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Kiribati :: Overview
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Kiribati

In 1979, Kiribati, the former Gilbert Islands, plus the Line Islands and the Phoenix Islands, became independent from the UK. This group of 33 (21 inhabited) low-lying coral atolls roughly equidistant between Australia and Hawaii is surrounded by reefs—which makes it the perfect location for diving and all related activities. The mainly Micronesian population probably migrated in prehistory from South East Asia and first settled between the second and fifth centuries CE, though it’s the Samoan migration of 6 to 8 centuries ago which is the ancestor of the present inhabitants, also mingled with European and Chinese ancestors. The system of government was not affected by the British, but continues to be a clan system governed by a group of elders. Officially English-speaking, I-Kiribati people also speak Gilbertese and Kiribati, a Micronesian dialect, while the currency is the Australian dollar. You are likely to stay, especially on the outer islands, in a traditional Polynesian guest-house with a thatched roof, and quickly to master the full 13 letters of the local alphabet (read “ti” as “s”). But you’ll be interested to hear that the twentieth century did its best to undermine tradition. Some of the fiercest fighting of the Second World War occurred here. Banaba, or Ocean Island, in Kiribati is one of the three massive phosphate rock islands (now exhausted) of the Pacific Ocean, with the others being Makatea (in French Polynesia) and Nauru.
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