Laki, an Australian-born Samoan history student, and Gen, a New Zealand-born Tongan psychology student, spent years at university learning what it means to be Indigenous to the Pacific while living away from home.

We learned some amazing things but kept noticing the gap – why don’t more of our people know these amazing things? There is a wealth of knowledge that exists. The Moanan exists to bridge the gap between our people and our knowledge.

The Moana is vast – geographically and demographically. Different peoples have different migration stories, different colonial histories, different ways of being Indigenous to this ocean.

We are Polynesian. We are based in Aotearoa. We hold that position honestly, and we aim to do our work in a way that honours the greatness of the whole Moana.