Memories of Chagos

2006-08-23T10:45:00.000-07:00

Memories of Chagos, Clement Siatous

The Artist:

On the 17th January 1947, like his parents and grand-parents before him, Clement Siatous was born in Peros Banhos. At the age of five he moved to Diego Garcia and stayed until the coconut plantations were closed down. Since then he has been living on the outskirts of the Mauritian capital Port Louis. He started painting in reaction to the British policy of trying to hide the fact that there used to be a settled population in the Chagos archipelago. He is therefore completing no less than forty pictures based on his memories of how life was like in the Chagos archipelago. The list of paintings below is therefore not complete, but they are still for sale. He intends, whenafter being able to finance the remaining of the project, to establish a fund for the defavourized Chagossian children growing up in poor conditions due to what happened to their parents. In 1998 he was decorated with the Mauritius Star and Key (MSK) for an exhibition in Port Louis the year before.

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1) The village of Peros Banhos. Children are going to school in the morning. Here they are pictured outside the ‘gran kaz’, the house of the plantation-manager.

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2) Chagossian workers collecting and peeling coconuts before they are to be dried in the ‘kalorifer’

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3) The ’Kalorifer’ in Diego Garcia. Women and men are working together while the ‘kommander’ in his white uniform is overlooking the process of opening and chopping up the coconuts.

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4) The cocnuts were left to dry in the sun. In case of heavy rain, mobile roofs could be pushed over the produce for protection. This is from Diego Garcia, and at the back from the left you can see a vegetable garden, an office, a shop and the building where the finished copra was stored

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5) Embarking of copra. The painting illustrates the work of loading copra onboard the ship ‘Mauritius’ from a quai in Peros Banhos

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6) Women clearing the field on Diamon Island, one of the smaller islands of Peros Banhos. The ‘kommander’ dressed in white in the centre of the picture used a long stick to indicate the size of the area to be cleared by each woman. The coconuts gathered on the smaller islands were brought by boats to the central plantations

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7) This is a picture of one of the boats ‘bato ponte’ used for bringing the coconuts from the smaller islands. The loading of this boat is taking place on the beaches inside the lagoon of Peros Banhos

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8) Women using traditional equippment for opening cocnuts in the ’kalorifer’ of Peros Banhos

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9) A woman in Salomon carrying a basket of coconuts ready to be planted

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10) Extracting cocnut-oil from the copra also took place in the archipelago. The copra, or the dried flesh of the coconuts was processed into oil by means of traditional mills pulled by donkeys. Whereas the local population was deported and their dogs exterminated in the early 1970’s, donkeys are still to be found in the tropical forests of the archipelago...

2006-08-23T10:34:00.000-07:00

11) Producing equippment. Chagossians also were employed as blacksmiths making equippment for work and leisure. A variety tools was made here for different kinds of fishing in the waters surrounding the islands. Next door is the prison of Diego Garcia.

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12) Chagossian men involved constructing the ‘kalorifer’ of Diego Garcia

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13) Constructing a wooden house in Zil Mapou, one of the is lands of Peros Banhos

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14) By the quai of Diego Garcia in 1955. The ship to the left is called Sir Jules, one of the ships used for the last voyage of many Chagossians now living in poor conditions in Mauritius and the Seychelles. On the shore, the plane ‘Katalina’, a wrecked airplane many Chagossians still remember playing with when they grew up

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15) This is Peros Banhos. Sir Jules is at anchor in the back, ready to take passsengers along with the load of copra to Mauritius and the Seychelles

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16) Saturday, Chagossians preparing a feast. Here, a family is preparing ‘seras pwasson’ for the evening. ‘Seras’ is traditional food based on a coconut sauce, but the ingredients vary. Sometimes it’s made with fish, other times with octopus or chicken. Turtle meat was also used in former times. Chagossians also say there never was a proper feast without the home-made drinks ‘Baka’ and ‘Kalou’

2006-08-23T10:28:00.000-07:00

17) Due to number of birds in the archipelago, another kind of job related to the guano resources on the islands. Guano was exported mainly to be used as fertilizer in the sugar-cane fields of Mauritius

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18) Loading the guano onto the ship Sir Jules

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19) Women making brushes out of leaves of the coconut palms. Some were used in the local houses while other was exported for sale in Mauritius

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20) A Saturday in front of the manager’s house in Peros Banhos. The women are finished working

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21) The Church St. Mari in Peros Banhos. Regrettably, the church is now abandoned and falling apart

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22) Peros Banhos abandoned. This used to be the head office

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23) The last embarking. The ship Nordver is leaving in 1973. No Chagossians are left on the shore. The British officials are painted in the lower right corner

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24) abandoned island, abandoned quai. Old settlements are now overgrown with palm trees and tropical forest

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25) Abandoned island

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26) Mauritius Trochetia when leaving Port Louis harbour the 30^th March 2006. On board, 100 Chagossians who were allowed to return back to their islands for a short visit to tend their families’ graves. The painter himself, chose not attend the voyage due to the work of finishing these paintings. Along with two Mauritian priests, masses were held in the ruins of the old villages of Salomon, Peros Banhos and Diego Garcia. In the latter island, which since the deportations of the Chagossians has been housing a major US military base, the old village has been reconstructed. However, access remains extremely difficult, particularly so for the people whose families are buried there