The Purple Culture Guide to Kiribati

Chapter 1: First Impressions

Let's set the scene. You've been traveling for what feels like two days. You've crossed more ocean than you thought possible, and the plane finally bumps down on a runway that looks like a strip of concrete dropped into the middle of a lagoon. You step out, and the air hits you - thick, warm, salty, and humid enough that your clothes feel damp within minutes. You hear the ocean before you see it, a low, constant rumble that you will quickly realize never stops. This is the first thing to understand about Kiribati: it is not a place you simply arrive at. It is a place you commit to. And that commitment is rewarded, but not always in the ways you expect.

The most common wrong assumption people bring is that Kiribati is a tropical paradise in the standard postcard sense. White sand, swaying palms, turquoise water, an endless idyll. There is truth in that - the lagoons really are that blue, the water really is that warm - but it's an incomplete picture. Kiribati is not a resort destination. It's a working country. On Tarawa, the main island of the main group, you'll see the rusted hulks of WWII vehicles from the Battle of Tarawa, still where they fell. You'll drive past houses made of corrugated iron and palm thatch, faces seeing laundry in the yard, pigs rooting in the shallows. The "paradise" is layered over a very real, sometimes hard, everyday life. The