Seminar-Workshop
on Asia-Pacific Forum for Library and Achives Management
Training
Bangalore, India, June 1-30, 2004
WELCOME
TO SIA’ATOUTAI THEOLOGICAL COLLEGE
KINGDOM OF TONGA
The Pacific Ocean.
Friday,
June 04, 2004
1.
INTRODUCTION:
v
The Island of Tonga.
v Sia’atoutai Theological College
2.
BODY:
v
Sia’atoutai Thelogical College Library.
v Sia’atoutai Thelogical College Archive.
3.
CONCLUSION:
v
Hope and Vision of Archives in Asia and Pacific.
HAVE
A GOOD TIME IN TONGA AND GOD BLESS YOU.
…….
THE
KINGDOM OF TONGA
Tonga is one of the islands in the South Pacific.
It is an Independent Monarchy island. The population
is one hundred thousand, the weather is like here
in Bangalore and Bangladesh. The currency is Tongan
Pa’anga. It has a 718 sq km with many many islands.
Most of the people are Christians. There are Methodists,
Roman Catholics, and Anglicans. We have The Free Wesleyan
Church, Free Church of Tonga and the Church of Tonga.
European explorer (Captain Cook) came by and call
the Island “THE FRIENDLY ISLANDS OF TONGA”
because the people were so friendly and also respectful.
In Tonga I am happy to say there are many Indians,
Chinese, Philippians, Koreans, Japanese, New Zealanders,
Europeans and others. In the mean time Hindi movies
and music are became very popular in the Island
THE
COLLEGE
Sia’atoutai Theological College was established
in 1948 and named by our late King, Queen Salote Tupou
III. Sia means, the weaving of the fishing net. Toutai
means fishing. ( Gospel according to Matthew 28: 19&20
and Luke 5:10b)
In the college we offered three programs, The Certificate
in Theology (Tongan), The Diploma in Theology and
Bachelor in Divinity (English). We have 182 of students
being married and unmarried boys and girls. It is
a boarding school. The college is belongs to the Free
Wesleyan Church of Tonga (Methodist).
THE COLLEGE LIBRARY:
We have a Library with collection of one thousand
books. ( books, journals, magazines and pamphlets)
and also computers. We have book catalogue, Card Catalogue
and also computer catalogue. Students have to borrow
five books at least for one week. We to believe that
Library is a place where information is collected
and stored for library users and we hope that they
have to get the right information.
THE
COLLEGE ARCHIVE:
We in Sia’atoutai only heard about the Archives
but we have not yet seen what archive is all about.
We have a lot of documents in the Church that are
now rotting away, because we do not have that necessary
tools and no archivist to look after those important
and documents for Tonga. The Free Wesleyan Church
of Tonga has begun to do some Archiving work, but
only on a half measure because of the lack of fund
for just work. To be honest, the amount of archiving
work that has been done in order to keep the Church’s
documents from rotting away is so minimal.
In
Sia’atoutai Theological College which I am representing
in this workshop, has started to pool a fund to build
an archives where we can preserve various documents
about the life and development of the College. This
project is depended on the benevolence of the students.
We have accumulated only $10,000.00 towards this end.
To preserve of some of our very old documents may
be coming a little bit too late. What are we going
to tell the children of the future? Should Tonga be
once again resort to oral tradition, in the age of
high-tech developments. Please, awaken us to be able
to see where we have gone wrong in this matter of
concern.
In
CONCLUSION the last but not the least, OUR HOPES AND
VISIONS OF ARCHIVES IN ASIA AND THE PACIFIC WILL COME
TO YOU AFTER 5 YEARS THEN WHEN WE MEET AT ????.
MAY
GOD BLESS YOU ALL.
MALO ‘AUPITO (THANK YOU)
For
any questions please condact ;
fakaanaua@hotmail.com
(fakaanaua means dreaming of, in hope of getting it
some day)