| "Coming Home to Banaba" Images and Quotes 4 |
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"Now we're talking fifty metres under the village: now we're sitting at the very root of the pinnacles, which means that the village is gone. With the sacred land gone and all our waterholes gone, the spirit of people seems to be lost too."
Ken Sigrah from Rabi - Clan Historian |
| A coral pinnacle, about 20 feet high, in the mined-out area. It took seabirds millennia to bury such pinnacles in the bird-lime which turned into phosphate. It took just 80 years to mine away the phosphate and reveal the pinnacles again. Ground level used to be above the pinnacles: the village of Buakonikai was just above here.
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"KEN SIGRAH: If you could choose, where would you prefer to be? Here on Banaba, or on Rabi?
Aii: I would you prefer to be here. To stay here, die here and be buried here. KEN SIGRAH: Why? Aii: Because I was born on this Island." |
| This was the first time Aii (Teburerai Touakin) had visited Banaba since she was sent to Rabi in 1945. She died in Tarawa on the return journey, happy that she had visited her home island once more. 'Coming Home to Banaba' is dedicated to her memory.
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