We went to a church that had missionaries who’d come back once a year from Fiji & give talks. I remember one of them saying it was very hard work telling people they were going to lose their everlasting souls if they didn’t shape up. I pictured people sitting on the beach listening to this sweaty man all dressed in black telling them they were going to burn in hell & them thinking this was good fun, these scary stories this guy was telling them & afterwards, they’d all go home & eat mango & fish & they’d play Monopoly & laugh & laugh & they’d go to bed & wake up the next day & do it all again.

One other thing: at the meeting in Canada, [there was] the coup in Fiji. This comes to an important part of the Commonwealth: the role of the Queen [Elizabeth II]. I had absolutely just enormous respect for her as leader of the Commonwealth. You could talk to her about any of the fifty-one countries of the Commonwealth and you could have an intelligent conversation with her about the economics, the politics. She really immersed herself in the Commonwealth.

If you could use the Internet somehow to see how a Fiji sailor is doing, rather than having to read a text version of it somewhere a day later, that would be great.

I dive all over the world: Fiji, Australia, the Caribbean, Hawaii, and many other places.

The only thing I really love is Fiji water. That’s like the only crazy request – I don’t like any other water.

Fiji had experienced the ordeal of two military coups.