Friday, November 22, 2002

 
And it keeps raining ... Thursday night's dinner was at Daikoku ... very nice again, we found out they have early bird specials, each dish for 15F$ .. so we had some sushi, wasabi steak and fish and rice and ice and beer and walked out for 45F$ .. not bad at all .. and very very tasty.

We are trying diving again this weekend, but after calling the diveshop we heard the same story "with all the rain, the tourists don't want to dive and we can't fill a boat" .. so .. we have even played with the thought of renting a car and explore the route to Nadi ... well, let's see what the weather is going to be like.

Friday night was having beers at the office



and later having even more at Traps. I was getting tired quite early but helped finishing 3 jugs (pitchers) of beer. The atmosphere was different this time (maybe it was too early) but there was no dancing going on when I left ...

coming back to the hotel, we ordered some kokonda and after eating that while watching TV we went to bed.


#posted by Peter 4:37 PM

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Thursday, November 21, 2002

 
It rained and rained yesterday (Wednesday), I had lunch with Ritsu and Bad Dog Cafe, I had a steak sandwich which was ok ... maybe a bit pricey for lunch .. and the bread under it was totally soggy, full of steak and onion juice. Ritsu had a ham / cheese Panini which looked ok ...

Dinner was at the hotel restaurant (the place of choice when it is raining cats, dogs and tiny elephants): Fish and Chips and braised chicken ... nice stuff ...

So, a pretty "regular day" Wednesday ...

I keep getting asked about the online connection down here ... well .. i try to give a quick overview ...

Fiji is connected to Australia / New Zealand and the US via the Southern Cross Cable. This article is a bit misleading though ... it make it sound as if that cable actually offers what it can offer ... well .. trouble is, is that the "owner" of that connection is Fintel which again is a subsidiary of Fiji Telecom, which is controlled by the government ... Now .. what does that mean in english ... Fintel owns the cake and is giving out mini pieces to the retail market (people like me) and sells big chunks to the industry ... just recently Quest openened a call center here ... and Fiji is all proud and calls itself leading in IT.

Anyhoo ... for Joe internet user it looks pretty grim. There is only ONE internet service provider connect which offers unreliable 28.8 modem connections. They have several plans depending how many hours per month you think you will use .. I think it starts at 13F$ (7US$) for 3 hours (who can live with 3 hours ???) and goes up to 40 hours !!! that's it !!! 40 hours for 94F$ (50US$)... that is the "small businesses" plan ... every hour above that is 5F$ (2.50US$). (so, some offices have chosen to rather buy 4 of those plans to have enough hours for a whole month). Did I mention a 30F$ (15US$) setup fee ?

In addition you have local phone rates which is 11cent per call (well, 50cent from the hotel room). Also you have fun things like busy line and suddenly disconnects ... yippieh ... even though it is supposed to be 28.8 , which means a download should go with 2.7 K .. it only has 1.2 K most of the time ..

There was an old "unlimited" plan, which is not being offered anymore, but a generous friend borrows me access to it some times ... that plan is a joke too ... autodisconnect after 1 hour ... and something about "if you make the top 10 list of users, you get thrown off more often" or something ... this plan also has it's own access number which is constantly busy !!!

So ... although the technology exists, there is no real getting to it ... Fintel operates an internet kiosk and charges there 11 cents a minute ... allegedly it is pretty fast .. only catch is that I cannot connect my own computer there ... so .. no good ...

The government is protecting Fintel (since some overseas investors have tried several times to rush into this market here) and gives out very few exemptions ... like for the University here, they are allowed to use a satellite connection (everyone else using this is doing so illegally.

One big embassy here just dials into their sister embassy's highspeed connection in AUSTRALIA ... they must have a great phone bill !!!!

There is talk from time to time that some company tries to weasel its way around the jurisdiction and will try something ... but as long as the gov here is hardline about it, i see little chance .... rumor has it they want to open up the market a bit in 2 years ... GRRRRR

I'd be happy with unlimited 56K for now ... without auto disconnect ... and judging the news reports, they have the bandwidth to spare ... but they have no incentive to do so, since they are without any competition ... bummer

#posted by Peter 12:35 PM

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Tuesday, November 19, 2002

 
Random Suva picture of the day:



Yes, i know it looks dark and gloomy .. but as stated before .. Fiji is not just all about sunshine !!!

So .. today was more of a "going to the supermarket" and "reading lease agreement of possible house" kinda day.

On a totally unrelated note .. on my friend William's blog I came across the blog of Wil Wheaton, he was that annoying kid on Star Trek, The next Generation ... and since then I am not sure what he has done since then .. well.. many actors have their childhood career down the drain .. but i have to admit .. this guy seems to have quite some humor about himself ... and he just won back some respect points, just for having that website ..

(and if i recall correctly .,. he got to kiss Ashley Judd in one of the ST:TNG episodes ) oh .. and i just found this quote in his FAQ section

Is it true that you were really Ashley Judd's first onscreen kiss, and you ruined her for the rest of her life?

Yep. It is 100% true. Ashley Judd played Robin Lefler, in the episode "The Game", and Uncle Willie went to bootytown.

I am not sure if he is trying to say the he is the one who deflowered Ashley Judd ... but if so ... his choice of language is rather ... lame ... a word he uses on himself many many times ... (one of the funniest typos I did this season: i said "defloured" ... wha wha)

But .. "the game" was actually a pretty cool episode I have to say !!!


anyhoo ... there is now a "COMMENT" option just below each posting ... i wonder who will be first to actually use it ! .. You can also use the email adress posted on the left to ask stuff and snicker about this blog ..



#posted by Peter 3:35 PM

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Monday, November 18, 2002

 
Nothing much to report about monday ... but i will think of something :)

I really like that one counter I have installed .. it shows me how some people get on this website .. by what terms they enter into a search engine ... while i do understand "Fiji + cooking + cookbook" .. i have no idea how someone gets here by looking for "organizing shelfs" ... your best guess :)



#posted by Peter 11:18 PM

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Sunday, November 17, 2002

 
A day at the "Beach"

I got up quite early, read the newspaper and then made breakfast for Ritsu (I still do not eat breakfast .. just can't, not hungry ... but I like making it .. so I am glad to have an appreciative mouth to feed :) .. maybe I went a bit overboard with the eggs on toast / banana creation ... (also learnt how to disect a small mango .. which produced slices of the most yummiest mango flavor we ever had)



We then went out for a stroll .. mostly through a neighborhood called "domain" (coz its along Domain Road) which is very pretty and quite safe .. since many politicians, diplomats and government people live there .. the police is patrolling all the time ... again and again we were mezmerized by the growth of trees and bush and all the green stuff ..

Then we came to the waterfront ... Suva's Beach .. !!! and for those of you who still think we are here in beach paradise . sorry ... not the case .. the sandy beaches are somewhere else .. but not in suva .. and the blue skies you may know from tourist brochures are quite rare .. in fact while we were walking, there were casual showers (which we tend to ignore by now) ... click below to see the mess more clearly :)



I walked back half barefoot since I was running a blister .. we came by a Taxi stand an saw that cab with the leopard print seats again, we already rode in it twice :)

We returned to the hotel to have lunch (Fish and Chips .. very nice .. and Ritsu had a club sandwich, which was a bit greasy, but nice) and some beer ...




After lunch Ritsu took a long nap, while I was doing computer stuff ... In the evening then we went to Great Wok (again) and had a great duck dinner. We returened to the hotel and watched Three to Tango, a cute romandic comedy. Ritsu later got a call from her family and I must have fallen asleep trying to understand all the japanese chit chat.


#posted by Peter 4:07 PM

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