Jaron & Risa's Wedding -- My America Vacation

This month, after sixteen months of living in Fiji, fourteen of which were spent living alone in my remote village, I came home to America for a vacation. Oh, Risa (my sister) and Jaron also got married. So that was also very exciting. :-)

My village threw me a going-away feast two nights before I left. Here, I'm sitting at the head table with the chief lounging to my right, and the oldest man in the village on my left.

The ladies helped me pack all the mats I was bringing home. The mats barely fit inside my suitcase; even with the women's folding expertise.

My tickets from Nadi to LA and my Peace Corps passport

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The bride-to-be on the way to her Bachelorette Party in Palm Desert.

As an after-dinner activity, I changed into my sulu-jiaba and dressed Risa up in a traditional fijian wedding outfit given to me by my village friends Mareani and Ilimo.

Masi is a paper-like fabric made from soaked and pounded leaves. It is painted with handmade dyes from local mud and soil.

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After the Bachelorette Party, we all checked into the downtown San Diego hotel and started gearing up for the big day.

It was great to see relatives again, too.

Risa and Jaron even brought their adorable "golden doodle" dog with them to the hotel.

Jaron's brother Matt just proposed to his girlfriend Erika, so now I have two new brothers-in-law and a new sister-in-law!

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For the first time in days the sun came out and we had a beautiful rehearsal in Balboa Park.

Mom and Dad walked Risa down the aisle together.

Getting pampered and finally feeling clean for the first time in 16 months was definitely one of my highlights during wedding weekend.

Jaron's family friends were nice to talk to. He was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Africa in the 1980s where he met a Host Country National woman. They are still married, and very interesting people to talk to, today.

The Rehearsal Dinner was at an excellent Mexican restaurant. Yum.

After the toasts I presented Jaron with the Fijian wedding outfits Risa saw at the Bachelorette Party. ..

Then Tara and I dressed the two of them up for a preview.

Risa and Jaron, looking somewhat Fijian, also brought home a present--a kuta mat woven by the women in my village.

Risa and Jaron with their Bride and Groom pinatas.

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10-10-10

WEDDING DAY

Getting my hair done.

Of course, Risa also got pampered.

Pre-glam bridesmaids.

Glam bridesmaids and Tilli, the flower girl.

Risa looks like Cinderella here.

She made a beautiful bride, too.

First thing after arriving at the Prado Restaurant in Balboa Park, Jaron and Risa signed the katuba (Jewish marriage contract), and were privately married. Then we had the big ceremony.

After the ceremony, Jaron and Risa practiced their first dance under the beautifully decorated chupah (Jewish marriage covering).

Mr. and Mrs. Luksa!

The party was so much fun.

Tilli, the adorable flower girl, danced with us all night long.

The ladies in my village wove a small kuta for Jaron and Risa's wedding cake. It looked beautiful together with Jaron and Risa's wedding motif.

oh, the four flavor cake was a delicious, too...


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Now that all the celebrations are over and Jaron and Risa have left for their honeymoon, I've been chilling and trying to soak up as much America as possible before I go back to Fiji.

Part of my return-to-Fiji preparations included cutting off all my hair. It's almost the hot season again, and this will be so much easier!

Well, that's all for now. For all of you who I saw on this trip, thanks for putting up with my culture shocked antics and for making this trip so much fun. I'll miss you all!

xx

Milika

Ilimo & Sereana's Wedding

On August 24, 2010, my friend Ilimo (the leader of our village Water Committee) got married to a girl he met last year on a trip to the capital and stayed in touch with over the phone until now. Here are some pictures of their wedding:

The most important aspect of any Fijian function is food. Here is the cooking shed the village constructed for all the wedding cooking. On the right, you can see one of the guys carving up a recently slaughtered cow. Weddings and funerals are also the only occasions during which Fijians binge on meat--both beef and pork.

Akoila, one of my teeth brushing kids, and Ilimo's mom show off the tail of a cow that is on it's way to becoming lunch.

While the men carve up the animals and make the underground ovens, the women do all the chopping. I have spent hours upon hours cutting up raw meat for chop suey, stew, curry, and steak.

Here, some youth boys carry freshly-harvested Dalo (aka Taro Root) to be put in the lovo (underground oven).

These guys are preparing the lovo, an underground oven made of a woodfire at the bottom of a hole that gets covered with stones, then filled with food, and covered with leaves to hold in the smoke.

Traditional Fijian wedding presents from the groom's side (the side I'm on because Ilimo is from my village) are mats and bedding (pillows, mosquito nets, blankets, sheets, etc).

Here, Mareani and I pose with the pile of gifts given by the immediate family living in our village.

Here's an amazing kula, woven string edging along a mat, on one of Ilimo's wedding mats with his name written into it.

The day of the wedding, Ilimo's house looked like a bedding store showroom.

The wedding shed was set up for eating, dancing, and drinking yaqona (kava) right accross from my house (seen on the left).

To dress up the wood-post-and-roofing-irons shed, the women braid coconut leaves onto the posts and decorate them with colorful plants and flowers.

I had some wedding guests of my own. Sally (aka Selina) and Brian, a married couple in my closest neighboring village, came to partake in the festivities.

The groom and bride arrive in full traditional wedding outfits made of masi. Masi is a special type of fabric made from soaked and pounded leaves. It's almost like a handmade paper. Then, the off-white-colored "fabric" is painted with handmade dyes.

Inside the church, the wedding guests await the bride and groom's arrival.

The wedding party consists of one Best Man and one Maid of Honor...

...The four of them dress in traditional garmets and stand in the front of the church on top of special wedding mats with elaborate kula string along the edges.

This hand holding as the priest marries Ilimo and Sereana is the most physical contact that will ever be observed in public between the married couple. They do not kiss during the wedding, nor will they touch again for the rest of the celebration.

Because I'm taking pictures and making a big spectacle, I am able to request a rare smiling pose from Sereana and Ilimo on their wedding day.

After the ceremony, the wedding party heads to the chief's house to change into more contemporary Fijian clothing. For the rest of the day the men will wear bula shirts and pants in matching fabric (known as kala vata) with the women's sulu jiaba's.

While the wedding party is changing and celebrating privately, the village women start to serve up the feast. Here Litia and Mesi pose with a huge vat of beef chop suey.

Mareani and Sereana carry out some of the dishes to the main table.

As usual, almost all of the wedding guests will eat heaping plates of food, and they also bring takeaway containers to bring leftovers home to their families after the event. Because of this behavior, most of these women from my village will not get to eat the feast they prepared except for soupy scrapings from the bottom of the pots and leftover scraps of Dalo.

Here, all the young women prepare to serve up the dishes to guests buffet-style.

While the food is being prepared, someone revs up the generator and the dancing begins. I'd be lying if I said that us Peace Corps Volunteers didn't get it started. Notice Brian, Sally's husband, at the top of the picture dancing to a full room of spectators in usual Fijian fashion.

Here the wedding party sits up at a special table of honor and feasts on all the choicest cuts of food.

After the meal, some of the village girls perform a meke (traditional Fijian dance) and the good times continue until well after dark.

All said, I was struck by how Fijian weddings hardly differ from other Fijian special occasions such as funerals. As long as there's tons of meat and yaqona to drink, everyone's happy.

A little different from weddings in America, as I would soon find out...

Vinaka Vakalevu.

Milika