Since being back here in Sydney we have not been watching too much TV, but our son called us up last week and told us to watch a show called "Meet the Natives". A group of Ni Vans from Tanna Island were taken to England to observe the customs of the locals. They were amazed and interested by many things, but two stuck out as being notable.
Firstly they remarked at how nobody smiled or said "Hello" in the street - they found this puzzling, especially as they went out of their way to greet people. The other thing was their reaction upon coming across homeless people sleeping on the streets in Manchester. They were told that these people had no home and no family. This was a concept they clearly couldn't process - "What do you mean, no home, no family? Where are they from, where is their village or their town? Don't they have a father, a mother, cousins?"
To pass someone in Tanna, in fact anywhere in Vanuatu, without a smile and at least "Hello" or "Where are you going - can I help you?" would be regarded as being odd, even bizarre, just as to actually SAY "Hello" to a stranger in our urban streets would viewed very suspiciously.
In rural Vanuatu we found the happiest people we have ever met. Many areas have no electricity, no running water, no shops and no money; yet they have a rich sense of community and mutual responsibility within a social structure that is based on benign oversight by elders, and the Chief in particular. Food is adequate but basic, although protein is scarce. Tuberculosis still afflicts many and leprosy is common enough, with medical facilities outside the few major towns quite deficient. They have little but are always willing to share what they do have. They do not, on the whole, live to a ripe old age. Why do they seem so content?
In 1980, Vanuatu became independent from the UK and France (who ruled the country as the Condiminium, known to locals as the "Pandemonium"; early in the piece the Brits drove on the left side of the road and the French on the right! There were separate police and court systems for Brits, French and locals - visitors could choose one!). From that time, infrastructure has suffered neglect and is failing in many areas. Vanuatu doesn't generate a lot of foreign exchange, and aid from Australia, New Zealand and the EU is sometimes misdirected and often doesn't reach its target areas (as anywhere in the world, especially where European governing structures are grafted onto indigenous root-stock, the politicians have flexible morality and expanding bank balances). Many of the tourist businesses and hotels in the larger centres are foreign-owned and repatriate their profits.
But the Ni Vans are incredibly proud of their independence - they value their culture and social structures, respect "Kastom" and deeply value the elder/chiefly system. They have taken the decision to go down a path the New Caledonians have yet to tread. The penalty for that is that they lack wealth and all the seductive conveniences of a modern European-style life. But they stand proud in their poverty and wouldn't swap places with the New Caledonians at any price.
The Ni Van social structure is very important to them as individuals - a sense of place in both geographical and clan terms, of individual and group identity, and of the crucial importance to their communities of family, of sharing and of helping. They know that they always have a home and a family - and so cannot comprehend our term "homeless". For someone to have "no family" is almost as incomprehensible. To the extent that they would understand the term they regard it as a shameful reflection on the broader family not looking after the individual.
This all gives them the security and confidence to look strangers in the eye and welcome them, to be genuinely interested in one's origins, family and beliefs. It would make them feel less than good community people if they passed you without at least a smile. They are fortunate and uncomplicated people. Wherever we went in Vanuatu, we felt like we were constantly "coming home".
We fear that as time passes health care will deteriorate further, inter-island communications and transport will flounder, and Vanuatu will not prosper. Yet ironically we suspect that they will continue to be the happiest people we have met, or are likely to meet. And who are we to tell them to do otherwise?