Well, I'm back from my (first) adventure in Polynesia (Feb 5th - March 18th, 2000).
The highlight was my time with the people of the Pihaena lagoon (on the island of Moorea), helping them protect it from the government and a hotel developer (who together want to extract 10,000 cubic meters of sand from the lagoon). These people are real-life Loraxes -- when the lagoon was threatened, they circled the sand-extraction barge with their boats, set up camp on the shore of the lagoon, and have been there standing vigil round-the-clock ever since. When I left, it was still a stalemate.
Please see www.drGoose.org (it has some good photos!). I set up the drGoose.org website to help them publicize their cause. I also ended up getting in the papers and on TV. Before I left, I was able to help them set up their own website (in french: see www.chez.com/pihaena), and help them learn how to create and edit HTML files.
The people were very warm and friendly (and heroic!), and took great pride in their heritage. They have many legends, which explain things like how the mountains got their current shapes and positions, and why the roosters crow in the middle of the night (they crow to keep the mountains from being stolen away! -- Those who live on islands without mountains are jealous of Moorea).
I knew I was in a very different culture when I looked down at my breakfast and saw it looking back at me -- I have never eaten so much fish in my life, nor have I ever loved it as much. The fish was fresh -- very fresh -- I saw them haul it in and clean it while it was still flopping around. And all the native fruits -- breadfruit (very much like bread), mangoes, avocadoes, papayas, pineapples, bananas, and one called something like "maniac".
Another highlight was playing with all of the children -- we played in the water, and I also showed them my coin and card tricks, and let them play with my computer.
The Tahitian language is a lovely language, full of laughter and vowels. One sad thing is that the children do not speak Tahitian -- they understand Tahitian but speak only French. Their parents encourage this -- because the children are punished at school if they speak Tahitian.
I also stayed for a very restful week at Relais Familial (I helped them set up this website), and another week at Club Med, plus some time in downtown Papeete as well as at the Moorea Camping.
Sorry there are so few photos -- my digital camera became a casualty of a particularly enthusiastic downpour. I might have saved it, but I did not think to remove the battery, and so the electronics got fried.
It was good to go, and it is good to be .
