VANUATU

Hey everyone :-)

My name is Philipp and I have a question about VANUATU.

I am going to visit Vanuatu and stay there for round about 2-3 nights.

I would like to ask you a few questions, maybe you can help me. Of course you can! ;-)

• Are there clothing-optional beaches?
  Or at least beaches where one can change a swimsuit without a "towel-dance"?

• Is naturism / nudism a misdemeanor / crime?

I love to snorkel, sand-beaches, nature
I dislike mass-tourism/crowds, noise, anoying insects and everything that wants to eat or just kill me

Is there a place on Vanuatu you could recommend to me? :-)

Thanks for any help in advance!

Cheers
Philipp

( I'm going to Vanuatu in December - probably round about the 17th or 19th. I'll have to return to Brisbane on the 23rd December to catch my flight back to Germany. )

Melanesian culture is very conservative. Unless you are in a resort, you would need to wear board shorts at least, not very brief swimmers. like speedos, as you would be offending local custom otherwise.
I am not aware of anywhere in the country that would be clothing optional - you mught be better off staying in Sydney if that is what you are looking for.
If you like nature, be prepared for insects.

Yeah, nudism is definitely a no-no in all of Melanesia, unless you go somewhere definitely out of sight of locals. Period.

However I found it no problem to swim in "brief swimmers".
Note that this only refers to actually swimming in them, not walking through the villages etc on the way to the beach.
I did notice however that the conservative Aussies really prefer those broad short kind of thing, which somewhat surprised me.

Thank you!

That's unfair - the natives in the jungle can wear their nambas while I have to dance with the towel at the beach. ;-)

I'm surprised that the people on Vanuatu struggle accepting their own body and the body of others. Or maybe they have to many naughty thoughts. I will try to behave even more prudish than in Australia but I am not willing to wear more than one swimmer at the same time! Hopefully I won't need it. :-)

Is there any region/island/spot on the map recommendable for snorkel?

Thanks again! :-)

Philipp

Philipp - the missionaries beat you to the Pacific by a long time!

I believe the only areas where very brief (or no) swimwear would be accepted in the Pacific are around the resort areas, and particularly in the "French" islands of New Caledonia and French Polynesia.

Other than that, the only opportunities are away from villages, where you are certain you are alone.

Although I drop my kit at every chance, for me the real pleasure of being in the Pacific Islands is to experience the local, distinctive cultures.

Accordingly, when out there, I keep my bathers on and tend to stay around people.

(If you only have a couple of days, it's unlikely that you'll get far from the crowds either!)

Edited by: bendigo

I feel sorry for the natives on the pacific islands who are victims of radical fundamentalistic christian missionaries.

The last time humandkind behave prudish they were kicked out of paradise! (Book of Genesis) So how can prudery be a christian value? How can the natives stick to it? Don't they have a bible or can no one of them read? roll eyes

Alright, we cannot solve this issue. Nevertheless it is nice so read that here are liberal minds, too.

Edlin, surely the most important thing when you travel is to respect local custom, and not impose your values and beliefs on them. You are being as insensitive as the worst of the missionaries. And please don't refer to islanders as "natives". They are intelligent educated self-determining people, and that word is demeaning.
Also, most missionaries were neither fundamentalist or radical.

Also bear in mind that even the most traditional and non-Christian "natives" do wear at least some attire (be it nambas, loinclothes or grass-skirts) to cover their private parts.
No adults go naked, traditionally or otherwise, in this part of the World.

@Ozziegiraffe

You got me wrong. It was not my itention to hurt your feelings or believes. My post was influence by a documentation on the way they should dress on the Island and what I know so far about christianisation and cultural imperialism.

I respect the native's values and believes. Nonetheless it must be considered that many had no free choice - they were forced to adopt the new values and believes and to forget about their own values, believes and traditions. That's some kind of religious imperialism.

A problem arises when things they were told are not in one line with what it should to be. Meaning a priest teaches them his own opinion instead of the religion itself. Let me give you an example. I saw a documentation about Vanuatu which also showed a priest preaching to his church. He preached that god told him that he (god) does not want the people to wear jeans instead of the traditional island dress!

From my point of view he manipulates the people, obtrude them his own oppinion by telling them it is what god requests. The bible (and the Holy Father) gives no indication that could cover his request. It's a misuse of authority.

Maybe this discussion goes a bit to much off-topic but I felt annonyed by listening to him - the medival is over. As a priest he should follow the bible, the ten commitments without adding something that contradicts to it.

I feel sorry of the natives because in most cases they were forced to give up their own cultural identity. That's not okay and is in contradiction to the bible.

Secondly - the term "native"

Why do you think that natives are not "intelligent educated self-determining people"? Of course they are! Following my wise dictionary the term native has no negative conotation at all! ;-)
Maybe you prefer terms like "aboriginal people" or "original inhabitants" which acutally means the same ot me.

@Laszlo
As I mentioned before, I am not intending to be naked in public. I was wondering if I have to take care with the towel while changing the swimmer or not. In my home country or in Dankmark it does not matter that much. You just change your swimmer and it's okay. For instance in islamic countries it's a no-no with a harsh punishment for those who don't care about it.

Doubtless, I will follow the expectations of the people of Vanuatu. I am there as a guest and not as a conquistador and that's how I will behave. Therefore I ask all this strange question because what seems right to me needn't be the same that's right for the local ones.

I think the linguistic problem of using the word "native" is more obvious ot me, as I am a native English speaker, and I gather you are not. It is more polite, probably more politically correct, to refer to people as "locals" or "islanders" rather than "natives", which has bad connotations to native English speakers, including, for example, Aboriginal Australians.
As far as what you have seen re "priests" telling people not to wear jeans, in my experience, it is the village chiefs, and priests or pastors, who are also members of the tribe, who try to prohibit, for example, women from wearing trousers, even though women (from the same tribe) have tried to tell them that they are safer from sexual assault if they wear trousers than they would be wearing skirts.
Historically, it may be the churches who have forbidden cultural practices (eg head-hunting and cannibalism, as well as nakedness), but it is also often the churches (at least some of them) that have actually been at pains to preserve culture. Jeans are a late 20th century cultural item - the church has been in these countries since the 19th century.

I think the other thing that is pertinent to this discussion is the question of whether what we think is best for the local people / nationals is really relevant?

I remember once suggesting to a very wise woman is Samoa that it was terrible to see how much money was being "wasted" on the churches in the area.

She agreed that a lot of the village money was committed to them, but said that "since they came, at least we don't kill each other all the time".

So, on balance, she thought there was a fairly positive impact from the work of the early missionaries and the subsequent strength of the churches.

I also recall a bizarre conversation with a Westerner who thought it was terrible that you could see people gathered around TV's in some fales if you went for a walk at night. He seemed to think it was important that villages be locked into a traditional lifestyle so that they were consistent with how they were "supposed" to look when he flew in for a two week holiday.

Cheers,

Rob