Looking For The Real “Moana” in Tahiti
Our family’s first Quest when we started in 2019: Tahiti and Moorea
Dear Parineeti and Sanskriti,
Let me tell you a story. Once upon a time, in cold and pristine Canada, lived two adorable and bright girls. They loved visiting the aquarium so much that our family made over a dozen trips a year.
This is the story of how, when they were four and two years old, respectively, they inspired their nomad parents, Shashank and Prajakta, to take them on many epic journeys to see and learn from the world.
I bet you remember intrepidly stroking little sharks, almost caressing rays as they swam past in the touch pool, and having your fingers “cleaned” by shrimps? Inspired by how much you both loved marine life, we thought what better way to start our journey with a two-week excursion, including swimming with sharks and stingrays in the open ocean?
Intrigued?
Okay then, let’s start at the very start — the story of our first quest through the world. What is a “quest”, you ask? And why Tahiti? Come on then…
Why Tahiti?
Tahiti is a honeymooner’s paradise — vistas that leave you breathless, the quiet but wild life-force of the Pacific Ocean, and everything that inspires new beginnings.
A lesser-known secret is that French Polynesia is also an excellent place for wildlife and earth-loving families. The South Pacific lends itself to exploring wildlife in its natural habitat. The beauty of this marine experience is that when we interact in its natural habitat, we get a glimpse into their uninhibited behaviours. That is impossible to observe in captivity, actual or perceived. One nugget of learning from my years in Africa — once you’ve been on a Safari, you’ll never quite enjoy the zoo again. So we decided to start with a marine safari into the Pacific Ocean. To see for ourselves and to show you the real thing — in all its splendour, and all its clumsiness too. So, in our family’s signature style of going with the flow, we decided to kick off your year of worldschooling with Tahiti and Moorea.
Questbased Learning™ is intentional, not incidental
Right from the beginning, I wanted your learning to be central to our travels, unlike holiday trips for fun. It had to be (and remains) the essence of our journeys, an intentional educational quest. And such quest-based learning is only so effective as it is directly aligned with whatever makes the children curious, NOW.
In early 2019, our home was full of your singing, “How far I’ll go” from the Disney movie Moana. All you needed was something you could imagine to be the sail of your boat, and instantaneously you transformed into Moana singing at the top of your lungs. Your fascination with Disney’s Moana and curiosity about her world prompted us to start our worldschooling pilot with a quest to find the “real Moana.” Motunui, the island where Moana grows up, is modeled after the French Polynesian islands, Tahiti and Moorea.
We had our quest waiting for us, in plain sight — to go looking for the “real” Moana and her Polynesian grandmother!
Swimming with sharks and rays
To tell you the truth, girls, I am glad we didn’t meet Moana on Day 1. Our quest for Moana and her grandma took us through a meandering series of experiences — natural and cultural.
On the day we were supposed to sign up for the swimming with the rays experience, I was quite hesitant. There seems something reckless and dare-devilish about letting your little ones swim as wild black-tip sharks circle them in the Pacific Ocean. And while sting rays are supposed to be shy — they have a sting and are part of the shark family, and a shark is a shark… so went the voice in my head all night and morning of the trip. But I signed up on the condition that I could stay with my kids in the boat while the others snorkeled if I didn’t feel comfortable.
Ten minors were on our boat, the water was chest deep, and I saw people frolicking away with the beautiful fish and rays. So I get in the water with my kids and husband; our instructor feeds the rays some fish he’s carrying, which makes them come closer to us, and before we caress the rays, the rays were all around us, playfully caressing us with their “wings.” We were pleasantly surprised to see that instead of being annoyed or wary, the rays welcomed us warmly into their natural habitat. How did I know? Because I seemed unsure of touching the ray circling me, she dived underwater and tickled me with her waving fins as she swam past. As if to say, “Come, let’s play!” It was the most affectionate experience!
My four-year-old Parineeti wanted to play along with the rays again and again. Soon enough, we could see little black fins above the surface circling the group…. looks like a messenger ray had quickly relayed information on food availability to these cohabitants of the reef. A group of ten sharks made its way to our location. Shy, swift, and focussed on food, the sharks kept swimming underwater as we snorkeled turn by turn to look at their exquisitely designed sleek bodies that were so silver that they almost looked white. These sharks are the most elegant marine animal I have seen. Two-year-old Samaa, you were super fascinated by all of this but also unsure. No wonder you chose not to get close to any of the rays. You were more interested in fish whose colours you could identify — so blue fish around corals, and rocks shining through the clear ocean waters were your favourite. Personally, as your mom, I found the experience unexpectedly touching (pun, not intended again), eye-opening, and unexpectedly spiritual.
Yet, no sign of Moana or her grandma dancing with the rays as they swam around us.
Dolphins and sea turtles in a marine sanctuary, and Moana!
Sea turtles, unfortunately, make delicious prey for sharks because of their green fat. Shark attacks also hurt dolphins, often mortally, so much that their life expectancy has been falling. At the Sea turtle and Dolphin sanctuaries in Moorea, we met rescued green turtles who have lost a fin but survived. We also interacted with an 80-year-old blind Dolphin, Hina, a terrific swimmer who uses echolocation and had to be rescued post-shark attack. She has been looked after here ever since, along with two other younger dolphins, Lokahi and Kuokua. The matriarch in the lagoon, she let children play with her, tickle her belly and even kiss her if she was in the mood. There, explaining to us all about her, was our Dolphin caretaker — Moana!
Eventually, after carefully trying to listen in to Polynesian-sounding names for a week and trying to literally “look” for her during and in-between marine experiences, we found Moana! Surprisingly, Moana is a boy! You were so fascinated when he shared that “Moana” means “the ocean” in the Tahitian language. Several names in Tahiti end with -moana, to mean some quality “of the ocean.” And what’s far more fascinating, it is usually only a masculine name! You both still chuckle recounting these faux-pas of nomenclature in your first movie.
Finding Moana’s grandma while experiencing the native life
You quickly noticed that every Polynesian grandmother looks just the same as in the Disney movie. So you were far too delighted to watch not one but several “Moana’s grandmas” going about their business in the flower markets, in the food markets, at the roulottes, and on the beach.
Yet, the best example was the mother of one of Daddy Nomad’s colleagues, Torea, who invited us for lunch by the beach at his mother’s place. An active, youthful, and independent lady of over 70 years, she had cooked us a feast including fish head curry, a delicacy meant for the dearest guests. I felt honoured to be treated with such warmth and hospitality by a lady who had never met us! Torea’s mother lives in her own house right by the beach, with the houses of her two sons right behind her backyard garden. Just like Moana’s grandmother, she can often be found at her “own patch” of the beach, collecting shells and, who knows, even dancing?
This, we learned, is the traditional way of living for Tahitian families. As families grow, their houses create a line-up starting with the matriarch’s home right on the beach and those of the younger members going up the slopes towards the peak of the volcanoes. Family compounds extend from the sea to the peak. Was it now easier to make sense of the settlements we observed from the helicopter ride over Tahiti and Moorea?
This matriarch was the quintessential Tahitian grandmother that we were looking for. And we are so grateful to have found her.
I wonder what would have happened if we didn’t find Moana or her grandmother. Would you have been disappointed? Maybe. Would you have come with us on another quest? Most certainly. Over more than a year of continuous travel, your parents became much better at developing quests that are likely to have a desirable ending, keeping the scope narrow and embracing detours from the original plan. Yet, much of what we later fine-tuned came from our first few quests, including this one!
Hope you enjoyed listening to your own story of adventure, my little Moanas!
Love, hugs, and kisses,
Nomad Mumma.
Why Quests matter
We might as well take kids journeying with us and let the learning happen as we go. Why bother with a quest? Well, the reality is, when children are younger, they tend to “remember” very little of what they are experiencing on a moment-to-moment basis. If everything they experience is part of a quest, it is easier for them to understand why we are traveling or participating in certain activities. It makes the journey meaningful, for them, at their level.
Imagine taking a 2-year-old and 4-year-old to Tahiti and saying we are here for the fabulous, once-in-a-lifetime scenery and to learn about the unique Polynesian culture. I don’t think that would mean anything to them at all!
In the course of finding the real Moana and her grandmother, who likes to dance with sting rays, we ended up trying Polynesian-Chinese fusion food on roulettes, swimming with sharks and rays, traveling across the length and breadth of the 8-shaped island, and taking a horse-back ride to the highest vantage point on the island. Looking for Moana also made our kids interested in conversations with the locals, for which there would have been no reason otherwise (I thought you said, don’t talk to strangers!)
There was so much that we experienced beyond the quest. And yet, the quest made the journey meaningful for them and us.
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