Is This Real?

We are in a tiny ancient car, zig-zagging slowly on the best parts of the road, almost stopping to cross potholes. The only light, coming from our head beams, illuminates towering gnarled trees. The air is heavy with a sweet smell. 

Tenga sua (ten-gah sue-ah) in Madagascar! Welcome in Madagascar.

We had one of the most pleasant flights, with large chairs and free leg space, a really tasty meal (with a choice of beer, wine and martini) and stewardesses who had a genuine smile. Ioan and myself are to be blamed for coming to this part of the world. He doesn’t remember why, maybe because of the Madagascar movies, but I wanted to see this “flora and fauna” gem. 

We start in Hellville (El-veel)( named after a general). The main road is asphalted, but the ones radiating from it, are yellow dirt. 

People going to a funeral

From our room we can see a bay, people unloading boats left on squelching muddy sand, carrying on their backs boards for hundreds of yards, a few backyards with quacking ducks, a dirt street on which children play noisily. Add to this the hourly cock-a-doodle-doos, from different roosters, with different intensities, spread around town and you probably got an idea.

Hervais (Air-vay) is our driver and in a way, guide. With his Renault 4, made in the 1970’s, he drove us on various points of the island Nosy Be (Nossy Beh), striving to improve his English, and we, our French. He taught us to answer to his U-bip-bip (Oo-beep-beep) with Oo-aah, and we happily did, several times a day.

Inside a Renault 4

Our first trip was to Lokobe reserve, started almost 15 years ago by the efforts of one man, Jean Robert, our guide. We had to drive almost an hour, stopping from time to time to look at chameleons, clinging to bushes on the side of the road. This one is a male, we know from its green color (the females are pink and black). We admired the design on his skin, his paws, so well-fitted for clasping the branch, his “Egyptian” walking, moving back and forward to fool his enemy, his perfectly coiled tail. It was frustrating to take his picture, as he wouldn’t look at us with both his eyes in the same time!

Then we climbed in pirogues, to traverse a shallow bay and paddled for another hour, under the hot noon sun. 



After a short brake, we were presented the different types of mangroves, long fruit, round fruit. The Malagasy children transform the round fruit into a wheel, harness a crab to it, and have races on the beach! 

Playing with boats made of drift wood and sails of plastic bags.

Whole family fishing: two people are holding the sheet, the rest scare the fish into it.

We had to cross his old village to get to the forest. Houses made of wooden poles and palm fronds were strewn around. The door frame was covered with embroidered drapes. We were asked not to talk in the forest, we could scare the animals, or he could not hear them. We followed his steps, stopping when he stopped, listening to the unknown sounds of the jungle, mixed with songs from the village and other tourists’ voices (it seems that other guides don’t enforce this rule of silence). 

Our first lemur was sleeping in a hollowed tree. Fluffy brown fur, human-like hands, he opened huge nocturnal eyes that seemed to say, “Why are you waking me up? I hope you don’t hurt me.” We would see others, also sleeping, or from a different species, a diurnal one, curious about us. 

The jungle walk is a life lesson. You have to have patience (to walk hours to find animals), to be physically fit (so you could climb up and down the trail, dodge that whipping branch, crawl in confined spaces), be quiet (so you will not scare that blue pigeon away),



 watch where you’re stepping (or you will crush that tiny chameleon)



 go slow (or you won’t notice the owl sleeping or a boa sliding on a branch), 





respect the environment and be mentally prepared that all your efforts have been in vain (sometimes you don’t see animals). 

A feast has been prepared while we were away, with grilled fish, skewers of shrimp and meat, crab and salads: carrot and papaya, avocado, lettuce and tomatoes. Dessert: fruits. 



We eat our fill and while we digest, Jean Robert explains to us what we saw. He begins by singing (and had us following the melodic line) the Malagasy anthem, translating the words (which I forgot). The flag is white—representing the people, green—the bounty of nature, red—the royal color (though now they have a president). He talks about 71 species of lemurs, from five families, where you can find them and so on. He says their scientific names and also the ones of the plants. It is obvious he loves what he is doing. He answers our questions about people. Their life is not an easy one. Most of their needs are satisfied from nature, but they have little cash, if crops fail, they will suffer from hunger. 

Under Jean's hand and tool there is a white diagonal line: that is the sap, streaming from a hole that he made. If you drink it, it's sweet, if you wash with it, it will take away even the resin. The stems are good for walls, fences, doors. The leaves for roofs.
This is the Travelers Palm Tree.

The school is free only in the elementary and now the teachers are in a two months strike for higher wages (the only raises are for military and police, even the doctors went on strike). Learning about our trip he is curious about the children’s school. “You are the school for today!” Mihai answers. And they are not the only one who learned new things today: I found out that pepper is a vine, and needs a tree support to have a good crop. The different kinds of pepper come from different handling of the seeds: white, black, green. The red pepper is a different plant.

Pepper vine with fruit

Going back on the pirogue I open my channels and take all that I can in: the swish of the pirogue over water, the rhythmic dipping of the paddles, the slanted sun, the birds, the open sky, the sound of insects, the children playing, my toes in the water slowly accumulating on the bottom, the grey sanded wood, the smell of all of them... filling that memory room for later, when I need it.

June 26th is the Madagascar National Day. Everybody is dressed in their best. The feast started the night before, with dancing and singing. On this day there is the fanfare playing while the schools (elementary, private, Muslim and so on), les jandarmes (police force) and some other institutions parade. The road is lined 4-5 people deep, all happy and proud, holding their children high so they have a good view. 

The Malagasy flag (right upper corner) is on every house!

The heat is too much for us. We retreat in our hotel and in the afternoon we move on the beach of Andilana.

We rented an apartment that has shutters instead of windows and there is a 6” space between the roof and the walls. Every bed has mousticaire (mosquitos drapes) that flutter in the breeze. In the night time we can hear the waves, changing sound as the tide comes or goes, and a small animal that moves through our room and disturbs the garbage. We have lunch on the beach, French cuisine under palm trees with sand between our toes. And an almost deserted beach...

But after two days we had to go back to Hellvile. We were to visit a perfume distillery. On this island there are many ylang-ylang (ee-langue- ee-langue) trees brought here from Philippines in 1903. If left alone they could grow to 30 m (100 ft), but here when they are three years old, they cut the growing tip. This makes the branches droop. Why? It makes for easy picking. Their flowers have a heavenly smell.



 Women, armed with headlights and front bags, will pick the flowers, starting at 3 am (the sun affects the perfume). They bring the bags to the distillery, where they would be weighted. They fill a cistern with flowers, seal it, and through a coiling pipe comes the water vapor. When it condenses, the water picks up the essential oil, and together they exit in a sealed cylinder. The oil stays on top, the water is recirculated. 500 kg (1000 lb) plus 300l (72 gal) water make 12 l (3 gal) of essence. A few milliliters cost $10. In the room were the old machines, made from copper, in France. Now they were using stainless steel ones. 

Crop of ylang-ylang and tourists.

Above the red funnel is a cylinder. The inside white band is the essence of ylang-ylang.

Crop of pepper

After this we were treated with a juice and fruits buffet. We got to try the cola nut, the one that goes into the soft drink formula. It was bitter and we didn’t feel any stimulant action. With bananas in our pockets we went into the forest to feed the lemurs. Emanuel, our guide, started calling them: maki-maki and making grunting noises. Soon enough four male Sifaka lemurs appeared interested in our bitses of bananas. They would hold onto a branch and lean to pick it, touching our hands or licking them (it felt like a cat’s tongue). As I was standing on my toes one of them caught my hand with his and steadied me, then he took his banana. It felt strong and sure, though soft and warm, and so tiny! It was wonderful to be there and have this kind of interaction, but in the same time I was asking myself: is this correct? We shouldn’t touch them, we could give them diseases, we shouldn’t feed them, it will change their behavior. But it felt so good... 

In the vicinity there were cages with other kind of lemurs, and a wild cat (this one is persecuted because when it attacks, it will jump for the eyes). The guide said that they were kept for three months and then released, their place taken by new ones. No one has any consideration for the change of habitat, or for territories, for the animals. Just for the tourist and his satisfaction (and his money). With one stop he can see many kinds of lemurs (including King Julien’s brothers - Madagascar movie, the ring tailed lemurs, who were kept on an island, as they are afraid of water), 

Catching a nap.

chameleons (kept for 3 weeks; while there, a female was digging a hole to deposit 4-6 eggs at intervals, that will hatch in 50-60 days, they will all have the same sex, the first one to claw its way out will be the strongest, the rest will emerge in 2-3 days), a giant tortoise, Napoleon, who celebrated his 200th birthday (he has a dent in his shell because after independence an hotelier wanted to shoot him, to have his shell in the hallway!), beside wild pigs, crocodiles, snakes.

Napoleon liked to be petted, especialy on the back of his very strong neck.

There was also a miniature botanical garden, with mini native trees and plants that look like rocks. The Malagasy people would keep it around the house for the water that is stored in it (the moment it develops horns, it becomes poisonous). 

So many new things for us in just a few days. It seems like a dream ... is it real?

The Eighth Continent

Believe it or not, but some people don't know where Madagascar is. Most people don't know that it is truly special and nobody actually knows how special it is. There are isolated areas where no scientist has ever made it and they think that there are plenty of undiscovered species. Madagascar broke away from the corner of East Africa some 160 million years ago and, that I really like, some 80 million years ago, the eastern part of Madagascar broke off to become the future... India. Isolated, the island took its own evolutionary course and subsequently 70% of its plants and 90% of its animals are endemic. Madagascar alone accounts for 5% of the number of species known to man. There are 71 species of lemurs, some mammals similar to monkeys yet different, still distant cousins of ours. Humans only arrived 2000 years ago and did their usual share of damage, but there is still a lot left. They came from different corners of the Indian Ocean and melted into a unique culture. The language has the closest relative on the island of Borneo. For all the above reasons, Madagascar is often considered the eighth continent, a world in itself that doesn't resemble anything else on Earth. Ioan wanted to come here, probably inspired by the animated movie, but he did a decent share of studying and preparing this segment. We were all on board and made this an important part of our trip.

It is not easy. With little competition, the airfares are exorbitant and the connections are few and far between. Air Madagascar is a respectable airline, but their website sucks, it was no use for me, just to see that they have no discounts. Alternatives include South African Airlines, Kenya Airways and Air Mauritius, but surprisingly it is easier to get here from Paris than from other parts of Africa. After looking for many months, I found the right website and the only flight to make this accessible. At $735 per person, the 3-hour return flight from Johannesburg was a good deal, considering the options.
Madagascar has it's own messy history - we will have a chance to learn about that later. In the last three years it has been in a political impasse, the fighting made the international organizations to withhold the aid that was essential for the functioning of the government. The political uncertainty dramatically decreased the numbers of international tourists and increased the levels of poverty. It is a shame because Madagascar could be a rich country. "Our politicians are stupid" said the first guide we had. Welcome to my world! I assured him that I have been to many countries and all politicians are like that, but I have to give him credit, the Malagasy ones seem to be even worse than usual. He is sad that other governments told their citizens not to travel here, the lack of tourists had seriously hurt people. We knew about their political problems and we chose to ignore government warnings, I decided not to seek any news about the current situation. I just got the latest electronic edition of Lonely Planet's guidebook and we got on the plane.

As chance would have it, our flight from Johannesburg to Antananarivo had a stop over in Nosy Be! Even if we didn't save any money we decided to jump off the plane there and find our way somehow to the capital for the return flight. This is a huge country, with 500 km on the West-East axis and 1600 km North-South. It's coast is 5000 km long. More importantly it has a big variety of ecosystems, with desert or jungle or impassable mountains, a very poor infrastructure, with the main roads full of potholes the "size of an elephant!"

We knew that we could only reach a couple of the areas and starting in the North West was a good offer. The flight from Johannesburg left an hour late. On the plane we had a good dinner, like in the old times. Ileana got a red Martini and I got a glass of red wine! We arrived after 10 pm in the tiniest airport that we ever saw. Of course one of the soldiers yelled at me for taking pictures, but after that everything went smoothly. Three signatures and stamps on each passport and we got the (free!) visas. A few other tourists stayed here but a good number would get back on the plane for the second leg of the flight. Hervais was waiting with another driver, sent by our hotel. While most tourists got into big size vans, we split in the two Renault 4s. Later I explained to Maria, that all my childhood I wanted to ride in one of these cars, but I never expected it to be quite like this. The ride in the dark to the hotel was memorable and indescribable. The poor road, the car with no dashboard lights or instruments, the driver starting without a key, by twisting some wires underneath the wheel. The slowdown to almost a halt every time there would be a little hill and he had to change the gears. The trees of the jungle in the pitch dark of the night. Amazing.

Nosy Be is a little island on the side of the big island of Madagascar. It is a superb tropical destination with five star resorts, white sand beaches and azure calm shallow waters. It is used by rich Europeans for vacations (they get here by charter flights) and has some reputation for sex tourism (strictly outlawed and mostly a thing of the past). We set up for the first few nights in the main local village, the only place with affordable accommodations. Few people travel like us, most others come straight to their resorts. We had Internet and the first day, Sunday, we caught up on correspondence and uploaded a couple blog posts. We only went out for lunch - I had "Langue de zébu en sauce piquant". It was just like my mother made it. Fantastique.

Monday we took a day trip to the Lokobe Natural Reserve. Almost an hour in the two Renaults, then almost an hour of paddling in a local pirogue and we got to the small village of Lokobe. Ninety adults and almost as many children. No road, no electricity, but they have a couple accommodations and some solar power. Our guide, born in the village, was the first one that started touring the forest. It is now an ecological reserve. After the two hour visit we had an unbelievable lunch of salads, rice, several kinds of fish and lobster, made with a sauce similar to the one I tasted in Galapagos. We later figured out that our guide transported the cook, an older lady, and the server, a younger one with a tiny baby, just for us, to prepare our lunch and serve it. He stated that it was just a typical Malagasy lunch, only the avocado and the green leaf salad were special. After that we had an hour long lecture, he explained to us what we saw, plus bits and pieces of history and politics and we had time for questions. He started by singing the national anthem and wrapped things up with another song. At some point he learned that we are traveling for 15 month and the first reaction was: "and the school, what about the school?" "You are the school for today!" He got it and he smiled. No further questions.

My first lemur 

Tuesday was the national holiday, starting with a three hour parade in the center of the village. Hell-ville (named after the French admiral de Hell) has about 22000 people and the center plaza, close to our hotel, was crowded and busy.

Activities were planned for the rest of the day, perfect reason for us to get away. We went to Andilana, the best beach in Nosy-be, and we agreed somewhat surprised, the best beach we ever saw. By far. Last year, I thought I found the perfect beach in Galapagos, I didn't know better. There was an Italian resort with loud Italian radio a few hundred meters away, behind a little hill, it didn't bother us, there were (possibly) some other people living in our huge house and certainly a mouse or similar animal. We had a huge loft without ceiling and only partial windows. Two mornings, two nights and two perfect sunsets, not like the ones in Bali. Some pictures might help.

Thursday we came back in the south of the island to work on our plans for the following weeks.

View from our room in Hell ville

Looking in the same direction, just a few degrees west

Friday we visited the ylang-ylang distillery and the Lemuraria, a little zoo/reserve/botanical garden. They keep the animals in cages for a day, a couple of weeks, months or permanently, like the crocodiles. One of the boa constrictors is released every day at 5 pm and next day they will catch another one in the forest and put it in the glass box for display for tourists! Ylang-ylang is a plant imported from Philippines in 1903, now covering all of the island. Five hundred kilograms of flowers (and 300 liters of water) are distilled three times per week to make 12 liters of oil, exported to France to make perfume. Eighty women work from 3 am to 10 am collecting flowers, which they bring in bags and discharge on the floor of the factory. Twenty men "work" in the factory, operating the machinery or counting the bags brought by women.

They refused to allow us to take their picture. they work!!!

It is not unusual for one of the flower collectors to step on a boa early in the morning, saving the hunt for the snake of the day. We saw plenty of lemurs, got acquainted with some various species and primed for the real search out in the national parks.

A tortoise celebrates its 200 birthday today!

Our guide was a marine biologist, retrained after his research station was closed. He also had a CD of reggae music. I refused to take his disk asking him to send me his tracks by email. His email disappeared from my iPhone. If you ever find Emmanuel at the Ylang Ylang distillery, please ask him to contact me.

Saturday we got up early, went to the port, caught a boat and left for the main island.