Contrary to the popular belief, it is possible to sail from London to Paris in a perfectly straight line.

I-Kiribati men, Kiribati, by Roger Hayman

Te Tauti (Porcupine) fish helmet https://collections.tepapa.govt.nz/object/267666

This is a warrior's helmet, made from the dried skin of a porcupine fish (Diodon sp., probably Diodon hystrix), lined with plaited pandanus strips. The skin is oriented so that the tail forms a peak at the back and the two fins form wings on either side. The lining has been partly plaited to fit, like a rounded basket, but then cut and overlapped in three places so that it fits snugly. The base is edged with a roll of plant fibre which has been neatly sewn to the edge of the skin with a blanket stitch in fine twisted cord of light and dark fibres.

even kiribati is in on it too

A fiddler crab at Kiribati’s uninhabited Line Islands. The first destination of the Pristine Seas expedition will be the southern Line Islands to study the reef system.

Image by OggiScienza via Flickr (CC BY-ND 2.0).

Please reblog for a bigger sample size!

If you have any fun fact about Kiribati, please tell us and I'll reblog it!

Be respectful in your comments. You can criticize a government without offending its people.

Tarawa, Kiribati

🌊🏝

“As remote as they were beautiful, the coral reefs around the 5 volcano tips making up the Southern Line Islands dazzled National Geographic explorers in 2009 during a visit.

Remarking that they re-painted the image of what a pristine coral reef looks like—bursting with color and life—the team of the Pristine Seas Expedition had been crushed when a record-warming even in 2015 called El Niño caused mass coral die offs.

Then a return in 2021 revealed a remarkable scene—bright healthy corals teeming with life as far down as 100 feet off the island slopes. After record numbers of coral deaths, a team member estimated their populations averaged around 43 million to 53 million coral colonies per square mile.

The Southern Line Islands belong to the Pacific island nation of Kiribati, and Enric Sala, a marine biologist and member of Pristine Seas, detailed that it took longer to reach them by plane and boat than it took the astronauts of the Apollo missions to land on the Moon...

“The reef was covered by light-blue corals that looked like giant roses—a garden of Montipora aequituberculata stretching as far as I could see,” says Sala.

Since the Southern Line Islands are so remote, no one was keeping an eye on how the corals were able to regrow so significantly, but Sala has an idea. Since most of the montipora were the same size, it’s possible that one or two massive coral spawning events, where they reproduce and launch their eggs out into the sea before the larvae rain back down on the reef, are enough to repopulate large areas of dead corals.

Its resilience earned it the moniker of a “super reef” among the crew...

Kiribati’s government has ensured that these seas, which have never seen large-scale commercial fishing, will never see it, and now make up the Southern Line Islands Marine Protected Area (SLIMPA).” -Good News Network, 12/7/22

Historical Flag Wars: Round 3, Bracket 1

Through its science and advocacy work, National Geographic Society's Pristine Seas program has been convincing marine biodiversity-rich nations like Kiribati to protect their marine ecosystems to prevent overfishing and other destructive practices.

by @NatGeoMaps

I-Kiribati girl, Kiribati, by ADB

Population: 3,537

Time zone: UTC +14

Note that Tabwakea is also known as Tabakea, and Kiritimati is also known as Christmas Island.

Photo: Gift of Prof. Alexander Emanuel Agassiz (c) President and Fellows of Harvard College, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, PM# 00-8-70/55612 (digital file# 99250028)

Fish Helmets Don’t Save Lives, Kiribati’s porcupinefish helmets were more about drama than defense. (https://hakaimagazine.com/article-short/fish-helmets-dont-save-lives/) Krista Langlois