Pearl Diving

For those of you who don't know, Justin has been walking around for months talking about how Liam wants to be a pearl diver when he grows up. I don't know why, but for those of you who do know Justin well, you know that he's just like that:)

Well wouldn't you know, right in front of our Fijian house, there is a pearl farm. So today, Justin and I went pearl diving! We didn't figure Liam was quite ready for his first dive yet, but we thought we'd check the profession out for him.

We were the only tourists on this tour. ( In fact, I think there are fewer than 30 tourists on this whole island, and that may be an overstatement. We are quite frequently the only people in a restaurant, and at most only 2 other tables are full.) We went on a small boat out to a house built on stilts over water. There they cultivate and farm the pearls. It's pretty labor intense and to get one pearl takes nearly 2 years. Even then, only about 30% of the oysters generate a pearl good enough to sell. It's a family enterprise here, we met the father first and then his son, Soli, took us out to the farm. They are one of only 5 pearl farms in Fiji.

Soli took us snorkeling around the beds and to see the reef nearby. It was beautiful, my favorite was the bright blue starfish. Before we jumped in, I asked about sharks and he said "nah, maybe a small reef shark here and there". On the ride home though, he confessed that he just had a 15 foot tiger shark encounter. "But," he said," if I told you that you'd never get in the water."

He also told us a scary tale of riding out a cyclone in the house (hut) on stilts. Not something I'd want to try. He stays there most nights to guard the pearl beds, robbers and thiefs are not unknown. Justin, of course, wanted to eat the oyster, and he did. He said it was good, but when offered more, he declined.

All in all, it made for a good adventure, if not a future career.