Polynesian Culture Lost

In Tahiti

MR ROBERT GIBBINGS, an English Author recentlv in Polynesia, claims that all" trace of the old and social system has lahitiby the Wench and Chinese, but that Western Samoa has escaped’ a similar tragedy. There the Samoans take pride in their tradi tions in which they have been supported by the New Zealand Government.

During a recent boxing match at the Tivoli Theatre Apia, between two Samoans one of the contenders was hit on Ishe jugular vein. He was taken to hospital where he died without regaining consciousness. On the same day a Samoan youth of Apia, after quarrelling with his sister took some of the poisonous weed called by the Samoans ■'ava New Guinea dissolved in a bottle of home brew. His body was found next morning under the stairs of a nearby European building. Cases of suicide are rare among Samoans.