Precious Cargo

By Paul Joseph

At the end of the 19th century, Mark Twain, wife, Livy, and Clara, one of his daughters, traveled around the world for a year. Twain was on a lecture tour, and his experiences were later captured in Following the Equator. One hundred years later, Paul Joseph spent an academic sabbatical in New Zealand while also traveling in Fiji,

• Language: English
• Publisher: Red Penguin Books
• Release date: Mar 25, 2023
• ISBN: 9781637774045

Book preview

Chapter 1

Departure

Yesterday we passed close to an island and recognized the published Fiji characteristics: a broad belt of clean white coral sand around the island; back of it a graceful fringe of leaning palms, with native huts nestling cozily among the shrubbery at their bases; back of these a stretch of level land clothed in tropic vegetation; back of that, rugged and picturesque mountains ¹

–Mark Twain

I think I’m going to throw up, said Danny.

My family was climbing a set of steep, narrow stairs leading to the reception area of the Hotel Metropole. We were in downtown Suva, the capital of Fiji. My youngest son was upset. He was loaded down with a heavy backpack, lugging a duffle bag, and struggling with the steps. The promised cheeseburger was nowhere in sight.

Try to hang on, I said as I hauled my own set of family luggage. We’ll be in our rooms in a couple of minutes.

Then I’ll throw up on the bed.

Earlier that morning, my family stood on the road outside a beach resort until a public bus came by and took us in fits and starts to the port city. We had enjoyed the beach, snorkeling and exploring coral reefs, playing in the surf, and reading while sipping cocktails and sodas. Now we were in an urban core. The temperature may have been tropical but we were far from paradise. It had been my idea to move.

After arriving at the terminal, we dragged our bags through a huge outdoor food market that contained stall after stall of tubers. We stood out. Some people tried to sell us ornamental swords, while others offered replica cannibal utensils.

Stay in control and I’ll buy you a Coke, I told Danny. Buying Danny a Coke was pretty much my answer to any problem that came along. What’s wrong anyway?

It’s that smell, all the stuff we saw in the market.

You mean the things that looked like potatoes?

No, the stuff piled on the side, the stinky leaves that smelled like wet laundry, popcorn, and poop.

Oh, those were just the flowers leftover from the Hibiscus Festival. They had a big celebration here a couple of days ago.

Still smelled like poop.

Maybe they were a little tired.

We reached the top of the stairs and pushed through the doorway. I stood still as my wife Linda, oldest son Ian, and middle daughter Sara filed in behind me. We were in the middle of a large, open room. To our left, was a bar. It was early afternoon and the bartender moved slowly through the tables picking up the debris left by the lunchtime rush. The beer bottles gave off sad, tired sounds when they touched each other. Two small groups of drinkers were still hard at work, and the filtered light from the back windows lent a special clarity to the filth in the corners and dust motes in the air.

To our right the room morphed into a Chinese restaurant with its own separate bar. There were about a dozen crewmembers from the freighters moored at nearby docks. While seemingly divided by multiple nationalities, they were actually engaged in a common project: getting drunk as quickly and deeply as humanly possible – sort of a United Nations for the inebriated. They looked like they had lived hard lives and wore scruffy facial hair. Despite the warm day, most wore dirty woolen hats. Few seemed to be from Fiji itself, but to tell the truth, I was afraid to look too closely.

Three twirling ceiling fans blended Szechuan pepper, garlic, and black bean paste aromas from the leftover Chinese food with rancid cooking oil drifting in from the kitchen. Cigar and cigarette fumes wafted from overflowing ashtrays and joined forces with the unmistakable odor of spilled beer. We were immersed at the center of a remarkable aerial stew.

Unidentifiable scuffling sounds came from the men’s bathroom.

I paused to consider the rare ambience more closely. Then I looked at Linda and we both shrugged. I moved toward the end of the first bar where the cash register lay. The rest of the family trudged behind.

The bartender saw us, dropped his collection of bottles in a bin, and welcomed us with a warm smile. Bula! You must be the Joseph family.

How did you… I started to say but he was already gone in search of the manager. Linda and I looked at each other again.

While planning this trip, we promised ourselves to stay away from the protected cocoon that confines many American travelers. Fiji was just the first stop on a year traveling in the Pacific while based in New Zealand. Safety and a basic level of cleanliness were important, but we also planned to leave the usual roads and create more adventurous experiences than pleasant but generic beach hotels. Fiji was the first place to experiment with that balance and the laboratory equipment included local lodging over the standard Western-styled, foreign-owned hotel room. In this case, the guidebook indicated that the price for two rooms at the upscale, shoreline Suva Travelodge would be over $300 US a night – not a wise investment for a family on a budget. Instead, Linda and I had picked out the Metropole from the list of cheaper possibilities. We loved the name and, at only $15 US per room, the hotel seemed like an ideal base for a trip through the capital.

We decided to book an advance reservation. However, the Metropole was not on our travel agent’s list of fax-able accommodations so I made the booking myself.

Calling the Metropole from our home in Lexington, Massachusetts before our departure, I heard their old phone’s hollow burr. Five rumbles later, someone finally picked up:

Bula!

Bula! This is Mr. Joseph.

Good morning, Mr. Joseph.

I’m calling from the States. I’d like to make a reservation, please.

You’re calling from the States? Nine thousand miles of static and an unfamiliar accent could not mask his disbelief.

Yes, that’s right. I’d like to book a room.

One moment. I must go and get the manager.

I nodded to Linda who was listening from the other side of the desk. This is going to work out fine. The desk clerk is going to get the manager.

Disconcerting glitches in the international grid made it hard to hear if someone had in fact come back. Finally, almost five minutes later, someone else picked up the phone.

Bula!

Bula! This is Mr. Joseph.

This is Niumia. I am the manager of the Metropole.

Hello, Niumia.

And how are you, Mr. Joseph? Are you feeling well?

Just fine, thank you. At this rate, the extra phone bill was going to catapult the Metropole right back into the price category of the Suva Travelodge.

What can I do for you?

I’m looking for a room on August 25th.

August 25th?

That’s right. It’s a Monday. Hopefully you won’t be too busy then.

No, I am sure that we won’t be too busy then.

Good.

Do you know that August 25th is more than two months from now?

I know. I thought it would be smart to make an advance reservation.

He paused. Quite right. You are very wise. At any rate, I know for certain that we will have a room available.

Actually, we need two rooms.

Two? Why?

I’m coming with my family.

The phone screamed with silence, the void saying everything that we needed to know. I refused to hear it.

The phone hiccupped and clicked and then the manager’s voice came back on. You want to stay here… With Your Family?

Yes, is there a problem with that?

Another pause. No, not at all. What are their names?

Ian, Sara, and Danny. My wife’s name is Linda.

How old are your children?

Ian is fourteen, Sara is eleven, and Danny is eight.

You must have a very nice family.

I like to think so.

Well, if you and your family want to stay with us, I can tell you for certain that we will have two rooms available.

Great. Do you need a deposit? I could give you my credit card number.

No, no, Mr. Joseph. No need for that. Just come with your family and all will be taken care of.

Good. Thanks.

We look forward to seeing you.

And now here came Niumia himself who greeted us graciously and with no little curiosity. Those will be your rooms, he said with a wave toward a doorway behind the bar. Over a shoulder-high ledge holding ascending rows of liquor bottles, I could see a back hall and four closed doors. While we stood around filling out papers, showing our passports, and completing the surprisingly long registration process, two aging hotel employees struggled down the hall. They entered one of the rooms and began to remove numerous empty gin bottles from a wardrobe.

Your rooms will be ready soon, Mr. Joseph, said Niumia. Perhaps you and your family would like to take lunch while you wait. We have an excellent Chinese restaurant.

We took a pass, left our bags behind the bar, and decided to walk around the town, returning a couple of hours later. More customers had arrived and the drinking buzz was starting to pick up again. It wasn’t too difficult to duck under the short end of the bar, move behind the liquor shelf, and cut through the open doorway to our rooms. The kids looked a little scared so rather than our usual adult-children split, which would have left them alone, I moved in with the boys at the far end while Sara and Linda took the adjoining room toward the middle.

Slowly, gingerly, we began to settle. As we relaxed, I realized that the Metropole was actually blessed with a remarkable range of attractions. If hungry, you could venture into the bar and grab a handful of happy hour peanuts or pretzels. If that did not satisfy, you could cross over and join the merchant marine in the main restaurant. Or, for a change of pace, all you had to do was walk downstairs and purchase some smoked seafood from a sidewalk vendor comfortably stationed below our window. The fish were displayed on a sheet of newspaper right underneath a sign posted on the quay that read: Sale of fish from or around Nubukalou Creek is strictly prohibited. People who buy fish from this area, do so at their own risk. By Order, Suva City Council.

Thirst was easily quenched at the Metropole. I could score a beer just by opening our room door, taking a step out, and tapping the bartender on the shoulder. Later that evening, I went from thinking about how nice it would be to drink a Fiji Bitter to actually drinking a Fiji Bitter in under twenty seconds.

The rooms at the Metropole had neither television or radio, but did offer plenty of live entertainment. Music and laughter poured in from the bar located not more than twenty feet away. Each guest room had a tiny sink, sheets so thin that you could see through them, a strong insecticide smell, and a slowly rotating wooden fan. A gate was positioned between the set of rooms, and the shared bathroom further down the hall. This gate was locked, and re-entry could be gained only via an electric buzzer controlled by the bartender. The intention was to preserve at least some privacy for guests staying in the rooms behind the bar. But we had to be careful if we used the facility as it was easy to be trapped down the hall with no one to buzz you back to your room. The bartender seemed like an awfully nice man, but he left his post frequently, and a couple of times someone in the family was stuck down in the bathroom at the end of the corridor until he returned. Inside our rooms, a classic, bare light bulb hung from the ceiling, and peeling insulation and exposed wire stretched immediately above our heads. The kids expressed some trepidation about eating with the sailors, so we went out and found a quiet vegetarian place. We got back early, and caught up on our postcards and journal writing.

Figure 1.1: The Metropole Hotel, Suva, Fiji

Figure 1.1: The Metropole Hotel, Suva, Fiji

Sara slept soundly that night, but Linda was woken frequently by sounds from the bar, a banging door, and serial sexual activity coming from the room on the far side. Some other strange things must have been going on as well, for she later wrote in her journal, at 1:30 a.m., the relentless moving of furniture began, to what end, I’ll never know. While I prayed for silence and began imagining bed bugs, one old man sneezed thirty-two times in a row.

I was and still am a sociology professor at Tufts University about to enjoy the unbelievable gift of a sabbatical leave. I had been department chair for five years just before our departure. Our unit had been in turmoil over a hiring decision with factions forming in support of two very different candidates and no easy solution in sight. I made a critical mistake by allowing my advocacy for one of the candidates to become more important than my responsibility for the overall functioning of the group. We eventually recovered, but it was not easy. I was looking for a break; I needed a major change in routine.

Getting out of academic middle management and back into scholarship was appealing. I wanted to write a book and could do that somewhere in the Boston area. But I also like to travel, and the extended time away from teaching was an unusual opportunity to set up shop in an entirely different place. Maybe I could think more ambitiously about the upcoming year.

At the same time, I was not going to go anywhere without Linda and the kids. My wife was an elementary-school, special needs counselor, a job that often seemed more difficult than being a professor. She had taken a leave after Sara was born, and attending to the home front seemed more important than going to work every day. Various financial, career, and identity repercussions followed, but neither of us ever regretted that decision. Linda planned to return to work now that Danny was in school full-time, but had not done so yet and was therefore free to make a long trip. We were both aware that this was a rare opportunity that might not surface again.

We wanted an adventure for ourselves and also for the children. We had visited various national and theme parks on summer vacations but showing them at least a small slice of the world beyond the States had always been on our priority list. Their schools were fine, they each had a good set of friends, and messing with that involved some risk. Nevertheless, Linda and I felt that their lives would be richer if they faced some stimulating situations that upended their conventional expectations. Each day will be a little different from the day before, we told ourselves. Let’s get the kids away from routines, even if those routines are working reasonably well. Ian, Sara, and Danny were just a bit too protected – and so were we.

Finally, we wanted a strong bonding experience for our family. We would try to travel safely, but also journey to some unusual places. We would see and eat different things, and we would meet different people. Most of all, we would do all these things together. For Linda, this feeling was especially appealing. She liked the idea of travel as family bonding. There would be some challenges, but the prospect of creating a deep pool of family experiences that we would be able to draw upon forever was difficult to forego.

Our children were just the right age. Ian would certainly miss his friends, but was not yet in high school where cutting him off from his posse would have necessitated major surgery. He had already demonstrated an adventurous spirit that would serve him well. Sara said that she was willing and, like Linda, loved spending concentrated time with her family. Danny was young to be sure but old enough to hike a fair distance, and maybe even be open to eating a range of different foods – as long as it was fried. Everyone was in a good place for living in a different space and undertaking a series of expeditions. There was no guarantee that this chance would come around again. We would go.

Linda and I explored our options. Europe offered many possibilities, but we knew we would probably be able to visit the continent in bits and pieces over the coming years. We wanted something farther away, a place that you couldn’t reach during a two-week vacation. Somewhere in Asia was probably the best choice but many locations – Hong Kong, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Japan – carried a contradiction as far as the children were concerned. Since they only spoke English, they would end up going to a private school with other Americans or Brits. What might start out as a different experience would, at the level of daily routines, end up being overly familiar. One of the main purposes of the trip, the need to adjust to a different culture, would be defeated.

Australia and New Zealand were English-speaking, had public schools that enjoyed good reputations, and provided a base to see at least some other parts of Asia. Six months before our planned departure, I sent a cover letter and my curriculum vitae to a number of Sociology Departments and Peace Studies programs in both countries. I was looking for an office, a computer, access to a good library, and some interesting and friendly colleagues. It also had to be a location that worked well for the family.

Over the next few months, two strong possibilities surfaced: The Peace Research Centre at the Australian National University in Canberra, and the Sociology Department at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch. Both seemed good opportunities. ANU was perhaps a little higher powered, and the chance to move among the diplomatic corps in Australia’s capital would probably help my research project. But as we delved deeper, we began to hear negative remarks about their public schools, particularly a severe tendency to haze American children. We realized that our kids might not want to cope with the ruder cultural legacies of a former penal colony.

New Zealand’s schools were supposed to be terrific. The country is the source of the whole language movement now found in many elementary schools in the US. For a hopeless speller like me, any place that said it was okay for young kids to substitute phonetic constructions, say egl for eagle, had much to appreciate. We liked the outdoors and the country was undeniably beautiful. While Christchurch might not be a global diplomatic center, the Kiwi did have a strong peace movement that would certainly be relevant for my planned project on peace cultures. The Sociology Department seemed happy to have us, and even arranged for faculty housing and a much-appreciated fellowship that would cover two months of our stay.

Mark Twain wrote that, Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things can not be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime. ² By setting up a home in New Zealand, and making multiple side trips to other parts of the Pacific, we were about to thoroughly test that thesis. My hope was that it would apply to children as well as adults. Meanwhile, a long stop in Fiji, both to its beaches and to its more out of the way places, seemed like an attractive and sensible way to break up the long trans-Pacific flight, and to let the kids know that the forthcoming year would provide some special times.

As we moved in and out of the Metropole Hotel, I watched my 11-year-old daughter stare at tough, drunk, chain-smoking sailors. She carried doggie pillow, a gingham, cotton stuffed, soft cloth dog head, complete with red felt eyes, nose, and protruding tongue that served as a security blanket as we followed the equator. Sara’s brown, telling eyes widened in disbelief as she clutched the object close to her chest.

I did not want the sailors to see doggie pillow. I feared their scorn and tried scuttling sideways to place as much of my body as possible between Sara and the drinking clientele as we paraded back and forth through their bar. Doggie pillow was a bit much. It was one thing to bring one’s family to one of Suva’s prime watering holes. It was quite another to impose a Sesame Street sensibility on the whole affair.

Maybe staying in the back rooms of a combination Chinese restaurant/ Fijian bordello was not the best choice for the start of a year-long family trip abroad. Nonetheless, our strategy seemed to be working. During our trip across the Suva market earlier that morning, Danny had seen dozens of men wearing skirts (sulus) and the sight certainly gave him pause. At lunch, he had insisted that the guys were all just wearing aprons. That must have been a bunch of cooks, Dad, he had said. Men don’t wear girls’ clothing.

However, I could tell that he did not fully believe his own words. There was no way that every man in the market could have been a cook. Danny’s inner voice had to be calling for revised fashion rules. The memory of dozens of men in skirts would stay with him, and the process of adjusting the possibilities of what men could wear would continue. That was exactly the type of mid-course correction, a reset of the mental gyroscope, that we were hoping for on this trip. Beaches do not do that very well; nor does staying at the Hilton. Certainly, there would be uncomfortable moments that went with our strategy, and I knew that Linda and I would have to assume responsibility for the difficulties we would be creating for our children. I also understood that we were tourists. No matter how adventurous our particular choices, tourists we would remain. We had options; we could have bailed out of the Metropole anytime we wanted. Still, I was pleased that we were embracing the challenge of the unexpected. The children might not always be comfortable, but they would be better for the jouncing.

That night, mired in the budget end of the Suva hotel repertoire, we moved slowly toward bed, avoiding any touch of the grimy floor with our bare feet, and trying to use the common bathroom down the hall without getting locked out at the security gate or making a wrong turn and ending up in the bar as we brushed our teeth. Was I correct in thinking that the kids were rising to the occasion? I could not see Sara as she and Linda were in the female barracks located between our room and the section of the Metropole cordoned off for illicit sexual behavior. But I could see Danny and Ian. My youngest son lay on the bed, his almond eyes half closed as he twirled his fair hair while cuddling with Paddles, the stuffed penguin that served as his comfort object. He seemed quiet, retreating into his own world. Danny’s day had been like a long tunnel. He had been through a lot, come out the other side, and was finally able to relax. I sat next to him, gave his back a couple of short rubs, as he smiled back softly. Not so bad. That left Ian.

Figure 1.2: Ian, Danny, Linda, Sara, and the author at a Fijian beach resort

Figure 1.2: Ian, Danny, Linda, Sara, and the author at a Fijian beach resort

My oldest son sat on the other bed churning out postcard after postcard to friends back home. His hands moved quickly, eyes intense with the urgency of his task. My throat tightened. This was the upside of the adventurous voyage, the progeny who was growing, developing, taking satisfaction from coping with the test. He could only be in the midst of telling classmates how much he had gained from a day that had started with a warm ocean swim around a coral reef, and ended in downtown Suva with his clothing hung in a flimsy wooden wardrobe that still reeked of cheap gin. Ian was clearly starting to enjoy rough road travel.

I asked permission to see what he had written, received a favorable reply, and flipped over one of the postcards. It read:

Things are bad. We were staying in a nice resort on the beach, but then my father thought it would be a good idea to move into town. Now we are staying in a shitbox.

Chapter 2

Near the Edge of the World

The gentle reader will never, never know what a consummate ass he can become until he goes abroad. ¹ —Mark Twain

Toward the end of his life, Mark Twain conducted a year-long circumnavigation of the globe that passed through many of the same places that we would end up visiting: Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, and parts of South Asia. The motivation was largely financial; he had accumulated a large debt, and at that point in his career a world lecture tour was more remunerative than book royalties. Twain made the trip with his wife, Livy and Clara, one of his three daughters. He and I were both the fathers of families on the road for a long time.

Twain is a huge, almost mythical figure. Nearly every schoolchild in the U.S. has perused either Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn, and readers throughout the world have enjoyed the way those books have introduced our popular culture. As Ernest Hemingway once wrote, All modern American literature came from Mark Twain. ² Yet, during his lifetime, Twain earned more money as a lecturer than as a writer. During the late nineteenth century, still without radio let alone television, hearing a talk from a well-known public figure constituted a favorite form of entertainment. Authors, politicians, explorers, and ministers practiced and honed their oratory skills. And Twain was no slouch. His command over an audience was monumental. Even now, some 125 years later, his contributions as a lecturer lie right alongside his writing in establishing his reputation. That reputation is gigantic. In the 1890s, he may have been the most famous man in the world.

The Atlantic once invited a group of eminent historians to compile a ranking of the 100 most influential Americans. The result included presidents, athletes, inventors, feminists, business figures, performing artists, generals, and explorers. Together, they provide remarkable insight into who is considered important in our nation’s history and who is not. Abraham Lincoln, for example, came in first, but JFK does not even appear in the rankings. Twain (the author of our national epic) is the very first writer, and ranked an astonishing 16 th, behind founding fathers