Since, watching the Disney movie 'Moana' on big screen in Fiji on my birthday in 2015, I've been fascinated by the idea of 'wayfinding' and when my family travelled to Samoa and Tutuila last month, I was again reminded about how bright the stars were and the constellations in the islands that would have been maps for our ancestors to read.
I'm now considering the idea of 'wayfinding' as a methodology in my studies and wanting to learn as much as I can having been a paddler in outrigging years ago in Manukau and Tamaki clubs then a quick paddle in Rarotonga but since having a family, it's been put aside and now to pick up the paddle (studies) on further afield ocean voyaging except for me, it's from my study desk :)
What's so fascinating about 'wayfinding' is that when Europeans were just starting out in their boatbuilding, Pasifika peoples were already 'discovering' vasts lands in the Pacific Oceans using star paths, ocean swells, birds flight paths etc. to move from island to island. Their tools were what was around them in their environment from sinnet (coconut fibres) twisted into rope and tools fashioned from rocks to hull out canoes.
The difference I see now is that our ancestors left a 0 (zero) carbon footprint and much of the knowledge was lost or on the brink of extinction since colonisation but the neat thing is that not all was lost in that remnants of an amazing past is being brought to light as Pacific peoples begin to gather as much information as possible to re-learn some of the information.
And that's my commitment as well, to learn as much as I can to throw forward for future generations...
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