Aileen Reaps Fruits of Her Patience

Story of Her Determination in Achieving Her Dream

BY ALEX DADAMU

THE notion of becoming a Tourism operator never occur to Aileen Sukukonina until it was instilled by a foreigner during the visit of Prince William and Kate Middleton in September 2012.

During a dinner hosted to welcome Prince William and Kate at Tavanipupu resort, Aileen was sitting next to a Journalist who was traveling with the Royal couple at that time. The two started conversing about this and that until he (the Journalist) asks where she is from. 

After gathering that she was from the mainland and that Tavanipupu resort is not owned by local indigenous people, the Journalist advised Aileen that the local community could start a Tourism Business like the one at Tavanipupu because they have all the resources, the only thing was for the people to work together for the one common goal.

“Speak with the people, have this mindset to start a Tourism business of your own and make use of your resources. It’s good that you own the resources and also own the business unlike the case with Tavanipupu resort,” Aileen recalled the Englishman advising her.

Aileen recollected that from then on, the dream of starting a Business in Tourism stayed with her, however, the financial means to help pay for local labor was not forthcoming prompting her to apply for the seasonal workers’ scheme some years later.

 She was successful with her application and flew to New Zealand to work at an apple farm.

After spending some time working at the farm, Aileen began to make friends and they began asking where she is from. She spoke about her place, about Tavanipupu Resort and suddenly her friends wanted to come to her place and also see Tavanipupu.

According to Aileen, it clicked in her mind then and there that she must return home to start working on her dream project. So she return home and began work at the first building structure with her husband.

Actual work began in 2017 when some interested individuals in her community joined her and her husband and together they established a conservation area at an inland site and built 17 bungalows.

However, things does not go too well for them as towards the end of 2017, strong winds blew all 17 houses down to the ground.

“That incident cut the morale and determination of the people which resulted in them not wanting to continue further with the work,” Aileen said.

She said work on the project plummeted until “the dream of starting the Tourism Establishment was like a dim light at the far end of the tunnel.”

So work was halted in all of 2018 until come 2019, and with a renewed spirit, Aileen put force to once again pursue her dream.

“I can’t persuade any of the people to help me start work again on our project and I can’t blame them either, however, my husband and I in the meantime started work again on a building structure which was completed that year, 2019.” 

So without any funding opportunity or support whatsoever, Aileen and her husband went on to complete a building which contains a self-contained room and 3 budget accommodation which shares a toilet, a bathroom, and a Kitchen.

Aileen further told Tourism Media that recently, they went on to erect a building purposely for conference and meetings and another building – a Pub Hub to complete the mix.

She revealed that currently work is ongoing with more than 40 families showing genuine interest to link up with Aileen to carry the project to a new level, and that is to build Accommodation starting from the seaside right up to the bush occupying a large portion of the land.

“However, being a woman trying to lead a group that consists mainly of men is quite a challenging task,” Aileen admitted.

She encourages women who might have this big dream to start a business in the tourism industry to have a vision.

“Vision to successfully achieve your goal and never to give up on the way because your every sweat by the end of the day will be rewarded. 

“Despite the challenges, criticism, and hardships, you must stand strong for your vision,” Aileen urged.

Meanwhile, with the help of the Guadalcanal provincial Tourism desk, Aileen said she is currently promoting her Tourism Accommodation establishment and is looking forward to joining with Solomon Airlines ‘Umi Tugeda’ package to promote domestic tourism in the country.