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Fijituwawa.com
When Tarisi Vunidolo was small her mother told her Fijian legends (Tukini). Today, in keeping with a strong Fijian oratory tradition, Tarisi and her husband Kalisito have created a forum for storytelling via the World Wide Web.
If you have ever wanted to know about Fiji: its history, language, geography or legends, then a visit to www.fijituwawa.com is the perfect place to start.
For Tarisi and Kalisito, www.fijituwawa.com represents a natural extension of their interests and work as museum curator and teacher respectively. www.fijituwawa.com was born out of the many enquiries Tarisi was getting about Fiji's culture and history. Tarisi says living overseas has made her think deeply about her own roots and identity.
One of the target audiences is Fijian children living overseas who may not be exposed to Fijian culture. The site features audio tracks of Fijian legends, learning how to pronounce the Fijian Alphabet and how to count.
And what does 'fijituwawa' mean? Tuwawa means Giant, and Tarisi was inspired by the legend of two giants, one from Kadavu and the other from Nadroga. The two raced and ended up at Sigatoka sand dunes where some of the first evidence of early Fijians is found. It's a wholly appropriate name for a website that has adapted the traditions of Fijian storytelling-including creation stories-to the 21st century.
–Tamsin Vuetilovoni
Read
Mr Pip
Mr Pip is a devastating story, simply told. Set on the Melanesian island of Bougainville during the civil war of the 1990s, it is the tale of 13 year old Matilda, and how the introduction of Charles Dickens' novel Great Expectations into her life and classroom by an eccentric white man, Mr Watts, provides some refuge and hope. Matilda's powerful mother Grace however, sees Dickens and Watts as a moral and eventually, mortal threat. When the war arrives at their village, a misunderstanding over Dickens' central character Mr Pip, becomes the catalyst for a tragic denouement.
Mr Pip has a series of powerful themes: about war, education-both traditional and institutionalized, motherhood and religion.
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WatchLove Patrol
After years of watching American procedural dramas and New Zealand hospital soaps, Pacific Island stories are finally making the leap to our television screens. HIV-prevention is the central message of 'Love Patrol', a 10-part series that has been showing on television stations across the Pacific Islands.
The idea behind 'Love Patrol' is to have a popular TV soap made by and for the Pacific "that is entertaining and engaging whilst providing information on HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), stimulating community dialogue and encouraging behaviour change," says Pacific Community Behavior Change Communications Specialist Robin Drysdale. It's all of that, and the fact that as viewers we become attached to characters, means their dilemmas, decisions and hardships affect us more deeply.
www.spc.int
