Episode: 3
Title: Cocos Culture and History
Broadcast: August 13th
Presenter: Chrissy Morrissy
Come and discover the fascinating history that placed the Cocos Islands on the map, as Chrissy travels to Home Island, in the north of the lagoon.
- Home Island is not like the rest of the atoll, where the dominant language is Malay instead of English.
- The Cocos Malay people were brought over in 1825 by John Clunies-Ross, to start up a coconut plantation which was the beginning of an empire.
- Home Island also holds the island’s most famous building: Oceanus – a colonial mansion that housed the Clunies-Ross dynasty for almost 100 years.
- Today, the mansion is owned by Avril and Lloyd Leist, a couple of historians who through their love of the past, have turned their home into a B&B, even offering history tours.
- While you’re at the island, make sure to take the Home Island Cultural Tour, and visit the final resting place of those that helped establish the Clunies-Ross dynasty.
Cocos Keeling Islands
P: (08) 9162 6790
W: http://www.cocoskeelingislands.com.au