The Maraamu
p. 34 · Read in the full issue
When Tahiti Yells For Hot-water Bottles
PEOPLE who imagine tropical coun tries as steaming jungles of relent less heat should take care to include blankets, rugs, woollen clothing and hot-water bottles in their baggage, if they visit Tahiti during the months of July and August.
Tahiti lies well within the Torrid Zone, but is in that part of the world where steady winds blow from the south and south-east. The boisterous southerly wind, the Maraamu, originating in the Antarctic, will often blow for days. There are no land masses, or even a warm ocean current, to temper its wintry chill.
The high central mountains protect
the town of Papeete from the direct force of the wind. It pours, however, over the summits, losing there whatever warmth it may have picked up from the comparatively mild waters north of Capricorn, and is cold when it descends the steep slopes and sunless gorges onto the coast.
Before the European incursion, when Tahiti was really civilised, the native people built houses suitable to the cli mate, walled with fine bamboo, spaced so that the air could filter in without causing draughts, and roofed with thatch.
The white man, in his wisdom, has fashioned dwellings, roofed with corru gated iron, which are ovens by day and icy tombs at night. Now, when the Maraamu blows, the inhabitants cower in corners, seeking vainly to escape the cold air currents, or take to their beds, under layers of blankets and steamer rugs.
The Maraamu causes surprising varia tions of weather in different parts of the island. July and August being the dry season, the leeward districts get little rainfall during those months. If, how ever, one journeys around Tahiti, he is likely to run into light showers at Paea, a heavy downpour at Papara, and a veritable deluge at Vaiari.
During our many migrations through Vaiari, we have seldom seen its land scape, except dimly, through a curtain of falling water, or as a succession of soggy fields and plantations. A scientist who lives there disputes the assertion that more rain falls on Vaiari than on any other part of Central Polynesia. He is equipped with rain gauges, barometers, and all the fearsome apparatus of the meteorologist, and his records prove his contention.
We have a theory, nevertheless, that the rain gauges overflow on rainy nights and that all the cats, birds and centi pedes thereabout repair thither to drink, preferring the sweet rain water to the miasmic ooze of the neighbouring swamps. Moreover, the bush vegetation of Vaiari, as compared with that of other districts, bears witness of heavy and continuous rainfall.
Indeed, Vaiari is the garden district of Tahiti. There are the nursery grounds where exotic trees are grown from seed lings for transplanting in other parts of Tahiti, and thence come the loveliest of Islands flowers.
The Maraamu often has surprises' for those who go by sea. One day an excursion to the Peninsula (Taia’rapu) on board the “Hiro” was advertised. A seldom-visited sector near the Pari (the Cliffs) was to be explored. There were to be the amusements afloat and ashore, usual to excursions ever since the first paddle-wheel steamer bore the first per sonally-conducted party to a picnic resort in the wilderness.
A goodly company sailed merrily out of a glassy harbour and over a calm sea, until they turned the corner off Paea.
There they ran, head on, into the Maraamu.
The “Hiro” is a staunch vessel, and there was no danger. But the cross seas stirred up by the wind caused her to pitch and roll and squirm and shiver, until every landlubber aboard was pros trated under a mal-de-mer that grew in intensity as the hours passed.
The ship finally reached a haven far from any settlement. The sad end of that excursion resembled the ending of all such expeditions the world over.
At a late hour the inhabitants of Tea huupoo—the little village 12 kilometers from the landing-place—were startled by the arrival of a procession of pallid ghosts who besought transportation by motor truck, horse-drawn waggon or any land-navigating vehicle, to Papeete.
The Maraamu can make our nights bleak and miserable. But there is one consolation —the icy wind will chill to immobility all the mosquitoes, yellow wasps and other noxious insects.—A.C.R.
Miss I. McArthur, formerly of the Government Secretary’s Department, Papua, now occupies a Commonwealth Government post in Canberra, ACT: before being evacuated from Port Moresby, she was an untiring member of the various patriotic movements in the Territory and held the office of hon. sec retary of the Red Cross Society (Papuan Branch). Another staff member of the Papuan Administration, Miss G. C. Lit tler (Treasury Department), has a com mercial job in Sydney.