Forcing myself to make a blog entry. I'm quite overwhelmed with how far behind I've gotten in my blog entries. I apologize. I was out of touch with the Internet for two weeks and at the end of it got violently ill. The global term is "Delhi Belly", a kind of stomach/intestinal thing that I may have gotten from water/food who knows what. I tried the "let is pass through" for a few days remedy and then I went to a medical clinic and was given antibiotics. Those took care of it in a kind of all out stomach battle. I totally recovered now, and hopefully a little more resistant.

Fiji has been mostly enjoyable, but it's probably not one of my favorite places. It's not really all that exotic, it's expensive, and it's a weird mix of very laid back for the locals who are on "Fiji Time", while being very rigid on the tourists. When they say check out is at 10:00 a.m., I found two people at the door of my buree at 10:00 on the dot when I was sick and running a little late. At the beachhouse they have two dinner choices which your supposed to select by 5 pm. The day we went to Kula Park we were late reserving a dinner choice, so we had no dinner that night!

The Fijian people are quite friendly and fair while the some of the Indian Fijians are quite ruthless business people, charging as much as possible, and harrassing you to come into a shop and buy something.

I guess I'm a little frustrated in Fiji. Maybe I just haven't been in a place to be receptive to really meeting some of the local people. I don't know. I 've felt so far that everythings been a paid performance. I've felt like a tourist. I'd rather be a traveller than a tourist and that hasn't happened here.

Don't get me wrong. I've had a good time. I love beaches, water, snorkeling, sunsets, hiking and I've really loved meeting other travellers. I just haven't felt like I've connected with any of the native Fijians. Some of them have been really nice, just haven't really connected.