Easter Island/Rapa Nui

The Tapati Festival is an annual celebration of Rapanui culture that takes place in the summer (by southern hemisphere reckoning) around the end of January and the beginning of February. We had a hard time finding out the exact dates before we got there, so we missed three days at the beginning and two days at the end, including, unfortunately, the parade.

The festival is structured as a series of contests between two groups that represent two candidates for Queen of the Festival, somewhat like the confederations of old. The winning individuals or groups of each event are given points and at the end of the festival the candidate whose group has accumulated the most points is declared queen. This year the candidates were Emilia Hei Pakarati - young, pretty, and sexy - and Gina Pakarati Patay - a little older, poised, and graceful.

Most of the events took place at Hanga Vere Vere, a field on the coast between Hanga Roa port and the Tahai complex, within easy walking (and hearing) distance of our hotel.

The first event we attended was a gastronomical contest where different families in traditional costumes prepared their specialties and displayed them in thatch-roofed booths where the judges could sample them. In the same area there were thatch restaurants serving free food, such as shish kebobs and pineapple/chicken empanadas. At the eastern end of the field was a large stage decorated with huge figures and scenes from the culture. The decorations are changed annually, and this year's design featured the "founding father" of Rapanui culture, Hotu Matua, in the center; his sister, Queen Avareipua, on the right; and an elderly woman Maori (wise woman) on the left holding a giant string figure known in Hawaii as "three eyes." The model for the Maori woman, we learned, was the grandmother of our hotel clerk. The "orchestra" area was reserved for VIPs who got chairs, occasionally tables, and refreshments. Behind that were log benches for the plebians, like tourists and most of the locals who weren't performing.

The next event we went to started at 10pm (as did all the evening events). The show began with a Rapa Nui band playing local music, and some young dancers in costume. Rapa Nui music and dance are a unique blend of different instruments, styles, and traditions, due to the near annihilation of the race and the borrowing from other cultures in order to recreate their own. For instance, "traditional" instruments include the ukurere, based on the word "ukulele," but really a Tahitian instrument with six strings and a flat body with no soundbox that sounds like a banjo; guitars, of course; bongo and conga drums from Central America; and, believe it or not, a small piano accordeon that was introduced by European sailors (there is hardly anything more strange than seeing a bare-footed, grass-skirted, bare-chested adult man playing an accordeon). The "traditional" dances borrow a lot from Tahiti, but also include gestures from Hawaii, couple dancing from Samoa, derivations of sea chantys from the sailors, and - here we go again - the tango from Chile (if there's anything more strange than the accordeonist, it's a man and a woman in Polynesian native dress doing the tango!). And "traditional" costumes borrow a lot from Tahiti and Aotearoa (New Zealand).

After the first show came the string figure contest. Since I'm going to cover string figures in a different section I'll pass over that right now.

Following the string figure contest was the body-painting contest, or Takona (no Hawaiian equivalent). For this contest the contestants came on stage in in their body paint and did skits, then explained in Rapanui what the paint ingredients were and the meaning of each of the symbols on each part of the body. First was a young teenage boy in a breechclout, painted in gray with white symbols on his body. He brought out a whole kit of natural paints and called for a couple of volunteers. A man and a boy jumped on stage and the contestant painted various symbols on them in red and yellow ochre to demonstrate the process. He then said, "Maruru" (thank you in Rapanui) and the man left, but the boy stayed, as if unsure what to do. The contestant said "Maruru" a couple of more times without effect, then carefully and clearly said, "Muchas gracias!" and the boy finally left. Although the kid looked Rapanui he obviously wasn't.

The next contestant was a man who came on stage carrying a large, freshly-caught tuna over his shoulder, accompanied by two boys carrying smaller fish and a big eel. After him came a woman who was totally nude except for red ochre and a g-string (she must have had some symbols, but I don't remember), and another woman also nude with a g-string, painted all in gray with similar white symbols all over her body. When it came time to explain them she simply took a provocative stance and said, "Komari!" (vulva) and the locals all laughed. We left about 12:30 am when the storytelling started (and lasted till 4 or 5 am, like most nights).

On another night we watched a contest between the two queen candidates which was supposed to demonstrate their skill at making traditional clothing, but which might just as well have been called the "Who Can Make The Skimpiest Costume" contest. Each queen had to model a costume that she had made out of shells, then banana bark, then feathers, then paper bark. Emilia won skimpiness without a problem (her smallest outfit was a crotch cup made of shells), but Gina outdid her in elegance (her cape of feathers was a marvel).

Following that was a dance contest with separate troupes of children, adolescents and adults representing each candidate and numbering from 50 to over a hundred each. The children's group representing Emilia featured a highly talented five-year-old who led the whole dance sequence with skill and aplomb. Emilia's adult group was overtly sexual as well as very talented and featured several women running around and between the other dancers while mock riding and whipping several men. There was also a rousing sea chanty sequence and a hootchy-kootchy bit. Her segment ended with Emilia herself stripped down to a string bikini and actually riding a strong young man who stamped and snorted like a horse for a very long time. Gina's whole group was more sedate and more subtly sexual, though not quite as skilled. We left at 1 am, feeling worn out, while the singing went on and on.

The last evening event we attended (with hotel towels to cushion the logs) was a traditional song contest between the two groups, with about fifty singers on each side. The rules for this one were that each group got to sing three songs in turn. Only traditional Rapanui songs could be sung - no songs about Rapanui from anywhere else. The first team to use a foreign song, to repeat a song, or to use a song sumg by the other team. would lose. If no one lost, the judges would rule on the winner according to costume, language ability, and enthusiasm. The contest ended around 5 am, but we don't know who won.

We also attended the finals of the rock sculpting contest at Hanga Pito, a small bay west of town. The judges were having a hard time choosing between a larger-than-life sculpture in red scoria of a man in traditional dress, and a smaller-than-life sculpture in gray tuff of a swimmer with a raft holding an egg, exquisitely done. However, the larger carving finally won.

On our last full day Rosita picked us up with another visitor and we drove out to a steep, grassy cone roughly in the middle of the island, called Maunga Pi'u, site of the exciting sports contest called Haka Pe'i. Although the word pe'i is related to the Hawaiian word peki, meaning "to move along step by step," on Rapanui it refers to a dangerously fast (up to 50 mph) sledding sport in which the contestants speed down a 45 degree hill for 120 meters (close to 400 feet) - if they make it. Furthermore, they wear nothing but bodypaint and a very brief breechclout, and the sled consists of two banana stalks tied together.

We got there early enough to get good spots on the grass at the base of the hill, but even with my 20x binoculars I could barely make out what the people on top of the hill were doing. Finally, after a few hundred more people had arrived - by taxi, private car, truck and horseback - the contest began.

Each contestant had to lie on his back on the stalks, which were so heavy that it took four or five men to get the sleds started, and a horse to drag them off the field. An ambulance waited at the bottom. Rosita told us that there had been some bad accidents in the past. I could believe it, because this was not just a grassy slope; it was a slope of lava rocks and dirt with grass growing on it. With my binocs I watched the first man come down, looking scared but determined as he held on tightly to the sled by the ropes. He made it safely, as did the second one. The third one, though, was a truly heroic sledder. He came down the slope with his legs held high as if to say, "Who needs to hold on?" and, in addition to sliding farther than anyone else, he rose up on his feet and actually surfed the last few yards! A frequent visitor to Rapanui whom I spoke to later said he had never heard of anyone doing that before. The hero was not only good, he was young and handsome and I think his name was Claudio Romero.

The next two fell hard before getting halfway down, tumbling among the rocks without serious injury, but the third made it okay. It was amusing to watch the female tourists running to get pictures taken with the contestants. After it was over we shared a fresh watermelon with some friends of Rosita.

NEXT -> String Figures