Schools In Tonga

Liahona High is the Church's Flagship School in the Pacific.  Other church schools on the islands of Samoa, Kirbati, and Fiji are a close second, but Liahona is the largest and nicest facility.  Below are some pictures of classrooms with students and teachers.  These will not look so different from the classrooms you remember as a student, but probably not as nice as the classrooms you see in today's modern schools in the states. 

Below are some pictures to give you a comparison of other schools on the island. 

This picture is looking from the road across the grounds of an elementary (primary) school.

GPS stands for Government Public School and Kahoua is the village name. 

This is a  primary school Class 1 thru Class 6 

Notice the sign "From the People of Japan" -- much aide is given to Tonga from Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

Here is a primary classroom.  Two-to-a-bench and table is the norm. This class has flooring covering the concrete, most GPS do not have this nicety.

All Secondary Schools are sponsored by outside organizations or churches.     Here are some pictures of a Queen Solete High School -- double story buildings 

Here is a math classroom ... notice the environment and bench / tables

 

 

Another high school visit took us St. Andrews Anglican High School

I casually walked around and took pictures while Elder Meyers was talking to the office.  I felt comfortable and walked into the art classroom and found the art teacher.  He saw my name tag and gave me a Tongan check greeting and then told me he was a returned missionary, married in the temple and lives in the village behind Liahona, named Kahoua.  We had a very pleasant visit and upon leaving I in turn gave him a Tongan check goodbye, which he warmly accepted.

3rd Term Parent Day

At the conclusion of 3rd term Students and Parents gathered in the gymnasium for a celebratory program.  With acknowledgements of honor roll students, students performing, leadership talks, the program was 21/2 hours, and it was all in Tongan!

We were invited to sit on the stand with the program participants, even though we were not on the program we are always treated as dignitaries. 

 

After much honor roll recognition, student music performances and administration talks we celebrated Liahona High's 67th Anniversary

Here are some fun pictures from Parent Conferences

 

 

Island Tour and Stories

 

We went on a Tour of the Island with the Senior Missionaries. Our bus driver was Peni Tonga, the father of Kaloni the girl in the Friend article on Tonga.  Our tour guide was Lopeti, he does tours for the Cruise Ships when they come in here. He is a counselor to the Bishop in the Ward we attend. We started with a picnic at the gates of the Palace as our guide talked about the King and his kingdom.

 Then we loaded on the bus and the sites we saw were, the King’s Palace from the outside, the Royal Tombs, Captain Cooks landing - below

 The Ha’amonga Arch - Lapaha, where time begins as Tonga is the first to see the sun rise each day based on the International Dateline.

Lopeti has some fun interesting stories. When he left for his mission and  arrived in SLC no one came to pick him up so he hitch hiked to Provo. He rode with a farmer who was not a member of the church. Lopeti couldn’t pay him for the ride so he offered to work for him to pay him back. The farmer took him home to Spanish Fork and he worked for a couple days then he was dropped off at the temple.  He was a very good worker and he was able to tell the farmer about the church a little bit. He forgot his book of Mormon in his room and the farmer picked it up and read it. A few weeks later he went to the MTC and asked for Lopeti. He wanted him to be baptized. Lopeti’s first baptism was in the MTC before he even left the MTC.

Lopeti was a missionary in California. He noticed that people hired out the trimming of their palm trees and he could climb up those trees like a monkey so he offered to trim trees for people for free if they would listen to his companion teach them a lesson.  He was pretty good at shinnying up the tree barefooted and trimming the dead limbs.  One day he raced a tree trimmer who used shoes and a belt. The deal was that if Lopeti lost, he owed the tree guy $100 but if Lopeti won, the trimmer had to listen to the lessons. Lopeti won. He said he had four baptism from that project until the Mission President heard and told him to stop as it was too dangerous.