The Seychelles is famous for its Créole cuisine which is influenced by French, African, Chinese, Indian and English cooking. Whilst the staple food is fish and rice; careful blending of spices is a major feature and much use is made of coconut milk and breadfruit. Local specialties include the daube (a sweet sauce); rougaille, (a tomato-based sauce); carii coco (a mild meat or fish curry with coconut cream); cari bernique, salade de palmiste (made from the 'heart' of the coconut palm also known as 'millionaire's salad') and brèdes, a local variety of spinach. There is a wide selection of fruit and vegetables, which include melon, guava, lychee, aubergine and calabashes. A popular drink is Seybrew; a German style lager which is made locally on the Island. Different blends of local tea can be sampled at the Tea Tavern on Mahé Island. Waiter service is the norm in most of the restaurants and tips are usually 5 -10 % of the bill.

People
About 90% of the Seychellois people live on Mahe Island. Most others live on Praslin and La Digue, with the remaining smaller islands either sparsely populated or uninhabited.

Most Seychellois are descendants of early French settlers and the African slaves brought to the Seychelles in the 19th century by the British, who freed them from slave ships on the East African coast. Indians and Chinese (1.1% of the population) account for the other permanent inhabitants. In 2006, about 4,000 expatriates lived and worked in Seychelles. Of those, about 65 were American.

Seychelles culture is a mixture of French and African (Creole) influences. Creole is the native language of 94% of the people; however, English and French are commonly used. English remains the language of government and commerce.

About 92% of the population over age 15 is literate, and the literacy rate of school-aged children has risen to well over 98%. Increases are expected, as nearly all children of primary school age attend school, and the government encourages adult education.

Demography. The population was 79,164 in 1999 and is growing slowly as a result of out-migration.

Linguistic Affiliation: The official languages are Seychelles Creole, French, and English. Seychelles Creole has a strong resemblance to the Creoles of Mauritius and Reunion and those of the Caribbean. There has been disagreement about the use of French versus English and the extent to which Creole should be used. Most people speak Creole at home. The English-French divide occurs in debates about how new words should be integrated into Creole.

Symbolism: The flag consists of wedges or rays emanating from the lower left corner. The colors are yellow, red, white, and green, with a blue wedge at the upper left. The flag symbolizes the ocean, the link to Africa, and the multicolored nature of the population. The government that gained power through a coup in 1977 had Marxist leanings and used rhetoric appropriate to that ideology. The country has used a national rhetoric of development and the pioneering spirit, especially in regard to the development of the outer islands.

Religious Beliefs : Most of the people are Roman Catholic (90 percent) or Anglican (8 percent). What the priests teach is somewhat different from the beliefs and practices of the layperson. Seychellois traditionally had a strong belief in spirits (nam) and sorcery (gri-gri). Some sorcerers were very influential.

Religious practitioners are priests of the various churches as well as the healers/sorcerers.

Rituals and Holy Places: There are no religious rituals specific to the Seychellois, and the Christian religious feasts are celebrated.

Death and the Afterlife. In general, people follow Christian conceptions of death and the afterlife. Linked to ideas about sorcery was the belief that the spirit of a person prematurely killed by sorcery could be made to serve the sorcerer for the duration of that person's natural life span.

Art
For a small country, there are several very well known painters residing there. Perhaps the best of these is Michael Adams who has a studio and gallery on the southwest coast of Mahe. The Daily Telegraph said "Adams catches the spirit of the islands, his brilliantly colored silk-screens prints throb with life, pattern, activity and fun. Every surface is worked over again and again with animals, people, rampant vegetation and crisp white buildings..." The silkscreen shown here is "Anse Royale," presented courtesy of Mango's Fine Art Gallery in Barbados which exhibits a retrospective of Michael's works.

Other artists are Leon Radegonde, Gerard Devoud and Marc Duc.

Museums
In Victoria you'll find the National Museum on Independence Avenue, the History Museum on State House Avenue and both the National Library and National Archives are on Francis Rachel Street.

The National Museum exhibits local cultural and natural history along with artifacts including ship wreckage, coral, voodoo implements, stuffed tortoises, old musical instruments and household objects and various possessions of the pirates who once roamed the waters.