NUKUFERO
Ngangea pelapela is what it used to be called by many visiting kinsfolk decades ago yet today it is considered te ngangea vakivaki(the place of happiness) as it becomes the center of attraction for many incoming Tikopians for various reasons.
Little heard of and hidden within a deep bay lined with green mangroves and separated by a crocodile infested river which flows from a waterfall deep in the rainforest, lies one of the biggest Tikopian settlements in the Solomon Islands with a local population of around five hundred. Half of the villagers live on sea level where the first landing of Tikopians occurred over fifty years ago while the other half built their houses on a flat elevation further inland.
Nukufero was the older name of the current Tikopia island which the newer settlement on Russell Islands was named after. According to the old folks Nuku means place or settlement and fero refers to the brownish color of the Tikopians. The village was established and registered in the mid to late 1950s to cater for Tikopian families working for Levers Solomons Ltd(LSL). It was formally registered under the British Solomon Islands protectorate government. During that period waste land belonged to the state as unused land while most of the coastal land was left to the indigenous Russell Islanders as customary land. This was of course not without dispute from the original land owners as the company was of little benefit to them and most of the workers had to be recruited from other Islands such as Malaita and Temotu province.
Early Life
I was born and raised at Nukufero village and the former Levers Solomons Limited(LSL) Pepesala estate. Nukufero, Pepesala and Somata are all located on the west end of Pavuvu Island in the Russell Islands. I have a younger brother and two older sisters, all grown now. My parents travelled as young adults from Tikopia and got married at Nukufero. My dad, among other young Tikopian men, had come from Tikopia Island to work during the 1950s at Somata, an estate of the LSL. He decided not to live amongst the other fellow Tikopians in the allocated community land but decided to build his home, our current home some distance away, outside at the Northern end of the village, within the waste land of the LSL where we live to this day. However we have our registered plot of land where we do our farming at the Southeastern end of the village and have to travel through the village and through other farms for about 10 kilometers to get to our gardens.
Growing up as a child at Nukufero and Pepesala was quite challenging yet not without exciting and memorable experiences. I had lived with my Aunt( Rangimotu) at Pepesala from infancy till just before I started school. My uncle used to be an overseer for the then more modern copra dryer located at Point Six on Pepesala, which eventually got burnt to the ground in the early 1990s. I moved back to Nukufero to live with my family when I started school while my aunt and uncle remained on Pepesala.
I attended Waterpump School a.ka. Nukufero Primary school(now known as Nukufero Community High School) from 1983 to 1988 and did my high school at Waimapuru National Secondary School from 1989 to 1994. I had to board at primary school with other boys since grade 3. Life as a youngster at Nukufero was very harsh and challenging as my parents had very little income from copra cutting for the LSL to support my siblings and I in our education. After leaving primary school I had to travel miles to live away from my family at the age of 11.
Waimapuru NSS is a government-run high school located on Makira Island so my dad had to drop me off in Honiara town to live with my aunt and uncle pama Rotopurotu before I travelled for the first time to attend Form 1(Grade 12). Then I had to travel overnight by boat for about 18 hours to get to Waimapuru.
Hardships of growing up
During my school semester holidays I would help my family with copra cutting in the coconut plantations at Nukufero, Pepesala and Somata and often had to get up as early as 3AM to 4 AM to travel to work. Usually there would be a tractor to catch but sometimes we would walk miles or paddle by outrigger canoe to get to our location of copra cutting.
When copra was not in season we had to cut brushes for hours in the heat or rain with long brush knives. Sometimes we would go with very little to eat during those long hours at work. Malaria was common as the plantations were heavily infested with blood-sucking mosquitoes. We would return home late in the evening or get home at night only to wake up early the next morning to the same routine. Occasionally I would return home with blisters on my palms from the knife handles caused by unrelenting thick bushes or some other injuries.
On weekends we would paddle in our outrigger canoe for three hours or so to sell our produce of pineapples, bananas, breadfruit, betel nuts, cut nuts and swamp taro(pilaka) at Pepesala and occasionally at Somata stations. We would use a little money to buy sugar, salt, tea and rice at the society store at the other end of Pepesala then travel the same route back later in the evening. The rest of the money was saved for tuition and travel expenses or pocket money. We had to wait till late afternoon or evening when its less hot and sunny to paddle back to our village.