5 things you did not know about locals in Maldives

I have to admit I really love luxury resorts, and all those I stayed at in the Maldives were pretty unforgettable. However, I’d like to recommend you to also go to a local island if you get more time. Local islands are completely different to resort islands and will give you a unique opportunity to learn about how the Maldive Islanders (Maldivians) live. As many people will never go to a local Maldivian island, I decided to write this article about 5 things you need to know about locals in Maldives. Hope you find it useful.

Following are the things I did not personally know about the Maldivians until my first visit to the Maldives in September 2017.

5 things you did not know about locals in Maldives

1. Maldivians love playing football, basketball and volleyball

Maybe it was just me, but I seriously did not expect it at all. As the Maldives are a country of 1,192 islands, it made me think the locals would be more into water sports than ground ones. I was so shocked to walk around Thoddoo, one of the local islands I visited, and see a group of local men playing volleyball. And then see local Muslim women all covered up from head to toes and playing volleyball at the nearby volleyball court. If I understood it right, on Thoddoo they play every second day around sunset time.

I noticed a similar thing with local women playing basketball on Gaafaru island, and men playing football at a huge football field just a few metres away. I found out that many local islands have a big football field where both kids and adults like playing soccer in the afternoon/evening. 

2. Maldivians are crazy about coffee

Personally, I do not drink coffee at all so I usually do not check out coffee shops a lot. Well, unless I need fast wifi to work online and there’s no good restaurant around. But in the Maldives I noticed a lot more coffee shops than you might expect.

Especially in Malé there’s a coffee shop at each street corner. And not just one. There’s a coffee shop next to yet another coffee shop all around Malé. I know locals, especially Maldivian men, who go out to a cafeteria even a few times per day; and they drink up to 5 cups of coffee daily. That’s crazy!  However, while in Europe it’s more women going out for a coffee to chat with their girl friends, in the Maldives I found mostly local men doing so while talking about business, fishing, or nothing important :D

at a coffee shop with locals in Maldives

3. Chewing areca nut

Coffee and food comes together with a plate of areca nuts with spices. Areca nut is the seed of areca palm. In fact, it’s not a nut, it’s fruit categorised as berry. When dried, it’s hard as wood which is maybe why it’s called ”a nut”. In the Maldives it is usually eaten after drinking or eating. Well, sometimes during the meal, or even before it. But often I saw the locals chewing areca nuts after eating. It’s a local culinary tradition to chew areca nuts with betel leaves and different spices, such as cardamom, cinnamon, clove etc. 

To be honest, I found areca nuts to be too hard to chew, but most of all, they taste weird. I didn’t find it pleasant at all and my local friends were laughing at the faces I was making when trying it. Not a good ”dessert” for me, sorry. I still prefer vegan chocolate, or young coconuts. But when you get a chance, definitely try it to make your own opinion.

4. Swinging

Inhabited local islands are full of swings. Many houses have their own swings under their garden trees, but also trees next to the ports, beaches or grocery stores are used for public swings. There’s not that much to do on local islands at sunset time, nor at mid-day when it’s too hot, so taking a break while swinging sounds like a good idea. And frankly, I could get use to swinging there half day every day, too. Easy peasy.

Similarly to swings, you will find also many benches all around the local islands. Many of them look exactly like the swings just on the ground. The locals gather around these benches quite a lot, or even use them to dry up wet clothes.

5. Many local women are housewives

I’ve noticed that on local islands men go fishing or work in the fields, but most women are housewives. At least on Gaafaru, each time I asked, the answer was ”women take care of the kids and the house”. And I really saw women doing so. I saw that even when the school is a 3-minute walk from where the family lives, the mother would go to pick up the kids after school anyway. Same with walking the kids to school in the morning.

And I noticed women sweeping the ground around their houses, the main streets and around the fields, too.

TIP: read about my experience on the local Gaafaru island in Maldives and what I did in there.

TIP 2: another local Maldivian island I visited was Thoddoo and afer spending 10 days there I wrote about 25 things to know about Thoddoo. And if you are planning a visit there, you might find my article about 15 things to do on Thoddoo useful, too ;)

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Posted in Asia, culture, habits, Maldives, tips, travel Tags: Asia, locals, Maldives