Will Olympic surfing damage a remote Tahitian village?

“Teahupo’o is the land of God before being the land of the Games,” say locals, but in five months the world’s biggest sporting contest will come to a one-cafe South Pacific village. Can it survive unscathed?

David Cole

Feb 20, 2024 – 8.09pm

Email LinkedIn Twitter Facebook

Subscribe to gift this article

Gift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe.

Subscribe now

Already a subscriber?

Peva Levy said he felt a powerful, natural energy known as “mana” when he surfed Teahupo’o’s waves on a piece of plywood for the first time, rushing down a crumbling white surf in front of an untouched volcanic beach several years before the steady streams of surfers started arriving when the village got its first asphalt road over 50 years ago.

“It was a secret spot,” the surfer and Tahitian native remembered, as he stood on the pristine beaches of Teahupo’o on the island’s south side, waves crashing off in the distance. “But it was not a secret spot for a long time.”