Ethelwyn Aitcheson

“Hi, my name is Ethel and I’m from the Fiji Islands. I work at the University of the South Pacific as an electronic publisher. I’ve been here for the last ten years, going on eleven years.

I was excited to do the digital storytelling workshop. I thought it was nice to have my Dad, myself, and my daughter in my story … I’m really glad that I did it because since then my Dad has passed on, and my daughter has given birth to a daughter – so there’s still three generations, it’s just shifted now.

I like how we were taught to tell the short story – I mean the story that we imagined we’d tell was a few pages long – and how we told it with the pictures and the sound effects. In just a short time you can build a lot of emotions just by telling a story, a short story, depending on how you write it. Some were really emotional, sad, brought tears, some made us laugh – but very interesting how emotions can change suddenly, in a short time.”

My Family

I lay on my bed, listening to my 18 year old daughter Renata with her friends, getting dressed for her first time at a nightclub.  ‘Mum, you ready?’  ‘You asking your Mum to come with us?!’  From the other side of the wall I await her answer.

“I used to go drinking with my Dad when I was Renata’s age. My parents usually come down for Christmas from Samoa so I thought I’d save the video and screen it on Christmas morning …  and Dad was like, ‘really, you told a story about that? There’s so many other great stories!’  And I was like, ‘no, that was a memorable one.’ But they enjoyed it, they thought it was smart.

I think it’s good, just doing personal stories about oneself and it’s something you can keep and show for generations to come maybe. They are stories that could be told in a short time – it’s like everyone’s rushing now, there’s not enough time so I think that these, the shorter things are, the more interesting it’s put, the better it is. With anything, with the news, with what’s current. And I think it’s effective if it’s in a shorter form instead of long, if it’s video or audio.”