captioning made possible by friends of nci narrator: a pacific island community faces the devastating effects of climate change, including a terrifying flood. will they stay with their island home or move to a new and unfamiliar land, leaving their culture and language behind forever? "there once was an island," next on pacific heartbeat. [man chanting in native language]

man, voice-over: my name is satty. [roosters crowing]

i am married. i have five kids-- three boys and two girls. i'm 30 years old. i'm a farmer and a fisherman. that's all i do. sometimes when i'm fed up with the kids even if there is protein in the house, i just have to say, "wife, you have to look after the kids today." my wife says, "don't go, don't go. i'm doing laundry. you must stay with the kids." i say "no, no, no. i've found this fishing spot. it's a great spot. i must check it out today." so i go. something has caught on to the line. i don't think it's a fish. must be something else. let me just... so we have two fish. we have one real fish and we have one bad fish. we call it hiloa. i like that fish.

[laughter, conversation in native language] woman, voice-over: my name is endar. i'm 48 years old now. i'm married to a papua new guinean. my brother wanted me to see my father before my father dies. that's why...the reason i came. but i live in port moresby. my father is the elder of our clan. he is te matua in this house, hare naoro. after he got sick, that he couldn't walk anymore, so they had to carry him to the sea for him to have his wash, bath him there, bring him back.

i have to give a break to my sisters, too, because all these years, they have been caring for the father. so the period of time i'm here, i have to look after him. [conversation in native language] coming back and seeing women here, it's very, very hard. they can't do things that i can do. like, i'm the first woman to work. i travel on my own because i have to go on business trips. i am the one who changes a lot of things. it would be worse for me to stay on this island compared to my life in port moresby with my husband. [rooster crows] [girls singing in native language] [laughter]

[man speaking native language]

[man speaking native language] man, voice-over: my name is telo fakatutufenua. with my wife medlyn, we have six children but two daughters have been adopted out by the family. [speaking native language] [drumming] [man speaking native language] i am a man who is very keen in my traditions. to me, it's a very, very colorful thing.

i love it. so two, three times a year, i have to teach the children traditional dances for concerts because it's also a good thing to help the children while they are still small. they have to start picking up traditional dances. [singing in native language] i think today most of the traditions has been forgotten. and i think mortlock is one of those few places around papua new guinea who still keep their cultures and traditions but already the life in the community has been very distorted. and i think i've already seen signs of a bad future for my children. [children speaking indistinctly]

when i was living in this area in this house, this is where my kitchen is. now the sea has washed the place, and it's very sad to see that the children now growing are not seeing what we have seen before. [conversation in native language]

man: tamaki... [speaking native language]

telo: no snakes. no harmful insects, not on the island, except mosquitoes. it's the only thing that makes people afraid to come to the garden. [insects chirping] when the garden was given to my father by his father, the garden has already been affected by salt water. [mosquitoes buzzing] the giant taro takes 15 years to grow. and there's maybe over a hundred different types of ceremonies you have to dig giant taro for. that's why this salt is a big thing affecting the lives of families on the island.

[mosquitoes buzzing] as you see, this area here, this bit in here, it's completely affected, and there is no chance of giant taros growing again. telo, voice-over: it's a waste of time replanting giant taros because they will never grow up. and there's nothing we can do now. [children singing]

satty, voice-over: we build sea walls because we think it's the only way we can stop the sea. i mean, the high tides and the current and the waves, that's the only way we can stop the sea from coming in and claiming higher ground. [indistinct chatter] but i see my aunts and my uncles with their sea walls. they get pretty upset. the more storms we have, the more work they keep doing. when i was a little kid, i used to play around on the beachfronts. there was white sand. since we've started to make the sea walls, we have no white sand. so that feeling, that feeling that was with me since i was a kid, it's not here anymore. i think my place is, it's losing its beauty.

the bougainville government sent teams over to the island doing this survey and these questionnaires and just trying to collect information on how the people would feel moving to a different place. but the more they ask questions to the people here, the more they panic the people. so we knew that the government is thinking of doing something. but the question is, how long will it take? [indistinct conversation, music playing] [men speaking a hybrid of native language and english]

[man speaking native language]

...small island surrounded by this ocean... [continues in native language] he knows it. hallelujah. so god is in control. god cares for ausi, god cares for kaua... [continues in native language] god cares for avo! god is in control... [continues in native language] [different speakers continue in hybrid of native language and english]

[conversation in native language]

[women singing in native language] telo: i don't think the culture can work if you take it out to other lands. all these types of plants that are growing in taku won't be available in our new destination. and, also, the elders in the village are the people who will normally emphasize the traditional cultures.

and if they are not coming with us to our new land, then, you know, it's going to be very hard to take your culture with you. [overlapping conversations] satty: this ladder needs to be fastened. and voila. [satty speaking native language] satty, voice-over: i like my home. it is my home. i have my own resources here. i have the sea. i have my crops. i could live. but if home is going somewhere else, then i will be forced to move.

but i do not want to move. [speaking native language] [radio interference]

[conversation in native language] [endar speaking native language] [rooster crows]

[indistinct]. he doesn't want me to leave him behind. bye! [children speaking excitedly] bye! [music playing]

endar, voice-over: i wanted to come back to taku to come and see the place, the people. and also because my father died and i haven't--i wasn't there that time he died, and i wanted to see the family, especially my sister. i left her behind.

hello. hello, hello, hello. endar: thank you. [conversation in hybrid of native language and english]

man: boat to island? [translating into native language] second man: that's the ocean. [translating into native language] and-- [translating into native language] "where are you going?" [repeating slowly in native language] [repeating phrase] fi? fai. f-a-i. "fai.?

yeah. ok. endar, voice-over: the people on the island cannot believe that, you know, there is a danger there for them. for the scientists to be there and tell them what is happening on the island, that will make them change their mind to move out of the island before anything will happen. satty, voice-over: i know this island hasn't been having these kinds of people. the information the scientists will give will be a very great help. it's like digging up the past and knowing that there is something good around us. we can still do something.

it's not too late. [children playing] [overlapping conversations] at the moment, the world is warming up. and it's warming up because of other people in the world. it's certainly not you. it's other people in the world burning things like diesel fuel in large amounts. this is putting gases into the atmosphere,

which actually caused the world to warm. one thing we know is going to happen during this century, we're going to get some sea level rise. man: as the sea comes to the island, the sea wall stops the sea. that's the only way the people can hold the water back. as you go to some locations on the island, there are much lower locations. that's where some of the water gets up, so it's been playing a big role in the community, i mean, the island itself. as you can see, most of the sea walls are built just... scott smithers: in front of... in front of the houses. yeah. so if i had a house along the beach,

i would build my sea wall. but as you can see, there are no huts out there. so there are no sea walls. and the beach is obviously a very valuable place for people to put their canoes on it. so when the northwesterly winds come up where the canoes are, do the waves break right up into the hare at the top? they do, they do. sea walls like this, what they actually do is they impede the island's ability to cope with sea level rise. sure, you might have the odd wave that comes up and swashes down the back of the berm-- is what we call it-- the high point. but when it does that, it actually builds the island up. the islanders started building sea walls. it was their decision. that's right. they made the decision. nobody knew the consequences. that's right. now that the walls are in, i don't think the community would allow the walls to be taken away. so i really think that what we have to do is try and have something that's further up shore that performs the function of the walls

but actually also allows some sand to build up. the reality is, is that major engineering costs money. but i guess the end option is for everyone to move. that costs a lot--a lot of money. [conversation in native language]

[conversation in native language]

endar, voice-over: my sister still disagrees with what i am saying. the time i went to see my father's cemetery, i just told my sister the sea is coming closer to the cemetery. but, hey, you know, it's hard for me to speak it out because i don't want to make her upset. [rooster crows] [harmonica playing]

ok, scott. all right. is that a good mark? yeah. [boy imitates rooster crowing] [chuckling] [song ends] [woman laughing] hey... [laughter continues] [indistinct conversation] [mosquitoes buzzing]

you can see there's a lot of water bubbling out. yeah. if i throw this on, you can see it drift away. it's very sulfurous. you can see that mud, the fine mud, that's come up here. see the calcium carbonate... yeah. mm. that's come up? well, yesterday, you know, we leveled from the beach on the lagoon across to the sea. the tide was at 1 1/2 meters. yeah. and your garden, which has the salt water coming into it is actually about 20 centimeters lower... lower than the level of the high tide yesterday. that's right. if the level of the high tides rises by 50 centimeters or a meter over the next century or so, then...the water level is gonna be coming up all the time. [tool slashing] telo, voice-over: after i've been watching

the scientists working, i have realized why we have a lot of salty water in our garden. i found out the level of the giant taro pit were a bit lower than the level of the rising sea. so this is why the salty water is getting higher and higher because, also, the level of the sea is going up. i'll have to go and build... some sort of barricade around my salty pump. i call it a "salt water pump" already because it's coming up like a pump. you know, fence it away so that this salty water won't move around to affect my giant taro. the work i've been doing with john and scott has really given me the overall idea of what is happening in our garden. and maybe by the time we have completed

all the jobs, i think actually i'll be starting an office like a scientist on the island. [mosquitoes buzzing]

the water's still pretty high for a low tide, isn't it? scott: at the moment, these large waves are affecting all the northern islands of papua new guinea. so this is a big scale event. i'm a little worried that this afternoon, we will see waves like we did yesterday and maybe a little worse, even. that's one reason we don't want to keep you all here for very long today, because people might want to go and move some of their possessions out of the way of those waves. they might not come, but they might.

[children playing] [conversation in native language] look at this one.

endar: like, for me to see the place like this, and my sisters, they do not know what it is all about. and i'm feeling sorry for them because they don't know anything. maybe these things will happen so that they will understand what i am talking about. oh, no. there's one great big one coming. great big one coming. [children speaking excitedly]

[conversation in native language] [conversation in native language]

well, that's the end of us. woman: no school. no school. [conversation in native language]

[tuning radio station] man on radio: when i left this morning, the tides were still lapping at the village doorsteps. and there might be a bit of respite, given that these huge swells that also came in with the king tides is possibly dying down somewhat. second man on radio: there are going to be many thousands of people whose homes are damaged, some, of course, who have lost their homes entirely... ...thousands of people in papua new guinea have suffered degrees of loss. so far, loss of life has been relatively minimal. but the cost of property and the cost to the economic well-being of the people affected is going to be large. [tuning radio] [music plays]

nothing about the mortlock people. still forgotten. [conversation in native language] it's been four, say, or five days. five days. [man speaking a hybrid of native language and english] the government does not do anything. [chickens clucking] [static obscuring man on radio] charlie, charlie, charlie, charlie. charlie echo? [static] charlie, charlie, charlie, charlie echo?

[man speaking indistinctly] telo, voice-over: when it comes to an emergency like what just happened to us, how can we deal with this problem when there is only one ship in the province? one day when we have the real problem, maybe they'll find nobody on this island. we'll all be gone

before any rescue team or whatever get here. [rustling] [clanging] scott: john and i have been surveying around the island. we can see where some parts of the island have been eroded. over the next few months, some of those changes might come back. and that's what happens on islands. but some of them may not. because this is a big event. john: and you have to think that, well,

there's flooding events. in 50 years' time, they may be happening 3 to 10 times more often just because of sea level rise. scott: i full understand why people are worried and concerned. and there are things that should be important for your government, but i don't want everybody to get very sad very soon because there are things we need to worry about. but we can worry and we can think and we can get things happening in the time. we need to be productive rather than panicking. john: you can alleviate that to a certain extent simply by planning, by moving to the areas of the island that are a bit higher. that's one--way we can help, by telling you which parts of the island are higher. [overlapping conversations] scott, voice-over: there's the issue of climate change here, but there's also simply an issue of money and resources. and we're talking about a country that simply doesn't have the money to do

the things that need to be done. [telo speaking a hybrid of native language and english] and after 10 years, that will be 10 million kina. [conversation continues in native language] satty, voice-over: we cannot wait for the government.

i believe we should start helping ourselves first. then if somebody can see that, somebody might be willing to assist. if we can't help ourselves, then who can help us? i think we could do a rough plan. or we could sit down, just looking at the physical features of the land. then we could plan out the next row of houses, where they should have been built and how they should have been built to avoid worse accidents. but the thing is, it would be very hard convincing the people. if the people want to be relocated, that's their decision. but i guess i'll be the last one. [rain]

[conversation in native language] telo, voice-over: i've been always saying i'm not going. i'm staying back on the island until i die. but seeing what happened a couple of days ago, it actually changed my mind.

and if the people has to move out of this island, i'll be one of them with my family. [conversation in native language] telo, voice-over: today i think i don't have any trust anymore on the government because they say things that will never happen. i didn't want to leave my culture, my traditions, way of life, of living, but i have to do it for the good of my children and for the future of my children.

[woman singing in native language]

i hate to see you two go. [scott speaks foreign phrase] thank you for organizing... john: we might meet again. scott, voice-over: maybe when people do things, they need to consider more about whether or not if the places that they hold dear, if they had to leave or even if those places were to be struck off the map... how would they feel about that? and then they need to magnify that impact by 10 times, because this is all these people know. their whole culture, their life, everything is here. or down the coast or somewhere else. this is it. this is their world. and their world is being destroyed. [child speaking indistinctly] john: climate scientists, i think, will say the developed world has to start to really reduce

its emissions in order to allow the developing world to raise its emissions. we can't expect the developing world to start to actually not have any greenhouse gas emission increases. otherwise, they're just not gonna lift themselves out of poverty. john: we'll need that bag. endar: i'm sad about losing part of my culture, but it's life that we have to move on with. you cannot sit down here and stay and die here because of your culture. you have to move out and then carry on with your life. [sobbing]

satty, voice-over: i, myself, i still feel hope. we can hang around this island for some time. somebody big must not look down. somebody big should say, "let's see what you've got. "let's get together and do something. maybe we can do better than i do with somebody my size." [drumming, chanting in native language] no matter how small you are, you're useful, and you are still part of the world. so if you lose something small in the world, you lose a lot.

[man chanting in native language] announcer: if you would like more information regarding this program

or other episodes of pacific heartbeat, visit www.pacificheartbeat.org. [music playing on soundtrack] captioning made possible by friends of nci