During a cruise from Sydney, Australia to Fiji we stopped at Vanuatu, a South Pacific nation comprised of about 80 volcanic islands. We had berthed at Port Villa and now we were off to visit a traditional tribal village in the jungle and a chance to explore the local cultures and traditions of the people.

Vanuatu (formerly known as the New Hebrides before gaining independence in 1980) is located in south Pacific, between Australia and Fiji and the archipelago is made of 80 islands. The islands were formed by the movement of tectonic plates and even today the movement of the tectonic plates triggers numerous earthquakes. At the joint of these plates there are 9 active volcanoes (Vanuatu is part of the famous Pacific Fire Ring).

The islands are covered by lush forests, dominated by banyans, a type of fig trees that form a huge treetop. There are over 150 species of orchids and 250 species of ferns in these forests. The beaches are neighbored by coral reefs and this is one of the few places where a type of sea cow, the dugong, lives. The people of Vanuatu belong to the Asian Black race, which entered the islands about 25,000-30,000 years ago coming from southeastern Asia. Geneticists have discovered that populations of Vanuatu and neighboring New Guinea and Solomon islands have one of the highest genetic diversity amongst human populations. In this part of the Pacific there are big differences between groups just from one island to the next – one might have to name five or six new races on this basis.

Vanuatu was first inhabited by Melanesian people. When the first Europeans stepped on Vanuatu in 1606, the islands were inhabited by tribes that commonly practiced cannibalism. It was Captain Cook who fully mapped and explored these islands when he arrived in 1774. He named the island the New Hebrides after the Scottish islands.

The forests where rich in sandalwood and the Europeans exploited heavily these resources. Later, they “recruited” work power from these islands for the sugarcane and cotton plantations from Samoa, Fiji and Australia. Theoretically, men signed a three-year contract but most of them were actually kidnapped. When this reached its peak, by the end of the 19th century, over half of the men of Vanuatu worked in other countries. Most of them never came back, killed by diseases.

Read more and see all the photos at : https://highlanderimagesphotography.com/2017/02/08/iarofa-cultural-village-vanuatu/