Fiji
Solomon Islands
Vanuatu

Samoa
New Zealand

Another restful and relaxing day around Apia. Nothing much has really changed since we were last here in December 95, with perhaps the exception of traffic lights. Why there need to be so many is anyones guess. Whilst there a quite a few cars on the road, it seems that the traffic planners must have had an excessively generous budget allocation for traffic lights. Another change that is taking place concrens taxis. A recently passed piece of government legislation states that all taxis must be painted white. Noone seems to know why this is the case, my own explanation revolves around a government minister acquiring a large quantity of white auto paint at a bargain basement price, and needs to find some way to liquidse his asset. So the taxi drivers went had their cars resprayed only to find that the government had introduced another piece of legislation stating that all taxis have until the end of the month to get a checkered band placed along both sides of the door. Needless to say none of the taxi drivers seem too pleased about this developments.

Samoa is also one of the last places in the world I would expect to encounter a new piece of technology, especially when it involves a Samoan taxi, most of which were probably not new when they arrived. But it was in Apia where I came across the automatic seatbelt for the first time. If you are not familiar with this device, the belt is attached to the floor of the car in between the two front seats and the other end is attached to a recessed rail above the door. When the door is opened the belt moves along the rail towards the front of the car, so that it is not in the way as you get in. When you shut the door the belt moves back along the rail until it is level with the back of the seat, holding you firmly in place.

In the evening we met Lucy's cousin, Emma, at Evening Shades and then went to Sails for a meal. Both the food and service at the restaurant were excellent, but it is fairly expensive by Samoan standards. Most of the guests seemed to be either tourists or politicians; Emma pointed several of the later out to us.