SURFERMAG.COM CURRENT ISSUE VOL. 44 #7

Although Henry, Patrick and others from the original Tahitian Surf Club traveled to France and Hawaii, their protégé Arsene Harehoe was the first young competitor to travel widely to England, Japan, Puerto Rico and Australia. In 1977 Arsene, just 16, traveled to Hawaii for the first time and won "best tube" at the Smirnoff. When Hira spoke of Arsene the word "legend" popped up frequently because, as he said, "Each time anything important has happened in Tahitian surfing, Arsene was there."

Today, Arsene is still in impeccable physical shape. When I met up with him at the shore inside of Ta'apuna, he'd just gone for a swim. Walking along shirtless, he began to imagine his paddle strokes for an upcoming canoe race. He made his hands into paddles and brushed his arms in an "S" pattern to his side. Then he stopped at a bush and found a flower for his ear. I asked him why others call him a legend, and he was characteristically modest. "Maybe because I was the only guy to do something in the surf. But probably just because I teach [the younger generation] to surf."

More than teaching the kids, Arsene shapes their boards, surfs big Teahupoo, works water safety at the big events, and, of course, races canoes. But by example, he showed the surfers who followed, like Poto and now Hira, that basing a competitive career out of Tahiti could be done, considering all the WCT event at Teahupoo brings to Tahiti, and the growing number of local competitions it has inspired.

As Hira said, "I think Teahupoo has the people thinking more about surfing. Before it would have been soccer or canoe. There are more kids surfing because of it."

To sit on the beach and listen to tales about the outer islands is like sitting in the original Star Wars outpost bar, absorbing fables of distant, sparkling planets. Tahiti is undeniably like the Hawaiian chain--the wafting fragrance, the volcanic earth and the dark green heights with clouds stuck on its crown. But Hawaii is established in the world's view, the number of islands in its chain counted and finite. For the industrialized world, Tahiti remains the romantic notion embedded in Gauguin's brushwork despite its traffic jams and crowded line-ups. But when looking at detailed maps of French Polynesia and the number of islands and atolls seemingly caught in Tahiti's gravitational pull, the myth lingers in the imagination. Considering that Teahupoo, in clear view at the end of the only coastal road, wasn't exposed until the mid 90s, the idea of the reef, wind and swell possibilities still undiscovered in the Society Islands blows through the mind like the restless trade winds.

In Papeete, I was introduced to a twenty-something Tahitian pearl farmer from the Tuamotus, a remote group of atolls to the north. He came to the city looking for a little fun and to buy a supply of surfboards to take back to his favorite home break. It was a story out of the American Midwest: he'd come in from the farm to the big city. Yet his farm was an aquatic one, and the "big city" was just a gathering of lights in the South Pacific.

With a knowing smirk, Poto confirmed that despite the relatively new desire for recognition on the part of Tahitian surfers, there are many surfers, especially in the outer islands, who "don't give a shit about a photographer."

Subscribe to Surfer Magazine