The island residents are among the country\u2019s best oarsmen and oarswomen as rowing had been part of their daily way of life to travel to and from the main islands. Manono Island ended its four-day celebrations of Samoa\u2019s 60 years of Independence last week with a Fautasi exhibition race on Saturday 4 June 2022.<\/p>\n
But in the advent of the outboard motors and the three year lockdown, fautasi<\/em> racing had been a dying event and the massive 30 plus oars long boats had deteriorated over the years. So when the island residents prepared for last weeks\u2019 race, it was unfortunate that one of the two remaining fautasi<\/em> leaked the night before.<\/p>\n Since the very first Independence regatta in 1962, the well-known Manono island fautasi<\/em>, the Telefoni o le Vainu\u2019u<\/em> had been a feature of Samoa\u2019s fautasi<\/em> regatta history.<\/p>\n This is other than the smaller version of the longboat, the Tulula<\/em>, which is more a utility sea vehicle rowed by women.<\/p>\n So last Saturday, the Manono Islands pride, the Telefoni o le Vainuu<\/em> was on an exhibition race with two Tululas<\/em> rowed by women. The CCCS church minister, Reverend Ieremia Saufo\u2019i told Talamua<\/em>, the spirit was to celebrate Samoa\u2019s 60th<\/sup>\u00a0years of independence.<\/p>\n With rowing a part of their daily lives, Manono residents are the among country’s best oarsmen and oarswomen.<\/p><\/div>\n After the exhibition race around the island, the fautasi<\/em> paddled along the shores of Manono-Uta to wish them a happy independence.<\/p>\n Two denominations on the island, the Methodist Church and the Congregational Christian Church of Samoa were the main ones involved in organising the celebration.<\/p>\n CCCS church minister, Reverend Ieremia Saufo\u2019i told Talamua<\/em> the difficulty with the other fautasi did not dampen the residents\u2019 spirit to commemorate Samoa\u2019s 60th<\/sup>\u00a0independence.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is also a good chance for us to prepare and start training for the national fautasi<\/em> race in September for the Teuila festival so we\u2019re really excited,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n \u201cFor today itself it\u2019s really special, we\u2019ve been locked in our homes for three years due to the pandemic however, it\u2019s really that things are slowly going back to normal and we\u2019ll be waiting for September and looking forward to the whole year of Samoa celebrating its\u2019 independence.\u201d<\/p>\n The Telefoni o le Vainu\u2019u<\/em> is the only longboat to have publicly confirmed its participation in the upcoming Teuila Festival fautasi<\/em> regatta.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Talaia Mika APIA, SAMOA \u2013 08 JUNE 2022: Manono Island residents have revived the iconic Fautasi \u2013 long boats regatta that have become synonymous with the national Independence and Teuila festival celebrations. The island residents are among the country\u2019s best oarsmen and oarswomen as rowing had been part of their daily way of life […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":11902,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[190,177],"tags":[1082,1079,59,800,1080,1081],"class_list":["post-11900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-latest","tag-60-independence-celebrations","tag-fautasi-regatta","tag-featured","tag-manono-island","tag-telefoni-ole-vainuu","tag-teuila-festival-regatta"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"Manono](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/talamua.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/Manono-rowers-on-the-Telefoni-on-le-Vainuu..jpg?resize=740%2C503&ssl=1\")