Tahiti, Islands Under The Sun (1960s)

This is a focus leader. Do your movies look like this? Do your soundtracks sound like this or like this. And so you need this a focus leader. First, set your lens so that these lines are sharp and clear on all parts of the screen. Now, set the volume control on your projector. The sound level should be adjusted until my voice can be clearly understood in all sections of the room. You are now ready to participate in another Pan-Amean travel adventure. [Music] [Music] You wonder sometimes where in this world is there a secret place? Well, come. Life is to be lived. I will show you one. It takes only the strong silver wings of a dream. For there is not much distance anymore between the dream and the reality. It waits for you a tiny fantastic jewel. Voila. In the South Pacific in this tide beating heart of Earth. The secret place of secret places. [Music] You know, ever since man was old enough to think. He has wondered which he was living, the reality or the dream. Which is really life, the dream or the waking? What does it matter? I care only that I am returning to Tahiti, flying once again over the Pacific. Oh, the Pacific. This devil of oceans, this angel of oceans, this god. And in the lap of this god, Tahiti Bora Bora Muria Huahini the Tuamo Tahiti like whispered words of love. Huh? Such is a South Seas. Such is paradise. [Music] Ah, the tiar Tahiti, the flower of Tahiti is there upon the wind. It will tell you surely that you are back again to the big Tahiti city of Papete to the warm friendliness of the people to Papete with its hotels its stores its hidden excitements and you have been drawn here like all the others for this is the dream harbor of every sailor's soul. This is where he must bring his boat, his soul. And they come to hug the gentle trade winds, to drift, to dream. [Music] Great sailors came. Captain Cook, Bllye, writers, artists, Ly Stevenson, Goan Mo, many other giants among people looked as I am looking, saw what I'm seeing, even so long ago, felt what I'm feeling, and came back again also. And blind men of the bounty, not far from here, the mutinied. Oh, I tell you this, Tahiti. It tugs at a quiet little mutiny in each of us. And it is everywhere this urging to mutiny to become yourself for a while. It is reflected in the water. You feel it in the soft blowing trade winds. It is caught somewhere in the rhythm of the islands. The rhythm of timelessness. [Music] Time does not fly here. It goes nowhere. [Music] Here there is no time. Only now, today. And always another tomorrow. Just like today. [Music] And this Tiki, this half-remembered god still watches out of timeless eyes. For how many years has Tiki watched the same thing? Huh? [Music] [Music] My soul Oh, we are we are we are we are we not give up our name [Music] and the mountains of Tahiti, the corals of Bora Bora, the sweet smell of salt spray. We are the same them as now. [Music] Yesterday and today here there is a glorious blending of time and this rhythm of timelessness is in the little everyday things the people do. [Music] You see, no rush, no push. The air is always soft and sweet. And this alone makes people happy. And you are happy because everybody else is happy. [Applause] So it becomes a joyous thing to stand and look at the people or just to walk on the streets of a piet [Music] or you are happy riding a bicycle. Get him. [Music] At once anywhere on the islands becomes some place to go to be like to the market in Papiet. And the people, they they go anywhere they can. [Music] And what a highway this sea is. never has to be made wider or repaired. From the island of Moria, they come to the big market in Papiet. From Huin, they bring special foods to sell or trade in Papete. And like everything, a trip from island to island is fun. And the food of life naturally belongs in a lifeboat or on a crazy Tahesian bus. [Music] And this market, an early morning mosaic of the South Seas. Colors and textures from many lands make an island people. French and English explorers, American whalers, Chinese, and the rich smells of island food. Papaya, pmplamus, bread fruit. But this is not so much a place for shopping that that only takes 10, 15 minutes. The truly important things take longer. The seeing of old friends and the island gossip network, the dawn broadcast of radio coconut. And everything is adapted to the rhythm of the islands. [Music] like the going to church. [Music] [Applause] [Music] You know there is an old island saying God's thoughts are soft in Tahiti. [Music] He's a simple god this one. The god of laughter, of love, god of children. [Music] Well, it is a warm natural truth. A child springs from love, from laughter. [Music] to hide in my hiding my [Music] holy am [Music] And here there is much of both. Yes, the air over the islands is rich with a sense of love and a sense of beauty. Innocent, simple. [Music] You know there is a thing called lifeh. Well, who has yet thought of anything better or a better place than here to live it? So they are the children of joy of deviv. For them to sing, to dance is to breathe. Neither. They sing, they dance, but they get hungry, too. After all, the fish does not swim out of the water and walk to the table to be eaten. Someone must catch him. Hello. Work. Of course, it is never necessary to catch all the fish at one time. There is always enough there for tomorrow. It stays very fresh. My friend Moa says the thing about work is to catch just enough fish for each family's hunger. And a little more when you need to trade fish for some clothes for a new pario, but just enough for, as he says, who can wear more than one pario? Or they push just enough copra for delivery to the boat? Or sell just enough soda pop or cakes. They know what is work anyway, but to feed the fun of life. So they do what it is necessary to do and work is a happy thing. [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] ah here is a wonderful thing of work. Every year the people come in their boats to the touatus for three months they dive for pearl shell. [Music] Oh, what a fine thing it is to watch them wrap their pario around them and slide into water as warm as the sun itself. Take the piece of lead between their toes, then down 60 ft, 80 ft, over 100 ft to the floor of the ocean. Put the shells in a basket and up. [Music] [Music] One always looks sometimes maybe a white pearl, sometimes a black. Most of the time nothing. But what does it matter? And what is a pearl anyway? This is a pearl truly. Well, what must a pearl do? Huh? To get what little money a Tahishian needs, the people work with the coconut to make copra. They ship it away. From this dried coconut meat, coconut oil is pressed to give Tahesian tans to the women of the outside world. This pearl gives them drink and it is always fresh and cool and good. The meat of the coconut feeds them with the fibrous. They squeeze a cream from it for cooking [Applause] and the shells give them fuel for fires. The heavy fiber from the husks holds the boats together and the coconut tree itself. With it they build their houses and weave the fronts to make the roofs to keep out the sun and the rain. But coconut or fish or coffee beans, one looks a good thing of work straight in its face. He knows he has prepared the beans for drying and the sun is there to dry them. So what is simpler than having the sun as your drying machine? No buttons to push, no breakdowns to worry over. And what is finer than working to live rather than living to work, to possess, to own? Well, the work part is done and now there is time for fun. What shall it be? H. Aha, something. For a Tahesian is not a wandering person. He moves always in a straight simple line. Well, I told you this is a boy with a purpose. [Music] Hey, Heat. Heat. Thank you. Hey. Hey. [Music] And a Tahesian night it comes dancing out of day. [Music] The quiet breeze from the lagoon. [Music] The undertone of the ocean against the reef. [Music] a garden of Eden. But here they have no serpents [Music] and no apples. [Music] Well, Tahiti night fishing primitive Exciting pollination. [Music] Tahiti takes you always into its past. [Music] Oh, Tahiti where there is no time like a dream. Maybe here the dream is the waking. Anyway, it is enough to come for two, three weeks and be oneself, to be refreshed by life, to take home with you a little of this magic. It waits for you. Tahiti waits. You come, huh? [Music] You m you [Music]