KALEIDOSCOPE: ALBERT WENDT - FA'A SAMOA

Albert Wendt is director of the University of the South Pacific in Apia, but he also teaches students at his old college. This film focuses on Albert lecturing in a class which includes his two daughters.

In 1889 Robert Louis Stevenson - built a home ‘Vailima’ in Apia, where he lived comfortably with his family and servants. When Stevenson died chiefs and warriors cut a track to the summit of Mt Vaea and it was here he was laid to rest.
Long before he knew Samoa he wrote his own requiem: “Under the wide and starry sky, dig the grave and let me lie. Glad that I live and gladly die and I laid me down with a will. This be the verse you gave for me, here he lies where he longed to be. Home is the sailor from the sea, and the hunter home from the hill.”

Albert’s grandmother Mele Tuapepe was one of the greatest storytellers and he tried in his own way to carry on traditions. Samoa derives vigour, strength and creativity from many strands. Books by Pacific writers cannot change much of 200 years of misconceptions, but they illustrate the changing mood of the new Pacific. “There never was a South Seas paradise, there never will be, but there is a vast complex region which is once again shaping its own identity and taking charge of its own destiny.”