PARAS Ram sat silently gazing at the cloudy skies. Slowly he gets up, shakes his head before turning again to our conversation.
It has been a week since he had cut his first tonnage of sugar cane for this year's harvesting season and his cane is still lying in the field.
"The first load is still in the field and because of the rain, the trucks can't come and I still have more cane to cut this season," Paras says.
Paras is a cane farmer at Cuvu Top, an area on the edge of the Sigatoka Valley on your way on the Queens Rd as you make your way towards Nadi.
He has been farming this piece of land since 2000 after securing a 50-year crown lease which is eligible for another 30-year renewal at the expiry of the initial lease.
He left his father, also a cane farmer and his family home at Ulusila many years ago, to start his own farm and family.
Paras' 15-acre farm is brimming with mature cane and he wants to make sure that his 34th year as a cane farmer turns out to be another successful season.
"If the rain continues it will mean I have to drag the whole crop down to the roadside because the trucks won't come to the fields. And if it doesn't rain it will take me two weeks to cut and load my crop but if it continues to rain, it will take me three weeks to complete the harvest," Paras says.
He, unlike some nearby sugarcane farmers, does not have the luxury of the railway tracks to transport his cane to the Lautoka mill.
A shrewd farmer, Paras has increased the acreage he has dedicated to planting vegetables and has constructed a roadside stall which he sells from.
"I have been selling vegetables from my stall for many years now," he says.
Paras is so experienced in cane farming he was able to work out the tonnage each acre can yield for him and surely that means he can work out the amount of money he can expect to reap from this season's crop.
And slowly he is sharing this hard gained knowledge with his son whom he expects to inherit the farm.
"No I don't force him to become a farmer but I know that one day he will have to run the farm. He also works on the farm every weekends or whenever he finishes from work," he says.
Paras' son has a job in Sigatoka Town and makes the daily commute of travelling more than 30 kilometres to the town.
His son has married and had children of his own but Paras definitely wants the land to be tilled and he hopes that his son will take up this challenge.
"In fact that's what I used to do while I was a young man. My father used to have his own farm but I went and worked in Sigatoka Town for 18 years," Paras says.
Now 54 years old and a grandfather, Paras does not have any regrets of leaving the farm to find work in town.
In fact he is very proud of having to have left the farm.
"I used to work in a duty free shop in the town and that time Tappoo's was still a small town shop but now it is all over the world," he says.
It is easy for him to give his son a free rein in his young life because that is what he did himself but the only difference is that Paras returned to the land.
And as the grandfather walked away, I know that deep inside, he harbours s silent hopes that his son will follow in his footsteps.