Happiness

photo by me, Raiatea

The purpose of our lives is to be happy.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

Choosing to live a happy life is not only our greatest gift to ourselves, it is also the greatest gift we can give to those around us. When we are happy, we radiate happiness, and that is infectious. Consider giving the gift of happiness to yourself as being your gift to all humanity.

photo by me

Tranquility
Beauty

Maupiti, 30 December 2008

The end of Polynesia

Unfortunately, time flew by in Polynesia, and with it the internet connection disappeared.... after Raiatea and the short visit to Taha, we headed off to Bora Bora. Oh, Bora Bora, Bora as they call it there..... It might be the island with the most famous lagoon, and thus has becomed into the most turistical one. Its where people head for their honeymoods, and yes the water was beautiful. However... the amount of tourism has made it become into a "fake place". To be honest, the island was not turistic in the sense of bumping into tourists everymoment, but there was less coral and less beautiful fishes as in the other islands, it was full of resorts with bungalows of the water. Yes, the bungalows where nice, but one starts to wonder. Is it really worth the night to pay more than 600 euros for a bungalow over the water? We were staying at some "pension" by the sea, first row (everything is on the first row anyways...) and got to swim under the bungalows of the Interncontiental.... They had a glass on the floor, and there was a rock under the bungalow so that fishes would come. Is this why the price was so high? I found it ridicolous! The good part of Bora Bora was that we swam with Sharks!! Once again these came because we threw them food....it felt fake, but it was amazing to swim with sharks and huge rays!

Unbelivably the greek girls that so annoyed us at Raiatea showed up again at Bora Bora, in the same hotel!! But something good came out of our meeting, they recommend us to go to Maupiti, and so we did. Took a boat for 2 hours to do 50km to the island "infront" of us.... Maupiti! The boat - The Maupiti Express- only goes there twice a week, so when we arrived there was the entire population of the island waiting for us. With bike to rent, cars to do an island tour (tour took 15minutes!). It was like being in Paradise, we ate at the only restaurant of the island. Maupiti is definatively the island to visit, and relax while away from the world. While we were swiming but right by the beach we saw a moray eel and the parents of the kids "shouted" " faut pass toucher"" (do not touch!).

New Years was spend seeing the home fireworks that the house next to our hotel did... I though the resorts around our little hotel such as ClubMed,InterContiental or Sofitel would do big things... However no fireworks were seen but the never ending ones of the house next to us. It was nice, we watched as we had our 12 spanish grapes, and then headed to bed!

And the days passed by, rainy days, sunny days,snorkling,insulations, island tours, water, photography....and soon back to Paris through LA...

Everything being imported from either USA,Canada, NZ, Aussie or Chile the prices were expensive in the supermarket. Leading to the question ...how do people survive there? There are great subsidies from France, they have tourism, fish, and coconuts, vanilla and pearl plantations but not much more.... A question to be answered.

Xmas Dinner

In the evening of the 24th came our christmas dinner organized by the little lodge we were staying at. With a cocktail to start, live music, lobster with typical polynesian vanilla sauce.... lekker lekker lekker! Miquel had an argument with the lobster but succeded to eat it by the end.

The night finished with some live music...by Alain.

Merry Xmas and Seasons Greetings to Everybody!

Day 4 and 5 Island Tour and Snorkling

Day 4:

We headed off early in the morning in a small boat to the island right infront of Raiatea...Tahaa island. Our boat had the 5 of us, 5 greek rude girls and 1 french lady. First stop was a pearl farm. Pearls are harvested here, the entire process was taught to us, and afterwards we obviously got offered some for sale. They were really nice and some necklaces were beautifully expesnsive. My grandma kept jumping on and off the boat - a miracle of nature. We then headed of to a vanilla plantation where they also showed us how to plan the vanilla plants and offered everything made of vanilla for sale. Later came the lunch in an island and some snorkling. I swam with some rayfish and small sharks...yes SHARKS! and later on we headed off to the other side of the island for some snorkling.

We snorkled down some corals which were magically situated by a super expensive hotel. The Taha private resort, blabla costing 1200 euros a bungalow A NIGHT! We were able to get there just by boat and be the only ones snorkling...a pleasure! So many fishes. Its astonishing that the fishes come up to you and swim right besides you with no problems. Unfortunately most of the pictures that I took outside of the water did not come out.

Day 5:

We rented a car and went around the island, 100km trip... nice day, except ITS RAINY SEASON. So we had strong rain fall on us for a while, then sudden stop, then rain again and then sudden stop. Break for some cookies and juices and ran back into the car as the rain hit on us strongly. Pictures, no that nice, rainy day cloudy skies. The interior of this island is very green...and mountainous, not suprisingy with all this rain. We also stoped at Uturoa, the biggest city of the island....There we visited the 4 stands of the market and took refuge from the rain. The market mainly had fruit. The supermarket was extremly expensive, since most of the things where imported from France.

The buses in this island are very intresting, they are like trucks. You can see one in the above image. While going around the island we also found a small van that was opened like a van and served as a shop around the island going house by house.

DAY 2 and 3 RAIATEA

On the second day we woke up early to have a nice swim in the swimming pool and get our luggages ready. We were heading off Papettee and to an island close to it...Raiatea! Only 198 km away from Tahiti; thus a 40 minute flight. We got on an ATR and flew quickly to the next island. As stated by Air Tahiti magazine, Air Tahiti has chooseen to have a fleet of ATR because they do not have strong engines. Later in the magazine it was argued that this led to less waste of fuel. At Raiatea we collected our multiple luggages and headed of to our little hotel. This is a small family hotel, very colonial and far away from a big city. Its extremly calm...once you jump into the water the fishes are right there. If you throw some bread into the water the fishes litteraly come up to you to eat out of your hand and pass infront of you..... quite amazing!! We even have free wifi to update blogs! Things start early, breakfast is from 7 to 8.30 and by 10 pm they close all the lights and leave me here alone with my computer updating my blog! Our first day at Raiatea was mainly spend hanging around the grass and the swimingpool of this small hostel, as my grandma had high fever and we didnt want to move too much around.

Day 2 lead us to an early morning start, early breakfast some reading and then off we went snorkling. We headed snorkling to what seemed to be a close by small motu- island- Have way my brother and mom surrender and only my dad and I made it there. Unfortunately I did not have my camera with me. The island seemed horrible from war away, but once there it was the typical islnad that you can only see in pictures of paradise. Palm trees, white sand, blue water, no persons and 3 abandoned cats. We walked around and after a few walkings we came back swiming. The swam back wasnt easy, we spend lots of time and had to swim against current. The water was calmed but still if u didnt swim it took you away from the area. After swiming for at least 30 minutes we finally got on shore, and it starting raining hard. It is rainy season. We didnt get off at the same place we had jumped into the water so we walked through the road till we got back. Lunch, Photography,Reading...and the afternoon passed by.

The destinations that one can reach from FAAA airport in Tahiti were all desnatinations I have never seen in departures screens ever... I took a picture, it felt exotic. Raniroa, ahe, raiatea, bora bora, rurutu... hahahah!!! This airport recieves flights from Tokyo, LA, Paris, Sydney..and yet is an airport which has no fingers, every passanger must get of the planes by stairs.

I put extrem sun cream on my self to make sure I didnt get burned, but now im all red like a shrimp already after the snorkleing and its hurting quite badly. And its only day 3....

Raiatea, the island we are staying at, and Tahaa, right infront and in the same lagoon.

The Pacific Islands

The islands of the pacific region. From New Zeland to the USA.

The Flag of French Polinesia

The capital city of French Polynesia is Papetee, founded in 1843 and located in the most populated island, Tahiti. Tahiti contains 70% of the entire polynesian population. All international flights come in through the airport of FAAA in Tahiti and then you must take a plane or boat to reach any other island.

Map of the french polinesia. The circled part on the right is TAHITI island and on the left Raiatea and Bora Bora. Some of other very well known and famous islands are Huahine, Moorea,Tahaa. The islands are grouped in the following groups: The Austral Islands, the Bass Islands ,Gambier Islands Marquesas Islands ,Society Islands, Tuamotu Archipelago

The islands are made of old volcanos which have come out of the sea. Coral has made up the walls of the mountains. And they have becomed atolls leading to a very rich world of fauna and flora. Its full of fishes and coral making snorkling a fun and save activity. The water is transparent due to the low depth and white sand.

Please note that according to Wikipedia French Polynesia has the smallest crime rate of the entire France.

Raiatea

Raiatea at Night

DAY 1

We spend the first day at Papetee, and did some snorkling. We took some kayaks and went till a place where there was a sunken plane. We had some bread with us that we holded in the hands and fishes would come and eat right out of our hands!! There were a lot and of multiple colors and were not scared to come and pass 2mm away from us. Swiming does get you tired...and burned! Although do note I had put some EXTREM cream on me....Afterwards we spend some time in the pool and then I litteraly fell asleep, I was still jetlagged. In the evening we had a nice dinner while we watch some traditional polynesian dances.

Its full of palmtrees over here and coconuts and vanila are two very typical things from here. Together with perls. In fact, I was given a "pearl" in the airplane from Robert Wan, the big polynesian pearl farmer. I saw a nice lovely pearl necklace for 480 euros...yeah, had to skip on that one.

One long flight was ahead, 11.30h hours from Paris to Los Angeles...... and flying during the day time. I had no hopes up, the entretaiment system -compared to other airlines- suxed. I watched two movies and then simply listened to music, walked around, read some magazines ate a sandwich, stared trough the window and slept for 2 hours. We passed greenland and entered the north of Canada. However it was very cloudy so no special views. The best views came when we entered the Nevada state and crossed Sierra Nevada between Nevada and California. Hollywood. The thing that shocked me the most of the plane was its already pacific style atmosphere. Attached are the pics that i took when I walked in the plane. Yellow pillows, polynesian music, blue seats, and air hostess dressed up with flowery dresses and shirt gave an atmosphere already in paris. THe plane was small, an airbus 340 but made it well to LA and later to Tahitis international Airport Faaa

Later we were able to do a full flight over Los Angeles which gave me a good view of L.A. and Hollywood. As can be seen in this picture, not very well. L.A. gave me the impression of being a very largely extent city. Full of small houses, very american style each of them with their own little garden and multiple cars. Even from the sky you could recognize the fact- seen in many more american cities that the cars are ten times bigger than european ones. LA appeared to have a small business center with large skyscrapers but the majority were houses. Dont miss out on the small white flower on the wing of the plane - That is the symbol of Air Tahiti Nui!

In Los Angeles, for security reasons even the passengers in transit to Tahiti -thus me, we were forced to pass the amercian police. Even though we were going to reboard the same plane. The policeman took a copy of all our finger prints of all 10 fingers together with a copy of our eyes. After having passed the policed we were forced to go back upstairs and into a transit zone, an extremly boring area where we patiently waited for a few hours. In L.A. the plane got quite full. Unfortunately for me, the plane got full of rich,rude americans. The man with the red shirt got on with a cigar on his mouth....why he got on with the cigar if u cant even smoke it remains a mystery for me. Roman and his sister who had been flying from paris to LA now had to sit together as the plane got full. Roman seemed to have goten over the fact that her sister - they must have been on their 20s but seemed like they were 5 - had thrown juice over his pants when they had just borded in Paris. And off we took from L.A....... this time there was no view of the city...directly the pacific ocean....and yet 9 more ours of flight to go....sunset was starting.

I had had only 2 hours of sleep before the flight,due to my nerves. And almost no sleep during the flight Paris Los Angeles. So finally after watching a movie I fell asleep right after for 5 hours.....next thing I heard was that we were finally ready to land at FAAA intenrational Airport in Tahiti! oh yeah! This is a french territory thus I could enter- if I wanted with only my Spanish ID. I showed my passport but got no stamp, as afterall I had a EU Passport. Flying for 21h it seemed unsual to me to be in a territory where I could entere with a european passport and have no need for a stamp! So so far the only stamp is that of Los Angeles,city which I did not even get to visit.

Everybody had tons of luggage, but me. I think I was rather unusal. Traveling on my own, having a hoody promoting alcohool consumption and having only 1 small luggage. I was the first one to exit and was told if i was on holidays and if I visited family. As I replied to both of them positively I was asked to exit through the right door. It turns out I came out at the RESIDENTS exit :)

Unfortunately at the hotel I remet Roman and his sister and a few other posh americans. Who looked at me strangely as I was now surrounded by 4 family memebers and no longer wearing my alcohool promoting hoody. hihi. With an extreme jet lag it took me 1 day to get into routine.

Before Departure

3am
Flight will depart in 8 hours, but I still cant sleep. Its 3am and I cant sleep. What a typical scene before a flight departure. G walking up and down her room, tumbling around her bed for hours, G finally after 5 hours of attempting to sleep gives completely up and goes have a shower. Lets hope to have a nice flight, the unconcsious nerves are killing me.

Its been 1 years since I havent done a long haul flight. For many its not even that long. However, for me its definately been a long time! I know what to affront, legs that will swallow and hurt, discusting orange juices, people that will snore, and I with all the nerves will not sleep in the entire never ending flight.
.
Call uponTranquility! I have some paper and pen to write and later update this blog :)

9am
I have been at the airport for 1 hour and the "intresting issues" have already happened!

I showed my passport and was told if I came from Spain. Why I was going to Papetee and when I was coming back. However, they still found that strange. So, I was asked for a french ID card when I showed my spanish one. Unable to understand that I do not have a french ID card due to my european nationality they asked for something to justify my residence or work/studies in France. Luckily I had my student card with me, that gave me green light!!!

Due to the way im dressed - highly confortable for a long flight: hoody;jeans and i unbrushed hair and sleepy eyes ive been looked wierldly a couple times. Although I took all my cables out of my backpack they still asked me to have a second look at my bag.

One day I might be the non suspicious individual...one day!