Solomon Islands
Kwai Story
Kwakwaru Tribe of East Malaita, Solomon Islands
Kwakwaru Tribe of East Malaita, Solomon Islands
Kwai Aelan hem wanfala bik aelan bifo,
Gaden blo mifala lo aelan,
Kokonut tu, lo aelan,
Oketa bik tri na raonim aelan bifo fo sidaon andanit,
Distaem nomoa nao si tekem tu,
Klaemet cha’en hem kakaim gud aelan blo mifala
Pipol kam fo lukm aelan, mifala pulum teip mesa Stat wan saed lo aelan go kasem nara saed,
Taem mifala pulum kasim nara saed
Oketa sei ba help kam - Ma angita no?
Si, hem olowe go insaed lo aelan,
Mifala padol insaed lo hem
Mifala no lukim kaen si olsem bifo
Taem hem hae taed si go insaed lo wel
An spoilem mifala.
Ples blo oketa pikinini fo plei
Hem smol tumas nao
Tudei no eni ples fo bildim haos
Mifala faendem hem had,mifala waka fo selen Bata selen no inaf tu fo relokaitim mifala
Wane ne kini gera to’ana kalame futa la kini fana laona lolofa ne kwara’ae gera oli kini no fana meinlan...
Amelu ne amelu toa gula amoi amelu ne, te’ena ameli leka lau fai?
Amelu to masia asi ka dao mai ka raungia amelu
Wane baita ma’ana
Nia dou fafi golu,
Sulia, lua ne, fusia wane baita amoe,
Gula ne kini, fainia golu tetefou, amoe no.
Kwai Island was once a big island
Gardens grew on our island
Coconut trees grew on our island
Huge trees cooled us as we sat in their shade.
Now? The sea has taken them too.
Climate change has eaten our island
Outsiders come, we drag a tape measure
From one side of the island to the other.
Once we’ve dragged that tape to the very end
They say help will come – but when?
The sea swamps inside our island
We paddle in it
We have never seen anything like it
On high tide the sea seeps into our well
And spoils us.
Where our children once played
Is now too small
We have nowhere to build homes
We find it hard, we work for money
But money is not enough to relocate us.
Those with tribesmen, on the mainland,
Have started the move
Those without such tribesmen?
We just wait
For the sea to devour us.
God Almighty is the only One
Protecting us
If it were not for Him
All these places and us
Would have gone by now.
We are the Kwakwaru people, originally migrated from Gaita, East Kwaio. Kwakwaru is one of nine tribes within an indigenous group of people called Gula’ala from East Malaita, Solomon Islands. Today, our Gula’ala population is approximately 3,000 people, and the majority of us live on the Kwai and Ngongosila Islands.
My name given at birth is Aburi, named after my paternal grandmother. My connection to the Kwakwaru tribe, therefore, is through my father, who is the fifth generation from our ancestor who migrated from Gaita, East Kwaio. The Kwakwaru tribal system is patriarchal. However, Christianity has also influenced some parts of our tribal system. One of these influences is enabling female members of our tribe to be involved in important tribal discussions, hence my involvement in climate change and relocation discussions.
I travelled to Kwai, from where I currently live overseas, to tok stori (talk) with my people about our climate mobility stories. Using a tok storiapproach, this climate mobility research engaged 22 Kwakwaru tribal members across Kwaio, mainland Malaita, and Honiara in the Solomon Islands and Sunshine Coast, Australia.
Our climate mobilityi story shows our resilience in the past and the present. I begin this case study by describing the historical and geographical context of Kwai, then provide background on our Kwakwaru tribe. Our concept of togetherness - Rao kwaima la – is introduced as our cultural interpretation of resilience. In our experience, communal living, connectedness, and family values strengthen our wellbeing as we stand and face challenges together. Key insights for action gathered from the tok stori are outlined, and, finally, the case study fieldwork’s background and approach are outlined.
Kwai is located 3 km off the coast of East Kwara’ae, Malaita, Solomon Islands (Figure 1). The island is 500 metres long and 100 metres wide. Kwai Island can be accessed from the capital, Honiara, by travelling to Auki, Malaita’s provincial capital, either by air or sea, then by road across to the head of Atori, where transportation to the island is by an outboard engine. Another option is a direct flight from Honiara, across the island of Malaita, to Atoifi Airstrip in Uru Harbour to the south of Kwai. An hour and a half or less, depending on the speed of the outboard engine, will take you to Kwai Island.
Kwai Island used to be connected to its twin island, Ngongosila, by a sand dune that enabled access by foot between both islands. Such access by foot is no longer possible today, as the sand dune disappeared in the early 2000s, and water during low tide is knee-deep.
Kwai Island is home to six different tribes, with approximately 60-70 families and an average of five children to a family. High tides go through the village daily, digging away at the posts of our houses. Adaptation measures that most families take are the continuous building of sea walls, and some family members take the initiative to move to the coastal mainland, where there are traditional ties with other tribes living there.
During the 1900s, the South Sea Evangelical Mission established one of its centres on Ngongosila, one of their main mission stations (Sanga, 2023). Many Kwakwaru tribespeople joined the church and relocated to Ngongosila (Figure 1).
From Ngongosila, our Kwakwaru tribe moved to Kwai Island and have been there for the last ten generations. The Kwakwaru tribe was one of the earlier tribes to relocate to Kwai Island during the early 1900s, forming around the South Seas Evangelical Mission.
In 1990, South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission (SOPAC) conducted a survey on the coastal environment of Kwai and its twin island, Ngongosila (Rearic, 1991). The survey showed that coastal erosion on both islands had to be addressed. One of the survey’s recommendations was that retaining wall stones be built on the sides of the islands affected by coastal erosion. However, with only the islanders’ initiatives each year, the erosion worsened with little we can do. In 1900, vegetation was dense, and fewer people lived on Kwai Island, enabling each tribe to have enough land to cultivate gardens. Today, vegetation on the island is scarce. The centre space on the island, which once was used for community gatherings, is quickly diminishing as more houses are built towards the centre, away from the coastal erosion, causing overcrowding on the island and in homes.
The tok stori for this case study involved the following: Kwakwaru families on Kwai Island, three extended families who migrated to Honiara in 2009 and an extended family who migrated to the Sunshine Coast, Australia in 1989. Tok stori about past and future relocations, the vulnerability of families, and the unknown of finally leaving familiar settings have been very emotional for the families (and myself) at times.
(Im)mobility is an everyday concern, particularly when decisions made by family groups will affect themselves and the whole island community. Daily, families face new challenges with unpredictable weather patterns, high tides, strong winds, and king tides. As the population increases, families continue to adapt to the many economic pressures, with family members moving away from Kwai to find work to support the family; this is another form of resilience. It is these lived family experiences that this story explores.
Before settling on Kwai, the first wave of mobility for our kin group was from Gaita, East Kwaio, Malaita, to a location called Kwakwaru (Figure 1), on the mainland coast of East Malaita, 5 km from the island of Kwai. Gaita is the place of origin for the Kwakwaru tribe. Our ancestor came from Gaita and was known to have brought with him “mana,” a source of power that enabled him to shoulder “chiefly” and spiritual leadership. This “mana” has been passed down to tribesmen and women who are prominent community and church leaders. Spirituality was, and still is, a central and vital part of our tribe and the lives of the people of Malaita. A spiritual obligation caused our ancestor to migrate to Kwakwaru. As an example of the spirituality of the people of Malaita, Sanga (2023) writes, “In pre-Christian Indigenous theocratic Malaita, Ngongosila Island was a labu, a fort-like village of refuge serving the Gula’ala people and multiple linguistic and tribal communities of east, northeast and central Malaita” (p. 148).
A second migration was to Ngongosila Island, this time because of our new-found faith brought about by the missionaries in the 1900s. From Ngongosila, the Kwakwaru tribe migrated to Kwai for the third time and have lived there since. Land space on Kwai is scarce nowadays; families realise a new urgency to relocate. The tribe’s most valued asset is customary-owned land on the mainland of East Kwaio, Malaita. The customary-owned land is valued in this way because things that have been most valuable to us, such as our graves on Kwai Island, are no longer there. Knowing that one has ownership of customary land waiting to be occupied gives us hope and a great sense of security amidst the reality reflected below.
Lo taem blo mifala bifo aelan hem bik distaem taem mi go baek, mi lukim aelan hem fulap lo pipol. Aelan moa smol an pipol na staka. [During our time, the island was big. When I returned to the island, I realised that the island was shrinking, but the population had increased a lot.] (middle-aged male)
The next section unpacks our understanding and demonstration of resilience from our cultural perspective.
Rao kwaima la, or rao ofu/ogu la, means doing things together or working together. This concept is fundamental to building resilience and overcoming situations collectively, not only as families but as a whole community on the island of Kwai. It is the “thread” that has bound us to each other, to sustain us under the pressures of climate change faced in the past and present.
From generation to generation, profound expressions of spirituality have been an anchor and strength, as shared during our tok stori. Disasters during the earlier generations were seen as “wrongs committed”; therefore, kinsmen needed to live in harmony with the spiritual realm. The environmental changes were tied to spiritual consequences. The perspective shared in the quote below describes the “mana” and priestly leadership of the elder kinsmen who had to restore the unfortunate fate of our original people of Kwakwaru.
When harmony was restored in the spiritual realm through the “mana” from Gaita, Kwakwaru families began to experience prosperity.
In the 1900s, when missionaries introduced a new form of spirituality, the clan elders relocated to live closer to the missionaries on the island of Ngongosila. Families learned to live with tribes who also moved because of this new-found faith. Later, the Kwakwaru elders relocated to Kwai Island to build up another mission space for migrants from different parts of Malaita to live near. Thus, a new journey began not only with the display of “mana” from God, but the experience of now building a community around the concept of rao kwaima la, or rao ofu/ogu la, as reflected by the voices below.
Islanders always showed generosity and hospitality to strangers who journeyed past the island. Regardless of what challenge or disaster they faced, if strangers passed and called into the island, they would be cared for until they left.
Tok stori concerning mobility has been lengthy and emotional for our Kwakwaru tribe and family members. The first meeting to plan our relocation took place on the 19th October, 2018. On this occasion, we met with our ‘primary’ family members currently living in Gaita. Again, from 2020 to 2021, more trips were made - on the 7th June and 13th July in 2020 and finally 28th December, 2021. Each of these trips was done in the spirit of togetherness (rao kwaima la). Families arranged fundraising events and contributed cash for the fares of members travelling from Honiara to join up with a contingent from Kwai. Families on Kwai Island also worked together to make these trips possible (rao ofu la).
These meetings enabled discussions concerning genealogies, land boundaries, tribal affiliation with neighbouring tribes, and identifying important landmarks. The discussions (tok stori) were also to encourage and point out the importance of our ties to our land in Gaita and urge us to take the step of relocating back to Gaita. These conversations continue to occur between our families on Kwai Island, Honiara and our families in Gaita. It is a slow process, but there is great enthusiasm from all parties. From their tok stori, a site for relocation was identified and allocated on the coast called Kwainiula. In July 2023, I was privileged to accompany our leaders to see the site on Gaita.
The fear of being forced off the island with no plan in place to move is what has brought this planning about. The plan is in its early stages and will need wider consultation. Islanders hope that with the availability of land, it will be easier to formulate a strategy that will enable relocation sooner rather than later.
The choice of this particular site on Gaita is because Kwakwaru kinsmen are known as fishermen; from early childhood, every child is taught to fish. The effects of climate change have changed the way fishing is done on Kwai Island; most families have adapted to new fishing methods.
Besides adapting to new fishing methods, our men have expressed that relocating to a site on the coast will enable them to continue with their fishing skills. For the younger generation, even the adapted methods are difficult to use because many of them do not own outboard engines. So, for them to adapt, they have had to migrate to find work to support their family and, for many, their extended families. Many have migrated to Honiara, while others have only started moving temporarily to work in the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) Scheme.
To be picked to go and work in Australia, family members on the island send their child to go and live with a family member in town. This starting process is difficult for many families, and only those able to afford the costs involved in this first stage of the application and selection process send their child to Honiara. Many of our families who remain have shared their lived experiences through our tok stori, and these are discussed below.
Intangible assets such as expressions of connectedness to the island, each family group, and communal activities are strengths in challenging times. The following two quotes, one as a proverb, express the emotions and connectedness to the island. A middle-aged family member shared this proverb:
The other is an emotional expression:
The above quotes show two different ways of expressing the same ‘thing’; immobility! Again, a clan member makes a comparison of how waves did not sweep into the centre of the village, as is the current experience. He says in rao Kwaima la, they can do something about the waves.
However, he believes that people could dig up the pools or create new pools. Further, when people all put their hearts towards working together it is not an impossible task (rao ogu la).
Others on Kwai Island have shared contrasting experiences to those expressed above, giving different reasons why they are not able to leave the island. A seventy-eight year old elderly male expressed his frustration by saying he was tired of hearing discussions on relocating because nothing has happened since he was in his early years.
This particular elder died three weeks after our tok stori and will never have the opportunity now to relocate. Many of our elderly men and women face this reality.
The following section discusses wellbeing and considers family values, communal living, and health, concerning resilience and how families experience rao kwaima la or rao ofu/ ogu la.
The section begins with the experiences of a clan member who migrated to Australia to be a missionary and Pastor. He found it difficult at first because he was not used to the absence of rao kwaima la. He speaks of his experience with his family and how society has influenced our young generation away from extended family members, nationally and internationally, missing out on experiencing and appreciating the value of rao kwaima la or rao ofu/ogu la, experienced in communal living.
He compares the fragmentation of family to our disappearing island and poses that the younger generation needed to be equally concerned, if not more, about this fragmentation than concerns raised about climate change.
Another of his observations relates to our Kwakwaru seasonal workers in Australia. His connections to them enabled him to sense their vulnerability. He began to build small communities amongst the workers so that they were able to connect and help each other adapt to the changes and provided social and spiritual counselling for them. He explained that he could reach out to these seasonal workers because of his lived experience of rao ogu la, as outlined in the following quote:
Drawing from his experience growing up in a communal setting, he visited different workplaces to help the workers. The following section is centred around communal living, a familiar surrounding for him but told by others in our Kwakwaru tribe.
Growing up on the island, one could remember that everybody lived and did things together. Women would paddle out together in groups to go to the mainland to gather food, firewood, and fetch freshwater. Men went out in groups for fishing and on their return would share the catch with everybody on the island (Figure 2). Children played on the sand dune that once connected the two islands. Everybody looked out for each other, and during special occasions, the whole island would be involved. This is an example of rao kwaima la, when the whole community is involved in preparing for a week of celebration. Prior to rao kwaima la, each family makes sure that they have their own supplies ready to take part in rao kwaima la activities. Rao ogu la is expressed in this quote by one of our elderly men.
Doing things together and staying connected to one another is a pillar for our people.
Without the spirit of rao kwaima la, or rao ofu/ogu la, we would not be able to cope. Not only are we faced with environmental issues, but we also have no health clinics built on the island. Concerns that emerged from our tok stori about health and wellbeing are shared in the next section.
There are no health services on the island, making life challenging, especially for expectant mothers and sick children. Family members raised many health issues during our tok stori, particularly overcrowding and sanitation. With houses previously destroyed, overcrowding of families in homes has been the result. A middle-aged female expressed her concern, saying that the only option to avoid living together in overcrowded conditions is for them to relocate.
During the discussion, families who were living in overcrowded conditions said they did not have anywhere to go, and they could not afford to build a home. This brought about a lengthy discussion on the importance of relocating for health reasons. Besides overcrowding, women expressed the need for better sanitation and access to drinking water. A middle-aged female shares her experience.
Water tanks have been made available on the island to access drinking water. However, the overpopulation on the island and seasons of no rain mean that the water tanks are empty.
The most moving and emotional time during our tok stori was when we talked about our grave sites. In the late 1990s, more frequent king tides washed away many of our graves, and alarmingly, graves have been disappearing more quickly. By mid-2013, high tides had washed away most of the graves, leaving only a handful in front of family homes. Since 2020, family members have had to find land on the mainland to bury their loved ones.
Rao kwaima la and rao ogu/ofu la have been how resilience is understood and carried out amongst the Kwakwaru family members that sat down to our tok stori on Kwai Island, Honiara Settlements, and in Brisbane. They believed that rao kwaima la, rao ogu/ofu la was the most important “thread” that held them together as a community and family as they faced everyday challenges from climate change, and in situations of climate mobility or immobility. Below are some insights for forward thinking and action.
Insights gained from the tok stories show that although there are a lot of policies in place for climate change and many projects, our people felt that isolation and the population size living on the island (approximately 3,000 people) could be to their disadvantage. Kwakwaru tribe family members have expressed that it has been very difficult to get help in the last couple of years.
In 2006, the Late Hon. Joses Sanga, the MP at the time for East Kwara’ae Constituency, facilitated a land transaction of SID $10,000 to the customary landowning group at Atori. Since then, the people have been pursuing it but nothing has progressed.
In 2011, the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock, in collaboration with In Him Community Care (ICC), a church group from Kwai, addressed the family food and nutrition security by running a training workshop. This collaboration was welcomed by all and had an impact on the families. One of the participants who attended the workshop in 2021 said it was very worthwhile. The only disadvantage was that when the tides were high, it destroyed their vegetables, and the soil turned to salinity.
In the last couple of years, the introduction of the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) and the Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) Scheme into the family circle has been enhanced and has been seen by our Kwakwaru tribe as a form of resilience, supporting families on the islands. However, while more are interested in the opportunity to migrate and work, the waiting time can be two to three years; changes in climate are fluid and unpredictable, and a system in place to enable shorter waiting times could help. While both schemes offer temporary work, the Australian scheme provides a longer term of three years’ work.
Besides those who have gone to work internationally, many family members who live in Honiara continue to reciprocate food sent from family members on the island by sending back store-bought goods.
As an insider to the culture and ways of doing things, I can see where traditional strategies are in place to help enhance a project. Embracing this knowledge could greatly assist in complex decisions and workable policies. For example, the organic farming model to address family food and nutrition security on the island of Kwai. The project successfully transformed the lives of the families on Kwai Island, but unfortunately, only for about two to three years, as – like the stonewalls – they were destroyed by coastal erosion. Could there have been a better long-term solution? What follow-up could be done to assess the damage and provide an alternative? Who has benefited? As the quote below asserts, any initiatives need to benefit not only stakeholders or policymakers, and local mechanisms need far greater attention.
As a local researcher and a member of a primary holding tribe to customary land, our human dignity and Indigenous rights can be upheld by encouraging extensive research and consultation. One may attribute many of the land disputes experienced today to the primary landowning tribe not being consulted and engaged in decision-making. Instead, it has been the secondary landowning clans that have been contacted and are taking the lead.
To conclude, the section below provides background information on the approach to developing this story.
This case study is one of 10 multigenerational family or kin group stories across six Pacific nations (Kiribati, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, and Tuvalu). The case studies collectively sought to examine Pacific understandings and experiences of resilience and wellbeing in the context of climate mobility. The research had three key objectives:
The research approach has consisted of my tribe’s prioritised values of relationality, reciprocity, knowledge, and culture specific to Gula’ala, a linguistic-cultural group in East Malaita, Solomon Islands. I used tok stori to engage stories of mobility across time (historical, contemporary, and future aspirations) and space (homelands, diaspora, multidirectional mobility).
Tok stori is a Melanesian Pacific relational mode of communication and involves people sharing stories of their experiences as experts in their own lives. (Fasavalu & Reynolds, 2019; Sanga & Reynolds, 2018). The quality of tok stori depends largely on positive, reciprocal relationships. The space where this occurs values “vulnerability, emotionality, relational encounters and narrative intersections” (Fasavalu and Reynolds, 2019, p. 14); hence, tok stori occurs in a ‘trust-based relational space where people listen well, connect deeply, and contribute to the conversation’. (Steven, 2020, p. 136)
Tok stori occurred in July 2023 in three different locations. Firstly, with a family member who’d migrated to Sunshine Coast, Australia, and secondly, in the outskirts of the capital city Honiara, in Burnscreek and Lunga. Lastly, on Kwai Island and the coastal mainland at Atori and Adakoa.
In total, 22 clan members participated: 13 males and nine females. The age range was from 38 to 78. When I arrived in Honiara, I met with extended family members around the outskirts of Honiara to explain the research project. Four families from the outskirts of Honiara consented to participate in the case study, so I arranged to meet them in their separate locations. In Honiara, the tok storisessions were carried out in the evenings after work.
In Kwai, Atori and Adakoa families gathered collectively for the tok stori sessions. Individual family members’ tok stories in Honiara and the group tok stori sessions in Kwai, Atori and Adakoa highlighted climate and environmental changes that have, in the past and more so frequently, impacted their livelihood. Events highlighted were cyclones, sea level rise, king tides and salination of drinking water. Our tok stori sessions contributed valuable insights to deciding whether family members remain on the island or realise it is time to move to the mainland.
The tok stori sessions in Honiara, Atori, and Australia were audio recorded. In Kwai and Adakoa tok stori sessions were audio and video recorded. I applied reflexive thematic analysis for each tok stori session, which involved listening to each recording several times for familiarity, then undertaking selective transcripts in the language spoken - Pidgin English and Gula’ala dialect. Key ideas were identified and then organised into themes and sub-themes before translation of these themes into English. In addition, the analysis included talanoa and tok stori at workshops and team check-ins with other team members and a nominated family member.
The study was assessed and approved by the Aotearoa New Zealand Ethics Committee (AREC23_07). A research permit was also provided by the Solomon Islands Government, Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development (in accordance with the Research Act 1982 [No.9 of 1982]).
I acknowledge the Kwakwaru family members in Brisbane, Australia, Atori, Adadoa, Kwai Island, Honiara city and Burns Creek, Solomon Islands. Thank you for all your hours of tok stori, and for taking the time to share your lived experiences. Thanks to our videographers Mr. Alex Waimora and Mr. Gordon Ora from AW In4mation Centre, Honiara, Solomon Islands. Special thanks to Mr. & Mrs. Alafa, for arranging all the meeting venues, transportation, and accommodation for the team, and accompanying the team during the week on Malaita. Rev. Bobby Kusilifu, thank you for your support throughout this journey. To God be the Glory!
New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade has commissioned this work, funded by New Zealand’s climate finance. The views expressed here are the authors’ alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the New Zealand government.
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i ‘Climate mobility’ is an umbrella term for situations where climate change and environmental factors are a driver for people moving, and for situations where people decide to stay in place. Some examples include the relocation of a community within a country (e.g. moving a village inland in response to natural hazards such as flooding or sea-level rise), an individual’s temporary move for economic reasons (e.g. via labour mobility schemes), and permanent migration within the Pacific.
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