The Trip

The picture is of the tree nursery I work at
In order to make it to Tana on time to meet Dan I had to leave Ranomafana on the day after Easter, incidentally this is also the biggest day for tourism in Ranomafana. Thousands of people pour into town from Tana and Fianar to swim in the hot springs and picnic in the valley. Not only was I forced to miss out on all this fun, but it made getting a taxi-brousse OUT of Ranomafana a frustrating task. I walked into town at around 7:30 and proceeded to wait for three hours while van after van of holiday makers poured into town. Finally at 10:30 a crammed red taxi-brousse pulled up into town and I was able to secure a seat.
I use the term ‘seat’ loosely because where I ended up was more or less squatting in the space between seats. I had to prop myself up on the benches next to me so I would not collapse onto the chicken which occupied the floor-space above my hovering bottom. This proved to be very uncomfortable and my legs lost circulation almost immediately. My predicament left me leaning rather heavily on the woman on my right who had a small child in her lap who, frightened by the white person, screamed in moral horror every time I so much as shrugged my shoulder. The van’s engine kept over heating on the way up the mountain so every 20 minutes we would stop and everyone would pile out and pick strawberry guavas off the trees while the driver fanned under the hood. I ended up befriending a nun from the bench in front of me and made pleasant conversation while we munched on fruit waiting for the engine to cool.
I slept poorly in the Fianarantsoa hostel and was up at 5:30 the next morning to catch a taxi to Tana. I have learned to have low expectations of actually leaving on time, so I was mildly impressed when we left only an hour and a half behind schedule. While I waited I made friends with a young lady from Glen Arbor who was visiting her boyfriend in Tulear. We left for Tana at 7:30 and made steady progress. We only broke down once and the only other significant impediment to our progress was the 2000 head of cattle strolling down the highway just south of Ambostra. Nine hours later I arrived in Tana seriously exhausted, but was greeted at the Peace Corps house by a small contingent of fellow volunteers passing though the capital. This necessitated me staying up much to late yet again sharing stories, pictures, and dinner cobbled together from the overpriced snacks at the gas station.
I was up again at 5:30 the following morning to meet Dan on his way out to Moremanga. We arrived early (always an unexpected surprise with Dan) so I toured the impressive, developed tree nursery run by SAF/FJKM in Moremanga. SAF is celebrating its 20th year in Moremanga and I was told that there would be a ceremony to celebrate the event. I had few details about what to expect, Dan had said something about a slide show, a 10 minute speech, and maybe food (coffee and munchies?). After all, Dan planned to lay out an entire fruit orchard and drive another hour down the road to spend the night after the ceremony was finished, how involved could it be?
We began at 10 AM with a full church service out on the driveway to the tree nursery. Hymns, prayer, sermon, collection, the works (keep in mind it is a Wednesday). This was followed by the unveiling of a new sign and the ceremonial cutting of a ribbon. Then came a series of speeches by various notables in SAF’s Moremanga operation, including Dan. Some 200 people had turned out to the event, decked out in their finest suits and skirts and about 15 people were diligently documenting every captivating second with digital camcorders and cameras. The speeches rapped up around 1PM and guests were given 20 minutes to explore the tree nursery and poke around SAF’s facilities before everyone was herded across the street for food.
A red pole barn had been prepared with clothed tables complimented with complete table service and a wide selection of chilled fizzy drinks. What unfolded over the course of the next three and a half hours was a four-course feast. The main course was rice served with fried chicken AND beef AND pork no less. Cake and ice-cream were carried out for dessert as well as a collection of fresh fruit juices. All the while we were serenaded by a Malagasy singing group from an artificial stage constructed on the far side of the barn. Unfortunately Madagascar has not yet grasped the concept of ‘background music’ so conversation was a challenge. At 4:30, having consumed more food than I thought possible, we all stood up, held hands, sang a song, and danced a little jig behind our chairs in unison.
With the sun sinking low Dan, myself, and some other SAF employees dashed out to our prospective orchard and began measuring distances and plotting trees. We jotted down the basics, drove out to Sara’s site where we would be spending the night and stayed up till 11:30 planning everything out.
That night all the early mornings, late nights, and soda pop caught up with me. I got very sick and was feverish and nauseated all night. I spent most of that day on bed rest, talking with my doctor on the phone, and limping back in the direction of Tana. This included a very unglamorous hour nap on a slab of concrete outside one of SAF’s Moremanga buildings. Back in Antananarivo, the doctor managed to rule out malaria he gave me some pills to settle my stomach. I finally got a good nights sleep.
After a recovery day it was back on the roads. One of the signs that Madagascar is starting to get under my skin is that nine and a half hours in a crammed little van doesn’t phase me anymore, in fact the drive is quite pleasant. The further you go south the bigger and more spectacular the mountains get. Route Nationale 7 is lined with fruit and craft vendors selling fresh persimmons, apples, bananas, you name it. It was a beautiful day and the air was filled with the aroma of burning eucalyptus baking red mud bricks. However, due to the poor budgeting of yours truly, I arrived in Fianarantsoa on Saturday with a dollar and a half in my pocket. With barely enough money for food and the banks closed until Monday, I spent the weekend exploring the hills of this fascinating city and scrounging the markets for cheap rice and veggies. My banking town was officially changed from Mananjary to Fianarantsoa this week so I will be seeing quite a bit more of this city in the future. I was more than pleased.