HE was a man full of humour and everywhere he went his personality would go with him, even on the rugby pitch.
This was how Eastern Zone Rugby Association vice-president Development Walesi Soqoiwasa described his long-time friend and former national rep, the late Sairusi Naituku.
Sitting at his Sila Central School home on Sunday after returning from the usual Sunday church service, Soqoiwasa recalled all the memories they had with someone he played with in the Suva Rugby Union and also taught with at Ratu Sukuna Memorial School.
Soqoiwasa first knew Naituku through stories of him when he went to attend the Great Council of Chiefs School in Nabua — Ratu Sukuna Memorial School.
But he said Naituku had left the school then, however, how he carried himself in the school was what teachers and students who knew him would continue to talk about.
“I later came to meet him when I joined the Suva Colts in 1988, he was in the senior team, more senior than me but during our Suva rugby games we got close because for Sai an introduction would lead to him trying to explore connections until he finds a way to be related to you,” Soqoiwasa said.
“He was already a national rep then and when I said he took his personality everywhere, I meant this — when he was playing for Suva he heard that his brother “Ilex” who was in the Navy would be playing in the Navy team against Lomaiviti, he went and played for Lomaiviti and every time there was a scrum he would pull his brothers beard and would giggle, spoiling the navy’s scrum.
“When he was in the national team with his brother, they would continuously spoil each other, at one stage in a bar in the UK, he was having beer with a woman when he realised that the woman was looking to someone else behind him, this was his brother signalling to the woman not to be interested in him, he just swore at his brother then he looked back and realised,” Soqoiwasa said of Naituku.
Soqoiwasa said Naituku started at locks with the national team and later went to looseman before he was later shifted to prop.
Sports science education
Naituku started his teaching career at Ratu Sukuna Memorial School as a Physical Education, Music and Arts teacher.
Soqoiwasa said this was in 1993; a year after Soqoiwasa joined the school from the Fiji Navy.
“He was brought in to replace Vesi Rauluni who had gone to join National Bank and that was also where our friendship bond became stronger than ever,” Soqoiwasa said.
Soqoiwasa said Naituku was the kind of person that was so connected to his former school that he even asked Soqoiwasa that he wanted to spend his last year at Ratu Sukuna before retiring.
He was one that helped Ratu Sukuna in the years they came up proving to be a force in the national secondary school competition.
“He was one that was very good with development work, he was always eager to train the smaller grades in rugby in school and was one that would execute and show students what he wanted them to do by doing it himself.
“He was the teacher that developed players such as Marika Vakacegu, Waisale Suka and the national 7s captain now — Osea Kolinisau.”
Soqoiwasa said through Naituku’s development work, for the first time in the history of the school, RSMS went on to win the U16 grade which Vakacegu was playing in and later the U17 and U18.
It was also through his development that in 2002, the RSMS U19 team made the Deans trophy final, which former Flying Fijians Suka was also a member of.
“When he trained those students at the age of 13 years, he is probably the only teacher that would roll on the ground in the mud with the students when he shows them what to do; he was a good development teacher.”
Soqoiwasa said in those years, former national reps Simeli Radrodro and Fotu Waqabaca were also teachers at the school and they would refer to Naituku’s team as the “Froggies” because they were the only teams that would train in the swampy side of the school ground and would return after training without the teachers knowing who was whom.
“These “froggies” were the same team that had eight players joining the Hot Bread Kitchen national U18 team in 2002.”
“He was the one that believed in Osea Kolinisau,” Soqoiwasa said.
He added at RSMS, Kolinisau was one player that the coaches were always reluctant to allow to take the pitch because of his miniature built, but Naituku told them once that he was a player with great skills.
“At one stage Fotu was coaching Kolinisau’s team and RSMS was already losing, with about 10 minutes left in the game, he called out to Fotu “karua, let Kolinisau in”.
“Fotu did, and Kolinisau with his first ball just went for the try line from his wing position,” Soqoiwasa said.
He said that was how much he knew of players and how well he tried to work on developing children.
Naituku was also coaching Natabua when the Lautoka based school walked away with their first boys’ title in the Coca-Cola Games.
Sociable life
Soqoiwasa recalled their days together at Ratu Sukuna where they were once told by Waqabaca that the best place to get chow mein from was at Kim’s Restaurant in Marks St in Suva.
“So after school, he said that we go to Kim’s, when we reached there, he ordered two large size chicken chow mein.
“A while later, we were still waiting, he told me, okay we will do it like we do it in the national team, we had to finish the boil eggs so he ordered six buns with boiled eggs.
“The owner of the restaurant was shocked and asked him, huh, you just ordered two large servings of chow mein,” Soqoiwasa recalled.
“But that was the Sai we knew, there would never be a tense situation with him because he’d always find ways to make us laugh.”
Soqoiwasa said on another occasion, after school, he was coming from Waimanu Rd with Waqabaca and Soqoiwasa when Naituku was holding a stick.
“He came down acting blind, using the stick as a walking cane putting on his sunglasses, everyone that knew him called out to him.
“On another occasion we came to town together and I went into a shop opposite the now Mid City, I didn’t know that he sat outside the shop and acted like a beggar, took out a five cent coin and a one cent coin at the time and placed it on his handkerchief which he had spread in front of him,” Soqoiwasa said that was how humorous Naituku was.
He said he was a people’s man and made friends with everyone.
“No one of his friends was better than the other, they were all his friends and he was indeed a man with the heart of gold.”
Soqoiwasa said he was one that could tell jokes and repeat them and people would still laugh at the jokes.
Soqoiwasa said he would miss his dear friend, who has not only contributed to sports in the country but also in music.
“He was the one that started the group Domo Ni Savu because he would gather those boys who were students at Ratu Sukuna then and they would serenade after school.”
“I will miss him,” Soqoiwasa said of his friend and colleague.
Naituku is originally from Nacavanadi in Gau and died at his Natabua home on June 7.
