but I know very little about the country and the cultures they come from, which is why I'm off on a voyage of discovery across the Pacific. SPY MUSIC Captions by Philip McKibbin. Edited by Faith Hamblyn. www.able.co.nz Captions were made possible with funding from NZ On Air. Copyright Able 2014 Less than two hours' flight away is NZ's nearest Pacific Island neighbour. It's Norfolk Island. All I really know about Norfolk Island is that it is an island in the Pacific owned by Australia and it's famous for its trees. That, and it has a reputation as being a holiday destination for not-very-adventurous newly-weds or the nearly dead, all of whom return saying ` much as you would about Morrinsville or Geraldine ` that it's lovely. But surely there has to be more to it than that. ADVENTUROUS MUSIC The island is home to around 2200 people. Roughly a third are indigenous Norfolk Islanders, a third are Australian, and the other third are NZers. Unsurprisingly the sea and seafood are a pretty big part of life here. These are the trumpeter? The locals call them trumpeter, but their proper name is sweetlip emperor, or redthroated emperor. In Queensland they call them tricky snapper. Tricky snapper? Tricky snapper? Tricky snapper. It's pretty much sort of the iconic Norfolk Island fish, isn't it? It's pretty much sort of the iconic Norfolk Island fish, isn't it? It definitely is, yeah. Good size. Yeah. Marvellous. Good fillets. Is there a commercial fishing, uh, you know, I guess for the shops and the restaurants? Yeah, at a very small scale. Um, the boats will go out and get a couple of bins, and what they're excess they'll sell to the restaurants or the fish and chip shop. They batter 'em in the fish fryers, or you can just roll it in flour and pan-fry it. And there's no shortage of them out there? And there's no shortage of them out there? No shortage. We don't overfish 'em. There's no big trawlers or longliners. We don't allow that. So you've still got a bit of jurisdiction to say, 'Actually, we don't want that in our island waters.' Yeah. 30 years ago there used to be a fish factory here, and they just about ruined the reefs, but they've picked up over those years, they've picked up to good numbers again. There's a, uh... a fair old number of... number of sharks down there. They're gonna do tricks in a second,gonna get a hoop out, of fire. THEY LAUGH I was actually thinking of going for a... for a swim later on, but I... I may revise that plan. While the school of bronze whalers snack on scraps, I'm lucky enough to be able to enjoy a traditional fish fry. Thank you. > Thank you. > That's absolutely beautiful. I might be tempted to move here. UPBEAT COUNTRY MUSIC At just 34.6 square kilometres, Norfolk Island is not a big place. In fact, it's very easy to see from one side all the way around... to the other. And as you can imagine, the pace of life here is delightfully slow, something the locals are very proud of ` so proud of it that they resisted television until the mid-'80s, and in 2002 had a referendum in which they voted against the introduction of the cell phone. Unfortunately, five years later it arrived, after the Australian government declared the cell phone an economic necessity. What a shame! UPBEAT MUSIC Being 1500km away from mainland Australia, the Norfolk Islanders by necessity have to be a resourceful lot. Given the high cost of shipping, then, it's little surprise they have their own soft drink factory. You've got a high shipping cost here, which I think has helped us a little bit to... to survive and to keep the doors open. We get a lot of support from the local community. Uh, I think it` it's just, uh, more, from my point of view, the challenge of trying to keep alive and to... you know, to still produce soft drinks in that very competitive environment. You know, people say, 'Oh, you step back in time when you arrive in Norfolk Island.' And coming into here, it really is a little bit like stepping back in time. Sure. So often people will come in` in who are visiting the island, and they'll, um` they'll say, 'Oh, yes, I remember when I was a kid, you know, 'we used to have the local soft drink producer down the road, and, you know, 'we'd either collect bottles for him or work in the factory, you know.' And it is stepping back in time, because, sadly, you know, your soft drink producers of that age, uh, years ago, have been forced out of business by the big boys. Um, yeah, so I think we are quite, uh, unique. It's always wonderful to see those machines that were built so very well... Sure. ...still operating. ...still operating. Yeah, still operating. And there's an adage ` if it's... if it's not busted, don't try to fix it or make it better. And, you know, to their credit, I mean, the filler that we use is actually produced in the '30s, and it goes a treat. You know, the one thing we just have to do is regularly maintain the machines. So grease here, a bit of a screw there. That's it. Yeah, a bit of a clean, lubrication. Done. That's it. Yeah, a bit of a clean, lubrication. Done. Hmm. The global financial crisis has been pretty bad news for local businesses. Far fewer visitors meant a huge drop in revenue, and the island has... well, it's essentially gone broke. Australia has stepped in to bail them out, but in return Norfolk has lost a lot of its autonomy. At one stage, 25% of the houses were for sale. Absolutely. And I think the big serious demographic that exists on the island at the moment is that a lot of our young families are moving. The boys here, uh, develop really good practical experience on a number of things ` machinery, etc. So a lot of them have gone to work in the mines in WA and Queensland, and the families have gone with them. Can people... You know, can they go on the dole? Can people... You know, can they go on the dole? No. No? No? No social security of that type. There is welfare for old people, and the condition of that is that you have to be a resident here for over 40 years before you can become. So that's also quite restricted. But no, there's no dole, unemployment benefit, yeah. But you get a refund for your empties? The big bottles, there's 25c on 'em. And 10c on the littlies. It really is like living in the past. In another 60 years, that bottle-washing machine will still be washing bottles. I would hope so. It's a big challenge. And that's one of the reasons, you know, why we accept that challenge, because, uh, you know, it does provide employment, and` and` and there is a real environmental case for having a return to those localised soft drink or beverage producers. So, yeah, let's hope it is. # Rocks him gently so... # One of the biggest attractions on Norfolk Island is its annual Country Music Festival. Today I am very excited, as I'm about to catch up with one of the star performers ` NZ country music legend Dennis Marsh. Back when they said, 'We're gonna have a country music festival on Norfolk Island,' what did you think? I thought, 'Well, that's gonna be a good idea, because I don't even know where Norfolk Island is.' What was it like back then? Has it` I mean, it's 20 years ago. Yeah. Well, Radar, when I first came here there was no lights in the street; no cattle-stops ` the cows were able to come up and walk through the shops, walk through the town. You had to have a torch to see where you were walking, so that you didn't stand in anything you weren't supposed to stand in. But they had the right of way here. The cattle that are roaming the roads now have the right of way, so don't run into one while you're here. I will not do that. I will not do that. BOTH LAUGH Why country music? Why here in Norfolk Island? Why country music? Why here in Norfolk Island? I think it was to... get a, um, trans-Tasman ` where Australians can come off Australia, NZ can come off NZ, and we're halfway. So it... it was an ideal spot, and it's been going for 20 years now. It's amazing. What is it that you like about it? Norfolk Island? It's like home now. It's a special place, and people here have honoured me this year by putting me on a stamp. I mean, I` I just can't` A postage stamp? A postage stamp? A postage stamp! I just can't believe it. How many places in the world can you go where they like you so much they put you on a postage stamp? BOTH LAUGH BOTH LAUGH I just feel so honoured. Have you gone out and` and bought a whole lot of stamps? Have you got a whole lot of postcards that you just send off to people with a little arrow going, 'Check that out.' Yeah, I have actually. Yeah, we've spent hundreds. Yeah, I have actually. Yeah, we've spent hundreds. BOTH LAUGH COUNTRY MUSIC It's a, uh, bit of a custom here in Norfolk Island to give people a little finger wave ` great when you're out and there's not many people around, but when you're in town and there's a stream of traffic, it becomes very tiring. And then sometimes I forget to do it, and I wonder whether or not they think I'm ignoring them and being a stuck-up kinda tourist. But sometimes I just forget, because it's so beautiful. Of course, one thing you can't forget to do is give way to cattle. Norfolk Island currently has a fairly decent population, which is something of a surprise given its history of failure when it comes to human occupation. Te Radar, welcome. Hi, Rick. Hi, Rick. Good to see you, brother. Come in. Hi, Rick. Good to see you, brother. Come in. Thank you. Polynesians settled here around the 1500s, but inexplicably disappeared after several generations. From 1794 the island was a British penal settlement, but they too abandoned it after 19 years. These ruins are the remains of the second penal colony, established by the British in 1825. From the very inception, it was to house the worst of the worst convicts from New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land. And you can have the anger, the sweat, the anxiety, the sewage of over 1400, uh, individuals, uh, lost souls, really, just in this space here. That mixed with certain personalities of commandants develops a culture of` of cruelty that, um, just starts to feed on itself, so that easily by the 1830s, this beautiful island is starting to be referred to as the hell in the Pacific, and it was. It's hard to reconcile all of that horror with the fact that this is the only place that James Cook described as a paradise. Yes. It's one of the jail cells over here. They're not very, uh, big, are they? No, no. These, uh, outer cells were, uh, 6ft by 8ft by 10ft high, built ` on paper ` for one adult male. Typically on average there's three men in this space, and for very long periods of time, you typically would have one man lying down and there would be two layers of hammocks. Three men in here ` I mean, there's barely enough room to, sort of,... Oh, yeah. Oh, absolutely. Oh, yeah. Oh, absolutely. ...lie down. Oh, yeah. Oh, absolutely. ...lie down. You want the highest bunk. That's... This is an environment where most people are suffering from amoebic dysentery. The regard for sanitation is` is` is negligible. The alpha male always had the highest hammock. That's the one you'd aim for. That's the one you'd aim for. I've had a lot of arguments with people about who gets the top bunk, but I've never had to consider it because someone above you has amoebic dysentery. It would drip down. You wouldn't wanna be on the bottom. No, but often you wouldn't have any choice. Uh, but the... the hard part is resigning yourself to that environment on a daily basis for the rest of your life. It's incomprehensible. It's incomprehensible. It is. SOMBRE MUSIC This rather majestic ruin is the old mill-house, where the wheat was ground into flour for the prison settlement. It's a magnificent structure. It's a magnificent structure. Yes, it is. It's` It's magnificent in not only its construction, but, uh, this space right here was considered the... one of the worst assignments a convict can be given. You can imagine 50 men, two teams of 25, each team manipulating a very large millstone on the top floor. Uh, this building wasn't designed to be a crank mill, so the ventilation is quite poor. So you have the hardship, the sweat, the misery of 50 men working 12-hour shifts. They would have been in here pushing, you know, the oars around like that, sort of, opening scene in Conan the Barbarian. Was there anyone cracking a whip or beating a drum to keep them moving? They would be walking around in leg irons. It's in a contained environment. I would imagine there would be supervision with whips ` probably bayonets, uh, more like it. But in an environment like this, they would be very easy to control. It's like a cathedral of bread-based horrors down there. UPBEAT MUSIC The second penal colony was finally abandoned in 1855. But just one year later England's Queen Victoria gifted Norfolk to the people of Pitcairn Island. Pitcairn, some 6000km away, was home to the descendants of the famous Bounty mutineers and their Tahitian wives. Just when you think Norfolk Island can't get any more exciting ` a cyclorama depicting the entire story of the Bounty. It took two artists 16 months to paint. And for me, probably the most moving part of it is this depiction of tiny, tiny little Pitcairn Island and there the burning of the Bounty. And the mutineers and the Tahitians standing there watching it knowing that that is it. With that ship gone, they're there for however long it is until someone else turns up, which turned out to be 18 years ` quite a long time to be stuck on an island that's just under 5 square kilometres. The Bounty descendants quickly outgrew tiny Pitcairn Island, so in 1856 the community set sail for Norfolk. Is there a lot of pride, I guess, in that lineage coming through the mutineers? Yes, absolutely. Yes, people are very very proud of their background and know which families they're descended from. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And there's still strong links between Pitcairn and Norfolk? Yes. The language is the same, even though on Pitcairn it's called Pitcairn. Here it's called Norfolk. It's actually the same language. Um, the families, you know, are related, the people are related, and the culture's very very similar, so we` we can slip between the two places and, uh, feel at home in both islands. Yes. The Pitcairners became the only colony to flourish on Norfolk, becoming a proudly self-reliant and independent people. You know, my grandmothers' or my grandparents' generation were not closely tied to Australia at all. They` They were Norfolk Islanders first and foremost and` and very very strong. And I think for a while, maybe my parents' generation, that` that, uh, degree of passion died down. And I think now in` in my age and` and the next generation it's` it's` it's, sort of, uh, growing again, the` the passion for the story and the, uh... yeah, the homeland, I guess. What I love about museums is these tiny, almost insignificant little items that have so much meaning. The Bounty ring is the only ring that arrived on Pitcairn with the mutineers, and so, as such, it was used as a... a communal wedding ring. So when Fletcher Christian and, later, John Adams were marrying people to each other, this ring would be symbolically slipped on to their fingers and then slipped off again. And there it is, so delicate and so fragile. But it meant so much to all of those people. COUNTRY MUSIC One of the most intriguing things about Norfolk Island for me is hearing the locals use its indigenous language. Spoken by descendants of the Bounty mutineers from Pitcairn, it's a melodic mix of 18th century West Country English and Tahitian. (PLAYS COUNTRY MUSIC) BAND PLAYS COUNTRY MUSIC MUSIC CONTINUES Do you speak Norfolk language? Do you speak Norfolk language? Yes. Do you speak Norfolk language? Yes. A little bit? We learn it in school. Like, lessons. We get taught. Could you say something to me in Norfolk? Could you say something to me in Norfolk? Um, hello is watawieh. Watawieh. Watawieh. And you would say, um, I good, thanks, or 'I kushu.' It's a beautiful language, isn't it? It's a beautiful language, isn't it? It's so... flowy. Yeah. Yeah. THEY LAUGH It's probably not an official description, but yes, it is flowy. And, you know, are you gonna continue speaking it? You know, do your parents and grandparents speak? Yeah. Mostly our parents speak it to us, so they probably expect us to speak it to our children. And because we're learning it in the school and that, they encourage it more. And so, um, yeah, we're... we're trying to keep it going so it's not a lost language. The other thing that's not lost is their traditional dance, inspired by their Tahitian ancestry. Why hula? Because it's from our Tahitian ancestors and we need to, like, learn it to keep it going in the culture and teach younger people so they can carry it on. Yeah, we actually lost it for a while, but, um, had some Tahitian teachers come over, and, um, some of the old dance group, they went over and they relearnt it all and, yeah, brought it back. What's the best thing about doing it? What's the best thing about doing it? You stay fit. Is it`? It does look very tiring. Is it`? It does look very tiring. It's really fun. Is it`? It does look very tiring. It's really fun. Yeah. There's heaps of fun. You're here with a group of girls. You enjoy it. You can be yourself, nuts. You enjoy it. You can be yourself, nuts. GIRLS LAUGH But we're also keeping, like, the culture alive as well as having fun, so you feel good about it. BOTH: Yeah. BOTH: Yeah. It makes you feel curvy. BOTH: Yeah. It makes you feel curvy. GIRLS LAUGH If you've ever known anyone with a nickname, you'll often think, 'What is their actual name?' On Norfolk Island they've simplified nicknames. You think, 'Oh, jeez, I've gotta ring Knuckles or Quack or Foxy Senior or Junior or Hose or Hunky-Dory or Diddles.' You just go straight to the telephone directory, and in the back there's a 'fast find a person by their nickname' page. It just gets better and better, this place. UPBEAT MUSIC I've got one final stop to make before I leave Norfolk Island ` I'd promised I'd catch up with local farmer and restaurant owner Robyn Menghetti. Hello, Robyn. Hello, Robyn. Hi, Radar. How are you? Hello, Robyn. Hi, Radar. How are you? I'm very good. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. What are you doing? A little bit of aquaponics? Playing around in my aquaponics, yep. Oh. Why have you got this going on? Oh. Why have you got this going on? Um. This is an aquaponics system, and it enables us to grow things for the restaurant that we wouldn't otherwise grow, um, at this time the year or all year round. Um, it gives us constant supply, so for 52 weeks of the year we can grow, um, all sorts of things, as you can see. as you can see. I guess, you know, a lot of people would just fly stuff in. No, you can't. Um, we're not allowed to bring in anything fresh. Everything that we use in the restaurant's gotta be fresh ` well, we insist on it being fresh ` uh, and it's grown on the island, with the exception of potatoes, garlic, ginger, uh, and onions. Right. That must make it reasonably difficult to run a restaurant. It's challenging, uh, and it certainly sorts the men out from the boys in terms of shifts and their capabilities very quickly. And the guys have to use whatever's available. And it's seasonal, and it's true seasonality here, so the season might last a week or two weeks or three weeks. It's got a wonderful sense of self-sufficiency to it, like you would expect in some ways on an island. like you would expect in some ways on an island. Yeah. Coming from a farm, I am very interested in Robyn's other passion ` developing a unique breed of cattle, the Norfolk Blue. Can you hear him? No. No. Yeah, I can hear him. It's just a faint 'Moo.' Ah. He's a beauty. Yeah. > Yeah. > There you go, Mr Bull. All right. How old is the big fella? How old is the big fella? About 9 years old. How old is the big fella? About 9 years old. Right. He's a monster. Yeah, he's about a ton ` about a ton. Yeah, he's about a ton ` about a ton. Jeepers. And if it wasn't for him... ...we wouldn't have the Blues that we've got today. He's a bit of a legend. Yeah, we just got him just in time, before he was probably gonna be, um, cut. Right. Oh, cut ` as in... Right. Oh, cut ` as in... As in cut. Right. Oh, cut ` as in... As in cut. ...emasculated. BOTH LAUGH BOTH LAUGH So we got him just in time, and then we started using him to breed, and we've been able to produce the` the Blues. We've saved the herd. and we've been able to produce the` the Blues. We've saved the herd. Where were they from first? So, the story goes that a Blue bull, uh, was brought to the island over 100 years ago. And what the locals do is they` anything they really like, they nickname them. And so that Blue bull was called Dr Bluesuit. Now, at the time there were only British breeds on the island, and so, um, Dr Bluesuit just did his thing all over the island with all the girls on the island, and, um, basically, it's evolved, and it's just this lovely mutation of the breed, uh, to produce this beautiful blue/bluey-grey breed. They've acclimatised, and they're pretty special. It's the only place in the world you'll find them. And just think, if he'd been` if he'd had the chop... It might never have happened. It might never have happened. ...I wouldn't be staring at him. I know. So that makes him pretty special. > I know. So that makes him pretty special. > Yeah. He's a lovely-looking animal. He's just gorgeous. > COUNTRY MUSIC It's fair to say that Norfolk Island has been, well, something of a revelation. Home to one of the youngest cultures of the Pacific Islands, it's steeped in history and rich with its own language and customs. And it is most certainly not just a place for the newly-weds and the nearly deads. So,... (SPEAKS NORFOLK). I've even developed a liking for country music! It changes you, this place. (YODELS) (TRIES TO YODEL) Oops. I went down. I'm not an actual musician. But that's fine. But that's fine. Yodel. Do you actually say, 'yodel'? Yodel. (YODELS). Captions by Philip McKibbin. Edited by Faith Hamblyn. www.able.co.nz Captions were made possible with funding from NZ On Air. Copyright Able 2014