Pierre Chanel, Futuna and chanel paradisa

Max Allen of the Australian newspaper tells a great yarn about a ‘mysterious ancient grapevine’ that takes him full circle from France, through Chile, New Zealand and Wallis and Futuna and back to Australia. The variety in question is chanel paradisa and I mention this because I think that I happened to be in Wallis and Futuna on the occassion of the actual holy day attributed to Pierre Chanel, who Allen points out planted the original vine at the Catholic mission on Futuna. What an affair of colour and offerings (both photos were taken just outside the church and parochial house). But I could be wrong, and hopefully someone with a much greater knowledge of the religous calender in Wallis and Futuna will correct me. Atoloto are you out there? It was certaintly a religous holy day and holiday attributed to someone. And I did have a glass or two of wine at a very early part of the day in the parochial house after the mass in the church, plus a ‘small’ nip of Irish whisky kindly supplied by the celebrant. The church, parochial house and general site of the festival are captured in the early part of this video which I found on YouTube. Happy days!