yesterday

The issue of PIM for

August, 1943, was mainly a

hotch-potch of small bits and pieces. “Real news from the Pacific front is scarce these days—or dwarfed by events in the Mediterranean,” a staff writer said. Such news as there was included the follow

ing items:

Captain C. E. Hart, a Solomons Islands planters who had remained on his plantation in the Tulagi area after the Japanese invasion, told in Sydney how he had re covered his valuable collection of stamps from the pockets of a dead Japanese soldier a week after it had been stolen from his house.

American writer Robert Dean Frisbie, who had just published a book called Marooned by Request, the story of his and his family’s experiences on Suwarrow Island during a hurricane in 1942, was expecting to leave Rarotonga for service with the US forces in Hawaii. * * * Wasps, reportedly, were being rushed to New Guinea by plane to kill green bugs that threatened the food crops cultivated in Army operated farms in the forward areas. “One is moved to wonder”, a PIM writer wrote, “what has become of the super-wasps that were native to most parts of New Guinea; but perhaps these wasps spurn such trival prey as green bugs—they prefer humans on the hoof”. * sf* * Western Samoa, less affected by wartime conditions and limitations than most other Pacific territories, was enjoying prosperity. But householders were complaining about lack of fresh meat. The shortage had been caused by the opening, about a year earlier, of a number of restaurants and ham burger shops which took much of the fresh meat available. * * * Three parties of American draft dodgers, who had sailed in small cutters from California to Tahiti, had shipped out again as crew

members of a cargo ship, leaving their cutters behind. On their arrival in Papeete, they had been treated as enemy aliens, were kept under guard, and were told to get going or their boats would be confiscated. * * * After months of persistent effort, the Board of the Methodist Overseas Mission received an official assurance that some of its missionaries would be allowed to return to Papua. Due to a mis understanding, Methodist mis sionaries had been sent to Aus tralia during the general evacuation of Papua in January and February, 1942, while mis sionaries of other denominations were allowed to remain.

Tongan Delicacy

In these columns in the May issue of PIM, we published a picture of an old Tongan octopus seller in Nukualofa, taken by August Hettig just before the war. We asked whether Nukualofa still had any octopus sellers. The answer, apparently, is yes, as Mr.

Hettig has now sent us another octopus picture, reproduced above, which shows how the Tongans spread an octopus in the sun to dry before cooking it for food. Mr. Hettig says that a "feke" (Tongan for octopus) is a delicacy among Tongans, especially when boiled in coconut cream—which turns it an almost chocolate colour— and eaten with baked yam.