Bora Bora

Polynesian settlers reached the island well over a thousand years ago and knew it as Porapora, short for a longer name meaning "created by the gods" and often shortened to "first born"; the form Bora Bora comes from European attempts at the Tahitian pronunciation. Marae, the stone temple platforms of pre-Christian Polynesia, survive in the valleys and along the shore, and the island had its own line of chiefs and remained an independent kingdom into the nineteenth century, with long standing ties to Maupiti to the west.

European ships appeared in the later eighteenth century, and London Missionary Society preachers arrived from Tahiti in the 1820s, after which the island became solidly Christian. France annexed the island in 1888 and forced its last queen, Teriimaevarua III, to abdicate, after which Bora Bora was governed from Papeete; unlike the people of the former kingdom of Tahiti, its inhabitants were French subjects rather than citizens until 1945.

The turning point was the Second World War. From 1942 the United States built a supply and refuelling base here, with fuel tanks, wharves, coastal gun emplacements in the hills and, in 1943, an airstrip on the reef islet of Motu Mute. Nearly 7,000 servicemen were stationed on an island of a few thousand people. The base closed in 1946, but the airfield remained the territory's only international airport until Faa'a opened next to Papeete in 1960, which left Bora Bora unusually easy to reach. Hotel Bora Bora opened in 1961 and the first overwater bungalows on stilts followed nine years later, and tourism has dominated the island's economy ever since.

Bora Bora is a Tahitian-speaking, largely Protestant island where church, family and the lagoon organise the week. Himene, the dense unaccompanied choral singing developed after the missionaries arrived, is sung in the temples on Sunday mornings, and the day afterwards is kept quiet. Alongside it the older Mā'ohi arts have been strongly revived since the 1980s: 'ori tahiti dance, tatau (tattoo), drumming on the toere and pahu, and the making of flower crowns and pareu cloth.

Outrigger-canoe racing is the island's sport as much as the territory's. Paddling crews train in the lagoon at first light and in the evening, and the arrival of the Hawaiki Nui Va'a fleet on Bora Bora's beaches is one of the biggest public occasions of the year. The Heiva season in July brings dance and singing competitions, javelin throwing, stone lifting and coconut husking between villages.

Much of the working population is employed by resorts that most residents never stay in, and that gap is openly discussed. Craft work — shell and mother-of-pearl jewellery, black pearls, woven pandanus hats and baskets — is sold at the market in Vaitape and by the roadside, and French administration, schooling and food sit over everything. Visitors are met with real courtesy, and are expected to return it: a greeting before a question, modest clothing away from the beach, and patience with an unhurried pace.

Around 10,000 people live on Bora Bora, most of them in Vaitape and the villages strung along the coast road at Fa'anui, Anau and the southern point. Almost everyone depends directly or indirectly on tourism — hotels, boats, dive centres, taxis, construction — with fishing, small-scale gardening, black-pearl retailing and public-sector jobs making up the rest. Wages are higher than on most outer islands, and so are prices, since nearly all food, fuel and building material arrives by ship from Tahiti.

The day starts early, before the heat: bakery bread at dawn, children to school by bus along the one road, paddlers and fishermen on the water. Offices and shops often close for a long break in the middle of the day and reopen in the late afternoon, and by evening the village quay and the roulottes are the social centre. Sunday belongs to church and family meals.

Pressure on a small island is the running issue. Fresh water is limited, waste and sewage have to be managed beside a fragile lagoon, and land is frequently held undivided by extended families, which complicates housing. Coral bleaching, cyclones and sea-level rise are discussed as practical matters rather than distant ones, and young people continue to leave for Tahiti and France for study and work.

Everyday eating on Bora Bora is Tahitian with a strong French overlay. Poisson cru, called ia ota in Tahitian, is the staple dish: raw tuna cut into cubes, marinated briefly in lime juice and then dressed with coconut milk, cucumber, tomato and onion. Tuna also comes grilled, seared or sashimi-style, and reef fish are cooked whole or raw with lime. Fāfā, chicken stewed with taro leaves, and roots and starches such as taro, cassava and breadfruit ('uru) fill out a family meal.

For feasts and Sunday lunches the ahima'a earth oven is still used: pork, fish, breadfruit and taro wrapped and buried over hot stones for hours, and served with po'e, a sweet pudding of mashed fruit and starch in coconut milk. Coconut appears in almost everything, grated, pressed for milk, or drunk from the nut. Firi firi, a doughnut made with coconut milk, is a weekend breakfast alongside baguettes from the village bakery.

The roulottes and snack bars serve a mixed local menu — grilled fish, steak and chips, casse-croûte sandwiches in half a baguette, and the Chinese-Tahitian noodle and pork dishes that came with Chinese settlement in the islands. Hotel kitchens work in a French register, using island vanilla from neighbouring Taha'a, lagoon fish and imported meat. Hinano, brewed on Tahiti, is the usual beer; fresh lime juice, coconut water and French wine round out the drinks.