2007-08-19 Changing with the tides

Part of the secret to success in life seems to be knowing when to bend rather than break, when to roll with the punches, when discretion is the better part of valor. Having re-evaluated the possibilities of building a supply boat here and now in Fiji, we've decided to defer that plan and go see Micronesia while we still can.
I know a lot more now about what features are really needed in the supply boat, and what difference it will make if it goes into service. I also know much more about the obstacles to doing anything that might rock the economic boat for those who have virtual monopoly businesses here in Fiji. I've decide that I was insufficiently prepared to get the envisioned boat built in the year allotted. It's just so hard to do anything here when everyone with economic or political power wants to keep
the place frozen in time. And it's relatively easy for them to do that, because the local population isn't exactly on fire for change to occur. Thawaro is a dry village, so there's no big problem with booze, and that was part of the attraction it has had for us. But they've substituted "grog", or kava. Growing yangona, which is ground up and mixed with water to make kava is a steady business here. They sell a good bit of it, but they also drink a good bit of it, sitting around the village center
for hours each night getting mummified on the stuff. That's one reason it's so hard to find a captain for a boat who won't let it turn to garbage. It also explains why they haven't staged a popular revolution. They're almost all hung over almost all the time. The leadership of the present "interim Government" seems to recognize the problem, and is trying to address it. But until they make some progress, the local businessmen will use the small govt officials to interfere with any competitive
actions.
After having worked on a half dozen outboard motors, and 3 of the local plywood trawler type supply boats, I see how quickly machinery deteriorates here from abuse and lack of maintenance. A boat that would do business here has to be nearly bulletproof, and very easily repaired, or it won't live long enough to return the capital investment. There are things about the Fijian people that endear them to us, but we can only do so much for them, and there's more world out there for us to go
and see. Having decided this, I'm not really all that upset about the failure of the first plan. I always knew it wasn't a sure thing, and it's not yet out of the question for the future. So we move on.
There are things I want to straighten out on Sequester before we go to sea again. We don't much trust the now rusty Simrad autopilot, so we're working on getting a new Autohelm unit sent out from the States. I'm reconfiguring the navigation station, making the weather fax machine easier to reach, so we'll program it more, and get more accurate weather updates. I have several friends and businesses looking for a good backup laptop computer, to be sure we keep on having onboard email, and navigation
programs to help us stay off the reefs. My electronics knowledge and skills are steadily expanding. I found out that the little Etrex GPS we have as an emergency backup unit will run a computer navigation program as well as the primary unit, if I get the right cable for it, so I'm chasing a cable and training myself to program it. I'm not satisfied with the anchoring windlass I installed in NZ, but the shipping time for that and the required 200 feet of chain puts it out of the realm of possibility
before our visa runs out. We could try having it sent to Samoa, and stop there on the way north, but that's probably not going to happen either. Most likely I'll just live with what we have until we reach Majuro, in the Marshalls, and by then we'll have figured out whether it's feasible to have one shipped there. This world exploration by sailboat is neither easy nor cheap, but it still looks like our most satisfying course for now.
For the immediate future, Jim and I are working out what projects I can address for him in the next 3 weeks that will do the most good for Also Island. Karen's still developing the kindergarten program in the village, in hopes that if she gets it well enough established it will outlive our stay. We're rapidly using up the ink cartridges in our printer, giving pictures to all of our village friends. They love to have photos of the family. We're giving our evenings over to reading cruising guides,
travel books, and the charts of Samoa, Tuvalu, Kiribati, and the Marshall Islands, listing what visas we need to have in advance, planning where we can anchor securely for exploratory stops, and as all sailors do, studying the prevailing winds for the run from here to Latitude 5 degrees North. Not that reality will hold much similarity to the predictions. But we do what we can to plan ahead, and then deal with reality as it comes. That's life. Life is good. Ted