Who would you meet?

Towards the end of last year.
During an office retreat.
For the sake of team-bonding with a difference, or maybe to kill time before the next session.
We posed a question - Who would you like to meet in this lifetime?

Thinking on the spot, I said Sarah Kay.

And really, I would.

I discovered her through a TED talk. 'B - If I should have a daughter'.
Then I stayed up all night and you-tube'd every video of her Spoken Word I could find online.

I still do that from time to time, when I need inspiration,
when I need to renew my conviction.
Or when I need to share the beauty of her art.

I found this today. She calls it 'The Type'
I fell in love again, every time.
With her words.
With the possibilities.


The Type: by Sarah Kay

And if I should have a daughter, I'd have her listen to Sarah Kay. 

March Forth!

I started writing this as a reply to someone's status update on FB. But I know better than to feed the internet trolls on that platform, I still need to get this out of my system though, so here goes.

There was a Police brutality video posted up this week showing.. well, police brutality.
I know I don't have the heart or stomach to watch it, so I won't. But I have a fair idea of what it entails, especially judging by the comments of those who have watched it.

I understand the uproar. It's a major human rights violation, agreed wholeheartedly.
But I don't see eye-to-eye with those who are using this as an excuse to jump on the 'What has become of Fiji' bandwagon. 

Police-brutality is a reality worldwide and so as wrong as it is, I still don't think it justifies us questioning our progress as Fijians, questioning our identity and saying that we are ashamed to be Fijian. I question humanity, yes. But I am still proud of being Fijian, and one has nothing to do with another.

Cases such as these have been happening for ages now, and while that doesn't make it ok, I only bring it up to indicate that the only difference now is that this time ...it was caught on camera. I think it's wrong to blame our circumstances politically, or otherwise. Yes, we should not be having such incidences at all, but I think by blaming it on things like democracy, and coups etc, is a cop-out from tackling the more deep-seeded issues in our society that leads its people to act so inhumanely.

Someone commented that we are going back into the dark ages. I disagree, as a nation we are doing better, we are good people, but bad people do exist. I question the integrity of the person who was a part of this abomination, and of those that stood around and did nothing about it. I try to get my head around what would lead them to be so cruel.
But I will not blame it on our country, and its people as a whole. I think we get enough of that from the misled foreign media and other countries already; we don't have to resort to blaming ourselves too.

We are good people. We need to remind ourselves of that. Bad people will always exist. But we shouldn't lose the good ones either.

Rant. over.

You can count on it.

A Milford Sounds birthday

2013!

Last week during an ice-breaker at one of our regional training-workshops we were asked to share how we would spend 1 million dollars.

In the short time I had to think about it, I came up with:
"Pay off student loans, throw a party, buy a farm to retire on."

I've been mulling over the question for a whole week now.
Yes, I took the innocent ice-breaker to heart!

So I realised, who am I kidding, I won't buy a farm. (Well, not yet anyway.)

I am going to pay off my student loans, throw a party.
Put my belongings in storage and ... travel the world.

To every corner possible.
Sigh.

But for now, I will just continue to try to do the same without the million.
And while holding a steady job.

I spent the last month or so in Middle -Earth (NZ for you non-LOTR fans, gasp!)
The 10th country I have been to outside my own.
It was my 29th birthday, spent in a different country 4th time in a row.
(THAT was purely coincidental.)

This time around it was spent with two friends, travelling through the beauty that is NZ, to the Milford Sounds.
No better way to spend a birthday than in awe of the earth in all its majesty,
And feeding my soul with adventure!
(And geeking out on the fiords, and re-living my High School Geo classes in real life!)

I don't wish for 1million dollars.

But I am definitely in for the adventure.

These days...

So I check my horoscope at the start of every month. Sometimes it's for fun, sometimes it's out of boredom. Sometimes it's to see how way off the mark they are. (Yes, I am STILL waiting for that love-of-my-life to show up thankyouverymuch).

There's two that I usually browse through... one on Yahoo... and Susan Miller (which is disabled for a few days right now, oh no.. how will my October go? *rolls eyes* )

There are some months though when they print (post?) stuff like this and I think, gee..

"Nobody ever promised you that it was going to be easy to balance, tightrope-walker-like, as you move across that high line that is life.... First you want to spend time with your friends. Then you want to spend more time with your family. Then you have to stay late at work. Agh!"

So that's basically what it's been like for me for the last few weeks, and what I know it will be like for the next few too. Been running around trying to 'schedule-in' things: finish work, catch-up with friends, finish work, attend non-work meetings, finish work, hug the parents, finish work, eat with the parents, finish work, have beers, finis.. you catch my drift. But what's crazy is that ..I frickn' love it! (Except ofcourse for the missing family/friends bit during all of this!) 

Have been travelling for work a lot over the last few weeks: Samoa, Solomons and Vanuatu, to run a regional climate change quiz amongst the high schools in each country. It's been tough, but also exhilarating. There have been nights with only 3 hours of sleep, days where you breathe in your breakfast and work through lunch. Tough but... amazing. There's been challenges but there's also been so many great people, so many smiles, stories, jokes, tears, laughs, exhaustion and then the great teamwork that keeps you going. I love working in the Pacific. 

It hasn't always been work-work-work in the new places either. Have managed to have at-least one whole day in each country to myself. 

Samoa turned out to be like a Saturday-arvo-lull. I like chilling there. in their colourful sulus (sarong/lavalava)

Solomons was nice to go back to, I saw another side that I didnt have time to discover the last time I was there, meeting the kids, chatting with the teachers and saw a lot from walking around the place (thanks to the traffic jams caused by the Royal visit) 

Then there was Vanuatu. sigh. I didn't take many pics in Vanuatu. It's like you don't want to offend the place by trying to capture it on camera. Instead, you want to go back. I am not one for making many future plans, but if the opportunity arises, I wouldn't mind living and working in Vanuatu for a bit. *adds to flexi-future-plans list*

Next week I get to discover the Micronesia region. Two weeks in Marshall Islands with a few days in Hawaii. 

But first... gotta get through this week. (cue: gotta get through this, gotta get through this.. )

In other news:

It's been a year since I got back from Japan! I had no idea what it was going to be like being back after 3 years. Oh boy! has it been a fun adventure! *raises piece of dalo with chopsticks to toast* 

Nambawan

"Stuff your eyes with wonder, live as if you'd drop dead in ten seconds.
See the world.
It's more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories" - Ray Bradbury

This was Solomon Islands for me, and I met a few others who see the world in the same way. It was exhilarating! There was also the constant reminder of Paulo Coelho. When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.


[This has been sitting in my draft-box for too long, so I am going to put it up, as incomplete as it is.]

On our trip to Malaita

This was taken on Auki, the capital of Malaita and our last stop... which we did a mad rush through since we only had two hours before the boat headed back to Honiara. Good times.

Word!

We also got a tour of the Arts Village that was being set up on Auki for the Pacific Arts Festival, by the very friendly security guard who guided us through instead of chasing us for trespassing!

I think what was most enlightening on this trip was meeting so many people (we were there for a Climate Change Community Workshop) who were interested in the same cause. Instead of trying to convince people that climate change was real and debating with skeptics, I got to listen to people talk about the impacts they are already facing from climate change.

There were presentations by those who have led projects that relocated people who are losing their land to sea level rise and others who are working in communities on adaptation projects that help islanders live with the changes that are occurring.

And throughout the week everyone from Melanesia that was representing their community etc. got to share ideas, best practices and experiences on how they can strengthen their efforts towards dealing with Climate Change. Go Team Pacific!

I guess this post isn't so incomplete after all.

(On a lighter note, I also got to watch some soccer matches at the Oceania Championships that were going on in SI at the time. Fiji vs NZ and SI vs PNG. Yay!)