The British High Commissioner, His Excellency David Ward, gave the keynote address at the Samoa Observer Short Story Competition Prize-giving ceremony at the National University of Samoa (NUS) Fale on the morning of Tuesday 8 November 2022. See below his full speech delivered prior to the students' prize-giving ceremony. 

Gatoaitele Savea Sano Malifa, Editor in Chief, and Muliaga Jean Malifa of the Samoa Observer; Vice Chancellor of the National University of Samoa, Aiono Alec Ekeroma; Judges; Representatives of our sponsors, SSAB, Vodafone, Eveni Block, Teachers, Parents, Pupils, Ladies and Gentlemen.

“The true wisdom is to be always seasonable, and to change with a good grace in changing circumstances.”  

These were some of the words of Robert Louis Stevenson, the Tusitala, the storyteller, the Tusitala, after whom this competition is named. In this year of the 60th Anniversary of Samoa’s independence, when we look back on all the changes that have happened, and forward to those still to come, it is an honour to be invited here today to celebrate the winners of this year’s Tusitala competition on the theme of “Change” or “Suiga”.

Some things, we know, or at least hope, will remain true and unchanging throughout our lives. The sun will rise in the East, and set in the West. Water will run downhill, not uphill. This is because of the laws of physics, including the force of gravity, which we know will not change in our lifetimes. There are other things we hope will not change: a parent’s love for their child; that it is better to make peace than war; and better to give than to receive. These are beliefs and values which we hope will not change during our lives. 

But we spend our lives in a sea of change. We are born tiny and helpless, dependent on the kindness of others to survive. We grow in size and in mind. We learn. From being small and vulnerable, we grow strong and tall. Our families change around us. Our brothers and sisters grow in size alongside us. Our parents grow old in front of us. At some point, they become dependent on our kindness. We change from being a responsibility for others to carry, to being the ones who carry responsibility. And we take on other responsibilities: in our families, in our work, in our communities and villages. And then we notice other changes. Strange new aches and wrinkles. Then we grow weaker, not stronger, and become once again dependent on the kindness of those around us. It is the cycle of life, which for most of you here today lies in the future, but which many of us are part-way through, and still looking for the wisdom to manage with good grace.

But it is not just we who change. Our world changes around us. The weather changes every day. The seasons turn, and with them the fruits and vegetables we can eat. I expect that, like me, many of you now are looking forward soon to having more mangoes and avocados than you can eat, at least for two or three months as they come into season. The moon also changes every day, bringing the changing tide in its endless cycle of unfinished change. And bringing also the palolo harvests we have all been enjoyed this last month. We know now that there are bigger, longer changes than this as well.  Climate can change. We know now that the climate is getting hotter, and perhaps wilder, and this week we will hear a lot in the news about world leaders who have gathered together in Egypt to discuss how we might all manage this climate change.

And our human world also changes. Last week, I talked to an old man. He is 90-years-old. He talked to me of changes he had seen in Samoa.  He said that 50 years ago there were no General Practitioners (GPs) in Samoa. Now there are many. There were no more than 10,000 people in the town of Apia.  Now there are 30,000 or 40,000.  He said there were very few cars, but we know from the registration numbers of the cars that there are at least forty thousand now. And fifty years ago, only a very rich person could fly from Samoa to another country.  Now hundreds do every day.  Either flying has got cheaper, or people have got richer. Probably both – two changes at once.

Technology also changes what is possible. When I was a child, the telephone was something attached to the wall at home, or to a desk in an office. My friends and I laughed at the idea that you could use a telephone while walking down a street, or sitting in a car. And the idea that you could use a phone not just to hear the person at the other end, but to see them, was something from science fiction, something that we only saw in films and TV shows such as Star Wars and Star Trek. Something which only civilisations in other galaxies or millions of years into the future could possibly have. But now most of you will have seen, and probably used, such a device: a mobile phone, which you can use at any time, anywhere, to speak to and see what people are doing right now on the other side of the world.

In the universities and laboratories, the factories and offices of the world, there are people working all the time, even as we sit here now, to change our lives. Looking for new ideas and inventions, new ways of doing things, more safely, and more efficiently. Experts say that in a few years cars will drive themselves, and more safely than any human can do, because of advances in computer technology. And doctors will have new treatments and cures for diseases. If you talk to the oldest people in your community, they might remember a time not just when there were no mobile phones, not just no internet, and not just no television, but also before even radio. I cannot say when we will see cars which drive themselves, or perhaps even whether we will at all. But I myself have seen some of those same changes as the oldest people around you, and I can say one thing with certainty: that you will see more change in your lives than we here today can even imagine.

It is the job of a writer to help us all to see, to understand, and to adapt to these changes. A writer can share their own experience, let others know when they meet change so that others will also know it is coming.  They can describe what was difficult about that change, but what was welcome about it.  A writer can help us all to live with change, and make sure it is for the better, and not for the worse. In doing so, they can make us all wiser, and able to change with the good grace that Robert Louis Stevenson said we should have. That is why I want to thank all those who have worked to make this year’s Tusitala competition such a success. I want to thank in particular our hosts, who have done so much over the history of this competition to raise the art of story-telling here in Samoa: Gatoaitele Savea Sano Malifa, Editor in Chief, and Muliaga Jean Malifa of the Samoa Observer. Also the three major sponsors: SSAB, Eveni Block and Vodafone; and the four judges.  I should like to thank the teachers and parents who supported those who wrote their stories and entered them into this competition.  

But most of all I should like to thank the 1070 different writers who put their souls into their stories and submitted entries to this year’s competition, on topics such as “A New Teacher”; “A New Baby in the Family”; “A New School”; and “Changes in Technology”. We are here today to congratulate the sixty students from Upolu and Savaii who have won prizes. But I want to congratulate all those who had the talent, energy and courage to write their stories and submit them. It is thanks to you and your efforts that we will all be one step wiser in living with change. Please continue with your brave efforts.  

As Robert Louis Stevenson said on another occasion: “I kept always two books in my pocket, one to read, one to write in”.  

I encourage you all to do the same thing, so that you can please keep writing, and please keep helping us to become wiser.  

Thank you, fa’afetai, soifua.