Poland is one of four villages on the island of Kiritimati

Kiritimati

Kiritimati or Christmas Island is a Pacific Ocean raised coral atoll in the northern Line Islands, and part of the Republic of Kiribati....

 (Christmas Island), Kiribati

Kiribati

Kiribati , officially the Republic of Kiribati, is an island nation located in the central tropical Pacific Ocean. The permanent population exceeds just over 100,000 , and is composed of 32 atolls and one raised coral island, dispersed over 3.5 million square kilometres, straddling the...

. The village was named after a Polish

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

 explorer and engineer Stanisław Pełczyński who aided the villagers. He solved the problem with watering palm trees in dry season by suggesting modified irrigating system. He helped in building it and he taught them how to use it.

Location

Poland is located on the westernmost part of the island, at geographic coordinates: 1°51′52"N 157°33′07"W.

Demographics

Poland's population is 235 people (Census

Census

A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...

 2005), by far the smallest of the four inhabited villages on the island.

Name

The village was named in honour of a Pole

Poles

thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...

 whose name was Stanisław (Stanislaus) Pełczyński. Having arrived with an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 merchant vessel

Merchant vessel

A merchant vessel is a ship that transports cargo or passengers. The closely related term commercial vessel is defined by the United States Coast Guard as any vessel engaged in commercial trade or that carries passengers for hire...

 that was plying the copra

Copra

Copra is the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut. Coconut oil extracted from it has made copra an important agricultural commodity for many coconut-producing countries. It also yields coconut cake which is mainly used as feed for livestock.-Production:...

 trade at a time, when the local inhabitants were having difficulties irrigating

Irrigation

Irrigation may be defined as the science of artificial application of water to the land or soil. It is used to assist in the growing of agricultural crops, maintenance of landscapes, and revegetation of disturbed soils in dry areas and during periods of inadequate rainfall...

 their palm tree

Arecaceae

Arecaceae or Palmae , are a family of flowering plants, the only family in the monocot order Arecales. There are roughly 202 currently known genera with around 2600 species, most of which are restricted to tropical, subtropical, and warm temperate climates...

 plantation

Plantation

A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...

s, Stanisław helped them solve the problem. Accordingly, the village was renamed to its present-day name in his honor. Also, a church was built there and dedicated under the auspices of Saint Stanislaus, and a bay in the lagoon

Lagoon

A lagoon is a body of shallow sea water or brackish water separated from the sea by some form of barrier. The EU's habitat directive defines lagoons as "expanses of shallow coastal salt water, of varying salinity or water volume, wholly or partially separated from the sea by sand banks or shingle,...

 was named Saint Stanislaus Bay.

Sources

• R. Antoszewski: "Pacyficzna Polska" (Pacific Poland), Kurioza naukowe/Scientific curiosities, ISSN 1176-7545; year VI; No 1033. April 2005, v.55. On the web: 2005-05-29. Titirangi, Auckland, Nowa Zelandia. Link accessed on 2007-10-04.
• http://www.travelbit.pl/relacje/relacje.php?tom=VI&id=31 - another webpage about the village of Poland: Przez świat tom VI . Link fails with a database error. However, id=30, id=32, etc. all work. The cited source appears to have been removed. Link accessed on 2007-10-04.
• Wojciech Dąbrowski: "Od Kiribati do Nauru" . Link accessed on 2007-10-04.

The 5/6 class of the Poland Primary School and the head teacher at Poland Primary School.

External links

• Wojciech Dąbrowski: Homepage of the Polish world traveller Wojciech Dąbrowski. Link accessed on 2007-10-04.