Comment

Comment by Kaline on August 27, 2009 at 9:05pm

Aleta Raisele said: its our freewill to choose wether u wana live wit a gal who jst wants to be awana b then to bad.

Bula vinaka Aleta.

Must say that your sentiment as highlighted is surprising to say the least. Are you implying that girls and women who are in University or are professionals are wanna-bes? That's inane. To judge women merely because their life journeys led them to career paths and not that of a house wife? That's rather unfair don't you think? We'll have you know that many professional women handle their careers, their families and their homes. No stone left unturned - Fijian women. To belittle professional women merely because they don't have the time to loiter about the house, is misleading. Not all Fijian women are stereotypically of all rural women of Fiji. Even so, some rural women have their own versions of business, as market vendors, handicraft vendors, planters of produce, so your statement does a disservice to a fair percentage of Fijian women in your desire to place housewives on a pedestal.

Not all housewives keep house and maintain their homes well - at all - if that. That we're certain of. Some men of our community had already shared their griefs about this matter. The Fijian woman who pretends to keep house (which is all she was meant to do) but does not. The men couldn't understand how professional women managed to juggle the parenting, the spousal relationship, keeping a clean or tidy house plus career and yet the house wife believed that general laundry every other week and cooking daily (family dinner) was too much work. A husband actually mourned the change in his wife, in that she'd watch tv all day; talked on the phone whilst the dishes and the laundry were piling up.

This is not to deride housewives in general, just a window that was shared here on MFF.

Comment by ALETA RAISELE on August 18, 2009 at 10:46pm

kris that is so true ..i knw hw u must b feelin out there i can imagine.comparing to the life hia in fiji but to tel u the truth..life changes wit evrythin around u. even yo friends i guess,the sweet life they have there is no difference in fiji but the love is always there..i mean talking about gals, hia its ca culture and customs that matters wether u love the guy or fixed marriage,family is the first to cum..and ladies we knw that there place is the kitchen and thats all is to it..a wife wit a gud hand taste in cooking is a way thru to a mans heart or stomach..im jst trying to say is that evryone is different in colour and race bt we r only human cant change the facts that god created us in different ways wether u have a scarface or 6 fingers.wat we r we cant change that but wat u going thru thats the faceof reality ..yo gal mst b waitin somewhere out there jst waitin for the right time but its our freewill to choose wether u wana live wit a gal who jst wants to be awana b then to bad.

Comment by Kaline on August 8, 2009 at 4:45am

Bula vinaka Krishn! That sure was and still is quite a journey for you and your Dad. Reading your sharing blisters the eyes in seeing the trauma you've been through. It is no wonder you posted your angle of questioning the weightiness of migration.

You're only 18 and we can't fathom why and how it is prospective employers cite your juvenile criminal record. It should've been sealed. Not for public viewing. So how on earth did they get a hold of it to persecute you so? If you are at all disturbed by the loss of prospective fair employment because of this fact, we have a friend whose law practice specialises in this field. If you wish to pursue receipt of equal opportunity employment write us via mail and we'll have him know of your contact, so you can work through this together. Naturally after he assesses your case(s).

Racism and reverse racism is rampant we agree and what's best in any given situation is to not keel to what you know they expect of you (the reaction@laughing - he provoked you and you fell for it, in that you performed in the classic stereotypical 'coloured' manner. To be frank when some have nothing more but the claims of superiority (ethnicity or colour or creed) they will squeeze all that they have of the little they've got going for them, in this case, a poor white boy needing to feel validated through his abuse of you infront of his group - all about his pseudo senses of superior validation to make up for what he hates the most, studying and living where he has been situated, having to tolerate coloured people, with the newest immigrants being the most hated. We share this with you, having personally privied sharings of people we know who still mind and are severely affected with much vehemence that their children were forced by Government to board buses and be carted to black (minority) schools or had to tolerate minority (mostly black) students in their guarded schools in the era of forced integration. Their sainted halls were tainted. The oddity is - staunch Democrats of California. That's quite the reality check, where such individuals exude bi-polar existence of supporting the coloured from the candidate to the rights of the new immigrant, to the polar extreme (in private), hating what they interpret are the racist benefits of their Affirmative Action peers who are deemed, interlopers.

Glad you're motivated still knowing how important education is. You're fortunate that you are here for that. As an Indo-Fijian American, you have many scholarships and grants available under the ethnic categories (Indian) you can qualify for. There are a few available for Pacific Islanders aside from the Asia-Pacific, which are dominated by the Hawaiians, the American Samoans, Micronesians or the Asians proper. Benefits gained from the success rate of the Indian American conglomerates, makes for a party central opportunity for you in that you couldn't have a better ethnic origin, in the right place, at the right time.

lolzz@diy prospective lady ... lolzz You're just looking in all the wrong places. These young girls exist in all races here in California. A veritable market place, just teeming with them lolzzz Can't knock you down for wanting the island flavour burning up with the island fever ... lolzzz ... Hoot! Hoot!

You have a safe weekend now ya hear Krishn.

Comment by Krishn Prasad on August 7, 2009 at 8:24pm

I meanz dont get me wrong, if i met a lady that all she did was cook, clean, homebuild, that wud be quite boring but havin those qualities is hella rare these days. accademically, tha highest education i gots was a high school diploma and graduated just above half of my senior class. i never was a smart kid but a damn hard worker ya know? my family isnt dirt poor but we get by with credit cards. we are in the process of losing our house for not making payments, my father hasnt worked for almost a decade, mom divorced (2000) (dad also has a previous divorce and we got a stepsister) and brother, sister and grandpa went to live with her. i stay wit fada to help him. he currently purchased (borrowed even MORE money) to buy a house using my signature so my dads credit was blown to hell so mebbe im next? at least i have a roof, some food, electricity and computer access, (we cut tv 15 years ago). so things is gettin worse where im at. but i thank and praise the gods for gettin me this far and appreciate my life every day no matter tha situation) i stay in a pretty bad neighborhood but i have grown used to it. ppl get robbed, once evry couple months cops do drug raids, about once a year someone ends up gettin shot (both my dad and i got a gun each just in case), for fun i like to call the only fijians on my street for some bbq and have some drinks or go shoot some billiards. as for a job i applied to many many place but because of my criminal record i cannot obtain one. (robbed a store- had a pocket knife in possesion.hahaha i was 15 and did another few shopliftings for the next two years). im currently gettin paid under da table by my Mosa as an apprentice (student) carpenter and in the future will attend college and become a Master carpenter. never was a big fan of school but i was a b to c student. went to fiji to cut sugar cane for a month while on vacation and absolutely loved it (i miss tha gang)... yeah racism isnt dead, it is a REAL problem especially when i was younger. once when i was in the 7th grade in cooking class(14 years old), i pulled a knife from a drawer and held it against a white boy who was making racist comments about me and laughing and so i pushed and shoved him into a corner and held it at his chest and guess what? the bastard laughed.. i really was angry then so a couple of my freinds told me to chill and they threw him in a trash can in the locker room...didnt stop him that year or the next so i just learned to ignore him... america,england europe whatever (the "civilized white mans" world) all got problems which people have to realize, ppl are just too caught up driving Mercedes and buying 4-5 houses and too worried about michael jacksons next plastic surgery ect... i plan to join the military (marines-4 years) and than contemplate moving out of america to a better place mainly fiji (if i cant go back there maybe Polynesia or some other Melanesia islands...somewhere away from all this mess i am in and start anew) gods bless fiji and vinaka!!

Comment by Kaline on August 6, 2009 at 3:54pm

Bula vinaka Krishn!

This topic should generate a lot of interest for a fair percentage, most especially the regular forum and blog participants who are foreign based Fijians.

Hmmm case specific to the individual we're thinking when considering the possibilities of what becomes of ours who choose to emigrate out of Fiji for the developed nations like the UK, Europe, USA, Canada, Australia and NZ. What may be right for the parents may not necessarily translate to the child or vice-versa we're assuming from the few examples we've seen so far, for very rarely do the 2 generations both comfortably find their niches in their adoptive countries, when having to go through the education system, employment opportunities or start up small businesses, affinities, reality and goals with multifaceted risk factors, involved throughout the processes of acclimatisation as recent immigrants, oftentimes emanating the ways of the old country, determining many possibilities of an uphill progression, stationary or a digression as a family.



Unfortunately we didn't get to study through the American High School system to understand and grasp the gravity of possible difficulties and challenges, but did get exposed to the NY (Spence) and the NJ Private Schools' ways, which we understand is too detached from the standard and expected norms of high school life of Public American Schools and Specialised High Schools geared and directed towards specific industries. The kids from the ones we'd experienced through friends children and our Irish Uncle (Private School administrator of one of the country's top academic all boys school) were very much like kids from where we attended school in Aotearoa, in that they were prepped for specific Universities, where Victoria University's the minimum and one of the Triad Unis the pinnacle (University of Oxford, University of Cambridge , University of London) and comparatively to the students we encountered through friends and an Uncle, Brown University was their minimum and one of the American Triad universities was their pinnacle in Harvard, Princeton and Yale. Generally activities, social life and drama involved similar dynamics.



Could you possibly elaborate on the difficulties Krishn? Some examples? Will make it much easier, so we can try and relate or understand what it is exactly. We can imagine the difficulty. Its rather cliquey we agree. In that we were fortunate, where they chose to not see us as islanders. Case specifically, grasping the possibility of the detrimental effects of ethnic segregation in social interaction always is a factor oftentimes predetermined by money and not colour or race. Having shared this, we can clearly say that it possibly boils down to the British crowd's inclusion of us since Aotearoa. Why and how that is? We never delved much in to the whys, only that we'd meet today and we're family tomorrow, including their families most especially if their parents are localised. So yes - too clicky - the networks are too tightly knit. Most unfortunate that you didn't have a positive experience. Missed opportunities on their parts of forming hearty stable friendships with you Krishn. We do not associate but did see how vicious some got. We understand that politics affect the school board, the parents and teachers committees, which can most definitely poison teens social gatherings, determining whose to be whose friend and whose allowed and whose not ... Some are worse ... Whose to be academically acknowledged and whose allowed the school colours, which we will elaborate in the following paragraph. It happens and is alive and well.

The buzz right now here in the US is Morgan Freeman's HBO documentary, "Prom Night In Mississippi." Shocking and disturbing to see racism so rife in 3rd Millennium America. The black prom and the white prom. The black student who was allegedly denied Valedictorian for the colour of her skin. The white girl who'd been dating her black boyfriend, surviving all the disciplinary tools of her Dad's in his attempts to curtail their relationship. The white girl who'd dated the black boy and was denied jobs in their small town. Threatened friendships for fear of being disowned ... Couldn't believe that in 2008 when this particular documentary was filmed, having a combined prom was a big deal. Sad and quite a tear jerking feature when seeing Mr Freeman's reactions which transcends through the screen portraying the chilling reality of racism and the ugly truth that is equality and democracy - the sham.

Cali gals and many gals of other countries aren't what we'd term homebodies@cook and clean. What age group are you referencing when observing women in general, comparing the 2 countries, between the State of California (Sacramento, USA) and Suva, Fiji? We'll hazard a guess and commit that Fiji girls won't take all too kindly to cleaning and cooking as a lifetime professional housewife. The majority aren't in to that and it had been the pattern for the past 50 years, where Fiji's women have rapidly exited the domestics in to industry expert fields in career choices, surpassing men even as was referenced by Dr Warden Narsey last month. There is more luck possibly, of a Fiji woman whose educated, is a full time professional who multitasks, handling the home, knows how to prepare your exact dishes, efficiently tends to her job, is capable of tutoring and grooming the children towards what is expected, sensitive to your heritage - the language, the customs, tradition and the hubby, plus, plus, plus, plus. You see the ONLY difference between a Fiji woman and an American woman is that you are familiar to her. Her dishes are familiar to your palette. Her interests are what you'd both share. The likelihood of effortless compatibility are endless, which is not to say you can't find it here. You're young yet. The good thing is, you know what you want. Just a caution to the wind lolz ... If ever a man suggests or is seen to be hurling a primary preference of "Cook," "Clean" some women will shut down or run away ... Seriously. Not a good idea. Better to see that the woman voluntarily takes herself there and is a natural home-maker and a professional who will very likely nurture her children and love her husband is best. She volunteers to do it. Sees it as a natural chore not an expectation or a demand. No .. NO ... nnnNO! LOLZ

Whooo ... This is quite a subject ... That was a lot .... lolzzzz