AID FOR TONGA

As the Kefus were getting back to normal, more trauma struck. A tsunami surged across the Tongan archipelago as ash from a volcanic eruption rained down onto the Pacific Island nation.

Toutai knew it was coming. His mother, Neomai, had been on the phone to relatives just after the January 15 eruption. About an hour later, communication was cut.

Toutai is the coach of the Tongan rugby team, a role that would have made his late father proud. Fatai Kefu was a member of a revered Tongan team that beat the Wallabies in 1973, arriving in Brisbane a year later to play for Southern Districts Rugby Union Club. Toutai, the eldest of six, came to Australia as a baby but the Tongan bond is strong.

His Tongan relatives were safe and remarkably, says Toutai, given the destruction, just three people were killed.

One side of the main island was “completely levelled”, taking out plantations.

The clean-up and re-establishment of homes and cropswill take months and money, so Toutai, with the Queensland Reds and UNICEF Australia’s Tongan Recovery Appeal, pulled together a charity match between the Tongan Invitational XV and the Vintage Reds XV at Suncorp Stadium in February.

The aim was to raise $100,000 but the tally is edging closer to $150,000, and Toutai is stoked by the generosity. He’s chuffed Tonga won, too.