Tongan people

The Tongans, 98 percent of Tonga's people, hold the only Pacific kingdom never colonised, two-thirds of them on Tongatapu. Village life and kinship order everything under chiefs and the king; Methodists, Catholics and Latter-day Saints divide Sundays that the constitution keeps sacred from midnight to midnight, closing all commerce. Tongan seafarers once ruled a maritime empire of Samoa, Fiji and eastern Polynesia under the Tui Tonga line; trilithon gates, royal tombs and talking chiefs remember it. Tapa cloth, kava circles, lakalaka dances and the taovala mats of respect dress daily life. Nuku'alofa blends European and Indigenous patterns while villages keep the old courtesies; remittances from Auckland, Sydney and Salt Lake carry the kingdom abroad. Tongatapu holds two-thirds of the nation. Nuku'alofa blends European and Tongan patterns daily. Free Wesleyan and Catholic bells ring every Sunday. Primary schools still teach every child free. Sabbath law still closes every shop at midnight.