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In one of the world’s poorest countries an innovative new sports foundation led by a premier league player is changing more than just perceptions.
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“The rebels were at our door. They came in with their guns. They wanted my baby son. I pleaded no, that he had a stomach sickness. The female rebel told the men to go. She gave me 100,000 leones (£20) and left. I thanked God. Maybe if I didn’t have a sick son to care about they would also have taken me away. They killed one baby near to my house.”
It’s June 1997 and members of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) are sweeping through the Kington district of Freetown, Sierra Leone ‘recruiting’ for their militia by snatching babies and children and shooting the rest.
The ‘resource’ war was being fueled by a fight for diamonds dug along river beds to the East of the capital. The exchange of diamonds for weapons between the RUF and Liberia was deepening the crisis. The 1997 surge on Freetown was its violent climax where more than 3000 lives were lost. You’ve probably seen or heard of the film ‘Blood Diamond’ starring Leonardo Dicaprio depicting these horrific events. Sadly for many living in Sierra Leone today, this was a reality, not hollywood.
“Since my baby and I survived that day I have always wanted the best for him. Sometimes I sacrifice my whole salary just to send him to school. John is everything I have. At first I resisted football as I thought it would take time from school but now I can see the future it can give him. He is a goalkeeper and if he makes the academy everything could change. He could lead our country.”
Selina MaCarthy, a nurse and her only son John Fillie, were lucky to survive. Twelve years on and John is on the cusp of being selected as one of a dozen first generation players to Sierra Leone’s first professional youth football academy. Scouted from across the country this small group of young boys will represent a project that has aspirations not just to help them realise their potential but to also use football to empower teams and communities to initiate positive social change. An ambitious project in any country, but considering the recent history of Sierra Leone and with unemployment at 80%, it appears brave and optimistic.
*************
Freetown
“Welcome to Lungi International – you are in Freetown now!” Exclaims Kenya Airways as you taxi past the mirage of palm trees on a single strip of sweltering tarmac.
Freetown. Like its African neighbour to the North East, Timbuktu, Freetown is one of those distant, exotic, almost mythical places that most of us are aware exist, vaguelly recalling a lyric from a song or a reference in history, but little more. This is slightly worrying, considering the significant role we as a colonial power played in forming it. Aside from the familiarity of names – Aberdeen, Waterloo, Hastings – the first thing you notice in Freetown is the typical bustle but without the hassle I’ve experienced in other African cities. The dramatic geography of Freetown – sweeping peninsula, arcing beaches and ports, and steep surging hills, is almost at odds with its quiet charmed chaos; endless ramshackle Dickensian markets, with seas of people, taxis, bikes, trolleys, swelling in and out of the streets like tides. There are numerous war-inflicted amputees who wheel themselves along muddy alleyways in gloriously inventive homemade contraptions. One guy who looks my age and has lost both his legs high above the knee calls me from his tricycle, ‘hey aboto (white man) don’t take taxi. Come with me. I have four wheel drive,’ before pulling an impressive wheely, laughing loudly and spinning off down the hill.
The buildings have retained their colonial style but since the war many have changed the materials they’re built with; window shutters and steep rooftops are bent out of corrugated iron rather than hard woods and stone – it’s like a Tim Burton town in the sunshine. If anything, wondering through Freetown I feel less threatened, less of an outsider, than in other African city’s I’ve visited. In Freetown you happily become part of that ‘seething mass of humanity’ we often hear about but rarely experience.
My invite to this vibrant place came via a friend I’d kept in touch with since the summers I’d spent leading volunteer expeditions in West Africa. In 1999 Tom Vernon took some time out from a sports science degree in Liverpool and found himself coaching and teaching on the streets of Ghana’s capital, Accra. Tom was quickly struck by the gaping hole between the potential of these brilliant ten year olds and the countries so called poor Premier League. Something was going badly wrong in their development. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that a lack of adequate nourishment and basic education were undermining any chance these young talented players of becoming something. Tom rallied family and friends in High Wycombe and soon had the funds to start a basic academy. He scouted the country for his first generation of players, recruited volunteer coaches and teachers and set about work. Ten years on, Tom and his team at Right to Dream are completing a European standard sports academy in Ghana, have graduates at Fulham FC and, almost more impressively considering these boys backgrounds, 22 are currently on scholarships at top colleges in the UK and the States. Tom has also managed to become Manchester United’s head scout for Africa. Funny what a summer teaching English abroad can lead to.
In 2007 Tom got a call from a well known English Premier League player asking if he could help him set up a similar academy in Sierra Leone. Craig Bellamy, captain of Wales and today one of a plethora of world-class strikers at Manchester City, did not have the best ‘google me’ results page as he would be the first to admit. Regardless of reputations a partnership was formed, Bellamy visited Sierra Leone again, wrote a significant initial cheque and publicly made his commitment to the people of this war-torn nation. The government gave the newly formed Craig Bellamy Foundation a decent slice of land an hour from Freetown and in mid 2008 the goal-scorer took part in a ceremony and broke the earth where the new academy would be built.
It’s July 2009 and Bellamy is in South Africa preparing for the upcoming season. His visit to Sierra Leone last month oversaw the final trials 27 of which, 16 will become the academy’s first generation. The young goalkeeper John and his mother are hoping he makes the cut.
Alongside the academy, the Bellamy Foundation has also set-up with seed funding from UNICEF, a football league built on incentives that go beyond winning fortnightly matches. Each one of the forty U14 and U12 teams are also awarded points for fair play on the pitch, attending school and on the weekends when games don’t take place, initiating and completing community projects. Meeting some of the teams coaches and managers and you soon discover that a football league table can be a powerful motivator.
As we watch the competitvely fought U12 game between Promising Stars and Portugeuse Town in front a crowd in their hundreds, Kamusu Koroma, Regional Manager for the league in the Freetown district tells me:
“Previously the coaches and supporters would beat the ref before the game starts. Through the coaches training programme and now in the league we are demostrating fair play and incentivising ourselves to change the way we behave.”
When I ask if this is an overnight change across the league, Kamusu acknowledges the reality, “This is not a day job, it is a process. The good thing is that we are confronting corruption head on and showing that you can win football matches without cheating and violence.”
Coach of Freetown’s Eastern Eagles, Abdul Karim, goes further; “I believe the fair play policy of the CBF league is already changing attitudes of the young players. We are moving away from violence in our communities because of this league.”
The boys themselves are understandably more focused on the football but are still aware of the bigger picture they’re involved in, “Let me say the difference between this league and other games I’ve played in is that we are all all brothers here. We don’t fight anymore but we can still win,” says a determined looking 13 year old called Suleman who is known simply to everyone else as Essien because he is rarely beaten in a challenge even when he plays with boys two years older than him.
Beyond the football pitches the teams have already been involved in community clean-ups, water well repairs, and leading peer and health education sessions. As Tom Vernon suggests this is quite something considering that many of these boys older brothers, uncles and fathers were the child soldiers that make “this today’s history.” And because like goalkeeper John, most of the boys in this league were born just as the civil war was reaching its peak in the late 1990s, it is not an exaggeration to say that it is with them where a good chunk of hope for a better Sierra Leone rests. We know there are many life lessons to be learnt through sport but when it is set against this kind of recent historical backdrop as it is here, it becomes a much more powerful opportunity to those fortunate enough to be involved. Coming here you can understand the wave of optimism.
During my stay in Freetown I am a guest of Durosimi Thomas and his family. Duro is the foundation’s in-country director who has built a career as a freelance BBC sports correspondent (he had a premonition in 2001 not to go to African Nations cup game in Ghana because he tripped on a stone that morning, 126 people died in a stadium crush that day), resurrecting local interest in football and staunchly fighting anti-corruption in his country at every turn. A deep voiced, our-man-in-freetown thick set man, Duro is only too aware not to get carried away;
“Football is what I know, and football can teach people to be better citizens quickly. But it will still take time. Bellamy has given Sierra Leonian’s a good opportunity to find a new way, let’s hope we take this chance.”
*****
The league is only three months old and the academy is yet to open, but the hundred strong staff now involved with this new approach to sport and development in Sierra Leone obviously believe passionately in what they are doing both for themselves and their nation.
Kamusu, the regional manager of the league for Freetown, shakes my hand as I leave one red-sand rectangle of football, shouting and laughter for another;
“Football is finally getting a great name here – before, playing football was seen as idleness, now you can break the cycle of poverty by kicking a ball.”
For Kamusu, young John the goalkeeper, and his friends that survived the horrors of last decades war it is the simplicity of such an ambition that seems to be kick-starting the kind of positive mindset many people of this beautiful country clearly crave.
These footballers can feel change coming, even if it is only one game at a time.
———————————
Article written by Ben Keene on his visit to Freetown in July 2009
The Craig Bellamy Foundation Academy will officially open in 2010. The league will extend later this year to also include girls and amputees.
To find out more and support the projects:
craigbellamyfoundation.org
righttodream.com
Twitter: craigbellamySL
- 1000 ‘tribe members’ have spent an average of two weeks on Vorovoro Island
- $2,000,000fj (£630,000) has been injected into the local economy through the project as agreement with landowners extended for further five years
- The celebration included traditional Fijian meke (dances) performed by the tribe members, lovo (earth oven) feast and kava (Fijian Islands drink)
- Tribewanted founder, Ben Keene, plans to begin new tribes in 2010
In April 2006 an online community was launched with the mission to recruit a ‘tribe’ of adventure travellers to help develop a sustainable community tourism project on the Fijian island of Vorovoro. A partnership had been formed between Vorovoro island owners who were advertising for a tourism development and two young British social entrepreneurs.
The project opened on 1st September 2006 with 13 of the online tribe members arriving on the beach to be welcomed by the island’s chief landowner, Tui Mali and his yavusa (tribe).
Over the next three years a village has been built using traditional craftsmanship and materials. Several ‘bures’ – thatched Fijian houses – now nestle between the palms where visiting ‘tribe members’ sleep on drift-wood beds. All water is rain-harvested from a tribe-made dam on the hill and other roof-tops. The average tribe member consumes just 6.2 litres of water a day compared to 200 litres per person per day in the United States. Compost toilets and bathing in the sea have been the main reasons for this conservation. A small amount of energy is generated by wind and solar power sponsored by UK green energy company, Ecotricity. Area for biggest improvement is needed in the kitchen where 12.5% of the food comes from the island, but the project has almost eliminated using any imported food. Similarly waste is minimised on Vorovoro with 40% of the 13kg produced per person each month being recycled. The project currently houses several chickens and ten pigs and plans to add bee hives shortly as well as a community diving project and fair trade coconut workshop.
On the neighbouring island of Mali, tribe members have taught in the local primary school a day a week for the last three years as well as raising funds through the tribe’s own foundation and art projects for wiring and sanitation projects. The school also visits for Vorovoro for project away days .
Visiting tribe members stay for a minimum of one week at a cost of £200 which includes being met from the local airport and transfered to the island, all meals and stay. The tribe can be involved with the daily projects and jobs as much as they like alongside the permanent on-island Fijian team. The only expectation of the visitor is that they wash up their plate and respect the local cultural etiquette in terms of dress and greetings. Most members spend very little time sun-bathing compared to participating in island life: cooking, weaving, firewood-collecting, gardening, feeding the animals, carving coconut jewelry, sustainability forums, learning Fijian meke’s (dances), presenting sevusevu (ceremonies), learning songs, spear fishing and snorkeling on the great barrier reef of Cakau Levu – the third largest in the world – or creating their own art, education or eco project.
The average age of a visiting tribe member is 28. Although the project is also seeing an increasing number of families visiting. Jimmy and Jenny Cahill from Indiana in the US, spent ten weeks on the island with their three children Lucas, Bethany and five year old Oliver who has his own video guide to island life. The Cahill’s will return to Vorovoro in October to lead the project for one year.
Jenny Cahill says: “Our time on Vorovoro has given us gifts that will be a part of us forever – we have experienced enduring and strong connections to ourselves, to each other, and to our goals and intentions for our family. We have formed relationships that will last the rest of our lives. The important lessons of slowing down, laughing much, and enjoying the moment we are in have become a part of us.”
Online Tribewanted has won several awards including Broadcast’s ‘best social network’ in 2008. Out of the 1000’s of blogs, regulars include: The Hammock Society Interviews and Recipes from Vorovoro’s Vali ni Koro . 34 tribe members have been elected ‘chief ’ so far online, giving them the chance to help lead the project for one month on the island.
The three year anniversary began at sunrise with members and locals preparing the lovo, an earth oven that cooked pig, chicken, fish and root vegetables. Guests from neighbouring islands and the mainland arrived by boat and at midday Adam Carter, a 24 year old Australian accountant on his sixth visit to Vorovoro, blew the conch from a bilibili (bamboo raft) to announce the arrival of the islands chief – Tui Mali.
A ceremony consisting of sevusevu (kava drink), tabua (whale’s tooth presentation – the contract) and meke (dances) followed. The rest of the day and all through the night the 35 visiting tribe members and 100+ locals sat under the stars singing Fijian songs and drinking kava.
Ben Keene, founder of Tribewanted, says:
“It’s been an unbelievable three years. The first few months were the hardest – with the fire, the military coup and a cyclone all threatening the projects survival, and its always been tight financially. But we got through it and the tribe have flourished. I’m very proud and grateful for the way the two cultures have integrated on Vorovoro to form one community. When I return now I can sit back and enjoy being part of one of the happiest little villages in the world. There is nowhere I’d rather be.”
“There’s no reason why the best and most inspiring vacations should finish the day you go home. Tribes – people connected to one another, a leader, and an idea – can change the way we all live, for the better.”
“I don’t particularly see Tribewanted as voluntourism – its more adventure meets education meets community – it’s tribal tourism. On Vorovoro you belong to something and you play your part.”
“The downside of island life is leaving. The emotional attachment to the people and the island is strong and we’ve had a lot of members find it difficult to get back to life off the island. The good news for Vorovoro is that this means they often come back.”
“I always hoped the idea of Tribewanted could go beyond Vorovoro. Now is the time to do this as we have proved that it can work. Next year we will be launching a worldwide search for new tribes in new locations. The values of the projects will be the same – to empower both locals and visitors to live more sustainably whilst celebrating the local culture. The goal is to build a collection of the best community tourism projects anywhere and use social networking to fund, connect and scale them. It’s ambitious, but then again a lot of people thought what we’ve just done on Vorovoro as just a dream.”
Tui Mali, chief and landowner says:
“In most of Fiji there is a line in the sand between the locals and tourists. On Vorovoro there is no such line. That is why I’ve invited the tribe to stay. They are part of our community here on Vorovoro now, we feel sad when they leave.”
The project re-opens on 9th September 2009 and the lease agreement between Tribewanted and the landowners of Vorovoro has been extended for a further five years.
A two hour documentary about the project will be shown on National Geographic in Spring 2010. Ben Keene has also written a book published by Ebury. ‘Vorovoro Sessions’ is available for download from itunes.
Tribewanted’s partners include: Ecotricity , Survival International & World Nomads
Images available on request
Outside Fiji contact Andy Barr on +44 (0) 1452 300683 or +44 (0)7743057458 / press@tribewanted.com
or in Fiji contact Tribewanted on 992 0428 / island@tribewanted.com
Just in from Techcrunch UK about bootsrap launch event tomorrow night:
BootStrap Camp (@bootstrapcamp), an entrepreneur-supported community that helps start-ups build connections and find people willing to help them out with a bit of coding or a few introductions, is launching with the mother of all promotions: 25 weeks on Vorovoro, the Tribewanted island in Fiji.
You don’t actually get 25 weeks on the island. That’s the total time available, which will be split between the community: BootStramp Camp will operate on the basis of “credits” you can earn by helping others. You can then spend those credits purchasing services from other members. Or weeks in Fiji.
Personally, I can’t think of anything worse than a bunch of bespectacled geeks (yeah, me included) parading themselves around a tropical island. Don’t expect it to be like Shipwrecked.
But as a developer with a bit of spare time, I can think of worse ways to be rewarded. There isn’t much to look at on the website yet, so I guess you should follow them on Twitter for more info. One final thought: does this offer not pander to the misconception that European startups are lazy and too busy looking for a way onto to a tropical island?
1. Walking into the Weir pub an hour after their arrival and Leavi greeting those having a quiet evening meal by the canal with a: ‘Bula, we are here!’ Indeed they were.
2. The team arriving day one of build at Hampton Court in hard hats, yellow reflector jackets and steel toe cap boots; it was like a Fijian version of Resevoir Dogs with ‘father’ Marau leading the way. (The boots were soon removed as normal service resumed whilst doing the bure-top thatching).
3. Walking through London with Leavi as tour guide: ‘You build this (pointing at Westminster Abbey), we build the compost toilet.’ Seeing the re-unions with tribe members in the park that day was brilliant.
4. Strolling into the tropical biome at the Eden Project and Te pointing at the first flower and saying, ‘eh, we’ve got a song about this one,’ and proceeded to pull out the guitars and sing it. Those that had worked in the biome for the last 8 years were excited to hear their plants had songs and new medicinal values as well as Latin names. The boys were such a hit at Eden that day that they were offered jobs for the rest of the summer. Next time… 
5. Taking the boys with the family across Devon at sunset in a hot air balloon. Oh. My. God. We landed in a field where there was a young farmers tug of war contest taking place. And although we missed the chance to enter the men from the sky in skirts as a team, we were soon invited for cider at the barn dance. Welcome to rural England!
6. Marau and Leavi’s random dancing on the bili bili rafts and around the village on the opening night of the show. No fear and absolute classic entertainment.
7. Api explaining on the BBC why, when he tried to say Bula to a swan it bit his finger.
8. Te lowering the Fijian flag as we all sang isa lei on our own little beach at Hampton Court to a slightly bemused, smiling and in some cases teary British public at the end of the show.
9. Api and Tale busking for their cocktails on Hampton Court bridge on their last night. Tale: ‘It’s easy to make money all you have to do is sing.’ Api, pointing at the guitar case: ‘heh, who put the pinapple in there?’
10. Marau two minutes away from attempting to take a bin-bag wrapped handsaw on the flight as carry on luggage at Heathrow. It was quickly shoved down the back of Tale’s rucksack. Laughter ensued before more tears as these big sensitive men said their final goodbyes. The laughter had gone back to Fiji.
Those were the moments I will remember. What were yours?
Lots of pictures from members on facebook and Nienke’s brilliant videos at tribewanted.tv
Almost time for me to return to Fiji, see through the three years and get ready for Vorovoro part two…
Vina’a va’alevu’s to Jane, Andrea, Ulai, Kelly, Keti, Sophie, Jim, Amy, Craig, James, Helen and all those who made this dream come true for the boys and help bring a little bit of the best of Fiji to the English summer.
Team Fiji UK itinerary and events
The pitch perfect sound of fiji from a caravan in south london
From Sophie in London
The boys have landed….. hooray! Yesterday afternoon Ben, Jane (representing Tourism Fiji) and I headed to Heathrow T3 to greet some very special, long awaited VIPs. A slightly jetlagged Tevita, Leavi, Marau and Api arrived after a couple of days sightseeing in Korea, along with our new adopted team members Charlie, Jim, Matthew and Jimmy – the band boys from Pacific Harbour. After some typically Fijian last-minute visa interview dramas it was a huge relief to see they guys on terra firma in London. The world continues to come to Vorovoro, and now Vorovoro has come to us. So, what do you do with 8 Fijian friends in the UK? After settling the boys in to their accommodation, we headed straight to a traditional English pub, of course!
Hidden on the banks of the Thames, down the river from Hampton Court Palace, everyone tucked in to bangers ‘n’ mash, pie and chips, and a refreshing pint. Given the location the guys were keen to hear learn about Henry VII and the local history along the river, check out the moored power boats, and completely bowled over by the sight of two enormous Afghan hounds on their evening stroll. “Is England full of big hairy dogs?” was Leavi’s response to the sight, though Api wants to know where all the other wild animals are. Monkeys, specifically. We spent a really fun evening sitting by the river (once the gang were fleeced up!) singing some songs, and having a good yarn. Tevita and Leavi also had a chat with Tui Mali who was delighted to hear that they had all landed safely. All the gang were up bright and early this morning. We were scheduled to leave for the site at 7am this morning, so up they got at 3am for morning baths and prayer. 3am!!! Hopefully once they are accustomed to the fact that it’s NOT too hot to work at 1pm they will be able to enjoy a bit more sleep. Though I think they might be internally hardwired to survive heavy grog sessions, a couple of hours sleep, and begin the work day at 6am!
We took a beautiful drive through the palace grounds, and everyone enjoyed the sight of deer, ducks and swans, and are already scoping out the best fishing spots along the Longwater, next to our spot in the grounds. After we blessed the building and ancestors in the traditional Fijian way (let’s face it, we don’t want any broken bones having angered Henry VII!) work began at an astonishing rate.
It’s wonderful to be witness the energy and teamwork these guys show, and my cheeks are hurting from all the laughter so far. The frames of the four bures that will be the centrepiece of our ‘village’ had already been erected by a local team, and the roofing reeds (flown in from Fiji) were ready and waiting to be laid. Whilst this is a laborious and lengthy process in Fiji, involving lashing the bundles of reeds to make the thatch, we’ve been provided with flattened dried palm panels – another traditional Fijian technique for roofing. Having had a good conflab over a cuppa and bacon sarnie, the boys set to it… but this is no Fijian construction site. Each man is kitted out with hard-hat, high-visibility jacket, gloves, and steel-toed boots and a metal scaffold tower takes the place of mangrove poles. Not a flip-flop or machete in sight! But thankfully the familiar whooping, laughter, and friendly teasing have been abundant. You can take the boy out of Vorovoro, but…..
No word of a lie, by morning tea the roof of the largest bure was nearly completed before anyone had the chance to even break a sweat, and we hope to have all the major work completed by Saturday, leaving plenty of time for sightseeing and socialising. Speaking of socialising, come along to the Dream Foundation Picnic on Sunday 28th June in Hyde Park, if you can.
Grub, grog, guitars! What more could you want? Marau, Leavi, Api, and Te will be there and are all looking forward to catching up with everyone. Tickets can be bought (until 6pm, Friday 26th) here http://www.eventbrite.com/search?loc=&q=tribewanted for £15 (£5 to cover your food and drink, with the remainder going to the Dream Foundation). What a week. Vorovoro’s Team Fiji arrive in the UK, as Tribewanted:Andina sets off on it’s first trek in Peru. Thank you for being part of Tribewanted…. this trip is a dream come true for our friends, and it’s down to each individual’s involvement that it’s been possible. Vinaka vaka levu!
Sota tale.
Whether its the recent launches of the iphone3.0 software , microsoft’s search engine ‘bing’ (nice travel pics), twitter on the cover of TIME magazine , or the giants of the digital world’s with the unveiling of googlewave ; there’s little doubt about the recession-defying buzz around the on-going revolution in the way we communicate, work and play via the web.
And I’d like to think we’ve all learnt a little bit about online communities and the evolution of the web over the last three years. So with plans and ideas developing for the next level of Tribewanted online (I’m calling it Tribewanted 2.0) I took myself along – in person – to a digital conference in London yesterday.
would the real API please stand up?
Here’s the top five things I took away from the experts:
1. “Use small feature set, and large API” Doug Richard
No this was not a reference to our boat captain! API stands for application programming interface, which basically means if Tribewanted had an API – other web developers could build off the back of our website and add new features etc…
What Doug the Dragon is advising here, is that when you start your digital venture, you should focus on not making what you offer complex in terms of features, but allow others to take your basic features and turn them into something much bigger. Twitter is a great example – its feature simply asks: ‘what are you doing?’ The API has turned it into a 1000 new desktop and mobile platforms.
2. “hashtag us to appear on the twitterfall”
hash (# like you find on your mobile) and tag (when you label something online like a picture of your mate on facebook) are used on twitter as a way of creating easy new searches for certain events.
Twitterfall is simply where the hashtag search your looking for will appear in a cascading waterfall effect.
So, at the ‘being digital event’ where I learnt this, the hashtag was #bde, which if you search for on twitter you will see all the comments that were made at yesterdays event by the participants.
Useful? Yes, if you want to track the buzz and feedback around events, no if you want to ignore your audience.
3. “The internet is geographic – its all about the data”
Mobile location technology fascinates me. Using your data connected to your location to discover a place, especially urban areas will continue to grow. Check Rumbble
4. “Twitter was the communication we didn’t realise we needed until it existed.”
Brilliant for networking and getting the news and content you’re interested in fed directly to you. Makes newspapers more and more (apart from looking at nice pictures) obsolete.
5. “Digital ideas: last seen, most loved”
There is a trend, especially in investment into online ventures that the last seen – ie the newest – tends to get the most love, attention, finance. This is fashion, but shows you that you continually need to be ready to keep your content and brand and community moving.
Now back to the real API – our boat captain. He should be here in ten days and I’m sure he won’t be the least bit concerned by any application programming interface. Thank god.
What does all this sexy tech mean for the tribe? Well if we were starting again now I don’t think we would have put as much time and money into building a bespoke community online, and would be focusing more on sharing the sites development (just as we do on Vorovoro) – maybe via an API. Open ID (logging into any social network with one ID) is going to make multiple community memberships a lot easier to manage and allow niche communities like us to hopefully thrive.
I’ve also just re-connected (via Twitter) with global gossip , a travellers internet provider, who are bringing faster services to Fiji. Let’s hope they can help us replace Vodafone’s sluggish service on Vorovoro, or at the very least in Labasa.
follow the fun and insight with me on twitter
…and finally, if you want to see what the minority report is like in real life then check this amazing film out.
Update: 12:28PM A LOCAL tourism worker who does not consider sharing the Fijian culture a chore has gained overseas recognition for his selfless approach to work.
Tevita Ratunigaloa, the community manager of Tibewanted at Vorovoro island, received rave reviews that led him to be selected as one of the top six tour guides in the world.
The international competition, organised by Leap Local _ a travel website that was ranked among the world’s best by the UK’s Guardian newspaper _ was judged by an international panel of responsible tourism experts that included journalists and authors.
The five judges each picked six winning tourist guides and services and then debated the results during a live online conference.
“Tevita didnt even know he was competing, but is pleased to be amongst the winners,” shared Leap Local.
“This is a big honor for me, and makes me feel very proud. To share the traditional culture ofFiji
with the world is a blessing from God, vinaka vaka levu,” he was quoted to have said.
The hospitality guides were judged on the quality of experience they provided to the traveler, their eco-impact and whether they give back to their communities.
Tevita was an obvious winner on all counts.The other five were fromIndia, thePhilippines, two fromPeru, andEaster Island.
“Sponsors of the competition, such as ‘Go Outdoors’ from theUK, have provided prizes of sporting gear, while other sponsors are awarding free promotion to the winners,” said Leap Local.
Ben Keene of Tribewanted told Leap Local that the tribe would celebrate with Tevita as the project had gone from a three-year social experiment to a longer-term community project.
