Local Drinks

1. Bu

   Bu (green drinking coconut)

   Usage

   A coconut at the drinking stage, with only a very small amount of gelatinous flesh — essentially all water. This is the word it is sold under at markets and roadsides. One with little or no flesh is a bu sosou (p.28)

   Grammar Note

   ⚠ b is [mb], so it is "mbu", not "bu". A seller tests the nut by snapping a finger against it — vakavidika na bu. ⚠ The same spelling also means "grandmother (father's mother)" and is used as a term of address (p.28)

2. Drokai

   Drokai (part-mature coconut, still drinkable)

   Usage

   An almost mature coconut whose flesh is fully formed but not yet hard, usually still green-skinned. You get both water to drink and flesh to eat, so it goes further than a bu (p.76)

   Grammar Note

   ⚠ d is [nd], so dr is a single prenasalised sound close to "ndr". Saying which you want — bu or drokai — is what makes the request clear

3. Wai ni gunu

   Wai ni gunu (drinking water)

   Usage

   Water for drinking, a set phrase Gatty lists under wai (p.317). It is the wording to use when the question is not "is there water" but "is it drinkable"

   Grammar Note

   ⚠ g is [ŋ], so gunu is "ngu-nu". ⚠ The same wai also means "medicine" and "river": vale ni wai is a clinic (p.317)

4. Wai dranu

   Wai dranu (fresh water, as opposed to salt)

   Usage

   Fresh water as opposed to salt water (wai tui). On an island or a boat, plain "water" is not enough and this is the word you need. Gatty gives wai droka as an equivalent (p.71, p.317)

   Grammar Note

   ⚠ Reduplicated as dradranu or dranudranu the word shifts to "tasteless, lacking salt" (p.71) — not a compliment to pay a drink

5. Ti

   Ti (tea)

   Usage

   Tea. Gatty notes Fijians are often quite content to use mature lemon or other citrus leaves as a substitute (p.267), so in a village what arrives may be an infusion of those leaves

   Grammar Note

   ⚠ gunu ti, literally "drink tea", means to have breakfast (p.108) — Gatty gives it as the familiar counterpart of the formal ikatalau. If you are invited to one in the morning, a meal is meant

6. Ti vakasucu

   Ti vakasucu (tea with milk)

   Usage

   Tea with milk, a set phrase Gatty lists under sucu (p.239). Powdered milk is sucu mamaca and evaporated milk sucu sosoko — in a village it is usually one of those two

   Grammar Note

   vaka- (with, in the manner of) + sucu (milk). The same pattern gives vakasuka, "sugared" (p.239). c is the th of "this", so sucu is [suðu]

7. Isirovi

   Isirovi (the tea or soup drunk after yaqona)

   Usage

   The soup or tea drunk after a yaqona session to clear the mouth. Gatty adds that young people today are more likely to speak of a "washdown", meaning beer or spirits (p.230). The verb is sirovi

   Grammar Note

   The i- prefix derives nouns from verbs and is everywhere in Fijian (isevusevu, ikatalau, itaki). This is a word you meet when you are invited to a kava session

8. Waicala

   Waicala (too dilute, watery)

   Usage

   The adjective for yaqona, tea or coffee being too dilute; it also describes ice or frozen things melting (p.317). This is the word for commenting on strength at a kava bowl

   Grammar Note

   wai (water) + cala (wrong, off). The transitive waicalataka means "to dilute or cause to melt" (p.317). c is the th of "this", so ca is [ða]

9. Bilo

   Bilo (cup)

   Usage

   A cup. A drinking glass is a bilo iloilo and a tin cup a bilo kava (p.22). Gatty adds that cups of any kind did not exist in old Fiji — water and even yaqona were lapped up directly

   Grammar Note

   ⚠ b is [mb], so it is "mbi-lo". The kava vessel is a bilo ni yaqona, a smoothed half-shell of a mature coconut (p.22). The idiom bilo cicila, "leaky cup", describes an undependable person

10. Gunu

    Gunu (to drink)

    Usage

    The verb "to drink"; the transitive form taking an object is gunuva. Sa gunu vinaka means "that tastes good", of a beverage (p.91). In the Kadavu dialect it is somi, somica

    Grammar Note

    ⚠ g is [ŋ], so it is "ngu-nu". gunuva maca is "to drink it dry" (p.91, p.150). This, not the inu- root shared across the Polynesian languages, is the Fijian verb for drinking

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