‘We the Voyagers,’ first screening tomorrow

The Vaka Taumako Project is tomorrow night screening the first of a three part film called ‘We, the Voyagers: Our Vaka’ for free.

The Project aims to preserve and teach canoe building, sailing and navigational skills of the people of Taumako, a Polynesian Community in the Temotu Province.

Project Director, Heu Ionalani Wyeth explained, Nga Taumako or the Taumako People may be the only Polynesians who still know how to build and sail voyaging canoes like those which enabled their Austronesian ancestors to discover and colonize islands throughout the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Inviting the Honiara public to the premier screening, Director Heu said, most of the shooting was done locally but production and animation was done in Canada.

“It’s open to the public and we hope everybody will come not just the Tamako people.  This is the first part of a three part film called ‘We, the Voyagers.

“The first part called is Our Vaka which we will be showing tomorrow night and it’s about how the people began to learn how to build canoes.”

Heu said, Taumako’s isolation has enabled Nga Taumako to retain skills that Polynesians in more developed parts of the Pacific have lost, including those necessary to build and sail voyaging canoes.

Taumako is a small island in the eastern Solomons, remote from modern transportation and communication networks- No electric power grid, cell phone coverage, roads, harbour or airstrips.

By: Leni Dalavera