Kava is a traditional drink of Fiji that has special sedative power and is used in daily social gatherings. Luckily for us, our hotel hosted a kava ceremony while we were there and we jumped at the opportunity to participate.
We were the first to arrive and struck up a conversation with the Wise, the host of the ceremony, while he was churning the kava filled bag in water. You can see his explanation of how the ceremony goes below.
Since I was the first one there I was bestowed the honor of being the Chief (I know I said King in the title – alliteration sounded better) of the kava ceremony. With that, my responsibility was to make sure everyone clapped appropriately to ask for their drink and determine when it was time to give the group another round.
Kava tastes like – tingling, numbing, dirt. It isn’t pleasant but the effects on the mouth after pushing back a coconut filled cup of the stuff is an experience. You have to drink six or more cups of this stuff and even if you get past the taste the sheer quantity of liquid consumed is hard to swallow. Everyone did their best to keep up but it didn’t take long for people to back out, myself included.
I was hoping for a peaceful deep sleep as the kava promises, but neither I or Jackie got one. I don’t think it worked on us, but to each their own.
Sean Shadmand 