D. Todd Benson

Thursday the 13th was filled with excitement and wonder.  Hung out at the hotel and finished the laundry.  Napped.  Tried to get on the internet but failed miserbly.  Ruben called yesterday and said that it was his birthday so we made plans to go out tonight.  Had a good dinner and went to Ed’s for [...]

Sunday night I got sick.  Not throwing up sick, but can’t eat high fever sore throat sick.  I slept all day Monday - I know for a fact I didn’t get up to eat at all because I would hear the dinner bell and just roll over.  Several people came to check on me, but [...]

Went on a reef trip with several others out to the third largest living reef in the world.  It was apparently a bad day for diving and it was still the most beautiful snorkeling I’ve ever seen.  The water was 8 to 15 meters (24 to 45 feet) deep but would get shallow up to [...]

S 16′ 20.508″
E179′ 18.598″

Woke up early and went to breakfast downstairs.  I called Dad from the patio while watching CNN.  The polls were just opening in many places and we were hours away from any results, but the first two complete precincts in the north east had gone to Obama.  I left for the [...]

It was an easy morning - went down to the water and rested while my laundry dried in the sun near the dorm.  I got my times all messed up and ended up late back to the bus even though we didn’t have to leave until 12:30.  Bad Todd.  Packed up, checked out and got [...]

Drive through Suva, the capital of Fiji, today and saw some general sites.  We saw Parliament (but not Bootsy’s Rubber Band) and the president’s house.  We also saw several historical and financial landmarks, but only from the bus as we were pressed for time.  I took tons of pics of the people I was traveling [...]

So, we wake up and have breakfast, then get on the bus.  On the way to our first activity, we are told that we have a choice - we can hike straight up a mountain for an hour and then slide down the other side on our asses for two hours, followed by lunch, [...]

OK - NEW UPDATES!!! - Sorry it took so long, but more updates are coming in the next few days.  I have been thinking it might just be easier to wire the entire country of Fiji for new internet service than to continue to struggle with the existing system…
Woke up on time and packed [...]

A quick Fijian primer:

The letter ‘D’ usually has an ‘N’ in front of it - Nadi is pronounced Nandi.
The letter ‘B’ usually has an ‘M’ in front of it - Labasa is pronounced Lambasa and Bula is pronounced mBula.
The letter ‘G’ is pronounced with an ‘N’ in front of it, so Sega is pronounced ’senga’

There are [...]

I was sitting in a river today surrounded by the most beautiful lush landscape I’ve ever seen and I remember why I wanted to come here.  I grew up reading Robinson Crusoe, Swiss Family Robinson, Captains Courageous, Robyn and the Pirates - all of these stories about islands and paradise and pirates and far away [...]