Sliding south down the Tropics
After the excitement of seeing the young humpback breach alongside us just a few metres away, Zoonie settled into her groove with her full headsail a taut wind filled curve and her kerchief of mainsail supporting her from behind the mast. The wind was a generous 22 knots at first but this settled to 14 to 16 knots from an accurately predicted direction enabling Zoonie to pursue a course to the waypoint off the pass between the Lifou and Mare islands of the Loyalty Group sailing a few degrees free of being close hauled.
Gallivanta and Kia Orama were both ahead of us their longer lengths and cat configuration giving them greater speed, so we knew they would soon be out of sight and VHF range. But before they were Robert called us up from Gallivanta to check us out and confirm we’d get together in Noumea; so we had that to look forward to.
Rob had also told us about two incidents with American visiting vessels in the Ile des Pins, an exquisite island to the south of the southern lagoon of New Caledonia, that have at least affected the locals attitudes to visiting yachts if not the official welcome of yachts to the area. On one occasion participants in a traditional ceremony were killing a turtle and when the Americans saw this they reported the incident to the police, thus criminalising those involved for doing what they have always done in order to eat, survive and pay their respects to their forefathers. No doubt the Americans were flesh eaters so the old adages “He who lives in glass houses should not throw stones,” and “Make your own house perfect first” come to mind. But most importantly as visitors we must be respectful to the locals and tactful when we witness the ways of our hosts. If environmental and ecological rules are being broken then it is to those agencies that an explanatory email could be sent stating emphatically that the sender does not want to incriminate anyone but this is what has been seen. Education, education, education might have been my softer more insightful approach. However on this important occasion there is no excuse for the actions of the visitors.
The second incident involved an American vessel towing a barge full with toys of the jet-ski, board and water ski kind. Without seeking permission from the local chief either to anchor or to use their toys they started whizzing around the bay wilfully ignorant of their crass and inappropriate behaviour. The locals sank the barge, boarded the vessel and told the startled crew what for before leaving them to beat a hasty retreat.
We have been told that yachts are only now welcome in one bay, Kanumera as part of a coral regeneration scheme and swimming in water less than 2 metres deep is forbidden to protect the delicate ecosystem of the seabed and shoreline. Three once popular bays are now no go areas to yachts so our way of protecting this beautiful area is to avoid it in Zoonie, we have plenty of beautiful photos on brochures to look at and imagine the place and there is always the option of an organised tour from Noumea maybe to celebrate our tenth wedding anniversary coming up soon (?!).
Zoonie bowled on southwards, in fact on a due south heading and we had two nights of starlit skies to look forward to. During my off watch rest I heard Rob call up a cruise liner to ask if they were aware of our presence. That ominous pregnant pause followed, that has deafened us before, when the on watch officer searches their plotter screen for the as yet unnoticed vessel, whose AIS signal is loud and clear, and ‘confirms’ they have us in their sights.
So they were happy passing us at 1.73 miles distance? I drifted off to sleep once more and found Rob and I were driving around an area of pleasant Victorian town houses looking to buy one when we came across a young lady sitting in her back garden with a baby crying on her lap. She looked exhausted with this little creature who would not rest. Rob went to pick up the screaming child and as he cradled it in his arms it immediately quietened down and opened its big blue eyes, “There’s no wind,” he whispered, smiling, (no wind from the baby or outside?) and I awoke to find it was Rob suggesting we take in the mainsail as it was doing little work and see what just the headsail would give us.
We passed between Lifou and Mare of the Loyalty Islands in the dark, Zoonie having sailed 240 miles when we decided that as the wind was now becoming less constant and wanting to get anchored inside a reef in daylight we would start the engine and motor the remaining distance to the Havannah channel through the second largest barrier reef outside the Great Barrier off NE Aussie in the world. We visited the third largest off the north coast of Vanua Levu, Fiji last year in our van load of eight if you remember.
The white lighthouse on the reef to the right of the entrance channel confirms a night time entry is feasible into Goro Bay but as you know we always err on the side of caution if possible. We motored on in the flat water leaving a green buoy to starboard in the middle of the lagoon to avoid a shallow area, continued on past Cannibales Point (!) and anchored on sand in 15 metres just off the old nickel ore loading wharf with its two rusty gantries still pointing upward. On the top of one of them was an osprey nest where the single fledgling was being encouraged to take to the air by the infrequent visits of its parents.
Nowadays the nickel ore is processed at the quarry on the other side of the hill and is sent by conveyor belt laid through corridors cut in the red rock to the modern wharf in Prony Bay, (a delightful place we are in right now).
It was grand to be at anchor once more, by ourselves with just the birdsong around us and the distant roar of the surf on the reef. Occasionally a vehicle would go by on the road that hugged the shoreline but by evening we were alone and it was wonderful.
The next morning we set off early for the 41 miles to Noumea passing the elegant hills denuded of kauri and other building material trees and eroding dramatically in places revealing dried blood red scars amidst the dry shoreside forest and lower shrub-land higher up their ancient sides. The conveyor belt I mentioned was clearly visible as we passed Prony Bay.
The channel markers were all in place which was just as well as the day was grey and rainy and visibility limited. A ship passed us confirming our forward course for a few miles until she disappeared through Canal Woodin. Little crests and rims of white showed us where the numerous coral reefs were to our left but most were marked anyway. We moored alongside the outer wharf of Port Sud Marina (see photo) Zoonie feeling strangely constrained being tied both ends and in the middle after months of just a bow restraint.
Anne Marie eyed the only bio product I had on board, a pathetic and doomed quarter of white cabbage I found lurking in the bottom of the fridge a couple of hours before.
“I can make a salad and eat it today,”
“I have to take it” she said with an expression of reluctant duty.
“I could stir fry it tonight?” No chance
“Keep the peg” she said as I popped it into her plastic bag, a waste of food and plastic!
Carolyn had given us the name of the Sail Doctor and we called him to arrange collection of the main. My rusty French came in handy as I chatted with Yves. Early the next morning a familiar voice whispered in my ear, “There’s no wind babe” so up we got before 5.00am to lower the mainsail and bag it ready for Yves. As I made my barefooted way along the side deck the inevitable happened, “Ouch” I tried to keep my exclamation quiet, then as I returned the other way so I stubbed the toe on the other foot, thinking quickly of the stupid logic of that I found the funny side and laughed out loud, LoL! Why then when I walk the same route in shoes do I not bash them against unforgiving objects like blocks Hmmm? The Law of Barb.
The main crackled as it came down so we did the job as quickly as possible to lessen the disturbance to our sleeping neighbours. The seam thread was broken all over the upper part of the sail and down the leach, outer edge, but hopefully this repair would put it right for good. Our second French repair, the first being in Guadeloupe if you remember.
We had to visit Immigration the next morning and then went to Johnson Supermarket to stock up, our trolley bulging behind us. We detoured to Coconut Square for a coffee and French pastry on the way back and noticed the abundance of ugly Modernist 70/80s architecture. Occasionally we found some of the few remaining French Colonial style and Art Deco influences. I guess being in the cyclone belt quick cheap rebuilds are of necessity the chosen style.
(I sent all the photo files for the next blogs while we still had good internet in Noumea, so now I am sending you the written blogs to go with them. X)
Francois et le Parc de la Riviere Bleue Notes from a Time Warp
Francois is a keenly intelligent man who was born in Paris of a Vietnamese father and a Polynesian mother. At one year of age he came with his parents to live in New Caledonia and grew to love the country. His education and location taught him English and French and he was brought up with the Japanese language. Along life’s path he has learned and retained as much knowledge about the geology, flora and fauna of the Great South as you could want and enough to do conducted tours for the world’s scientists, geologists and botanists. So the five of us were very fortunate to have him as our guide.
The five being, apart from Rob and me, retired history teacher from Brooklyn, NYC Robert and Takahiro and Azusa from Hokkaido, Japan. So Francois commentary was given in perfect English and then Japanese which was great because the latter repetition gave me time to make a few notes. Our host constantly involved us all and as a result we were soon chatting with the others and encouraging Taka and Azusa with their little knowledge of English.
We drove away from Noumea through dry forest around Mont D’Or, named because it looks golden with the evening light shining on it, and stopped in a viewing area where Francois gave us an insight into how New Caldonia was formed and why its geology is unique in the world.
Two hundred million years ago a section of the massive landmass known as Gondwana broke away to form Australia and the island group of New Caledonia and there are two tectonic plates that came together in the fashion Francois is showing us in the picture which is unique in the world and means that the ecosystem has remained unchanged since then and the endemic plants are pre-dinosaur, without predators and still thriving.
Surrounded by a protective barrier coral reef the island, measuring 400km by 50 km, lies in the biggest lagoon on the planet. We were visiting at the end of the cool dry season from June to September. Over 800 mother Humpback Whales come to the safe shallows of the lagoon with their calves in July and that is when the farmers plant their yams, when the whales come.
Francois explained the four different ecosystems as we were driving up the hills towards the Park over green/grey roads made of non-toxic nickel slag; there is the shoreline mangrove region behind which the savannah once reduced to 7% of its original area is now increasing with careful management mainly on the north and west of the island where there are cattle ranches and then the scrub dominated marshlands land full with plants that dinosaurs ate and finally the sub- tropical wetland forest.
Along with the unique and considerable ancient biodiversity endemic to the island is the variety of ores and minerals that have been found and exploited, especially over the last 160 years. The plants suck their life support from the alkaline soil full with ore including nickel (green colour), copper, iron (hence the red colour), serpentine, pink bauxite, jasper, jade, sapphire, manganese, stainless, chrome, fluoride to name but a few!
As Francois explained the geology to us honey eaters sang from a nearby ‘toothbrush’ tree in between poking their sharp curved little beaks into the flowers. The ground gets so hot in summer that plants growing near the ground cannot have flowers or spores, instead their stamens grow extra-long within the protection of the leaves and form the fruit and then seeds at their ends.
The tray of ore Francois showed us could have come from a geology lab and I for one felt privileged to be receiving this depth of information from him. On the information board with the six circles there is only one ‘specimen’ we did not see and that was the little gecko and we weren’t too worried about that as grandchildren Henry and Ruby have a pet gecko ‘Gordon’ from New Cal so we are familiar with them. He lives in his own little rainforest, sprayed once a day by Henry.
We stopped at the park entrance amidst a wonderful plantation of Kauri that are being grown commercially in some parts of the forest. A fifty year investment before they can be felled and no trace of kauri die back suggests a good future for them. Ironically their commercial value that once nearly caused their extinction is now ensuring their continued existence.
When James Colnett sailing with Captain Cook re-discovered the island in 1774 Cook named it New Caledonia because it reminded him of Scotland and as you will see from future images he was right. He must have named the island from his vantage point on the ship and have been referring to the abundance of kauri and sandalwood visible from offshore and also from the mountains, streams and plantations, “little straggling villages” woods and beaches “might afford a picture of romance” a Scottish Highland romance.
“No people could behave with more civility than they did” Cook said of the inhabitants who were generous in supplying the mariners with fresh water.
Onwards and upwards for us to the wetlands and the sunken forest created when the Rivieres Blanche and Bleue were backed up to create the Yate Lake, now a popular leisure activity area. We saw osprey nests perched at the top of the bleached trees and Francois gave us another lesson on the local flora and how it survived the hungry jaws of the dinosaurs. The diverse flora of the island remains 75% endemic species.
We peered into pitcher plants to see the half-digested flies inside and the pleasure of seeing a half Vietnamese, half Polynesian man showing two Japanese youngsters, at the start of their life’s varied path, around his south west Pacific home after the turbulent history of their nations over the last century was not lost on me. Travel, the great peacemaker.
Francois stopped on a roundabout, it didn’t matter as there was no other traffic on this red earth road at the time,
“It’s not raining too much, would you like to walk down to the bridge and I’ll meet you on the other side, we cannot take vehicles over it?”
We chatted happily, the five of us as we walked the short way down to the wooden Perignon Bridge in the drizzle, at least it was warm.
Dejeuner a Pont Germain
We were getting hungry by the time Francois came to pick us up having driven through a shallow part of the lake. The dam was built in 1958 for hydro- electric power and is now also used in the nickel mining industry. The Perignon bridge we had walked across is made entirely of rubber oak trees, ‘She Oaks’ in Vanuatu, as it does not rot, useful as it is often submerged in the rainy season.
We had two more stops before lunch, one of a flora type and the other a very special one of the fauna variety in which we hoped to spot a Cagou ground dwelling bird with distinctive grey plumage and orange legs and beak.
Do you notice on the pretty round leafy plant that Francois is cradling where the formation is all in pairs, maybe to ensure it has a backup for survival, Alison and Randall where are you when we need you!
You will also notice that on numerous plants the new growth is red including the Flame of the Forest as we know it in England; these new leaves contain a UV resistant chemical to protect them from the sun, pre-human Piz Buin.
We pulled in beside a tiny sign saying ‘Cagou’ and started out on a little walk through the pretty forest along a well-worn track and I cynically wondered if Francois was ‘having us on’, doubting the likelihood of seeing a Cagou in this vast forest despite them being unafraid of humans. Well it appears they are only too happy to let humans do a little uprooting of the undergrowth to find them a few bugs. Their lack of shyness and the fact they have lost the ability to fly and lay only one egg each year are all factors attributable to the lack of predators on the island. Just the same as plants have no thorns and their foliage is soft, without prickly ends to the leaves.
Forty years ago there were only 60 Cagou left on the island after the predation of humans and dogs, but now due to careful protection there are over 1000 and growing. Our hopes were fading as we finished the forest loop and started back along the road to our vehicle. We peered into the dense woodland and I spotted one. Francois immediately started upturning leaf piles at the side of the road which brought the little fellow out, hence the photos. They are territorial and any trespasser might well be killed in a bloody fight. The long grey feathers lying down its back are raised at times of threat into a beautiful crescent enough to shiver the timbers of any intruder.
We were delighted to have seen this unique to NC bird especially after bird lover Phil who we met in Vanuatu had recommended them to us.
Our next stop was lunch at the Pont Germain BBQ site where it looked as if each tour guide had access to his own area and took a pride in maintaining it. Francois sent us off to entertain ourselves while he did the cooking and after thirty minutes exploring the banks of the river we were all seated around the table, as you can see, the others tucking into venison steaks and sausages and me opening a little foil package of fish cooked with herbs and vegetables all accompanied with three types of salad carefully prepared by Francois.
“If you’d like to walk down the road while I clear up I’ll pick you up in a few minutes.” Robert walked with us while Taka and Azusa lingered behind and came across another very shy Cagou and got some good photos. This one was orphaned before he learned not to fear humans, when his parents were killed by a dog. We hoped he would one day find a mate to keep him company.
At the start of our journey home Francois stopped to show us the incredible hooks on the end of the climber and then we were looking up the immense and familiar height of a very healthy Kauri tree still thriving at 1000 years of age.
From the lookout at Guepyville Pass we had contrasting vistas on both sides, one over the flourishing wetlands and the other towards hills and with a Kauri plantation in the foreground, Cook’s quintessential Scotland don’t you think.
An existence to imagine was the thousands of families, parents and children who used to spend their long days chipping away at the rock, eking out a living from the traces of ore they found up in the hot hills. In the 1800’s mules and donkeys were used to transport the ore to crushing plants and the shipping wharfs. The miners must have preferred working in the cooler months of the winter when the Australian High Pressure system reduced the temperature to around 23’.There are now 270,000 permanent inhabitants in New Caledonia and 54% of them are under 25. There is a big problem with young Melanesian men who kill themselves in car accidents and refuse to wear seat belts.
As we sped downhill Francois pointed out how the abundance of eucalyptus trees makes the scenery look like Australia and indeed a lot of it has come from that massive neighbour, thirteen types of eucalyptus alone including the white paper ones with their bark hanging off like shedding skin. Imported deer are a problem in the dry forest so hunting of them is allowed under licence.
During our amazing day with Francois we had seen and or heard these birds; the Blue Goshawk, the Falcon, the Whispering Kite, the Yellow Breasted Robin, the Red Headed Honey Eater and the second biggest pigeon in the country.
Half way down the Mont D’Or road we pulled in to a natural spring to clean our shoes as the red ore rich soil permanently stains anything it touches. Francois dropped us off 10 hours after picking us up and if we were weary he must have been even more so, which is why he now gives of his skills and knowledge just twice a week.
A Long Journey to the Zoological and Botanical Park
Robert from New York and Takahiro and Azusa from Hokkaido, Japan sent us emails with their photos of our day together and it was nice to know our shared experience did not mark the beginning and end of our acquaintance.
The experience of the time efficient and learning filled day with Francois was turned upside when we set out to visit the Zoological and Botanical Park the next day. The helpful young trainee lady in the tourist office had advised us that the bus time for the trip to the park had altered from 9.55am to 9.00am and she marked our timetable accordingly. So we were sitting at the bus stop by 8.30am, we left the marina early for the walk over the hill to the city centre because Rob’s back was playing up. The number 40 bus came and went twice with the same driver so when she returned a third time I asked her about the number 41 that left from the same bus stop.
“That is me with this bus and we leave at 9.55 and 12.35.” So the same bus changed its number and ran twice a day up to the centre. We escaped into the warm hospitality of the little café nearby for a coffee and cake to shorten the wait and reward our patience.
The Park is described as being ‘in the heart of the city’ but how that can be when it takes a 15 minute bus ride out of the city to get to it stretches the imagination. We arrived five minutes before the opening and sat, still patiently, with a few others who had come by car.
Map in hand Rob tried to work out a logical route around the park but it seemed a random meander was the best bet. The park itself is for a few species of familiar birds, the sedentary flora and us visitors; most of the birds and animals are caged up. Little flocks of finches at least had the company of eachother but one cage held a solitary falcon, the fastest bird unable to fly.
A pitiful spider monkey, its back scabbed and tummy severely concave moving slowly looked uncared for and it seemed that only the cagous had decent sized enclosures one could call their ‘territory’. The park itself was very pretty in places and laid out for the pleasure of the visitor with displaying peacocks and nice picnic areas and different ecologies along the promenades and circuits, but to actually learn anything new one needed a good knowledge of French to read the information boards so all the English, Spanish and Asian speaking world was excluded from their fount of knowledge.
After three hours of looking around we made our way back to the restaurant building hoping for maybe a coffee or an ice cream; inexplicably it was closed and a pleasant lady in a mobile canteen had churros and crepes on offer instead. We sat on a bench to eat our packed lunch and admire the view realising that the bus lady had made her second visit for the day and gone an hour ago, so we now had a wait of two hours before we could catch the bus back into town.
Unimpressed and saddened by what we had seen I asked the lady in the office to call us a taxi and we left thinking that the place needed a change in ethos and organisation. We caught another number 40 bus on the same route two days later and it sped past the bottom of the small hill that leads up to the park every half hour from 5.00am to 5.00pm, so why could they not have laid on a little complementary minibus to cover the rest of the journey and actually encourage people to visit. Then there would be the need to re-open the restaurant which people would see on their way in and know was there for their pleasure during their stay. Missed potential, end of complaint. xx
Jean-Marie Tjibaou
Political Mover and Shaker for the Recognition, Freedom and Independence of the Kanak People on their Homeland
It was not only the land of New Caledonia that was upset through the arrival of Europeans, through logging and large scale mining but also the Kanak people, the indigenous people of Kanaky as the late Jean-Marie Tjibaou would like his reclaimed land to be called.
The pictures tell you the aims of this charismatic man, his friend Yeiwene Yeiwene and their loyal followers. To achieve change these brave people had to appear to step towards the existing power house of politics to negotiate terms of an agreement to end the years of colonial violence – this led to misunderstanding with supporters on the outside, with fatal results. But first the man.
Jean-Marie was born in Tiendanite in 1936, sounds like a kind of ore itself doesn’t it, on the North East coast of the island, an area we will not have time to visit, sadly, because it is spectacular. Nearby on the coast at Hienghene Linderalique rock formations rise vertically from the lagoon rather like the rocks of the Vietnamese coast. The rich green valleys of the land yield yams, cassava, taro, mandarin oranges, bananas, coconuts, vanilla and lychees and is the heartland of Kanak country.
Today fortunate visitors can stay with the Kanak people in their tribal villages and immerse themselves in the living traditions of the Pacific culture, learn about and taste the bougna food, cooked in the ground on a bed of hot stones, as well as kayak, hike, explore and dive the lagoon. Through tourism it seems there is a step towards independence and evolution of the old ways into the future already. Jean-Marie’s vision;
“The indigenous way of life, rooted in the hearts of the ancestors, is gradually stepping out into the daylight. It is by its essence that the indigenous culture will survive and that Kanake remains and will remain Kanake, Melanesian of New Caledonia.”
At the age of 13 he entered a small seminary and then went to the Isle of Pines for his noviciate, his religious probation period. At 29 he was ordained a priest and exercised his ministry in Noumea Cathedral. However his further education took place in France where he finally started but did not complete a PhD in Anthropology at the Sorbonne. During that time he changed his mind about his future in the ministry and was released from the priesthood in 1972.
Five years later he started his political career when he became mayor of Hienghene under the maxime ‘Taking New Pride’.
Election to Vice President of the Union Caledonienne and in 1979 to the council representing the newly-formed Independence Front and then Vice President of the New Caledonia Governing Council gave Jean-Marie the power and footing he needed to promote his vision.
In 1984 he became leader of the F.L.N.K.S and very soon the President of the Kanaky Provisional Government; it sounds as if he was close to achieving many of his aims but then tragedy struck.
Just before Christmas of that year two of his brothers and ten other Kanaks were ambushed and killed at Hienghene, the booklet does not say who their assailants were.
The colonial experience for the Kanaks under French rule had been a particularly violent one and in June 1988 Jean-Marie did his final act towards his vision by signing the Matignon Accords effectively bringing peace to his country. But distant militants on the Loyalty Island of Ouvea misunderstood his motives and intentions and on 4th May 1989 he and his friend and fellow political mover Yeiwene Yeiwene were both assassinated during a visit there, while his children were still young.
Jean-Marie had a poetic dream one night.
‘O Kanaky, my country, my country!
My country, I salute you!
Your people, sovereign and proud.
Your people born of the land, from the sacred house sights.
One with the eternal ancestors,
United in the same destiny.
Looking towards the future.
To proclaim to the world, to history,
Your sovereign freedom.
Oh Kanaky, my country! Long live Kanaky! ‘
At present the country is under a three separate vote referendum system to review the independence issue. The first referendum resulted in a small majority to stay with France. Hopefully somewhere on some radio station we will hear the outcome of the subsequent votes. I fear the democratic process could well be challenged by the wealth to be made from the mineral rich ground alone.
The Tjibaou Centre – A Tribute to the Man
A pleasant cooling draught wafted by us as we sat on one of the open veranda areas that straddle the main hallway of the centre, sipping our microwaved coffee, hot at the top and cold at the bottom, from its paper cup. This airy aspect of the majestic building was fully designed in by the respected Italian architect Renzo Piano (architect of the Pompidou Centre in Paris) and is intended to take the traditional trade wind resistant design of Kanak houses forward to a more open accommodating future. Just as Jean-Marie Tjibaou believed the Kanak future must embrace change while retaining usable tradition.
The corridor itself which links all three ‘villages’ of the centre and runs behind the ten stylised Kanak Great Houses is curved as you can see in the photos, just as the main pathway is through Kanak villages.
Each of the Melanesian huts contains its own exhibition and along the linking corridor are angled images of contemporary cultural stage performances illustrating the Kanak way of life.
Outside is barely distinguished from inside and the slender columnar pines (Araucaria), which were brought to the sight and planted around the construction period of 1996 – 1998 have now grown sufficiently as if they are striving to top the highest House which stands at 28 metres tall. They are complimentary though, natural and Renzo designs working together, even to the fact that numerous pines are not so straight, but take on the curve of the House walls. That’s a happy coincidence though as pines growing in the wild do curve also I have noticed.
The atmosphere of the location is calm, almost sleepy and the people working there are relaxed and good humoured. So relaxed in fact that in the late opening shop, where we found some fine prints of a Cagou and a Turtle the young lady didn’t have a clue how much they were, and when after a few phone calls she told us their price the pictures were duly returned to the shelf.
We wandered around the outside in the gentle warmth of the subtropical day looking for a spot where we could sit and have our snack lunch. The beach was a little too windy so we found a bench on the edge of a car park where the stage was being set up for a musical performance at the weekend and provided us with something to watch.
Children from a local school like us had been enjoying the centre and were now ‘housed’ in an open sided meeting hut having their lunch. Once consumed they entertained us with a loud game of tag to burn off some of those energy beans.
Robert, our New York friend from the Blue River trip with Francois, had told us about a performance that is given at 2.15pm along the Kanak Pathway and we had checked with Reception to confirm and found we were in luck, so that would be our next treat.
George and Tea Kanake On the Kanak Pathway
Symbolism is an important part of the Kanak tradition as you can imagine; Tea Kanake was the first Kanak person, he founded the nation and yet true to his origins he is half human half reptile and stage one of his life and the pathway begins at the pretty pond, the water source surrounded by mangroves from which he emerged.
The flora along the pathway includes the abundance of plants that were on the unspoilt site of the Tina Peninsula and were instrumental in the choice for the new Centre. Many other plants relevant to the story and endemic to the island were brought in as work progressed and the mature Araucaria Columnar Pines were transplanted to the site. I would have like to watch that operation.
The job of the flora is to illustrate the second stage which looks at the mother earth that provides food and nourishment. Kanake and his male and female mentors moved onto the farmed terraces and showed the taro and yam plants. When used as a gift the taro is passed gently into a woven mat that Kanake is holding, symbolising the union of man and woman.
The design of the pathway and garden was an interesting project and not only were the Elders asked about the traditions but the links with other islands and Pacific Nations were established as well. As Rob and I have travelled through Tonga, Fiji, Vanuatu and now here we have noted the importance of yams, taro, papaya and bananas and so on, not just as food but as connections with the way of life of the ancestors and in their other uses, the leaves in ceremonial costumes, matting and clothes for example.
Another character wearing a mask enters the garden and prepares to receive a dead person, under the woven mat to his left. He sits guarding the deceased until all is ready in the after-life for him to enter and join his ancestors. That was stage three and four.
Accompanying us on this trip was George our laid back and jovial guide in his symbolically orange shirt, close to the colour of the soil and the sunrise and a group of school children from Australia with their teachers on a school trip. Seeing the story unfold through their eyes was nice, no doubt it would make a lasting impression on some of them at least.
At the final stage, the rebirth, Kanake’s mentors are showing him how to play skittles using pine cones and twigs set in the ground, how to be a child and learn from play.
Time came for the photo call and anyone willing was invited to join the story tellers as they chanted a traditional song.
We continued on through the grounds to the hill overlooking the entire site. If you remember from the blog about Jean-Marie Tjibaou, his statue stands atop this hill with a permanent view of the centre, a poignant substitute for the real person.
The slope back down was sufficiently grassy so the children were allowed to run towards the last area that George had to show us and that Rob and I had already explored after our lunch, the Mwakaa, the ceremonial grounds, fenced with a wall of logs and containing three fine houses, displaying the strength and beauty of the Kanak architecture.