Angels without wings

So, I think its safe to say that we are now friends with the locals. We have a small but firm pool of friends and a large group of acquaintances. We have been so blessed with the kind of people that we have met. I think that who we call our close friends are the best people on the island. They each are a true friend. Not one of them is trying to take advantage of us (which happens in Fiji sometimes, we've met a few) and are the purest, most loving people ever. I am going to miss them come the end of the summer. The three that stick out in my mind are: Cia, our cook, Tasleem, the woman who runs the internet cafe, and Matt, our favorite taxi driver with the really cool hair that turned out to be a wig (I know, sad, some of the volunteers are still in denial).
Cia has always been so helpful to us. She'll do our laundry for 3 dollars a bag (I have yet to do this. I'm mastering this "hand washing" thing). She is an incredible cook. Her and her family now share their meals with us because, well, it just felt right. She's like family. She has been married for three years now to her husband and has a beautiful boy named Peter, pronounced "pita". I didn't know it was actually
peter until she called him "pita pan" one day.
Tasleem is a jem! she and her husband run the internet cafe that we use. She lights up when we walk in and says that the locals always ask her where her friends are when we don't come in for a couple of days. I was down here doing research for a project during lunch time and heard a knock on my cubical door, I thought my time had run out, but no, It was Tasleem. She had made me some hot beef lo-mien-like noodles to eat and asked me to bring the left overs home to share with the others. She wants to cook for all of us one day before the summer is over and asked us if we would be willing to come on a picnic with her and her parents because she wants us to meet her family. We laugh so much together and she is always helping us sort out what is good to eat and what is not. She wont let us walk home by ourselves and will assign someone she trusts to walk us home if we're not in a group. She gives us pointers on what to expect out of the villages we visit and is just an all around angel. So kind! AH! I just love her to bits! "Cotton-eyed joe" was on the radio the other day and we taught them the dance that all the LDS kids know. She let us know that the boys that hang out here at night have taken to practicing that dance instead of causing trouble. Which is really cute, because they all kind of chuckled when we showed them, and with just cause, its a funny dance. We now want to put on a dace night for the youth in our neighborhood and teach silly white dances like cotton eyed joe and the electric slide to the locals. It would be so fun!
And then there's Matt. Matt is the Fijian big brother we never had. He is an amazing person. He wants to move to America one day and is working on getting a visa to American Samoa because once he's there it will be easier to get the the US. He has a brother there. We mentioned that we liked the music he plays in his taxi and he offered to make us all a CD of it as long as we get some blanks! (SO excited!) but what really inspired this post has been the past two days. One of our girls had an appendicitis scare right before she left the US. The pain has come back and she is now in Suva. She has been refusing to go to a clinic in hope the pain will just go away and after two priesthood blessings, one for the sick and one for comfort decided it was time to go to a clinic Sunday night. We called Matt. He zoomed over. When I met him at the gate he took off his sunglasses and with all the sincerity in the world resting in his eyes asked in his beautiful accent "Who is sick?" He almost looked anxious, worried. When they got to the clinic he parked, went in with them and talked to the doctors. He kept saying "It's ok Ivy, You are ok, You can do it Ivy!" He would run around the clinic and get her medicine. When they came back that night he refused to take any money. He came back this morning to take her to another clinic. When Annie, Tacy and I went to town, We found Matt, Katherine and Ivy sitting at the bus stop waiting to leave for Suva. They were all eating "kool pops" ( a really good red Popsicle they have here. They told us about going to the hospital in Suva and that Matt said that on the way home he is going to take Ivy to the beach as a treat.
Like I said, We have met the best people here. We are so blessed to be able to know them. I'm going to have to make tons of money when I get home or work for a non-profit because I'm making some very dear friends on the other side of the world. I feel so safe. All the time. Be fore I left I was going through a time that I felt I had lost a lot of safety. I felt vulnerable and weak all the time. Like I couldn't do what was being put in front of me. I felt very alone. It feels good to have some friends here and to feel safe again. I missed the feeling of security.
Keep Ivy in your prayers. And thank God for Cia, Tasleem and Matt! Our favorite angels of Lautoka!

<3 Moce (pronounced more like Mothe)