North to Banam Bay
04 August 2009 | Banam Bay
John and Shauna
From Awei Island we had a short downwind run to Banam Bay. This bay opens to the NNE and is relatively protected from the prevailing SE breezes and swell. There are three villages lining the bay - Banam itself, and two others which share the same chief and are closely tied together. The Kastom chief of these two is Chief Saitol - a very spry 84 year old who is as sharp as a tack. The villages are quite traditional and certainly very poor. We had a long walk with Saitol around the villages and their surrounds. He is a really likeable old guy who works hard at preserving the Kastom knowledge, dances and lore. He had a lot of interesting stories to tell about the Japanese, Australians and Americans in this region during WW2; he worked for the US during the war and has observed the whole period of joint British and French administration through to independence. His memory goes back to childhood recollections of his great-grandfather, who he says had 100 wives! The local kids have been delightful to be around - happy, playful and helpful to us without being intrusive or demanding - we have traded some t-shirts and stationery for a few pamplemousse and papaya, and have bought some pretty nautilus shells that they have found on the reefs and cleaned for sale. Yesterday Chief Saitol organised a traditional dance afternoon for us and two other yacht crews. The men danced in Small Nambas, the Kastom clothing of this area (tribes are often either Small Nambas or Big Nambas - the Namba is the banana-leaf penis sheath) and we saw various dances relating to courtship, amusement and to chiefly progression through the "Grades" of seniority. Then the women danced in skirts made from dried and delaminated leaves from various local plants. The women are not permitted into the men's dance area at any time. To enable the white women amongst us to enter the chief's area and watch the men dancing, Saitol had to kill and cook a pig prior to the dancing in order to prevent any bad event occurring in the village due to women entering a Tabu area. Although the dancing was serious and of significance, and explained to us by one of the Chief's sons, the men obviously enjoyed it a lot and had great fun during the performance. A full day and a sound sleep, with some wonderful memories; our next post will probably be from Luganville - we are told there are a couple of places there with internet access so hopefully we can put up some photos from the last few weeks. We had planned to return to Noumea from Port Vila at the end of the month, and then head towards either Brisbane or Coffs Harbour, but we heard on Radio Australia yesterday that there has been some unrest in New Caledonia, including Noumea - we hope this will prove to be transient but will be listening to see how it pans out. Cheers to all in cold Sydney!