Every Day Is Special: South Pacific

Showing posts with label South Pacific. Show all posts

January 30 - World's Tallest Geyser Discovered

Posted on January 30, 2022

This is an update of my post published on January 30, 2011:

Just in the nick of time, on this date in 1901, Dr. Humphrey Haines discovered the world's tallest and most powerful geyser. Called Waimangu Geyser, it was located on the North Island of New Zealand. Every 36 hours, this geyser hurled up water, black mud, and rocks as high as 600 to 1,500 feet into the air. This is between 5 to 10 times the height of the world-famous Old Faithful geyser at Yellowstone!

It's higher than the Empire State Building!

Why did I say “just in the nick of time”? Well, this geyser went extinct in 1904 when a landslide changed the local water table.

People worldwide were interested in the find, and many tourists visited the geyser in the three years between discovery and extinction. Three of the tourists disregarded the repeated warnings of their guide to keep back at a safe distance, and unfortunately all four of them (even the guide) died in a sudden, violent eruption.

New Zealand is shown here in red. It's east of Australia -
so it's on the way-far-right side of this map.

The Youngest Country on Earth

New Zealand calls itself the youngest country on earth because it was the last major landmass to be discovered and settled by humans. About 1,000 years ago, Polynesian people arrived by canoes. By 1250 A.D. (or C.E.), during a period known as the Middle Ages in Europe, and almost a half century after the Magna Carta was signed in England, these Polynesians had made permanent settlements on New Zealand.

Just a few hundred years later, European explorers reached New Zealand.

Unfortunately, New Zealand is left off world maps surprisingly often!

Learn more about New Zealand and the Maori.

(The Maori are New Zealand's indigenous people.)

Here is a book on Maori art. And here is a lesson on making Maori Koru art.

Koru art is inspired by the natural shapes
made by uncurling fern fronds.

Above, Sound of the Universe, by Sofia Minson
Below, A Bird on the Wall, by Sofia Minson
Can you see how the patterns and designs echo
the shape of uncurling fern fronds?

Sofia Minson is part Maori (Ngati Porou).

Here is a video advertising New Zealand as a great place to visit. And it is! I was in N.Z., enjoying the amazing scenery and the Maori art and even the geysers - but then the pandemic struck, and I had to scuttle back home. We missed the last four or five days of sightseeing! Hmmm...maybe I can go back?

Also on this date:

Author Lloyd Alexander's birthday

Anniversary of Yerba Buena renamed to San Francisco

Fred Korematsu Day of Civil Liberties and the Constitution

Anniversary of the First Lifeboat

Birthday of Thomas Rolfe, son of Pocahontas

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's birthday

Croissant Day

Hardin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival

National Inane Answering Message Day

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December 24 - Yap Constitution Day in Micronesia

Posted on December 24, 2021

This is an update of my post published on December 24, 2010:

Micronesia is the name given to a group of thousands of small islands in the Pacific Ocean. Nearby are the many islands of Melanesia, Polynesia, Indonesia, and the Philippines.

Many of the islands included in the region called "Micronesia" make up the sovereign nation of the Federated States of Micronesia. One of the country's four states is Yap, which celebrates the writing of its constitution on this day.

One of the things Yap is notable for is its stone money or Rai stones. These disks of calcite are pretty big, compared to most currency such as U.S. coins and bills. The Rai stones wouldn't fit in a wallet or purse. That's because they are from 1 to 12 FEET (30 centimeters to 4 meters) in diameter!!!

The value of the Rai stones depends on their size and their history (most stones were brought from other islands many, many years ago). The least valuable are the smallest - still, a foot-wide disk of stone is not a convenient coin to jingle in one's pocket!

Most of the time, these stones are not moved when ownership changes. People just know who each of the 6,500 stones belong to!

Of course, nowadays the people of Yap use Western-style money. As a matter of fact, they use actual Western currency: the Federated States of Micronesia uses U.S. dollars as its official currency! Still, the Rai stones are used in traditional and ceremonial exchanges and are seen as national symbols.

Also on this date:

Santuranticuy

Trailblazer Kit Carson's birthday

Anniversary of the first radio broadcast

Anniversary of the first performance of Silent Night

Christmas Eve / Nochebuena

Anniversary of first solar-heated home

National Eggnog Day

Birthday of composer Libby Larsen

Birthdays of a variety of artists

Christmas season gift bringers

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December birthdays
Historical anniversaries in December

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October 6 Happy Birthday, Thor Heyerdahl

Posted on October 6, 2021

This is an update of my post published on October 6, 2010:

Born on this day in 1914 in Norway, Heyerdahl became an ethnographer. What the heck is an ethnographer, you ask? This is an anthropologist who deals with the scientific description of specific human cultures. Heyerdahl had a background in geography and zoology, which came in handy for his first expeditions to remote South Pacific islands, where he was to study how animals first came to the islands.

Heyerdahl is most famous for one particular expedition. He had discovered some native legends and some archeological evidence that suggested that Inca Indians from South America could have had contact with South Pacific islanders thousands of miles away. Although old Spanish reports of Incas included drawings of their rafts, most people didn't believe that Incas could travel so far with their technology.

Heyerdahl and his Kon-Tiki expedition proved it was possible when they went to Peru and used native materials and Inca techniques to build a raft with sails and a hut-like shelter, based on the old drawings. They then set out on a 4,300-mile (8,000 km) journey!

The Kon-Tiki traveled across the South Pacific for 101 days. The balsa-wood raft turned out to be easy to maneuver, and fish congregated between the logs in such great numbers that the expedition members could stay fed and hydrated. The raft carried the adventurers from Peru to the Tuamotu Islands.

Since this famous voyage, other rafts have repeated the feat. Heyerdahl continued his career with other exciting expeditions (such as crossing the Atlantic Ocean with a papyrus reed boat, the Ra).

Thor's Theories

Heyerdahl built up some theories about the colonization of the South Pacific Islands based on some old legends and some likenesses of statutes and structures and other artifacts. His ideas were exciting to many but never gained acceptance by anthropologists, and later data such as mitochondrial DNA has shown that the majority of anthropologists were right, and Heyerdahl wrong.

However, Heyerdahl's spectacular expeditions did rouse public interest in anthropology and also showed the benefits of experimental archaeology.

Do you have a theory of how an ancient culture could have built a pyramid, a henge (like the famous Stonehenge), or a monumental sculpture? Maybe you, too, can work to gather a team to try out your ideas: recreate ancient tools using native materials—and build a similar structure yourself!