These Indian women were teachers with me at Ba Provinial Secondary School. Indians make up approximately 45% of the population in Fiji. The vast majority of the Indians were brought to Fiji from India between the late 1800's and early 1900's through a period of "indenture" to work on the British Colonial sugar plantations. Their "contract" required that the Indians work for 5 years on the plantation (often in horendous conditions); after which they were free to do as they pleased - after ten years of work they could return to India free of charge. (Very few took this option.)