Page 21 - IB January 2022

Education Education

THE TWEETING TEACHER

By Joji Seseu Raqio individual who had connections with the Japanese Embassy
contacted me on Twitter and things began to look good with a
Fijian teacher and storyteller Joji Raqio has provided some group of men from an Asian company coming to take mea-
powerful insights into teaching in rural Fiji during the pan- surements and scouting for possible sites on which the bridge
demic. His Twitter feed has entertained and educated people was to be built. Unfortunately with the onset of the first and
across the nation. Here he tells his story. second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic those plans have had
to be suspended.
My name is Joji Seseu Raqio and my family is originally from Another example would be the story that I had initially
Nasaqalau, Lakeba in Lau. Interestingly I am a part of the shared on Twitter about my mother taking in and looking
second generation of my family that was born and brought up after our Indo Fijian elderly neighbour Aunty Parmesh Gopal
in the village of Rakiraki here in the Ra province where my
paternal grandmother is from. Continued on page 24
My paternal grandfather Joji Seseu (I am
named after him) left Nasaqalau as a young man
and eventually ended up at Rakiraki where he
met, married and settled down with my pater-
nal grandmother Litiana Leba Bolobolo from the
chiefly household of Uluda in Rakiraki.
I joined the teaching profession in 2004 after
graduating from Lautoka Teacher’s College in
2003 after two years of study. I was first posted
to Nasau District School in the interior of Ra and
spent five years there. I was then transferred
to Malake Village School also in Ra and I stayed
there for three years. In 2012 I was transferred
to Mataso Primary School and have been here
ever since. I had come to Mataso a single man
but now I am happily married to Reavi Kinikini
who is from Narikoso, Mataso and we have a
son Mitieli Bose Tuinasaqalau who just recently
turned a year old.
I joined Twitter in October of 2016 and I have
never regretted it once. I have more often than
not used the bird app as a platform on which I
am able to relate stories and experiences that I
have been able to collect all throughout my 18
years of teaching. Twitter has also provided me
a platform and an opportunity to interact with
individuals from all walks of life who I do not
personally know. Those interactions have led to
some very interesting resolutions.
One such example was back in February of
2020 when I had put up on Twitter pictures of
our students from Nakorovou village crossing
the flooded Wainisici river to return home after
school. That tweet immediately went viral with
mainstream Fijian media organisations and jour-
nalists picking it up and reporting on it or shar-
ing it on their respective social media platforms.
The issue of the village not having a bridge was
therefore highlighted with the villagers and
students having to make life and death decisions
whenever there was heavy rain.
A few days after the tweet had gone viral an

Islands Business, January 2022 21