Editorial: Hurricane Sia, by Victor Rodger

Wellington, winter 1999:

She’s preparing to leave our flat on The Terrace, saying her goodbyes in her signature theatrical sing-song voice which seems somewhat at odds with her imposing frame. 

She is wrapped in an expensive looking pashmina which she could have picked up in any number of European locations that she often drops into conversation -  Venice, Berlin, Paris - but none of us think to ask its origin.

As she strides purposefully towards the front door, she passes a table upon which an open beer stands at the edge of the table. The bottom of her expensive looking pashmina collects the bottle of beer, making it fall onto the carpet with a soft, cushioned thud.

She stops, turns and watches as the beer slowly empties its contents onto the carpet. Then, barely a second later, she turns and continues on her way, utterly disinterested in even an empty gesture to clean it up.

Instead, she leaves us to clean up her mess.

This is the jukebox story I have always told about Sia Figiel, that hurricane of a woman: impossible to ignore, quite something to behold, and always with the potential to create chaos.

This May will be one year since she was charged with the murder of the poet and academic Sinavaiana Gabbard. The facts of the case have still yet to fully emerge. But everyone knows the rough shape of the story: Sinavaiana was found, dead, in Sia’s bathroom.  The night she was killed, Sia stayed with a friend or a relative. In the morning Sia disclosed that Sinavaiana was dead.

For most of us within the small community of Pasifika writers in Aotearoa our reaction was one of collective sorrow, not just for the victim but also for the alleged perpetrator. Yes, we all knew Sia could be high maintenance - but a possible murderer?

Never in our wildest dreams.

*

Wellington, summer 1997:

I was a poor drama school student  living with the not-quite-as-poor artist Ani O’Neill at the Rita Angus cottage in Thorndon where she had a nine-month residency. Ani stayed in the actual cottage; I slept out in the dome in the backyard, a fale-like structure which had no glass in any of its rectangular windows. (During that harsh, wet winter I slept in a balaclava underneath three duvets and a sleeping bag and hoped for the best).

One long weekend – perhaps Easter - Ani and I were both completely broke. The cupboards were bare. The outlook for the long weekend ahead was bleak.   

But then, just like in a fairy tale, a phone call from one of Ani’s friends: could we host a visiting writer from Samoa, who had just won the Commonwealth literary award for her debut novel plus a stack of money?

Why yes, yes, we could.  

Later that day Sia Figiel emerged from the path up to the cottage, statuesque, laden with laughter, anecdotes and, most importantly, two supermarket bags heavy with food.

The rich artist cooked for the poor artists: a creamy concoction with mince and leeks.  I remember eating thirds. Possibly even fourths.

Later, we went to a reading at Victoria University of the novel which Sia had won the award for, Where We Once Belonged.

The front row was stacked with your garden variety Samoan uncle and auntie types who had come to hear the tusitala who had won the fancy award.

Sia greeted the crowd in her signature high-pitched voice and then opened the book and read the ubiquitous first line:  

‘The first time I saw the insides of a woman’s vagina, I was not alone.’

The front row (amongst others) flinched; their eyes widened in shock even as their smiles remained fixed on their faces.    

It was glorious. And it made me love Sia – her lack of fefe (fear), and her unapologetic nature.

A decade or so later, I was in Hay on Wye, the well-known Welsh book town that is home to an annual literary festival and full of second-hand bookshops.  Scanning the shelves of one such bookshop, I was pleasantly surprised to discover Where We Once Belonged. How had it got there, I wondered? Whatever its journey to that shelf, I loved that it had made it. 

*

Over the years I saw Sia here and there:  a writer’s festival in Auckland; the opening of the theatrical adaptation of Where We Once Belonged; once at her fale in Pago Pago where she lived with her two sons.  

Later I saw online she had become a diabetes warrior, proclaiming: Sia Figiel has diabetes, diabetes does not have her.

But the last time I actually heard from her was in 2015 when she sent out a group email, appealing for blurbs for her upcoming book, Freelove:

December 1: 

So I'm not fucking crying at McDonald's!!!

I came in for a break to get coffee and to be away from my PC. To just sit and enjoy my last week of anonymity because once I hit Honolulu it’s gone. And the fucking phone is vibrating like a mother! And you're all fucking overwhelming me like crazy. Why you go make me cry like some Oceanic woman whose (sic) lost a lover and found a  race? A planet? A supernova? A moon? A family? A long lost friend? All of you. Shit. You're fucking me with your ofa. Your alofa. Your aroha. You overwhelm me and I'm drowning in your words, streaming down my face in a deluge of salt.

December 1: 21.13

Please check out my latest blog on Sia Figiel has diabetes, diabetes doesn't have HER, which I attach. oh and 'like' us. Fank u.

December 2: 00.39

and please like our diabetes page. we need your support. fank q also, then i don't have to duplicate.

December 2: 01:09

Thank you for giving me more of you. I've asked for a lot, haven't I? I know it.  I don't know how to repay you. I have nothing to give  But my heart.

Take it. Before it jumps out and slaps you  Or hugs yours

December 2:  17:59

I had a hard day today 

I come before you naked With nothing but my heart and my soul Begging your forgiveness This has been such a Pacific process This whole process of finishing a novel in less than 6 weeks A novel that occupied me for the last 20 years in thought I tell you, it was like taking dictation It basically wrote itself  The Gods must have a lousy sense of humor  To give such a big gift to such a coward like me But that was 12 hours ago At this hour, after a day of wandering the city looking at empty faces for answers I realize that I have to embrace the responsibility that comes with my profession

I bow before you Kneeling on broken glass Begging for forgiveness In the way I may have recklessly conducted myself and my wild abandon in language that may have offended some of you But understand this No malice was intended Only the spirit of the wild Free spirit Freelove Bursting to heard To be felt  To be

December 2:

Subject: Re: Every man for Himself at this point. Good night Moon. Good night.

There is no Freelove. No Hawaii. No tour. Nada. So hey you're FREE. I've got a spaceship to catch. But I'll have to say, it's been real. Thanks for lending me your ear. Even if for a while. I'll see some of you in Heaven. Pulotu. And behind that Black Star. Tofa Sofia… …I don't ever want to hear Freelove again. Ever. Well I won't be able to hear or understand you where I'm going anyways. I'm tired and need to return where I came from. Sia.

Five months later on May 15, an invitation appeared in my inbox to the launch of Freelove, with no mention of the previous email that had caused many of us to worry for Sia’s personal welfare.

And then, finally, a general email dated May 25, 2018: announcing the launch of Freelove with a quote at the bottom:

Tatou te manumalo pe'a tatou fa'ato'ilaloina i tatou lava, ae le'o isi.

We triumph through conquering ourselves, not others.

*

Now, much like the recent posthumous reassessment of Alice Munro’s work in light of the blind eye she turned towards the sexual abuse her daughter suffered at the hands of her husband, there is a post-alleged murder reassessment of Sia’s.

Multiple award-winning poet Tusiata Avia looks at it like this: ‘For me, Where We Once Belonged is one of the most important/ influential books I’ve ever read - and always will be despite what she’s (allegedly) done.’

And yet fellow poet Selina Tusitala Marsh struck a different note entirely with a trio of poems written soon after the news emerged, insisting that she would no longer teach Figiel’s work.

So what happens now? Does she now become defined as Sia Figiel, alleged murderer? Or does she still remain Sia Figiel, a seminal part of the Pasifika canon?  

Only time will tell.