OK so in light of all the wonderful things our host families have done for us, Peace Corps put on a host family appreciation day with dancing, delicious foods, and awards. Every village/settlement was asked to perform an item/act of some dance. 2 were going to be chosen and then were going to be performed at the official swearing in at the ambassador's house. At the celebration our dance was a hit....of course it was extremely embarrassing because it was only Krissy and I (and all the other villages had at least 5 people) but we did a cool dance with candles and scarves. Despite the fact we both forgot half of it, it all turned out ok when a Fijian boy jumped right in the middle of our performance and started dancing with us. They do that a lot here...but I was grateful because we weren't that good. Mid dance one of the chief's of another village came up a gave us shell necklaces because apparently we were that good. (???)
Anyways, the celebration was really fun with speeches, awards, lots of food (OMG actually I don't think I've ever had anything so delicious as this crab meat with tomatoes and onion that was cooked in lolo..coconut milk, in an underground oven), and skits.
But of course naturally ours was one of the dances selected to perform at the swearing in. cool.
So, because this was a formal occasion we all dawned our best sari's and sulu chamba's and headed out at a ridiculous hour in the morning. There were lots of Fiji TV news people and reporters who were there to document the day. The Ambassador is a really great speaker and has an awesome family. SO we performed our dance in front of the few cameras (hoping we wouldn't be on TV) and then the crowd gave us a standing ovation......yeah that didn't happen. Then of course the Hindu reporters wanted to know how I knewHindu and all about the dance. My favorite part was when the reporter walked right up to me and said 'Are you from Bollywood!?' Yes, I am. Can't you tell from the not-tan color of my skin, my horrible Hindi accent, and bad dancing moves? But I did appreciate the compliment. And after all that hype was over, we all ate lots of delicious chocolate cake, chicken salad sandwiches, and this awesome artichoke dip that we had been deprived of!!!
After that we headed back to the hotel for a solid nap. That night was really fun because it was the last night before everyone left. Such a blasty. Actually, that night I had the closest thing to a hot dog I think I'm going to get in suva and some REAL potato salad!
So I remember being told that Hindi people love dances but I didn't really believe it until the day after our swearing-in- when both papers had a picture of me dancing (good god) and also when the Fiji TV 1 did a segment on the Peace COrps. They showed both of our Fijian and Hindi volunteer speakers but then also played a clip of me dancing (why only me???? there was SO another girl there!) for at least 20 seconds. cool. And of course all of Nukomoto/Nausori/Suva saw this and now I'm 'that girl'. Now all these people think I can dance or something and so just recently was asked to perform again in the Girtin Festival that's in Nausori this Saturday. My first response was 'HECK NO' but then changed my mind when the same man who asked me said he would also be providing funds to help me buy a refrigerator. Not wanting to get on his bad side, I agreed. Food is worth it. :0) and I feel like I'm that girl already so why the heck not. PLus Prime Minister Bainarama is coming so maybe I'll get to sit next to him. (or not).
So clearly my career of going to Bollywood is already in the works. cool.
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