Tonga -- Malo e lelei

by Songül Arslan

The Pacific harbours many well-known gem-like islands. You're probably familiar with the Fiji Islands, Samoa, and the Cook Islands. All spectacularly beautiful, the pictures portraying these islands in magazines are dreamlike. When I think of fantasy islands I think these little spots of heaven. Tonga is an island group and kingdom in the Pacific Ocean that fits right in with the beach fantasy.

The kingdom of Tonga consists of about 171 islands, of which maybe a quarter are permanently inhabited by a population of roughly 100,000. Tongatapu is the main island and is home to the capital of the country, Nuku'alofa. The origins of these islands are partly volcanic (in the west) and partly of coral because of tectonic movements of the earthcrust (in the east). Because of their location, slightly west of the International Date Line, each new day on Earth starts here.

Temperatures vary between 22-30° Celsius (70-85° Fahrenheit) year-round, which adds to the impression of a fantasy island. It seems like the perfect spot to go on holidays, and tourism is becoming very important to Tonga, though financial concerns have kept large numbers of vacationers away. In earlier days there were other reasons to avoid the Tonga islands. In certain respects Tonga has a creepy history.

In the year 1616 the northeastern islands were discovered by a Dutch expedition group led by Willem Cornelius Schouten and Jacob LaMaire. Instead of the warm welcome they probably yearned for after being at sea for some time, they were greeted by war-hungry inhabitants in canoes. The inhabitants were bloodthirsty and regarded the Dutch as enemies. And there was one thing they did with their enemies: served them up for supper! With this extreme aggression, they dominated quite a few of the other islands in the Pacific like Fiji, Niue and Samoa. Cannibalism was incorporated into their behaviour because it was the best display of power. I can imagine that this was not the welcome the Dutch had in mind.

Despite these attitudes, explorers, travellers and pirates kept coming to the islands. I guess the beauty of of the land made up for a lot of the eventual trouble. Twenty-seven years after the initial expedition--enough time to forgive and forget, apparently--a Dutch man named Abel Tasman set foot on the island. More than a hundred years later by the famous James Cook followed in his footsteps. Cook visited Tonga three times and was so mesmerized by the islands that he, incredible as it seems, nicknamed them the Friendly Islands.

Eventually, missionary groups were brave enough to make the journey, and they converted large numbers of Tongans. The conversion to Christianity ultimately fueled internal conflicts in Tonga, but despite that, Sunday remains is a revered day on the islands and everything slows to a slumber on that sacred day.

From 1900 until 1970 Tonga was a British protectorate, but it is now independent. Tonga was the first in the Southern Pacific to create national parks and reserves to protect its unique nature. There are a lot of coral reefs, and some of the most colourful flowers, in the world like the frangipani, can be seen there.

Even though the history is downright scary, it is history and there is nothing frightful about the Tonga islands nowadays. The only slightly sketchy thing that comes to mind now, is that the current king, Taufa'ahau Topou IV, once weighed about 200 kilograms (440 pounds). To say he was quite fond of eating is a bit of an understatement. Luckily he started to get fond of exercising, too, and dropped to less than half his highest weight. As the title suggests, malo e lelei, Tonga indeed offers a welcome to the Friendly Islands.