Seas"

The "Romantic South Seas"

By Amel

Even in these enlightened times, peo ple cherish the delusion that life in the South Sea Islands is just one long, sweet song. Romantically-minded writers, exaggerated films and publicity blurb picture the “Islands” as a handful of small atolls, inhabited by lions, tigers, elephants, hippopotami, cannibalistic na tives and perhaps an Indian or two.

They clothe the atolls with “tropical vegetation”—meaning nothing less than a perennial abundance of bananas, pine apples, granadillas, yams, taro, paw-paw, mandarines, breadfruit, tapioca and or anges—jumbled together in glorious pro fusion, waiting to be picked. They trans form tropical beaches into sun-kissed stretches of golden sand, strewn with he-men of the Tarzan type and lovely ladies clad in little beyond a smile and a ukulele.

They place coconut planters under two headings. They are either exalted beings with vast resources, luxurious homes and a dozen servants; or they are unshaven bounders who live with native women in mud huts, and occasionally cut a coconut for a living.

These are all figments of vivid, mis guided imaginations.

ACTUALLY, the “Islands” are more im posing than mere atolls. Some are nearly 100 miles long, with a wealth of undulating hill-country, fertile plains, large, navigable rivers, and a backbone of high, craggy mountains.

There is certainly no lack of vegeta tion—but it is usually the sort that no body wants! The “Islands” are not over flowing with the luscious things you read about. If you want them, you must buy them—or grow them.

In my island, except for several thou sand wild pigs and a mongoose or two. there are no ferocious animals. And you cannot—as so many people imagine— whistle a monkey, and say: “Hey. Pongo!

Shin up that tree and chuck me a ripe banana!” ’Tisn’t possible.

Tropical beaches are seldom golden.

They are brown, and very often—whis per it— muddy! He-men are practically non-existent; while the only “glamour girl” you are likely to see would probably be a decrepit old native fisherwoman. with a smelly basket on her back, and about as much sex-appeal as a whale!

AND now we come to the planters.

Whilst a few are indeed loafers, taking but scant interest in themselves or their plantations, the majority are entirely different. They are neither un shaven bounders nor bloated capitalists.

They are just ordinary, hard-working men. lined and careworn, maybe, with the struggle of making ends meet. In spite of their tropical environment, their lives are not unlike that of the farmer in temperate climes. For, in addition to producing copra, they plough, fence, dig drains and —prosaically enough—milk cows!

Where does all this “Romantic South Seas” stuff come from?

The truth is that the South Sea Is lands are no more romantic than any other part of the world. They have, however, an indefinable fascination a fascination that does not depend solely on coconut palms, sunshine and silvery moonlight. It goes deeper than that.

To know and appreciate it properly,

you must live at least five years in the Islands. At the end of that time, you will have shed all the illusions you once cherished. But you will love the life so much that you’ll decide they weren’t im portant, anyway!