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This is a very special day, a very special flight, he said.
Until March 2020, tourism made up more than 70 percent of the Cook Islands economy. And it was surging ahead, with year-on-year record growth.
That growth was flowing to Vili s Burgers - a shack on the road into Muri, where Sione Vili made his self-described best burgers on the island.
But when Covid struck and the borders closed, those visitors withered to zero. You name it, I had heaps of business. A majority of my customers, 80 percent, were tourists. In the end I had to get the wage subsidy, he said.