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A spectacle you can bank on

St Andrew, the patron saint of Scotland, is remembered with a Bank Holiday every year in his home country. But in true Scots style, banks do not have to close on that day and employers are not required to give their staff a day off.

In other parts of Europe, St Andrew’s Eve is traditionally believed to be quite magical, revealing the identities of future husbands to young unmarried women.

On the Vanuatu island of Rah, however, St Andrew is celebrated a little differently.

For more than 100 years, the people of Rah and neighbouring Motolava in the Banks group of islands have been coming together to combine kastom

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(custom) tradition with Christianity, celebrating the life of St Andrew.

The St Andrew’s festival on Rah is a three-day event, with visitors welcome to join in the extraordinary culture and celebrations. Under the leadership of Father Luke Dini, villagers come together several days before the anniversary to prepare a kilometre of traditional fishing nets, made from coconut leaves.

The community and visitors head out with the leaves at high tide two days before St Andrew’s Day, forming a semicircle facing the white sand beach. The coconut leaves act as a giant net, trapping fish close to shore.

Nothing happens for several hours until low tide, when the villagers, in

PICTURES: Michael Kanashkevich

Father Luke Dini tells us why we should shell out for a stay on one of the more unusual islands – especially on St Andrew’s Day.

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Opposite: A Rah islander prepares for the festivities by applying traditional body paint. This page: Even very young villagers are welcome to join in the fishing.

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Snake Dance of the Banks, and lunch.

While on Rah, visitors are encouraged to explore. Father Luke says it takes somewhere between 40 minutes and a couple of hours to walk around the island.

The island’s Rock of Rah is the original home of shell money, an early currency used for trading in Vanuatu’s Banks islands.

Locals deposited their shell money at the Rock, where it was protected by the equivalent of a local bank manager. Shell money is still used in the Banks islands, but mainly in custom ceremonies.

Rah and Motolava are home to some of the country’s most beautiful white sand beaches, pristine coral reefs and a local culture that is alive and well.

Accommodation can be found on both islands, ranging from village stays to the as-good-as-it-gets Paradise Bungalows on Rah for around AU$40 a day.

Air Vanuatu flies to Motolava three times a week and transfers to Rah can be easily arranged.

By Tiffany Carroll

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PICTURE: Michael Kanashkevich

knee-high water, begin fishing, using everything from spears to bows and arrows, plus superior hand-eye coordination and a bit of luck.

When the seas have given up their bounty, the fishermen and women head to the community kitchen on Rah and prepare a feast fit for a king – or a saint, as the case may be.

The fish are ‘volcano baked’ in a mound of volcanic rocks, a practice unique to the people of Rah. St Andrew’s Day begins with an Anglican Church service, followed by custom dancing, including the famed

The three-day St Andrew’s festival begins with the catching of fish using spears and bows and arrows, after they have been trapped in coconut leaf nets laid in the pristine waters by villagers.

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