A New Cuba-Fiji Mystery!

Aussie Christine will soon be back and I'll be blogging about Cuba so, in anticipation, I've been reading up on Cuban history ...

... and I've just come across something considerably ODD!

Are you aware that the ancient petroglyphs in Cuba carved by the original and now extinct people called The Ciboney are identical in appearance and purpose to the ancient Fijian petroglyphs in Sigatoka Valley? Yup, in both countries they have ancient ceremonial rocks covered with astonishingly identical patterns which, in both cases, were used for ancient rituals involving "Secret Teenage Boy Business". Two countries at the far ends of the earth from each other and they have this HUGE thing in common? Do you find it odd too?

Wracking my brains here and coming up blank for an explanation. I am recalling there is another Cuba-Fiji Mystery Connection, which I answered to my own satisfaction decades back, but it simply doesn't mesh with this in any way.

Do you know about that other one? How Fiji has 14 species of iguanas, 13 of which are descendants of those found in Madagascar (another beat for Madagascar-origins of the Fiji people!), and the 14th which is only found elsewhere in Cuba?

Mind-boggling? They originally thought this was the case just based on the appearance but thought "Can't be" so had them DNA tested and the answer came back "Affirmative"! Yes, one type of Fiji iguana is the same species as the endemic Cuban variety! AND there is no other population anywhere on the planet.

I gave this much thought when I first heard about it nearly 30 years ago and decided the 13 Madagascan species were descended from escaped pets. But the 14th? Cubans with pet iguanas in Fiji in ancient times? Mmmm? Nah! Still can't visualise it! It isn't just that I doubt the Ciboney had the technology for such a journey but also because the Cuban iguana is so little, toad-like-warty and ugly and completely lacking in any sort of charisma - which the Madagascan sort have in abundance - that I can't see anyone wanting one as a pet.

But then I heard there was a species of red-leafed mangrove also found only in Cuba and a single small island in Fiji - and, yes, it's the same island this iguana is found - and that's when I thought "Bingo!"

Can you see it too? A mangrove bush wrenched off Cuban mudflats by a storm and floating off to sea. On it, simply by chance, a pregnant iguana? - a couple of iguanas?, a small colony of iguanas? And there it is, being pulled by currents and pushed by winds for untold numbers of years until finally it came to rest on an island in the Fiji group.

"Aha!" you are undoubtedly now saying "But the Panama Canal wasn't built then! How did they get through Meso-America without leaving specimens behind?"

That stumped me too, because there's no way they or the mangrove bush could have survived that dangerous and freezing journey around the Southern Cape. But that's when I realised there is another explanation!

Fiji is the oldest island group in the Pacific (apart from New Caledonia that is, which broke off from the continental shelf and so is millions of years old). Our beloved islands started rising out of the sea between 80,000 and 90,000 years ago. At that time, North and South America hadn't yet connected. So voila! No problem whatsoever. Storm! Ripped out red-leafed mangrove bush! Floating iguanas! Winds! Currents! Years pass! Fiji! Got it! Direct connection! Mystery solved!!!

However, you can see that this doesn't explain the matched sets of petroglyphs! Unless, mmmm!, those Cuban iguanas carved the rocks! Nah! Doesn't work for me either!

OK, how's this for an explanation: these rocks were carved for "Secret Teenage Boy Business" ... and boys will be boys! As a former high school teacher, I know better than most that teenage boys are endlessly vile, ghastly, hormone-driven and achingly stupid, and that could well be the reason for this strange similarity: that these patterns and ceremonies were created by teenage boys, and all over the world these unspeakably hideous creatures think exactly - like exactly! - alike!

Voila! Mystery solved! NEXT???