The day my daughter became an official woman by Tahitian standard - when a girl has her period for the first time - I cried my eyes out as my mother had done and sat with Turia at the kitchen table for the Welcome into Womanhood talk. It generally starts with, "Don't wash your hair during your period otherwise the blood is going to turn into ice and you're going to be mad."

When my mother told me this I was quite intrigued (Blood turning into ice? How could this be?) But I didn't say a word and listened as my mother went on. "Don't touch plants and flowers otherwise they're going to die. Make sure to rest because you lose litres of blood during your period."

The Welcome into Womanhood talk also briefly covered curtains, what to do when someone gives you something in a bowl, moving on to papers (degrees), cousin with cousin being strictly forbidden and contraception, contraception, contraception. My mother, professional cleaner with a vision and single mother of four children, didn't want a repeat of her life story.

Back to my daughter. "What?" she laughed. "Blood turning into ice? Are you mad? Litres of blood? Are you trying to be hilarious?" Turia left the kitchen table before I got to the curtains bit.

Meanwhile the same phenomenon was happening back home with my cousins and their daughters and I thought, there's a book! Excited, I began writing Frangipani about a mother/daughter relationship.