Press

From the

Islands

Erwin D. Canham in Marianas Variety and News,

Saipan

Is an ‘age’ coming to an end? The ‘age’ of cheap motoring? About 60 years ago, Henry Ford helped to usher in the age of cheap motoring with his fabulous Model T, selling for about $3OO.

Gasoline prices were almost as low, and for the next half century - with some bulges for inflation the cost of driving and fuelling a motor vehicle remained in much of the world one of the greatest of all bargains. Now this all seems to be coming to an end.

Gasoline prices in the United States and here on Saipan threaten soon to break the barrier of a dollar a gallon. In many other parts of the world, they have long been two or three times as high, and the cost of the motor vehicle itself was

correspondingly steep .. .

Les Nouvelles, Papeete, Tahiti

Forty-seven children have been road accident victims since the beginning of the year. Fourteen of them have died of their injuries. There must be more care on the part of drivers, and heavier penalties against those caught driving under the influence of alcohol...

Letter from ‘Friend of the Earth’ in Cook Islands News,

Rarotonga

If as a tourist, on returning to my country, I was asked to briefly describe Rarotonga it would be thus: a small hilly island with a flat coastal plain surrounded by a ring of rubbish .. .

The Fiji Times, Suva

A dance at the Tradewinds Convention Centre had to close more than an hour early on Saturday night after fighting broke out. . .

The dance was held by a charitable organisation to raise funds to assist poor families with school fees and other needy matters. ..

It is believed the dance was an annual event but the organisers are hesitant about holding another one ...

Report in The Tonga Chronicle, Nukualofa, from George Lavaka in Canberra Tonga and Tongans should make use of two mountains in Tasmania to publicise our kingdom, the general manager of Teta Tours, Mr Tonga Lemoto said in Canberra recently. He was commenting about two mountains with very familiar names he came across while on a field study of the Tasman Peninsula of Tasmania, Australia, last month ... The two mountains are named with no other but Tonga and Tongatabu. Mr Lemoto said Tongans in Australia should make use of the mountains to publicise the ‘real’ Tonga .. . The namings of the mountains were probably done in the second half of last century ...

Mount Tonga was orginally named Tongatabu as well. But the Nomenclature Board shortened the name to Tonga to avoid confusion with the other Mt Tongatabu.

The earliest evidence shown is an Admiralty Chart (no. 1475) that was compiled from the hydrographic survey of a British survey ship, the HMS Dart, in 1893. The HMS Dart cruised in the West Pacific in 1884 (under Commander Moore) and in the South Pacific in 1886,1887 (under Commander Field), 1890,1891 (under Commander Frederick) and again in 1892 and 1893 under Lieutenant-Commander H. E. Purey-Cust. The Nomenclature Board’s Land Development said it was possible the feature north

of Port Arthur now known as Mt Tonga could have been likened by one of the Dart’s men to the main island of Tonga, from a certain direction, and called it Tongatabu. The Department said perhaps the same thing happened to Mount Tongatabu which is in the southwest of Hobart.. .

Nauru Secondary School Newsletter, Nauru BEHAVIOUR ON BUSES. I am sorry to have to tell parents that a little girl from another school died last week as a result of a rock thrown from one of the buses at lunchtime. Your children have been warned time and time again both about stone throwing and bad behaviour on buses. I will be asking the Department of Works to cancel any buses where poor behaviour occurs again. That might be the only way to make sure that people can move about in safety...

Uni Tavur student newspaper, University of Papua New Guinea, Port Moresby The transfer of the snooker tables from underneath the students Union Building to the University Club has altered the snooker life of some students at the University . . . The Secretary of the Enga Students Association, Mr Joe Tapel, who claims to be the professional in snooker playing, said his right to exhibit his profession has been deprived, in the isolated surroundings the snooker tables are now in. No doubt, about Mr Tapel’s snooker profession, he has won K 21.00 in a sequence in a single day. ‘I do not have all the enthusiastic spectators I used to have, which would put me off,’ he said . . .

Nabanga, Vila, New Hebrides, in its series of photo-reproductions from the old French-language paper Le Neo-Hebridais (issue of December 4,1918)

Allied Victory Celebrated At Port-Vila. During

the night of November 11 our wireless station brought the news that an armistice had just been signed between the Allies and Germany. At once, from house to house, people were wakened to spread the good news. A demonstration of spontaneous and general joy finished up at the Town Club where people danced and quaffed champagne until morning. Next day all Vila was decked with flags, and the public continued to express their delight. In the evening at the Club there was a 46-place dinner preceded by a 21-gun cannon salute. The dinner was attended by club members and their guests. It was a delightful evening, with Britons and French mixing together most affably. At 11 pm, the British Resident read out the day’s radiotelegramme, which gave details of the armistice terms imposed by Foch on the enemy.

His reading was literally cut to pieces by enthusiastic bravos.

Messrs King, Nielly and Seagoe made patriotic speeches which were strongly applauded. There was then drinking and dancing until dawn, the club doors having been opened for the occasion to the ladies of Port-Vila .. .

Letter from reader Shirley Barker In the Fiji Times, Suva At a recent committee debate at the United Nations, a Fiji representative, Mr F. Jitoko, spoke out strongly against countries trading with South Africa and thereby paying ‘lip service’ to the UN charter against apartheid . . .

It should interest Mr Jitoko and the Fiji government to know that in 1978, Fiji imported South African goods worth $lB7 000.

And for the first half of this year, the figure stood at nearly $lOO 000. The statistics are provisional, and include foodstuffs, a number of hardware items, and clothing and fabrics .. .

Letter signed ‘Prediction’ in Cook Islands News,

Rarotonga

‘What goes up, always comes down ’ is true in many ways but it is not so with prices. Prices seem to rise high and higher but never come down again. With this happening in the shops, it won’t be long before we have to live in a cave before we can afford the things we need from the shops . . .