The Girmit is musical theatre attempting to encapsulate the vast story of Coolies in Fiji, the people of Indo-Fijian ethnicity and the history that is not talked about.
Nadia Freeman who performs as Miss Leading resides in Wellington and is a musician, poet and visual artist. She also works in public health. She has a European father and an Indo-Fijian mother.
She has appeared at both Edinburgh and New Zealand Fringe Festivals.
It is her maternal side that has inspired this production, and the need to give voice and expression to an aspect of her ancestry. It is not buried overtly but is by indifference and ignorance.
Coolies were people of Indian and Asian descent who worked as low-wage indentured labour.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it was applied specifically to sugar cane workers in Fiji and similar large islands.
Sugar and cocaine. Both white in refined form. The former much more addictive. Both require complex supply chains, and both are thoroughly intertwined with political and corporate machinations.
Indians were brought to the South Pacific by offers of a Paradise to live in and work. Promises of a short trip on a large vessel ride. It took several months, with little or no comforts.
What they found was a life of bondage and engineered servitude. Perfectly expressed by the classic Sixteen Tons, written by Merle Travis in the 1940’s.
Some people say a man’s made outta mud/ A poor man’s made out of muscle and blood.
The name Girmit is an adapted term for Agreement. This is what people were persuaded, forced or mandated to sign their soul away. They became the Girmityas.
Freeman has minimal staging and most it is taken up with a large back screen.
She uses her own customised electronic music devices.
The approach is very close to Laurie Anderson in its maximalisation of minimalism. Some loops are used, Mama heartbeat rhythms, melodic drone riffs.
A collage effect, the style best heard on Andersons live United States Vol I – IV. Freeman tells me she does not know this artist.
The story is told from confessional recorded interviews. Her own lyrics broaden the perceptions.
Since I was running away/ Running away from death row. Some similarities to the penal colony that was Australia in the 1800’s.
The vessels operated as slave ships in all but name. Fiji looked like the perfect this must be the place.
I feel at peace/ We have arrived is sung with Pop Jazz vocals.
The idyll soon dissolves into reality. We rise at 3 am each day/ I dream/ The more we work, the more we thirst.
In its minimalism the performance also touches on the found voices techniques of Brian Eno and David Byrne and the layered construction of My Life in the Bush of Ghosts.
It quietly captivates and unfolds. The story does boil but we are like frogs, and the rise in temperature is camouflaged.
The discussion with the audience is an important part of the experience. It is sold out at the venue, just off iconic Karangahape Road.
The majority are of varying Indian lineage.
A lot of forced migration occurred in 1987 from the Fijian Indian community, after a coup to overthrow the democratically elected government of Timoci Bavadra, and to oust the Queen as Sovereign. Fiji was declared a republic, and the mutiny was led by Col. Sitiveni Rabuka.
I was working as a doctor, and a lot of health workers relocated to New Zealand. Much violence was directed against the local Indian population, the true extent not well known.
Further coups in 2000 and 2006, again via the military and Commodore Bainimarama. Maybe less violence, the relocated Fijian Indians here supported him.
The history is complex, and a lot of trauma came out of those times. The young people here remember this as their parents’ generation not able to talk about it.
Some express a sentiment that they do not belong to any tribal culture. They aren’t regarded as proper Indian or having a real Fiji heritage.
The spectral shadow of ethnic cleansing creeps and slouches along. What manner of beast?
Girmit exposes harsh and ultimately cruel an inhuman behaviour. Miss Leading, Nadia Freeman is courageous in cutting to the heart of the matter and demonstrating why it is important.
Last words to Malcolm X and his epiphany. If you can’t face the truth, you don’t deserve freedom.
Rev. Orange Peel
Discover more from Red Raven News
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.