By Leigh O’Connor.
In a dimly lit bar, the pour of red wine glows like liquid rubies. Across the Pacific, under a woven bure roof, a wooden bowl of kava glistens like soft earth after rain. Two drinks, worlds apart - yet each steeped in ritual, community and emotion. Wine intoxicates the senses; kava stills them. One stirs the heart, the other quiets it.
Wine has long been humanity’s mirror - its vineyards tracing the rise and fall of civilisations, its bottles marking our greatest joys and sorrows. Each sip carries sunlight, soil and centuries of devotion. Wine speaks to the art of indulgence: the swirl of the glass, the slow bloom of aroma, the taste that lingers like memory. It invites warmth, laughter and conversation. With wine, we celebrate - births, unions, achievements, love itself. It is the drink of expression.
Kava, by contrast, belongs to silence. Made from the powdered root of the Piper methysticum plant, mixed with cool water and strained through cloth, it is the heartbeat of Fijian ceremony. Its flavour is earthy and faintly bitter, its effect deeply soothing. Where wine races through the veins, kava moves like a tide, soft and grounding. It relaxes the body, clears the mind and welcomes stillness.
In Fiji, drinking kava is never rushed. It is shared - always - from a communal bowl, passed in sequence, each person accepting the cup with a clap and gratitude. There are no toasts or chatter; only the low murmur of respect, the rhythm of palms meeting in unison and the quiet hum of connection. It is a drink that binds people, that asks for humility rather than abandon.
Wine and kava reflect the dual nature of human spirit. Wine celebrates our passion - our urge to rise, to feel, to sing. Kava honours our peace - our need to listen, to be, to breathe. Both are sacred in their own way: one lifts the heart to dance, the other lowers it to rest.
To sip wine is to converse with the past - the winemaker’s choices, the sun-drenched vines, the oak’s embrace. To drink kava is to commune with the present - the pulse of the island, the rhythm of community, the grounding touch of the earth.
Ultimately, neither outshines the other. They are not rivals but reflections of balance - celebration and contemplation, stimulation and serenity. Perhaps the perfect life contains both: the bold red to ignite our evenings and the humble bowl of kava to ease our dawns.
