Serevi and Fiji Day in Melbourne

from Peceli

Serevi and Fiji Day in Melbourne

It is the second time for Serevi to come to Melbourne that I know about. The last one was in the Commonwealth Games which Fiji lost in the final. This weekend he came to Melbourne for the Fiji Day celebration.

Melbourne is a city of more then 4 million people and a cosmopolitan city with a Premier Steve Bracks who is of Lebanese background and the City Mayor is Chinese, Mr Ho and the Uniting Church Moderator of Victoria and Tasmania is a Tongan. Jason Kioa.

I went up to Melbourne from Geelong with my granddaughter and her parents celebrated Fiji Day. My granddaughter has come over from Fiji for a holiday. We were blessed with good weather. There were plenty of Fiji food stalls, sponsorship from businessmen such as Sharma who made the Seven team visit possible to come to Melbourne with short notice. Well done .

The Christian Mission Fellowship performed items such as a holy spear dance! That surely is one of its kind in the world! A juniors rugby team kept bumping into the dancers near the goal posts. Two lads, about ten years old, did a great Bollywood dance item and were applauded by the crowd then the same boys danced to music by Black Rose.

Children were interviewed in the Radio SBS about that they thought of Fiji Day and though many children are second generation from Fiji migrants they still celebrate Fiji Day.



More than a thousand people gathered at the Harlequins Rugby ground, especially young people for this two day competiton, including teams from Sydney and Adelaide. The highlight was the Nabua team and the Fiji Seven led by Wesley Serevi.

Then yesterday we had the Fiji Day thanksgiving church service at Richmond Town Hall and the main guest speaker was Wesley Serevi. He is 37 years old now and he is of course famous for rugby. He told us his story. He comes from Gau, Lomaiviti from a Christian family. In 1993 in Japan he realised that faith is not just cultural but has to be more and personal. These days he is helping rugby still and is a motivational speaker. You have to listen to him to understand how good he is.

My own observation is that if the young people are motivated by people like Serevi Fiji could be a different world from some of the aimlessness in youth we sometimes see today.