Bonjour
Bonjour!
I am now in Tahiti, [Tahiti Nui - the biggest part of Tahiti]. So it all began Friday morning at 5.30 am when I woke up, got dressed, ate and went to the airport. It was all kind of a blur for a couple of hours while I woke up and kind of slugged my way through the airport. I've never been on an international flight and so it was interesting not understanding where to go or what to do. I figured it out pretty quickly but got a little nervous when I rocked up to customs to find about 400 plus people in front of me and only 40 minutes until my plane started to board. It was all pretty okay because the line took only about 30 minutes to get through and they boarded my plane late because of new security procedures, being that the foiled terrorist attacked happened the day before. Overall the flight was pretty good (thanks Reenie for all the bits and pieces to keep me occupied!) but I do have to say the vegan meal was pretty bad... I thought it might be though. I got stopped at immigration for not having an address but that resolved itself somehow in the end... and customs was a bit of a joke. The customs officials have a please declare policy but don't worry about it if you don't attitude. The guys didn't even look twice at me and I walked out of the airport... ah well... this seems to be Tahitians for you.
Overall the Tahitians are really wonderful people - and they smile alot. I'm not far from the city centre (if you can call it that) which is an interesting place. Tahiti is not really anything like I expected. The postcards you see are all white sand and pale blue water with sun shining... it's a bit of a lie. Alot of the other islands can be like that but Tahiti for the most part is fairly busy, dirty and run down. People all have cars - lots of cars, and the really oversized ones too... the big utes with kids riding around in the back. There are something like 250,000 people on the island and around 150,000 cars... but the problem is there aren't enough roads, the ones that are here are tiny and are slowly running down in the ground quite literally. The markets, ah, the markets. They are pretty cool with lots of crafty things -mostly mother of pearl and pearls, oh, and sarongs - lots of sarongs and flowers. But if you are after variety maybe Tahiti isn't really the place. Everything at all the markets are quite the same and once you have visted one stall you have seen them all... with some execptions of course. So far I have figured out a few basic things about Tahitians... they all seem to love cigarettes, alcohol and food. Wherever you are there is a food stand with some baguette filled with all sorts of strange things (from spam like ham to chips and sauce or even tom yum like thing), and smoking is allowed pretty much everywhere - even in shops! Alcohol, well.... they are like the Aussies and love a drink of beer and are happy and social people. But unfortunately not all are so nice when they drink... again, just like the Aussie. But things are a lot different over here and life is pretty chilled and like I said people are pretty wonderful.
I went to Moorea today which is an island about 22klms from Tahiti. It is closest island to Tahiti and is a part of the French Polynesia and is soooo beautiful! See Photobucket for all the photos. We took the dinged up car around the island and stoped at all the wonderful sight points of the island. To get there you take the ferry across which only takes around 30 minutes and the ride is spectacular. You get this wonderful view of Tahiti as you leave and an even better view of Moorea as you come in to it.
Anyways, I am off to the really early markets tomorrow morning with Sophie and Michelle which I can't wait. All the little things at the market which I didn't know about will be clarified - like signs and strange meaty looking things which i think were sweets. We will also get some of this infamous Bread Fruit which apparently is the best.
Until later - Au revior
I am now in Tahiti, [Tahiti Nui - the biggest part of Tahiti]. So it all began Friday morning at 5.30 am when I woke up, got dressed, ate and went to the airport. It was all kind of a blur for a couple of hours while I woke up and kind of slugged my way through the airport. I've never been on an international flight and so it was interesting not understanding where to go or what to do. I figured it out pretty quickly but got a little nervous when I rocked up to customs to find about 400 plus people in front of me and only 40 minutes until my plane started to board. It was all pretty okay because the line took only about 30 minutes to get through and they boarded my plane late because of new security procedures, being that the foiled terrorist attacked happened the day before. Overall the flight was pretty good (thanks Reenie for all the bits and pieces to keep me occupied!) but I do have to say the vegan meal was pretty bad... I thought it might be though. I got stopped at immigration for not having an address but that resolved itself somehow in the end... and customs was a bit of a joke. The customs officials have a please declare policy but don't worry about it if you don't attitude. The guys didn't even look twice at me and I walked out of the airport... ah well... this seems to be Tahitians for you.
Overall the Tahitians are really wonderful people - and they smile alot. I'm not far from the city centre (if you can call it that) which is an interesting place. Tahiti is not really anything like I expected. The postcards you see are all white sand and pale blue water with sun shining... it's a bit of a lie. Alot of the other islands can be like that but Tahiti for the most part is fairly busy, dirty and run down. People all have cars - lots of cars, and the really oversized ones too... the big utes with kids riding around in the back. There are something like 250,000 people on the island and around 150,000 cars... but the problem is there aren't enough roads, the ones that are here are tiny and are slowly running down in the ground quite literally. The markets, ah, the markets. They are pretty cool with lots of crafty things -mostly mother of pearl and pearls, oh, and sarongs - lots of sarongs and flowers. But if you are after variety maybe Tahiti isn't really the place. Everything at all the markets are quite the same and once you have visted one stall you have seen them all... with some execptions of course. So far I have figured out a few basic things about Tahitians... they all seem to love cigarettes, alcohol and food. Wherever you are there is a food stand with some baguette filled with all sorts of strange things (from spam like ham to chips and sauce or even tom yum like thing), and smoking is allowed pretty much everywhere - even in shops! Alcohol, well.... they are like the Aussies and love a drink of beer and are happy and social people. But unfortunately not all are so nice when they drink... again, just like the Aussie. But things are a lot different over here and life is pretty chilled and like I said people are pretty wonderful.
I went to Moorea today which is an island about 22klms from Tahiti. It is closest island to Tahiti and is a part of the French Polynesia and is soooo beautiful! See Photobucket for all the photos. We took the dinged up car around the island and stoped at all the wonderful sight points of the island. To get there you take the ferry across which only takes around 30 minutes and the ride is spectacular. You get this wonderful view of Tahiti as you leave and an even better view of Moorea as you come in to it.
Anyways, I am off to the really early markets tomorrow morning with Sophie and Michelle which I can't wait. All the little things at the market which I didn't know about will be clarified - like signs and strange meaty looking things which i think were sweets. We will also get some of this infamous Bread Fruit which apparently is the best.
Until later - Au revior
posted by Mai @ 9:35 PM
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