The Gold Mine

 What good is gold when you don’t know it’s yours to protect?

We live on a small island, surrounded by ocean and quiet winds. To the outside world, it’s just a speck on the map a dot in the vast blue of the Pacific. But for those of us who call it home, we know the truth: this island is a gold mine.

Not in the way people usually think of gold. No, we don’t have diamonds or oil or flashing city lights. But what we have is rarer: rich culture, untouched beauty, deeply rooted traditions, and a people whose warmth could melt even the hardest hearts. Our land, our waters, our language, our ways, this is the treasure.

And yet, something is happening.

Something painful.

Something we don’t always want to talk about.

See, this gold mine? It’s been left open. Not protected, not fully understood, and worst of all not valued by the very people who live on it. We’ve grown used to outsiders showing up, digging into our resources, our culture, our opportunities and walking away with profits, recognition, and control. All while we, the locals, are standing on the gold and struggling to see its worth.

We welcome others with open arms. That’s the Samoan way. We offer our best our land, our hospitality, our kindness because that’s how we were raised. But sometimes that kindness is taken for weakness. Sometimes that open door turns into an open wound.

And the hardest part? It’s not just about the outsiders.

It’s about us too.

Too many times, we doubt our own people when they dream big. We question their intentions when they try something new. We whisper behind their backs instead of standing beside them. We’ll support someone from far away before we support our own neighbor. Maybe it’s fear. Maybe it’s pride. Maybe it’s something we’ve been taught without even realizing it.

But here’s the truth: no one will value our gold if we don’t value it first.

We have to stop giving away the keys to the mine. We have to protect what’s ours—not with walls, but with wisdom. Not with hate, but with awareness. We have to uplift each other. Invest in each other. Celebrate when one of us wins, not tear them down.

Because this island is full of brilliance. It’s in the young farmer planting taro with his bare hands. It’s in the aunty selling homemade food on the roadside. It’s in the child who speaks Samoan with pride. It’s in the artist, the healer, the dreamer. We are the gold.

The foreigners may come with fancy tools and polished words. But they don’t know the land like we do. They don’t feel the heartbeat of this place in their chest like we do. And they shouldn’t be the only ones to benefit from what’s here.

So let this post be a reminder:

To my people, to my village, to my island don’t sleep on your own treasure.

Protect it. Grow it. Share it but never forget who it belongs to.

The gold mine isn’t hidden. It’s right under our feet.

Let’s stop handing it away.

Let’s learn how to mine it for ourselves.

Fa’amuamua le fanua. Fa’amuamua tagata o le nu’u. Fa’amuamua le aganu’u.

Put the land, the people, and the culture first.