My Cousin Is a Chief in Samoa: The unlikely adventures of a Dane in Polynesia

Journalist Johannes Langkilde grew up in cold, windswept Denmark hearing stories of faraway relatives on the tropical islands of Samoa, one of them a real live chief! A thrilling tale, but obviously too good to be true — or so he thought.

Years later, while he was working as a foreign correspondent in the United States, he unexpectedly opened a door that would lead to his own very personal South Sea adventure. At a political convention in 2016, he suddenly found himself face to face with Fagafaga Daniel Langkilde of American Samoa. A spark was ignited between the two distant cousins, born on opposite sides of the globe. Their long-distance correspondence ultimately led the author, now a Danish news anchor, to travel with his wife and their two children to Polynesia, landing amidst the large and colorful Samoan branch of the Langkilde family.

But the author also had a mission: to chronicle the life and times of his distant uncle, Hans Alfred Langkilde, who left Denmark in 1869 at the age of 25. Along with Samoan relatives he revisits family lore and rediscovers key sites. And as he and his Danish family look back in time to connect the dots, they meet the boundless hospitality and exquisite natural beauty of the Samoan archipelago — and come away enriched.