Page 11 - CAMPAIGN Spring 2021

age of two plus, I believe my father used to go and work alongside the British soldiers who were already stationed here.
As time went on, I remembered being escorted with my family during the early hours to board a landing craft military (LCM) boat out to sea. I didn’t know the reason for the trip out at the time, but there were many other people with us. The LCM boat we boarded had fancy criss-cross wooden flooring with gaps and oily seawater underneath. It was still dark but after a long while out at sea, we returned to land at dawn. We arrived at the wharf at the end of the bay (NAAFI side) and everyone embarked and climbed up onto the wharf platform. I was distressed during the landing because my father let go of my hand to help my older siblings lifting them up onto the wharf and I fell through the flooring gaps into the oily seawater in the boat.
However, thank God I was quickly lifted up, and met by Toonga’s wife, called Nei Tainang. We were all scampering together towards the village, still early hours. When we got home, I was washed and changed, and I recalled my parents having an argument over my accident!
During those times, I later learned that the boat trip we took out to sea, was the first time England tested its bomb.
My father explained that we weren’t the only ones having to leave the island. There were some taken by aeroplane to Canton because they were too frightened of the first test. And there were others taken to Fanning Island, but everyone returned at the same time.
After a long while, I was over 3 years old, I remembered my father came home from work one day and told my mum that we ought to go to bed early because there would be another bomb testing in the early hours. When we heard this, we were all worried because our mum was crying not wanting to hear, but my father told us that there was nothing we could do about it as the decision was already made from England and that was the sole reason why the soldiers were here, to test their bombs. He reassured us that there was nothing to be frightened of as the test was perfectly safe as per the time, we were taken to safety out at sea. Nothing happened, no casualties, like nothing ever happened.
At midnight we were startled, as I was very sleepy but I was given no time to wake up properly, so feeling much like soldiers, we were ordered sternly to gather up our mat, a pillow and blanket and to hurry for it’s almost bomb blasting time! How miserably inconveniencing!
I wasn’t very happy about my sleep being interrupted and besides, my father held my hand and hurriedly walking and forgetting my legs were only small, so I was going along at a running pace! He couldn’t carry me, as he had covers and stuff to carry too and my mum was also pregnant.
When we got to the assembly point, others were already there, some were watching the film and some were just lounging whilst awaiting the bomb test. We put our mats down and continued our sleep. But there was no way anyone could relax and rest for all the noisy other children running around and people collecting their delicious bread and having a midnight picnic! We had no choice but to join in and got our bread and had the picnic without a drink!
After a short while, the headcount started and people were put into smaller groups. My father was also given a group of people from two Gilbert islands to look after and everyone was instructed to keep calm and stay put for its almost time! Everyone was quiet as the clerk to the Kiribati government, Mr Tiriboo, announced over the tannoy, telling everyone to pay attention and to listen and await for further instructions.
The speaker was on very loud and that petrified me even more as it’s a different setting to the first test and my father explained it’s the biggest English bomb ever to be tested! The clerk bellowed instructions through the loud speaker ordering the older people, “it’s time to put your dark glasses on and hold and cover your little ones’ eyes with your hands tightly and cover yourselves up with your supplied blankets.” “Ready for the brilliance lighting from the bomb ... “ and he started the count- down 5,4,3,2,1 and there it was! Brighter and so much hotter than the sun in daylight!
After the brilliant light had occurred, the clerk announced instructions to everyone, “it’s now safe to remove your glasses and come out from undercover.”
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CAMPAIGN SPRING 2021