How do you put 20,000 people in a German city on the cusp of winter and convince them they're in Fiji?
It's the vibe.
Diplomats, politicians, academics, business people, NGOs, media and environmental activists have been in Bonn over the past fortnight in the hope of pushing forward the work to make the Paris agreement on climate action actually happen.
Fiji is the first Pacific island nation to hold the presidency of the United Nations climate talks; a fact recalled almost every time any official has given a speech or interview over the two weeks.
For Fijians, the threat of climate change is not just theoretical.
Their story was powerfully told by 12-year-old Timoci Naulusala at the opening of the meeting of leaders and ministers on Wednesday.
"The sea is swallowing villages, eating away at shorelines, withering crops. Relocation of people ... cries over lost loved ones, dying of hunger and thirst," the Fijian boy told them.
"It's catastrophic. It's sad. But it's real."
Hosting the world's largest gatherings of climate activists is no small task so the German government and city of Bonn stepped in to help.
The UN leadership has lauded this as the kind of international cooperation that embodies its spirit and the collective action needed to limit climate change.
So the world has come to "Fiji on the Rhine", as an Estonian minister put it, with its Pacific spirit of talanoa, of constructive discussion and storytelling leading to wise decisions.
"Bula vinaka!" is the greeting heard as often as "guten morgen" or "hello".
The corridors of the sprawling conference centre are lined with floor-to-ceiling photos of Fiji and its people and the brightly coloured shirts of Pacific Island representatives are ubiquitous.
On the morning the world's leaders and ministers arrived, a concert was beamed live from Fiji's capital Suva to televisions in Bonn, filling the hallways with music.
The vibe is strong.
But the sheer size of the conference has left some feeling a bit left out.
For the first time, the COP has been split into two zones, comprising one actual building with the plenary rooms for official negotiations and a huge series of marquees with delegation offices and a media centre, and another huge marquee a seven-minute bike ride (or 15 minutes on a bus) away where the "side events" run by countries and NGOs are held.
It takes at least half an hour to get from one end of the Bula zone, through an art-filled park and to the far end of the Bonn zone.
There have been some grumblings about how this physical separation of negotiations and civil society has led to much less mingling and sharing of ideas compared with past COPs since it's hard for officials to duck in and out of meetings to get to side events.
The exchange of stories of climate change's impact and what people are doing can energise negotiators, reminding them they're here for something real and not to get too bogged down in arguments over what subheading should be used or whether a clause will say "should" or "shall".
It's hoped the vibe of collective action, of the whole world coming together to stop climate change will resurge at next year's COP in Poland, when the rules of the Paris agreement shall be set. Or should be.
