Most of my local negotiations, of course, had to be carried on in French, of which I knew even less than Japanese. Just to convey our thanks to the proprietors of the Cercle Polynesienne for their offer of shower facilities, or to order a drink, became a frustrating or a challenging adventure, depending on the situation and one’s temperament. We began to see the sense in having an international language which would be a second tongue to all and could be dusted off and used anywhere in the world.
Tahiti has always been a Mecca for yachtsmen. During our stay, we met several—some of them transients like ourselves; others who had succumbed to the charms of Tahiti and settled themselves more or less permanently. Outstanding among the latter was William Robinson, who circled the globe many years ago in his famous Svaap. Robinson seemed to be very shy and reserved, but when he came aboard he soon lost his shyness, when the talk shifted from social nonessentials to a discussion of the best rig to use in trade-wind cruising.
Another yachtsman of former days deserves special mention: Robert Argod, who sailed out from France with his wife and children and several others on Fleur d’Océan and has remained as captain of an interisland schooner. He is the uncontested senior host to all visiting yachts and has a fascinating logbook with pictures and accounts of all the yachtsmen they have met, a treasury of cruising yachts. We began to understand more clearly the close bond that grows up between those who sail, the gradual accumulation of anecdotes and experiences which one hears and passes on so that, although we may never meet many of the yachts mentioned in the Argod logbook, we feel that we are old friends.
As June passed into July, preparations for the Bastille Day fete began to get under way in earnest. Because of our location—practically a part of the Midway—we had ringside seats for everything and could stroll out a dozen times a day to see how the work was getting along. The concessions themselves were not unlike those of any honky-tonk state fair, but there was a charm and novelty to the French and Tahitian songs that poured out of every sidewalk café, a gaiety to the brilliant pareu, or wrap-around skirt, with which the dark-haired women clothed themselves, and a bit of humor in the fact that the frequent parking areas, labeled “Garage,” were to accommodate bicycles instead of cars. Cold pop vied in popularity with drinking nuts—the natives drinking the pop and the tourists the coconut milk!
Most fascinating of all was the transformation of the large park in front of the Governor’s Palace, which was to be the scene of the Bastille Day ball and the subsequent dance contests. A huge wooden dance floor was fitted together and laid down on the grass. Around it were set coconut palms, clumps of plants, and flowering ginger—all transplanted for the occasion. Strings of colored lights were festooned across the area and dozens of little tables were set up around the edges of the floor, changing the open lawn into a fairy-tale ballroom. On the night of July 14 hundreds of couples completed the picture, a picture as evanescent as Cinderella’s own finery, for the very next day the palms and the torch ginger were discarded, the dance floor was carted off, and a new phase of the construction got under way with the erection of grandstands and bleachers around the smooth expanse of grass where the dance contests would next be held.
The fete itself opened officially with a bang—with twenty-one bangs, in fact—as the government fulfilled the promises made on all the posters: Vingt et un coups de canon!!! That afternoon (while Mi-ke was on the boat giving birth to a long-awaited brood of kittens), the various dance teams, in costume, paid ceremonial calls on the Mayor and the Governor and presented gifts of bananas, breadfruit, and coconuts, as well as bundles of live chickens, ducks, and even suckling pigs. (After the formal presentations had been complete, the gifts were quietly returned to the donors.)
As soon as the opening ceremonies had been disposed of, the booths along the Midway went into full swing. Soon the dancers themselves became a colorful part of the scene, their grass skirts discarded and slung over their shoulders as they wandered along the street in more conventional garb, licking ice-cream cones.
Throughout the week of the fete, events came thick and fast. The most widely publicized feature, of course, is the series of dance contests in which teams from most of the neighboring islands as well as of the many districts on Tahiti itself take part. The Tahitian hula, justly famous, has to be seen to be believed. The girls vibrate with such frenetic yet effortless activity, to the insistent rhythms of native drums, and their hips perform such incredible gyrations that the dance leader not only has to call the figures but must constantly circulate among the dancers to retie a skirt or adjust a bra that a performer has danced herself right out of!
In addition to the nightly dance contests there was an overflowing program of events: sailing canoe races, spear-throwing contests, soccer games, swimming and diving competitions, horse racing, greased-pole climbing, and to climax all, the hotly contested outrigger canoe races, both single- and double-hull canoes which are propelled at incredible speed by teams of men or women rowers.
The fete was officially over, but the Midway was still going strong when we left Papeete on the 20th of July. The palm-bedecked booths were turning yellow in the heat, the flowers had long since wilted, but the performers, loath to return to their outer island homes, still wandered the streets doing brief dances for a few francs here and there or selling their dance costumes outright if a buyer could be found. We thought it time to sail on.