My last blog was about Labasa town, the place where I reside. I talked about the challenges living in a place without recreation and how not much changes from day to day.
This blog will be about the ONE time per year that Labasa comes to life! The event is called The Friendly North Festival. It is a big carnival with games, food stands, vendors, fairy floss (cotton candy), rides, and contestant kings and queens.
This ended last night with the crowning of the king and queen. It happens every year during the second week of school break so all the school kids can run free, stay up late and enjoy the excitement.
Peace Corps was able to have a booth this year to display projects and talk about who we are/what we do. We went down to the fair grounds every night (the fair lasted a week) so I took the opportunity to take my camera out and get some photos to share.
After living here a year I understand how big of an event this really is. The population of town doubles, people flow in from villages all over the north and people relish in the change of pace. Its so fun to see village kids come to town and be amazed by what I think of as the smallest things. At times kids would come and sit by our stall just to watch what the foreign people were doing. Bubbles, toy guns, balloons and empty cans were a hit with the hundreds of kids running wild. I loved this past week and I'm really happy that I was able to be a part of this event.
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| Tim, David and Palden setting up the booth and hanging out |
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| people! |
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| they put lights up in town and it gave labasa a bit of charm. i wish they kept them up all year |
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| behind the stage, all the people are watching the kings and queens |
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| Peace Corps booth |
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| pretty |
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| a king and queen on Pacific Island Night. each night is a different theme where they dress up and have to perform or answer questions. Some of the other themes were global night, bollywood night and fiji night |
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| Indian treats for sale |
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| i had so much fun taking photos during the festival. there were so many new scenes, fun colors and pretty lights |
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| fiji boys |
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| this girl decided to do things a little differently. instead of cooking behind the booth, she stood up front and put on a cooking performance. super cool |
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| kids are the same everywhere |
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| getting ready to perform a meke (fijian traditional dance) |
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| playing |
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| waiting and watching some performances |
love to all
monica
Cool pictures! I like the ones with the ferris wheel - very pretty.
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