Robert Locke [email protected] Lonely Island A True and Fictional Tragical Historical yet Comical Account Of the Myriad Mysteries and Enigmas Of Easter Island by Clayton Bess All Rights Reserved: This manuscript or any portion thereof may not be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the author or his agent. Or at least that’s what I used to put on all my title pages. Now I’m getting so old that all I want to do is just share. So if you like what you see here, go ahead and use it, but please give attribution to Bob/Clay. © Robert Locke 2004 rev. 11/06 Title Page rev. 7/30/2015 LONELY ISLAND Table of Contents Chapter One: The Mysteries 1 Chapter Two: Rano Raraku and the Mystery of the Moai 11 Chapter Three: The Joneses 33 Chapter Four: Europe Comes to Our Island 43 1722 – The Mysteries Begin 53 1770 – The Spanish 60 1774 – The English 68 Chapter Five: The English and Good Gossip 74 Chapter Six: The English Trek 79 Chapter Seven: Bad Men Coming 86 Chapter Eight: 1786 – A Gentleman of France 94 Chapter Nine: Mrs. Routledge and the Cannibals 106 Chapter Ten: Stretching the Truuuuuuuuth 131 Chapter Eleven: War 151 Chapter Twelve: The Battle of Poike Ditch 164 Chapter Thirteen: More Killing, And Now, Eating 178 Chapter Fourteen: The End of the Story – Not So 193 Chapter Fifteen: 1872 – A Wild Child of France 200 Chapter Sixteen: Rongorongo 226 Chapter Seventeen: Orongo 239 Chapter Eighteen: And Here Am I 247 Glossary … not yet completed List of Works Cited … 261 Index … not yet completed List of Figures Figure 1: Moai at Rano Raraku …………………………………………………………. 5 Figure 2: Rano Raraku, Another Angle ………………………………………………… 6 Figure 3: Where Kansas Is………………………………………………………………. 8 Figure 4: Coffin………………………………………………………………………….. 12 Figure 5: Coffin Up Close………………………………………………………………… 12 Figure 6: El Gigante, 1957......……………………………………………......................... 13 Figure 7: El Gigante, 1992…………………………………………………....................... 13 Figure 8: El Gigante, Today................................................................................................. 14 Figure 9: Ahu Tongariki, Four Moai..................................................................................... 15 Figure 10: El Gigante from His Foot...................................................................................... 17 Figure 11: Moai In Progress................................................................................................... 18 Figure 12: Moai and East End of Island……………………………………………………. 18 Figure 13: Horses and Moai Inside the Crater……………………………………………... 19 Figure 14: Excavating a Moai (by Mrs. Routledge)……………………………………….. 21 Figure 15: Excavating a Moai, Second View (by Mrs. Routledge)………………………… 21 Figure 16: Keel beneath a Carving…………………………………………………………. 22 Figure 17: Hands and Fingers of a Moai……………………………………………………. 23 Figure 18: Back Designs of a Moai…………………………………………………………. 23 Figure 19: Map of Ancient Roads (Mrs. Routledge)………………………………………... 24 Figure 20: Kneeling Statue (Lonely Fellow)………………………………………………… 26 Figure 21: Ahu Tongariki, Fifteen Moai……………………………………………………. 27 Figure 22: Ana-Kai Tangata (Mrs. Routledge)…………………………………………….. 39 Figure 23: Drawings Inside Ana-Kai Tangata (Mrs. Routledge)…………………………… 41 Figure 24: Humuhumunukunukuapua'a…………………………………………………….. 47 Figure 25: Our People with Moai…………………………………………………………… 52 Figure 26: Our "Signatures"………………………………………………………………. 64 Figure 27: Map of Early Exploratory Paths……………………………………………….. 66 Figure 28: Man of Our Island by Mr. Hodges…………………………………………….. 78 Figure 29: Cave with Broken Roof …………………………………………....................... 83 Figure 30: Moai of Mr. Hodges……………………………………………………………. 85 Figure 31: Clans Map of Mrs. Routledge………………………………………………….. 90 Figure 32: Our Cemetery Today……………………………………………………………. 99 Figure 33: Four Informants of Mrs. Routledge…………………………………………….. 106 Figure 34: Angata……………………………………………………………....................... 108 Figure 35: Rano Kao……………………………………………………………………….. 118 Figure 36: Motu Kao Kao, Motu Iti and Motu Nui…………………………………… 119 Figure 37: Ahu Akivi…………………………………………………………………… 120 Figure 38: Kava kava…………………………………………………………………… 123 Figure 39: Drawing by Mrs. Routledge of Entire Island from Rano Kao……………… 127 Figure 40: Photo of Entire Island from Rano Kao……………………………………… 127 Figure 41: Polynesian Triangle…………………………………………………………. 129 Figure 42: Kon Tiki and Pacific Currents………………………………………………. 134 Figure 43: Moai with Long Ears (Mrs. Routledge)…………………………………….. 145 Figure 44: Stonework at Ahu Vinapu………………………………………………….. 166 Figure 45: Mataa……………………………………………………………………….. 178 Figure 46: Downed Moai………………………………………………………………. 188 Figure 47: Two Downed Moai…………………………………………………………. 189 Figure 48: Row of Downed Moai………………………………………………………. 190 Figure 49: Downed Moai Contemplated With a Cigarette…………………………….. 190 Figure 50: Moai Collecting Water……………………………………………………… 191 Figure 51: Paro…………………………………………………………………………. 192 Figure 52: Watercolor by Pierre Loti of an Ahu and Moai…………………………….. 219 Figure 53: Loti at Rano Raraku………………………………………………………… 222 Figure 54: Loti at Rano Raraku Two…………………………………………………… 223 Figure 55: Romantic Imagination of M. Loti………………………………………….. 223 Figure 56: Our People Welcome M. Pierre Loti………………………………………. 225 Figure 57: Rongorongo Board…………………………………………………………. 230 Figure 58: Rongorongo Board, Obverse………………………………………………. 231 Figure 59: Rongorongo Board, Reverse……………………………………………….. 231 Figure 60: Moai with Eyes………………………………………………………….… 253 Figure 61: Ahu Akivi…………………………………………………………….…… 253 Figure 62: Ahu Tongariki……………………………………………………………… 254 Figure 63: Moai Broken Forever………………………………………………………. 255 Figure 64: The Earth from Space, the Arctic Ice Cap Melting…………………………. 258 Figure 65: Sunset………………………………………………………………………. 260 Lonely Island by Clayton Bess - 1 Chapter One The Mysteries They say we ate people. I think probably we did. But that was a long time ago. I was not even alive. I myself did not eat the people, not myself. Our people did. If they did. And although I think they did, what does that have to do with me? What does that have to do with today? Perhaps we will need to eat people again. Things happen that way sometimes when you live on an island. They say we are a friendly people. I do not think I am friendly, so much. I do not think I am unfriendly, either, so much. I am who I want to be: Toromiru. From the way I am writing this, you are going to think I am mad. And perhaps I am mad. Perhaps that is the reason I am writing this, because I am mad. I am mad because people from so many different places around the planet keep coming here to look at us. They want to take our photos. My brother is very handsome and my sister is very beautiful; so these many people from their many places want photos of my brother and sister especially. My brother says, “Why? Where will I see that photo?” The reason my brother says that? Perhaps my brother is mad, too. He knows that when the people go back to their homes around the planet, then perhaps they will use that photo in a story that perhaps they will write about us. So many different people are always writing about us in so many different languages. They all descend upon us wanting to know about our island because our island is “mysterious” and our island is an “enigma” and so what? And we are the people who live on this “mysterious and enigmatic island” and so what? And so they put our photos in their stories. And Lonely Island by Clayton Bess - 2 sometimes what they write is not true or even close to true, but they have our photos anyway. But when my brother asks them why they want his photo, he says it with a grin, and they go ahead and take his photo anyway. But I think inside, perhaps, my brother is not grinning. My brother is the one who takes the different peoples who speak English. I call them the Englishers: the Americans and English and Australians, of course, but also usually the Germans and the Japanese, and all of those who understand the language of English better than they understand the language of Spanish. My sister is the one who takes the Spanishers. Those are the different peoples from South America and Central America and Spain, and often the Italians and the French, too, or wherever they perhaps understand the language of Spanish better than the language of English. Those are the only two choices. Nobody who comes here knows our own language—Rapanui, as it is now called by our people and by some of the other peoples—and so it is no use to speak our own language to them. Nobody speaks it but us. I usually follow my brother so that I can learn the English better. I am not allowed to lead the tours yet—if ever?—because I am too young. Or that is what they say. But that is not true either. I am certainly old enough, but perhaps no one trusts me enough, which is why I ask—"if ever?"—in the way that I do. There is always the matter of the lying and the doubting vis a vis the telling of the truth, that which is prickly. I can take the Spanishers better than my sister because I have read many more books than she. And because I have followed my brother so many times I can do the Englishers equally good as to him. Perhaps better because I am always listening to the Lonely Island by Clayton Bess - 3 Englishers talking to each other at the same time my brother is talking to them. So I know the questions they have but do not have the opportunity to ask him. Or perhaps they do not want to ask him for fear of offense, and often these questions are indeed offensive, but then, what is to be done about