BOOKS-SOUTH PACIFIC: ‘Paradise’ Samoan Style

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Carolyn Court

MELBOURNE, Jul 28 1998 (IPS) - Say “South Pacific” and chances are the images that appear in most people’s minds consist of swaying palm trees, impossibly blue waters and half-naked men and women without a care in the world.

While many South Pacific islands indeed are breathtakingly beautiful, and their people friendly, the reality there are not postcard-perfect. Far from the paradise imagined by many, life in the South Pacific can be fraught with hardship, with problems ranging from a lack of medical care, loss of language and culture, to the continuing ill effects of being nuclear testing sites.

It is this South Pacific that is laid bare in the debut novel of Samoan writer-performer Sia Figiel. Recently published in Australia by Penguin Books, ‘Where We Once Belonged’ is a work that pulls no punches and takes the reader through a South Pacific that is both beautiful and ugly, and where life is not always easy going.

In a recent interview, Figiel said one of her strongest motivations for writing the book was her desire to de-romanticise how the West perceived the South Pacific, especially the region’s women.

According to Figiel, it was only when she studied overseas that she encountered the “happy-go-lucky” image of Polynesians, aside from other stereotyped images Westerners had of the South Pacific.

“The only images that people have of us – it quite shocked me, you know,” said Figiel. “You’re being nicknamed the free-loving Margaret Meadian schoolgirl, or you’re some Gauguin painting – these are all images that I didn’t know existed. I didn’t know that this is how the West perceived us.”

And while she was just going into university at the time, Figiel became caught up in the urge to one day present people with the South Pacific she knew well and loved.

“(For me) it became very compelling really to present people in a setting that was real, (with) real people,” said Figiel, now in her early 30s. To do that, she decided to write about her own experiences “as a girl growing up here, which is very much in contrast with the images that flourish outside of Samoa”.

The name of the book’s heroine is Alofa, and through her and her friends Figiel tackles issues such as teenage suicide and violence against women.

The novel won Figiel the 1997 Commonwealth Writers Prize for ‘Best First Book for the South-east Asia and South Pacific Region.’ It shows that life for a teenage girl growing up on a Pacific island can be as complicated as that of a city kid in another part of the world – or perhaps even more so.

Figiel balances the brutality she presents with the beauty of the Samoan legends and language she weaves in deftly throughout the book, as well as by the earthy humour that relieves the tensest of moments.

‘Where We Once Belonged’ in fact uses the traditional Samoan storytelling-and-song form called ‘suifefiloi’, which has been described by one South Pacific expert as “stringing distinct verses/stories together like flowers on a lei.” And while Figiel says simply that it gave her more freedom to describe Alofa’s world, it is clear that ‘suifefiloi’ has the novel buzzing and humming, making it as lively as the central market Makeki Fou I Savalelo in Apia-it.

It is hard to capture the essence and the music of this form, but even just a bit of Figiel’s description of the central market is revealing of its magic: “From the eye of a fish the sea at Makeki Fou smells of dead dogs, mango leaves and elegi tin cans. Waves cry diesel tears and banana peels, oil and human shit, too.

“The sun hangs there like a pumpkin with a ten tala sign written in ink taped around its belly. Pumpkins thing they taste like palmolive soap under the sun and eels swim, too – in coconut oil or along in their own oil, soaked there in banana leaves since six o’clock….”

Figiel also uses a lot of Samoan language and street slang in the novel. But while there is no glossary, enough context is provided to help a non-Samoan reader through the book.

It may well be that the poetics of the Samoan language cannot be translated, which is why Figiel does not even attempt to do this. Or it could be that the author is making a statement about the lyricism and vitality of languages other than English.

Whatever Figiel’s real reason, her use of the Samoan language in the novel gives it such a rich texture that it is understandable why Figiel chose to incorporate it in her work.

While ‘Where We Once Belonged’ is not the most flattering picture presented of the South Pacific, it is an honest, thought-provoking and entertaining work that deserves — and demands – to be read by a large audience.