Pursuing a dream to fly

Island Girl to Airline Pilot by Silva McLeod, Exisle Publishing, $34.99 .. .. .. ..

.. .. .. This book is a memoir and I am pleased to see the writer has dedicated it to her Australian husband.

Silva had grown up on a small Tongan island. Her mother and father had decided to separate and had left Silva and her young sister to be brought up by grandparents. Her parents both married again and had other families.

Now, older and working in the bar of a hotel she met a young Australian, Ken Mc Leod, part of a group working at their small hospital.

They fell in love, a very traditional Tongan wedding followed, attended by most of the Tongan community and included Ken's parents who had flown over for the occasion.

Silva and Ken lived in Tonga at first, but when Ken's contract had finished they returned to Australia.

She feels self conscious in Australia because of her colour but is totally supported by Ken, his family and friends. The only racism appears to be from members of the Tongan community who suspect any island girl seen with a white man is a whore, the Tongan word for that upset her and arose Ken's anger on more than one occasion.

They settled in Australia raising two daughters. During a conversation they had had when first met Silva had spoken of a daydream to fly. Cancer had reared its ugly head with Ken and he reminded Silva of her dream.

What follows is her battle to become an airline pilot.

Here she faced discrimination, but nothing to do with her colour, it would have been the same for any woman trying to enter a dominantly male preserve.

She did well, worked hard and realised her dream, but without the tremendous support of Ken while going through years of fighting cancer nothing would have happened.

Even while going through almost the last chemotherapy treatment he didn't prevent her from living in Tonga for three months where she flew for Tongan Airlines, while between chemotherapy treatment he tried to keep his electoral business afloat amid looking after his daughters.

Credit to both of them, but I am really pleased she has dedicated her book to her husband because without his support for both her family, culturally and financially, her future ambition to realise a childhood dream never would have been possible. —