Bula Fiji

This is the first time for my boyfriend and I to go volunteer overseas. Frankly, we had no idea what's in front of us: Is it dangerous? Interesting? Or is it a total waste of time? After some discussion, we finally decided to go for only a week to give it a try and Fiji is a place we always wanted to visit. It turns out to be the most unique vacation experience we ever had. When we landed at the Nadi Airport, the local Green Lion staff greeted us and we took a bus from Nadi to Suva for another 4hrs. The volunteer house was located about 40min away from Suva city. To be honest, the accommodation and facility at the local volunteer house is nothing fancy. It's basic but clean and safe, and you can always find friendly staff members for help whenever you have any questions. During the orientation, we met with our project coordinator who is one of the original team of the Green Lion Fiji. Under the guidance of the local crew, all of us helped to lay the foundation for a kindergarten that will serve about 30 local kids, who now have to travel at least 1 hour to go to another kindergarten far away from their home. Everyday we worked for about 2hrs in the morning and then 2hrs in the afternoon so the overall work load is not overwhelming. Whenever we returned back to the volunteer house, there's always food ready for us and we can just relax. In the volunteer house, we also got to meet people from all over the world such as Germany, Australia, US, China, Japan etc... It kind of brought us back to the college time when we met with new friends every day. At the end of the program, it's so hard to say good-bye and we really wished we had more time. We would like to come back in the near future and visit the place we helped to build!