Today, Glenbrae Pacific Group went to the Glen Innes Library to learn about the Pacific and also it was the Cook Island Week. When we got there, we met the Kaiakos from the Auckland Museum. There names were, Viliami, Mama Piri, Freda, Daren Kamali. Viliami was a Tongan, Freda was a Samoan, Mama Piri was a Cook Island, and Daren Kamali was a Fijian.
We learnt about the history of the Island countries these Kaiakos came from and how they used to catch fish, make their fishing hooks and what kind of food they ate.
We also learnt about the Tree of Life. The Tree of life is a Coconut Tree, In the Cook Islands, they call it Niu which is the same as in all of the Island Nations. They call it the Tree of Life because you can eat out of it, you can use it as your bowl, carve it and use it for Kava, use the husk to braid it into a long kafa for fishing and to put the hook on.
We learnt so much about the things we didn’t know about, even our own ethnicity, but we had so much fun. At the end the Librarians gave us some food that was delicious. I feel like going back to the Islands.
Tonga
By Fusi
