Rapa Nui (Rylan Reiny, Blaize Walker, Eden Yee)

Rapa Nui

By Rylan Reiny, Blaize Walker and Eden Yee

Contents:

Map/Land..............................................1
People....................................................2
Culture...................................................3
Climate Change....................................4
Similarities and Differences................5
Works Cited...........................................6

Map/Land

Welcome to the island of Rapa Nui, where lava flows formed the triangular shape of the island. Lava flows interrupt the soft eroded cliffs that form the coast. The small hilly island was created by three volcanoes rising from the seafloor. All three are now extinct. Also, many beaches are made of gravel and many caves reach lava beds.

People

On the sheltered west coast, the village of Hanga Roa holds nearly all of Rapa Nui's population. The people settled on the island around 800 AD. They are mostly of Polynesian descent and were skilled workers in stone and wood. At the time, the forest was very thick and was a nesting place for the majority of their birds.

Later, when the government came over to the island, the people used to have very little voice in government affairs.

The people also only had a few mixed Polynesian and non-Polynesian words recorded before the missionaries introduced the Tahitian dialect in 1864. Their writing is different from any other known writings. Spanish is mostly spoken.

Culture

In conclusion, we don't know much about Rapa Nui. However, a lot is known about their history and traditions because of the things they left behind on the island. They divide and separate parts of the island with long ears and small ears, and the island is made up of lots of volcanic rocks and stone. Creating this island also had the people of Rapa Nui create moai, or the stone heads of Rapa Nui. These heads are not known much about because people and others do not know about the people of Rapa Nui, but these moai are believed to have been created and put in place by the people of Rapa Nui. We also know that they developed their own writing. As matter of fact, they were the ONLY Pacific culture to develop writing. It was a form that used pictures as symbols (carved from wood). Now, only 25 examples are left. The islanders might have destroyed it themselves before the missionaries came.

Climate Change

A huge problem the people of Rapa Nui faced came from the volcanoes. The landscape of Rapa Nui was surrounded by lava that burned the fields of crops and food. The island was cultivated with crops, but since the people of Rapa Nui could no longer farm, they switched to getting income and food from tourism.

Another major problem the Rapa Nui people faced was a lack of water. Freshwater is a much-needed resource on Easter Island that mostly depends on rain, which maintains the only three permanent surficial fresh water sources on the island: two lakes (Rano Kao and Rano Raraku) and a marsh (Rano Aroi). Under these conditions, the LIA drought could have significantly affected human life. However, the Rapa Nui society remained healthy, showing remarkable resilience.

One last problem the people of Rapa Nui faced was the construction of moai statues that greatly impacted Rapa Nuiʻs forests. The trees were used for transporting and erecting the large statues, which eventually led to a declining forest. Once all the trees were destroyed, materials were limited and wildlife most likely declined. Rapa Nui had destroyed their entire culture and ecosystem by the end of the 17th century.

Similarities and Differences

Rapa Nui has a few things in common with Hawaiʻi such as, they both attract a lot of tourists, both were formed from volcanoes, they both have cultural languages, both are ruled by foreign countries, and they are both Pacific Islands. However, they also have a lot of differences such as, they attract tourists for different reasons. For example, Rapa Nui attracts tourists because of its moai statue, and Hawaiʻi attracts tourists because of Waikīkī and advertisements. Hawaiʻi still has a thriving forest environment rich in wildlife, unlike Rapa Nui. The population in Rapa Nui is much smaller than in Hawaiʻi. The moai statue is in both Hawaiʻi and Rapa Nui, these statues hold a special resemblance to Rapa Nui, in Hawaiʻi our special resemblance is the hula. We dance it to tell stories of ancestors, make people feel a different mood, and show them things that Hawaiians did in the past.