A South Pacific wedding

I'll be the first to admit that I grew up out in the country and I LOVE wild animals of all sorts. So this wedding turned out to be a real treat for me.

While shooting photos of the Bride & Groom, I looked up into the sky and saw this creature flying overhead..... so I shot a photo of it.

I don't know if any of you photographers will recognize this thing or not but it's called a Flying Fox. It's basically a bat with a wingspan of about 3 feet and it eats fruit that grows on trees in the jungle.

Turns out these things are quite common in the area and we saw LOTS of them during our 10 days in the islands. On one of the islands we even had a flock/herd/pack of them roosting in the trees right over our little cabin (called a bure in Fiji).

Most of the other cool creatures I saw were underwater.... black tip reef sharks, crown of thorns starfish, a really big green Moray Eel, a family of 9 big stingrays, pink starfish, lots of small green stingrays with blue spots, millions of small iridescent reef fishes of all sorts, and Amelie's favorite... the big blue starfish.

We had many opportunities to travel around and check out how the islanders live, but one of the most interesting was when we made the two hour drive over rough roads up into the mountains to get to this small village tucked away in a beautiful little valley. The villagers usually live a very simple and traditional life. However, when we first arrived, most of the village was packed in the chief's house watching a video on the only tv in town, which was powered by the only gas generator in town.


















Amelie played with this mean little horse for a while as I tried to get some cute photos of the two of them together.




Eventually he tired of trying to bite her and proceeded to eat the hat.





Amelie spotted this huge spider while we were trekking over a hill to get to a really nice beach on the other side of the island.

"Relahx! Yohw're in Fay-Jay nohw!"

I may not have an advanced astrophysics degree from Yale, but I'm still bright enough to surgically remove the reproductive organs from animals. And yet, it completely eludes me how you can lose an entire day when traveling west (*poof* Tuesday never existed...explain that to my birth control pills), and even more bamboozling, how one can travel east and arrive the day BEFORE you departed from the South Pacific. This is the point where I shake my head rapidly from side to side, slack jawed, and allow bits of spittle to fleck those around me in a convincing and unfeigned display of stupidity. This is also the point where I usually declare whatever conundrum I'm pondering over a "Mystery" (with a capital M), one of those Mysteries where I simply allow my lack of understanding to transform itself into utter amazement at the divinity and omnipotence of God/Science/Weather/Margaritas.

We went to Fiji to capture the wedding of the highly photogenic and delightful Jessica and Tim at a very swank, your-wish-is-my-command, resort called LikuLiku. Just the day before we arrived, killing time at the airport, I'd been trying to recall the French word for that teensy-weensy pre-appetizer yum-yum that you're given at more exclusive restaurants. I'm not sure why I was musing over this word; I'd only eaten at a restaurant that served them a couple of times in my life. But hark! At LikuLiku, we were rewarded with our own "amuse bouche," along with other unspeakably delicious fare that made me want to lick the plate. The company of Jess, Tim, and their parents was uplifting. Jess and Tim were not only fun and easy-going, but prepared to put themselves at our every photographic beck and call. Because of their lively and intrepid nature, we got some excellent images.
After LikuLiku, Glen and I stayed at a series of budget resorts in the Mamanuca and Yasawas islands. We shared our first scuba dive together, where Glen, like a toddler finally standing on his own feet, took off underwater and proceeded to pick up, or flip over, or attempt to catch, every possible living thing. His exuberance was contagious, so much so that I might have been persuaded to bravely extend my digits toward the moray eels, puffer fish, and crown-of-thorns starfish without fear...except...except for the fact that the hour we spent immersed under water was an extended and relentless, panic-induced, pee-in-your-wetsuit, costisol pumping, adrenal gland hypertrophing, hyperventilating experience for little ol' me. Basically, I was so petrified that I sucked down two hours' worth of oxygen in about 15 seconds. When the dive instructor tried to pry my right hand away from my mask--which I had permanently applied there with the thick glue of fear--I swatted him away and started to kick in one of those rabid moments kids have at the grocery store when you tell them to put the M&Ms back. From that point on, the instructor accepted that his wrist was going to be blue from the grip of my left hand, while I swam with my right hand mashed to my mask and regulator like drowning was not only imminent, but fully expected. There were moments we swam through dense clouds of neon blue fish, when a tiny cluster of neurons said something like, "Wow! Look at this massive and amazing tornado of neon blue fish!" But those neurons were almost immediately drowned in the panic-pumping neurochemicals that my brainstem was obliterating all good reason with. Cortex: "Wow! Look at th--" Brainstem: "Breathe, ***dammit, breathe! Kick survive surface landlandmustfindland."

We were surprised to discover that a large percentage of Fiji's population is of Indian descent. In long sections of downtown, the streets were packed with dark-skinned Indians in colorful skirts or saris, wearing beautiful gold jewelery, stepping over the typical piles of third-world-country rubbish along the curbs, and inhaling the typical clouds of black and acrid third-world-country bus exhaust. Glen and I both love gold, and since the typical Fijian handicrafts didn't appeal to me, Glen bought me a beautiful pair of dangly 22-karat-gold earrings for our anniversary. The posts on these earrings were massive. I'm not sure whether Indian woman pierce their ears with knitting needles, but I tried several times to try the earrings on and couldn't fit the 1mm in diameter, grooved posts in my piercing holes. I was not to be dissuaded. I loved the earrings so much--and it must be noted that ALL the earrings had incredibly thick posts--that I lubed them up with Neosporin and shoved them in. Now I'll admit, I can generally be called a wussy with honest intent, but when I screeched after inserting these earrings, it was a fully-warranted my-earlobes-have-been-raped scream. The earrings are being re-soldered with American earwires now, thank God/Science/Weather/Margaritas.

After many months of taking other people's pictures, Glen and I finally had the backdrop to take some new ones of ourselves. We had a great time together, and finally set a date of next July for our own wedding. Now the only real question is where? The only sore spot between us is that I wouldn't let him buy one of those tacky, wooden war instruments he so longed for. Seriously, do we really need a mass-produced Fijian bludgeon, or axe, or cannibal fork hanging on our walls? Fijian history gives new meaning to the phrase, "I have a bone to pick with you." I DID get my gold earrings...and perhaps if I don't let Glen have his tacky skull bludgeon, I might be in the hot water of his cooking pot after all.

Amelie