Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 106422 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 532(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106422 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 532(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
Skirting past the others milling around, I found the sign pointing out the direction for the domestic terminal, from where I was to fly to the more rural of Fiji’s two big islands. The walk took me a minute, if that, the international and domestic terminals side by side.
I barely noticed the palm trees or the cabs lined up at the stand.
The ninety-minute wait for my flight almost drove me insane, but the journey on the small commuter plane was mercifully short—and the descent into Labasa Airport a breathtaking glide over endless sugarcane plantations. The tall gray-green leaves waved in the breeze, the airport nowhere in sight until we were suddenly landing on the tarmac.
Even from this lower vantage point, all I saw were the sugarcane stalks in every direction, as if we’d been dropped from the sky into the middle of the fields. Unlike in Nadi, there was no skybridge when the plane taxied to a stop. Instead, staff wheeled over stairs, and we were directed to disembark directly onto the tarmac.
I was braced for the tropical warmth this time, but it was worse when my feet hit the tarmac, the sticky black of it reflecting the heat back at me.
“Bula!” A smiling member of airport staff standing on the tarmac directed me along the safe pathway to an entrance. His skin was as dark as cocoa beans, his smile beaming white; the lack of any sweat stains whatsoever on his clothing shouted local louder than even his Fijian greeting.
Meanwhile, I was pretty sure I was melting.
This was the smallest airport I’d ever been in, but it moved fast because of that.
When I stepped out on the other side, I found my face brushed by a breeze that felt like a silent welcome to this place that lived in my wife’s heart. The sugarcane in the distance rustled, creating a hush-hush sound that was just a touch rough.
“I love fresh sugarcane,” Diya had told me when talking about her birthplace. “Have you ever had it?”
When I’d shaken my head, she’d said, “You strip off the hard outer shell, then just chew on the white flesh inside. It’s thready, so after you chew out all the juice, you spit the husk out and take another bite. It’s not the same as having sugarcane juice—half the fun is in the chewing and holding the cane in your hand.”
A delighted grin, no hint of the shadows that had swirled around her only a week earlier. “Watch out for the leaves, though—they’re tough, can cut your palm if you’re not careful.”
Pain settled again in my heart, stung at my eyes as the sugarcane rustled on.
“Taxi?” A question asked by an Indo-Fijian man in a pressed shirt and trousers who was leaning up against his vehicle not far from me. His body partially blocked the Taxi sign emblazoned in faded black lettering on the door.
“No, thanks.” The rental car I’d booked from New Zealand was meant to be waiting for me outside, but I saw no sign of anything but other cabs or locals doing a pickup run.
Taking my no with good grace, the cabdriver turned to speak to another driver, the two of them flowing between languages so easily that it took me several minutes to realize that one was speaking Fijian, the other Hindi, both also throwing random English words in the mix.
Neither seemed to have any trouble understanding the other.
Five minutes later, and the original cabdriver had customers in his vehicle and was away, while I was still standing there.
A tic beginning in my jaw, I dug out my phone and called the rental car company. Sweat dripped down my neck, the breeze not enough to counter the heaviness of my jeans or the weight of the humidity.
Los Angeles heat was as dry as the Mojave, my body unprepared for the water in the air here.
“Sorry, sorry,” the owner said, his voice languid. “Car’s on the way. Only ten minutes. Island time, eh.”
Grinding my teeth, I confirmed the registration number and description of the vehicle so I could spot it as it pulled in, and was thankful that at least they’d given me the four-wheel drive I’d asked for when I’d booked over the phone from Auckland Airport.
When the rental did finally arrive—a good twenty minutes later—it proved to be far less shiny and new than implied, and the air-conditioning was broken, but it drove well enough, which was all I needed. In the interim, I’d managed to grab a sandwich, a banana, and an ice-cold Coke, as well as a paper map; now I threw everything but the Coke onto the passenger seat after placing my duffel on the passenger floorboard.
Then, my drink secured in the cup holder, I headed out.
I still had a three-hour drive ahead of me. The distance to travel itself wasn’t far, but Diya had described gravel roads and dirt tracks when she’d shown me a map of where her family had lived before they moved to Nadi so her parents could work in the hospital there, some years prior to their shift to New Zealand.