a new use for talcum powder
You need a lot of headspace to write (I do anyway). I have not had much of that the last few months – hence no writing.
Benny Hinn the American evangelical has been to Fiji, performing at the national stadium for 3 nights for free. He says if you have enough faith, you can reach out and touch your TV screen (while he is on the TV) and you can be healed. My friend Salote died this week and she died the same night after she has been to see Benny Hinn. She went up the front of the stadium for healing and she still died. She had a lot of faith but I think she was quite looking forward to meeting her creator.
There is a lot of death in Fiji. People often seem to die of things that you don’t die of in Australia. It is also quite hard to find out what people have died from. I find it very exasperating to be told that someone died because “they had a weak body” or “their knees were swollen”. It is very hard to get the story. Maybe I come from a culture that is obsessed with details or cause and effect but people here don’t seem to be bothered by lack of detail. Maybe it is enough that they have died.
Unless you are Hindu or Muslim, then you are likely to have a Christian funeral and burial. Fiji Christianity has its own style and I find it fascinating the blend of traditional Fijian practice with Christian ceremony. So when someone dies, a few days before the funeral you have what is called the Reguregu. This is where you visit the family of the person who has died. You present money and a gift of kava. Speeches are made, gifts are presented and a bowl of kava is drunk. The women will then separate from the men and visit the women of the family and often view the body. The body is in a coffin, often with a glass panel over the face. The coffin is in a room that is decorated with the traditional woven mats and masi cloth. You will file past the body, take a long look at the face, some people will kiss the glass. I got a shock the first time I saw the face of a friend’s dead sister. I did not know where to look. She had cotton wool in her nostrils and her skin was sweating. Then you greet and console the mother of the deceased. The family will then provide tea and bread or even dinner to everyone. The Reguregu can take all day as different groups of people come to visit the family. It is very exhausting for the family, as they are constantly welcoming people, cooking and serving.
The funeral service itself is not much different from ones I have been to in Australia, except that there is always a picture of the dead person placed on the coffin and the family will often hire out a couple of buses to transport people from the funeral to the burial and then back to the family home.
The cemeteries in Fiji are looked after by prisoners. The prisoners maintain the grounds, dig the graves and then bury the body. They work in gangs supervised by a prison official. The prisoners are young Fijian men, with fit hard bodies from the heavy work of digging graves. At the burial of my friend Salote, I saw an Indian prisoner for the first time and he stood out being so much slighter and slimmer than the Fijians.
The coffin is wrapped in several woven mats before being lowered into the ground. The prisoners then shovel in the dirt and make a mound. Then a piece of masi (traditional cloth made from the bark of a pepper tree) is covered over the mound. A prisoner then takes a digging fork and pierces it several times. Masi is quite valuable and in the past was stolen from fresh graves. Piercing it makes it unable to be sold and therefore not worth stealing. The prisoners then all kneel and clap several times and their job is over. Flowers are then laid on the grave and people depart quietly.
Other ceremonies take place, 4 days later, 100 nights after and then a year later.
Witchcraft is still practiced in Fiji and often spoken about. I find it hard to take seriously but people do take it very seriously. Often when trying to find out why a person became sick or became deaf, I will be told that they were cursed. Kava is used to make the curse and jealousy is usually the reason given for doing it. People are told to be careful about whose kava they are drinking and where it comes from. Certain places in Fiji are well known for having evil spirits or using curses. My friends’ sister who died recently, died on an island called Beqa just off the coast of Suva. She had a stroke and asthma which affected her before she went to the island but when she later died, it was the island that was blamed not her health. Some people even refuse to go to the island for the fear that it induces in them.
It’s fascinating living in a place where the blend of pre-christian practice and Christian practice is quite obvious.
In November, we celebrated the National Disability Games. People with disabilities from all over the country participate in athletics and other sports. The children from all the special schools travel to participate. The night before the games begin, they have a concert with every school and disability group performing either a traditional song or dance. It is quite hilarious seeing these little kids all in matching hula skirts, sulus and Bula shirts (Hawaiian shirts). Even more hilarious is the behaviour from the audience. At first I was affronted with what I thought was bad behaviour but I realized I was judging it from a western perspective whereby when you watch something you are expected to sit quietly, applaud at the end and in no way leave your seat and get up on the stage. You judge a performance by how good the timing was and how co-ordinated the dance is. There is a real division between the performers and the audience. Not so in Fiji. It is very hard for the performers to keep in time as their dancing is constantly interrupted by members of the audience (usually parents) who smother their kids with kisses, then stuff money into their costumes, sprinkle talcum powder on their heads, if they have a ceremonial sarong/sulu on they attempt to take it off while the dance is going on not before. If a kid is wiggling their hips differently or more provocatively, the audience will be raucously laughing at and pointing at this person. A performance is judged to be good when someone stands out not conforms. But what makes them stand out is usually something that would cause great embarrassment in Australia. Things like their costume falling off or being a boy but dancing like a girl, or dancing with great energy while everyone else is two steps behind. It is all very entertaining and but takes some getting used to. I have tried to find out why talcum powder is seen to be special or used to congratulate people but I just get told that it means they are good, but why? I want to know. I must come across as a 4 year old constantly asking “but why?”
I have been here nearly a year now. I still feel like an outsider and am the subject of a lot of gossip which I find hard to deal with. I guess it takes a while for a place to feel like home.
Happy New Year to you all for 2006.
Benny Hinn the American evangelical has been to Fiji, performing at the national stadium for 3 nights for free. He says if you have enough faith, you can reach out and touch your TV screen (while he is on the TV) and you can be healed. My friend Salote died this week and she died the same night after she has been to see Benny Hinn. She went up the front of the stadium for healing and she still died. She had a lot of faith but I think she was quite looking forward to meeting her creator.
There is a lot of death in Fiji. People often seem to die of things that you don’t die of in Australia. It is also quite hard to find out what people have died from. I find it very exasperating to be told that someone died because “they had a weak body” or “their knees were swollen”. It is very hard to get the story. Maybe I come from a culture that is obsessed with details or cause and effect but people here don’t seem to be bothered by lack of detail. Maybe it is enough that they have died.
Unless you are Hindu or Muslim, then you are likely to have a Christian funeral and burial. Fiji Christianity has its own style and I find it fascinating the blend of traditional Fijian practice with Christian ceremony. So when someone dies, a few days before the funeral you have what is called the Reguregu. This is where you visit the family of the person who has died. You present money and a gift of kava. Speeches are made, gifts are presented and a bowl of kava is drunk. The women will then separate from the men and visit the women of the family and often view the body. The body is in a coffin, often with a glass panel over the face. The coffin is in a room that is decorated with the traditional woven mats and masi cloth. You will file past the body, take a long look at the face, some people will kiss the glass. I got a shock the first time I saw the face of a friend’s dead sister. I did not know where to look. She had cotton wool in her nostrils and her skin was sweating. Then you greet and console the mother of the deceased. The family will then provide tea and bread or even dinner to everyone. The Reguregu can take all day as different groups of people come to visit the family. It is very exhausting for the family, as they are constantly welcoming people, cooking and serving.
The funeral service itself is not much different from ones I have been to in Australia, except that there is always a picture of the dead person placed on the coffin and the family will often hire out a couple of buses to transport people from the funeral to the burial and then back to the family home.
The cemeteries in Fiji are looked after by prisoners. The prisoners maintain the grounds, dig the graves and then bury the body. They work in gangs supervised by a prison official. The prisoners are young Fijian men, with fit hard bodies from the heavy work of digging graves. At the burial of my friend Salote, I saw an Indian prisoner for the first time and he stood out being so much slighter and slimmer than the Fijians.
The coffin is wrapped in several woven mats before being lowered into the ground. The prisoners then shovel in the dirt and make a mound. Then a piece of masi (traditional cloth made from the bark of a pepper tree) is covered over the mound. A prisoner then takes a digging fork and pierces it several times. Masi is quite valuable and in the past was stolen from fresh graves. Piercing it makes it unable to be sold and therefore not worth stealing. The prisoners then all kneel and clap several times and their job is over. Flowers are then laid on the grave and people depart quietly.
Other ceremonies take place, 4 days later, 100 nights after and then a year later.
Witchcraft is still practiced in Fiji and often spoken about. I find it hard to take seriously but people do take it very seriously. Often when trying to find out why a person became sick or became deaf, I will be told that they were cursed. Kava is used to make the curse and jealousy is usually the reason given for doing it. People are told to be careful about whose kava they are drinking and where it comes from. Certain places in Fiji are well known for having evil spirits or using curses. My friends’ sister who died recently, died on an island called Beqa just off the coast of Suva. She had a stroke and asthma which affected her before she went to the island but when she later died, it was the island that was blamed not her health. Some people even refuse to go to the island for the fear that it induces in them.
It’s fascinating living in a place where the blend of pre-christian practice and Christian practice is quite obvious.
In November, we celebrated the National Disability Games. People with disabilities from all over the country participate in athletics and other sports. The children from all the special schools travel to participate. The night before the games begin, they have a concert with every school and disability group performing either a traditional song or dance. It is quite hilarious seeing these little kids all in matching hula skirts, sulus and Bula shirts (Hawaiian shirts). Even more hilarious is the behaviour from the audience. At first I was affronted with what I thought was bad behaviour but I realized I was judging it from a western perspective whereby when you watch something you are expected to sit quietly, applaud at the end and in no way leave your seat and get up on the stage. You judge a performance by how good the timing was and how co-ordinated the dance is. There is a real division between the performers and the audience. Not so in Fiji. It is very hard for the performers to keep in time as their dancing is constantly interrupted by members of the audience (usually parents) who smother their kids with kisses, then stuff money into their costumes, sprinkle talcum powder on their heads, if they have a ceremonial sarong/sulu on they attempt to take it off while the dance is going on not before. If a kid is wiggling their hips differently or more provocatively, the audience will be raucously laughing at and pointing at this person. A performance is judged to be good when someone stands out not conforms. But what makes them stand out is usually something that would cause great embarrassment in Australia. Things like their costume falling off or being a boy but dancing like a girl, or dancing with great energy while everyone else is two steps behind. It is all very entertaining and but takes some getting used to. I have tried to find out why talcum powder is seen to be special or used to congratulate people but I just get told that it means they are good, but why? I want to know. I must come across as a 4 year old constantly asking “but why?”
I have been here nearly a year now. I still feel like an outsider and am the subject of a lot of gossip which I find hard to deal with. I guess it takes a while for a place to feel like home.
Happy New Year to you all for 2006.
posted by kate at 7:36 pm
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