The Curse Of The "Pass"
pp. 45-46 · Read in the full issue
(Contributed) A LOT of nonsense is spoken in the tropics about “white prestige”.
“No, we musn’t do that,” people say.
“It would lower us in the eyes of the natives.”
Such remarks are, in most cases, a cloak for laziness, which does not de ceive the natives, and lowers rather than adds to our prestige. The monu ment of white prestige in the South Seas has been so bedecked with ex quisite excuses by the lotus-eaters that its structure is hardly discern ible.
The habit of handing “passes” to natives, to allow them to do errands which should be the business of their master or mistress, is one of the out standing examples of indolence.
In Wau, New Guinea, where most of the business establishments are within a stone’s throw of the resi dences, 99 per cent, of retail business
is done through natives. “Send a ‘coon’ with a pass. It’ll be all right”, they say; and so we have “coons” conducting the daily business of Wau, buying the meat and the groceries, cashing the household cheque at the bank, while the lady of the house takes her ease at home.
The clerks and store assistants are driven almost mad at the annoying loss of time spent in deciphering badly-written “passes” on odd scraps of paper, writing explanations con cerning the order, and interrogating the native servants.
“Boy belong master ‘so and so’”, the store assistant will call, when the order finally has been completed. But his troubles are not always over then, for it is quite likely that half a dozen natives will lay claim to the one master—such is the mentality of the average “boy”, trusted and expected to carry out important errands.
In the meantime the employer may grow Impatient. “I sent him down
to the store an hour ago—he’s not back yet, and I want him to put up my ‘wash-wash’”. They do not rea lise that if they attended to their own affairs, the time and temper of many people would be saved.
Let the native servant carry the groceries home, by all means; let him be a hewer of wood and a drawer of water; but do not pass on to him your responsibilities.
The cult of the “pass” has now be come the curse of the “pass” and has reached the height of bad manners, when “send a ‘coon’ with a pass” meets any emergency.
A new 74 ft. lighthouse has been erected recently on Euaiki Island, at the eastern entrance to Nukualofa Harbour, Tonga. Its beam flashes every four seconds from dark to dawn.