 | Fiji Local Customs | Tips 1 - 10 of 74 |  | Popular Local Customs | Miscellaneous Local Customs Tips | All Tips (74)
Lovo is the traditional way of cooking a meal, often in celebration. The preparation consists of digging a hole and preparing a fire within it. They layer in the food such as dalo (their super starchy equivalent to potato), chicken, pork, etc. with onions and spices wrapped in coconut leaves. Then they bury it and dig it up hours later when it's ready. It's really delicious! The table spread in the photo shows a variety of the local food, much of it from the lovo. I didn't know what more than half of it was. Leave a Comment
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One of the popular traditional Fijian entertainments is watching villagers walk on hot stones. Many of the resort's offer a night to watch this for yourself. The men prepare the stones all day and at night, after much ceremonial singing and clapping and preparations, they turn the stones over to ensure the hottest stones on top and they take turns walking over them in their bare feet. Allegedly, only men from a certain village are capable of doing this. Someone also told me that many of them men will abstain from sexual relations, etc. the nights before they walk the stones. Leave a Comment
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In Fiji- and other parts of Polynesia -- the drinking of kava, is a common ceremonial and social custom. It has a very important place in many of the villages and in the culture in general, however, as it's such a staple of Fijian life, the resort's have exploited it as well for their guests so if you're interested, many locations have a kava ceremony you can take part in around dusk. Kava looks like dirty water and is made by grounding up the root into a powder and seiving it into a bowl with water. It has a mild narcotic effect. It seemed to me to be more of a masculine passtime and even when we'd walk through handicraft stores in Nadi, you'd find a group of men around a huge bowl of it sitting in the back of nearly every store. Kava can also be used as a tool of forgiveness. I met one housegirl who had left her husband's home to spend some time with her parents, however, after a few weeks, he never came to retrieve her, and as is there custom, she cannot go back to his house under those circumstances. The next step was for him to approach her father with an offering of kava to ask to have her back. Leave a Comment
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Meke is a group performance which mixes singing, chanting and drumming in a very catchy combination . Traditionally it is only performed in a village on special occasions - usually when the village is being visited by someone important (like us). However, meke is much more than a colourful dance, it is a way of keeping alive a culture and for important historical events, stories and legends to be handed down from one generation to the next. Leave a Comment
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Earlier in the day - about 2pm - we had watched the crew burning wood to create the heat for the earth oven, or lovo. The meat is then wrapped in banana leaves and cooked for several hours in the hot sand. We returned to the beach later in the evening after having been back to the ship to freshen up. Torches were lit on shore and there was a little oil lamp on the shuttle boat. Very romantic. Tui, the chef, made the opening of the earth oven into a great ceremony, which was lovely. We all stood round while he scraped off the sand with a shovel and removed the cloth covering to reveal the meat which had been wrapped in palm leaves. Then he did a quick fire walking ceremony (only messing about). The food was delicious, so incredibly tender. Leave a Comment
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