.

After staying in Fiji for a couple of weeks, having a little surf holiday on the coral coast, he took the dreadful 4 day boat trip over to Rotuma, the poor thing said it was the worst boat ride he has ever been on. I didn’t even want to know too much about it, as just the thought of it triggers my PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) from our boat trip over here just under a year ago, so I just felt sorry for him, and left it at that...

When he arrived back to Itumuta, his village, eager to get back into the work and get the house built, he discovered that his cousins had messed up big time!!!  Everything he had told them NOT to do, they pretty much disrespected, and did it all:  They used his Chain saw (and lent it to random people) and broke it, they used his other power tools and lent them to others, they used our push bikes and messed up the gears on one of them, they used or sold half a barrel of fuel  and most of the pre-mix fuel we had left , they had spent  money Carl had left for them to pay someone for work he was supposed to do, and the saddest part was they went and sold 2 massive slabs of the beautiful Mahogany timber Carl had cut for $250, (and obviously spent the money) after Carl had very specifically said not to sell or touch any of the timber...

When Carl heard all about it, from several relatives and people around the island, he was absolutely devastated!!!! For 6 months he had worked so hard on this project, slaved his soul, sacrificed so much, invested so much energy, time and money in this project, which was his life dream, but eventually it is his family here who would have benefited from living in probably the nicest house on the island, and they pretty much just stabbed him in the chest 59 times in return. It was 2 of his closest cousins that did it all, and he was really hurt. The one cousin is in Fiji, and we havent heard a word from him, and the other one , is here. Carl confronted him about it all, and asked him to tell him nothing but the truth about what he had done, which he did. It turns out that all he wanted was a bit of money to be able to drink and party over the Xmas period... He apparently showed a lot of remorse about it all, but this whole thing prompted a lot of family upheaval and anger.
Carl had to really have a think about what he wants to do. He felt so disappointed and betrayed by these relatives, and eventually made the decision not to build the house on that land, and rather build it on another piece of family land in another village called Hapmak.
They all begged him not to leave, but Carl had already made up his mind.

I was still in Australia when this all had happened, and when I heard about it, I too was ready to go slit some necks and punch some faces... I COULD NOT believe that these people can do something like this, and was really upset for Carl, and angry as hell!!! I too sacrificed allot for these people, much more than they could possibly understand, and I felt really gutted about it all. Clearly I was TOTALLY supportive of Carl to get out of that place and move to Hapmak, and was really glad he made that decision.

So within a few days, Carl moved EVERYTHING out of that house, from power tools and timber, to condiments and toothpaste that we had brought there, and took everything over to Hapmak.

I dunno if you remember me writing about this, but if you go back to my blog on 1^st of August  2010, I had written about staying at uncle Varo’s house, which was a great house and felt like being on holiday.... well- this is where we are now! A lovely spacious bright and airy house, with electricity from 5am till 11pm, a fridge, ceiling fans, a washing machine that actually cleans the clothes, fly screens on every door and window, a decent bathroom, a great kitchen! And a room to ourselves with a door on it!

We are living with Aggy, Uncle Varo’s wife, who is a funny character and is always trying to talk me into drinking with her and getting drunk, but she is sweet, and although she talks a hellova lot, she needs and takes her own space and gives me mine too. She is happy to have kids around and another woman in the house. Her 16 yr old son Muero is here too, he goes to high school and plays with the kids when he gets home. Uncle Varo is in Nadi (Fiji) at the moment, and will be back probably in April or May.

Needless to say how much happier I am here, and the spot we are building on is amazing. It is higher up on a bit of a hill, so it feels more spacious and breezy, it has million dollar views, surrounded by coconut,  pawpaw and banana trees, the ocean is about 50 meters down the hill, there isn’t a beach here, it’s all rocks and reef, which is a bit of a bummer, but, hey, I go to sleep and wake up to the sound of the waves, beautiful sunrises and sunsets, Carl goes out surfing and spear fishing from the bottom of the hill, and the kids have loads of space to run around here.

I went back to Itumuta yesterday to say hi to the lovely old ladies I love and left there, and saw the house we left and felt SO happy we weren’t there anymore. So many bad  feelings about that place, the energy there felt so stale and dead, I felt so much joy not being there anymore....

Luckily Carl hadn’t actually started building there yet, they had only built the retaining wall and filled the land with loads of sand to extend the property into the water (did I mention how good it is to be higher up rather than right on the water after the last devastation of earth quake and Tsunami in Japan?  The night of that tragedy, they had Tsunami alerts here too and I was really worried about Carl here. They ended up having to go sleep at some relative’s house on higher grounds for the night, and came back home after they were cleared of Tsunami warnings). So what is left for them in Itumuta is a beautiful extension to their land.

I always had the feeling that if we were to build the house there, it would not be looked after as soon as we left, and I had almost come to terms with the fact that this whole project, this whole journey is to support Carl in his dream of building a house in his village where his heart is, and knew that I can’t get attached to the result- the house,  So it would be like building a house of cards, and then just blowing it down, just like that... the law of detachment...

So after arriving in Fiji last Thursday and staying in a hotel for 3 nights because our flight, which was supposed to be the following morning was cancelled, (of course- nothing goes as planned in Fiji, but it ended up being good, nice to stay in a hotel, kids had a ball in the pool, spent lots of time with some relatives in Nadi), we boarded the miniature aircraft that flew us over the ocean and Fiji islands back to Rotuma...

I'm not in anyway a religious person, but whenever I go on one of these flights I feel I need to pray for the protection Goddesses to look after us, especially sitting in the front row of the 12 seater watching the pilots both have to use their full force to move the leavers which make the plane ascend, the buttons and dials looking rusty,  freezing all the way because of the cracks around the windows allowing the cold air at 10,000 feet to enter the aircraft, and us needing to scream in each other’s ears in order to communicate coz the engines are so close and noisy...

We made it, and the kids ran off the plane into their daddy’s arms, who they missed allot. Carls dad, Chris, is here too, he arrived 2 weeks before us to help with the first stages of building, and so was Shane, Carl’s best mate from Sydney, who had been here with us 3.5 years ago for Noah’s 1^st birthday party, but he took off back home on the plane we arrived on.

I was going to attempt to write about the work on the house that Carl and his mighty men have done up till now, but I think it is too technical and I don’t understand enough of it yet to be able to write about all the boysie stuff, so I will let Carl write all about that side of things when I manage to nail him down to the computer...

So its back to loads of coconuts, gazillions of Pawpaws, taro and Cassava, beautiful fresh fish that Carl spears, he had allot of practice while we weren’t here, and has got very good at it!!! (Cas and Ben- you’d be green!!!), SourSop, Vee, beautiful buttery Avocados, and this time- COLD water to drink, Ice blocks for the kids, a blender for cocktails, a toaster, and an electric kettle to boil water in 2 minutes as opposed to half an hour on the stinky kerosene cooker... the little things in life...

A few months ago I was reading a random blog of a guy who was cruising thru the pacific and stopped over in Rotuma, but I clearly remembered one thing that he wrote about the journey, the rough seas and all the hurdles on his way, he said that the difference between and adventure and a disaster- is your ATITUDE!

Clearly this time round in Rotuma is going to be much more comfortable, and I am determined to make it an adventure for us all, rather than it turn into a disaster like last time...

Wish me luck!!!!!! 

P.S The internet connection seems slower than it was the last time i was here, progress, it seems, doesnt exist here