Day 33: A Surly Start

We figured that back at home everybody’s’ mental picture of our trip is something you’d see out of a book. White sand beaches that burn your feet under a hot mid-afternoon sun. Clear blue waters washing gently up the shoreline while Fiji girls dance to melodic drum beats magically emanating from someplace out in the ocean.


Me and Dale sun tanning on beach towels, sipping on beers, or in Dale’s case a strong Mai Tai. Our sun glasses hide the eyes that watch girls in bikinis running along the beach, playing volleyball, or otherwise asking question about where we are from; there skin as dark as shade, while ours as burnt as a tomato.


That is what Fiji is right? The paradise so wonderful that people on vacation, come here to vacation from their vacation. Of course people have thought such things, I mean even Dale and I had some fantastical ideas about how the trip would be; ideas that failed to bear any fruit.


But after a full month on the island we planned to pick some of the fruits of paradise. The resort is called Uprising and you’ve heard the name mentioned before if you’ve kept up to date with all of my blogs. You have also seen me posing with the resort’s rugby team, to which I sadly admit I still have yet to play with.


Our plan is simple, swim in the ocean, get drunk, mingle with the people, drink more, swim more, and if there is enough time left, get some rest. It’s what we set out to do, and what we intent to accomplish. First on the agenda is to get back in the ocean for the second time.


There is a certain quality about the ocean, about this massive pool of water expanding as deep as it does wide. The waves come from a watery infinity stretching beyond the horizon as far as where it was once presumed to be the end of the world.


Above, on the never resting surface, the water is like a bumpy, unpaved road. The water splashes into the eyes, up the nose and down the throat as it continually moves from half way across the world to the shoreline we are swimming near right now.


We look around at the silhouettes of nearby islands, and joke about swimming to them. Though already looking like an impossible to reach speck, they truly are just the beginning of a never ending road to nowhere. Beyond them, and below the shallow depths swims timelessness; vast dark shadows in space living in the shadows of other colossal worlds.


After our swim its time to satisfy the second goal; food, and of course what meal is complete without a pitcher of Fiji Gold; Fiji’s only and finest beer. After this meal I make a mistake. I am curious towards the likes of Woodstock’s pre mixed bourbon tall cans. From the second I finish this fine specimen of cheap mixed drink I begin to feel surly.


Before we start on our own stash of Gin and Gatorade we both take a nap. I’m hoping that this time out will rejuvenate me and put to rest the anxious evil that the bourbon has awakened. But as I stir from my slumber no more rested than before I know that something inside me is eager to be released.


Upon returning to the bar, where the music is now on loudly, things are already picking up. It’s about nine now, and is 9:30 when we finish the next pitcher. Inside the demon is restless; it shakes its cage while calling out to be freed.


Another hour passes another pitcher consumed. Now inside me the cage is being wailed on by stone fists. Smoke rises from the black skin of the short, but stocky beast. Its white teeth show as the hinges of the cage begin to weaken.


Another pitcher, another hour. As he hurls his body one last time into the door it flies open. He calmly walks outside. At this point the night is now both mine and his to share.


Dale and I see a dice game happening a few tables over, so we grab a fresh pitcher and join in. They are playing a drinking game called 3-man. It’s very basic, you roll two dice and drink varying amounts based on the numbers rolled. If a three shows on either of the dice the 3-man drinks; whoever rolls a one and a two becomes the new 3-man.


Now we get along with the guys fine during the game, but the girls don’t take a liking to us. For me it’s because of my drunken demeanour, occasional slurring of words, and lack of my usual, natural charm. Dale on the other hand simply isn’t buying into any of their bullshit; neither their comments with aggressive undertones, snobby attitudes, nor their bitterness towards us.


We order some wings and when they arrive we pause the game and chow down. Dale tosses one of the bones into a nearby bush, and of course a snotty girl takes this as invitation for confrontation. With a hotty tone she demands Dale go and pick it out of the bush. His thoughts on the matter differ from hers, “what, look, I’m not crawling through the bushes in the middle of the night looking for a discarded chicken bone, but I will put the next one in the bone bowl”.


Soon after this we decide we’ve had enough of the games. We wish the gentlemen at the table a good night, trade scowls with the ladies, and head off to the bar. It’s here that the demon inside me assumes control. I am soon overtaken with a feeling of surly aggressiveness.


While talking at the bar Dale walks off and leaves me with a pitcher, so I grab it and head wherever the Devil inside guides me. One of the Fijians in the group Dale was conversing with catches up to me demanding I give back the stolen pitcher.


“What stolen pitcher? Did you pay for this pitcher?” His attitude begins to shift. He gets mad, than I get angry, and finally he gets sorry. I storm off from him as Dale explains that we are friends. “But does he not like me anymore” he pouts to Dale who does his best to console the grieving Fijian.


Where I went and what I did for the next little while is a mystery. About the next memory I have is me, sitting at a table with a cute Fijian girl, away from the party, behind a jet ski rental hut next to the ocean. The gentle waves must have lulled the beast to sleep as I am now filled with a new found tranquility.


We sit and laugh under a star filled night. The music from the bar now just a murmur in the background creating the perfect atmosphere for romance. In such a peaceful environment it is not words, but nature that deceives the emotions; and against this setting, there is no fear of logical up-rise.


After spending a good hour together we meet back up at the bar where Dale, with a stronger ankle than before, is busting dance moves that would put the king of disco, John Travolta, to shame.


As Dale wows the crowd with a spinning windmill I begin hiccupping. So now I’m drunk, surly, and hiccupping’ I have become the stereotypical drunk. This is no problem since I know the solution to hiccups which is Vinegar.

A barman in Toronto once witnessed me ailing from the illness and brewed me up a shot of vinegar. It instantly put an end to my sickness. Hoping for a similar result I order myself up a sweet shot. “What the hell are you talking about you won’t give me one? Man, get a shot glass, get some vinegar and serve me up my shot!”


To this day I don’t understand his refusal to cure me, but I nonetheless end up spending the better part of half an hour trying to convince him. The only other thing that I can think of that will cure me is a midnight swim in the ocean, and even though it’s already 1am I imagine the effect will be the same.


We suit up and take a mad run into the blackened salty waters of the Pacific Ocean splashing wildly and yelling up towards a glittering sky. At night the ocean is like the world, as gigantic as it continues being, its true immensity cannot be seen.


The water gently cradles us back and forth with the forceful pull of passing waves. In every direction lies only more opaqueness while across the sky shooting stars zip through the universe in intergalactic travel. Down here on the earth we enjoy a lasting moment of freedom; from our lives, from the world, from ourselves.


After a quick shower I notice that Dale is gone, and the Fijian girl I’m with, who goes by the identity ‘Towels’, has lost the memory chip in her phone, so we head back to a vacant bar which is now being swept.


I’ve already given up but give a lazy look around out of respect. In time Towels also deserts the hopeless search, and just as were about to leave Dale bursts in looking for cups. The tender, very unimpressed with all the late night happenings yells for him to get out. Seeing as he won’t be any help Dale uses his long reaching arms to swipe a few glasses from right under the nose of the disgruntled barman. I still have the hiccups.


After some late night-early morning night caps we’re finally ready to concede to time. We have a final cheers to the good times and leave our separate ways. At approximately 5am we fall asleep, which happens with great ease.


I will clear up one thing that I failed to mention earlier on in the story. Just before we went for our late night swim I stumbled to a near-by tree and buried our room key thinking it was an ingenious idea. The key was never recovered, we had to be let into our room by security, and there was a 30 dollar fee which was added to our bill.