Last March when Tropical Storm Hubert rolled through a little red scar of exposed earth appeared on a distant hillside above Ranomafana. Although it appeared harmless enough when viewed from the town square, the landslide posed a serious threat to a priceless internet and cell phone tower perched on the hill’s summit. After the storm cleared, a helicopter bearing concerned big-wigs from the French telecom giant Orange flew out to investigate. The initial report was not good. All the earth supporting the east end of the pylon was gone and each new rain shower was washing soil out from under the concrete foundations of the substructure. Orange purchased a colossal green tarp as a stop-gap measure to cover the damaged hillside. Then they called Yoann.
Yoann Coppin is a French entrepreneur who I met last May during my IST conference. He is the owner of a small company that uses an amazing grass called veditver to stabilize hillsides and prevent further erosion. Yoann and I have been communicating since May about his upcoming project in Ranomafana. I offered to help him get the materials and labor together to jumpstart the project before he was due to arrive. He made me responsible for locating and purchasing 200 Eucalyptus logs and hiring 25 men to work on the hill starting on the Monday following Vingt-six. Preparing for Yoann has been one of my major tasks over the past few months. Eucalyptus does not grow in Ranomafana, so the logs had to be ordered and transported from Kelialina, a little village 10k away. I also collected all of the labor necessary, agreed on wages, and organized a meeting place. Then about 12 hours before Yoann’s arrival he called me and told me he was going to be a day late. Not wanting to disappoint 25 Malagasy men expecting work and a paycheck, I made the decision to start the job without Yoann. The first big task was to get the 200 logs up the hill to the tower.
The cell phone tower in question is a prominent feature on the Ranomafana skyline. Reaching it from the town square is a very strenuous half hour hike. Although only about a mile and a half away, the slope of the hill is steep enough throughout that my ears pop at least once during each ascent and decent. I expected that carrying these logs up would be a monumental task, but on the Monday we began work, it started to rain. The trail up quickly assumed the consistency of burnt rice pudding. By the time I made it up with my logs, I was covered in mud up to my knees.
Yoann arrived the following morn, but the rain did not dissipate, rather it continued to rain without interruption for the next 12 days. Unlike the tropical storms of January and February which clobber the island with torrential rains, put on fantastic lighting shows, and blow over in a few hours, June and July rains spray Madagascar with a chilly mist for weeks at a time. The rains made Ranomafana about as cold and miserable as Michigan in early November. Conditions on Yoann’s project continued to deteriorate. The Malagasy workers, without any serious cold weather gear, continued working in the mud, re-leveling the hillside and hauling cement bags full of manure up the increasingly slick trail. Pay for a days work was 4000 Ar., or just under $2.
Yoann’s presence provided an excellent excuse to bring some other volunteers up to my site to learn about erosion and vetiver grass. Originally I planned on hosting two volunteers at my house for a few days. By the time it was over, 8 different volunteers had made the trip to Ranomafana. My modest home was transformed into a sleeping-room-only hostel. My kitten, overwhelmed by events, had to go live with the neighbors. The packaged candies and meats I had been saving up from my precious mail pouches were almost entirely consumed in the course of less than a week.
On some days, the prevailing Nordic weather canceled work on the project so we were forced to seek other means of entertainment. We took one morning to take a hike into the Ranomafana National Park where we saw one of the most endangered species of lemur and plenty of other neat critters. Cold and dirty from the hiking and working, we made good use out of Ranomafana’s community pool (pictured). Fed entirely by a geothermal hot spring, the pool is always pleasantly warm, making for excellent soaking. On July 4th we were invited to a ‘small’ (turned out to be a crowd of 35) get together at the Director of Valbio’s place. Patricia Wright made an appearance and was a huge hit with the other volunteers, especially after she took us all to one of the nicer restaurants in town and bought us all dinner. Drinks were on the house.
Although my friends were learning a great deal and enjoying everything Ranomafana has to offer, Yoann’s project took a serious turn for the worse. Saturated by the unceasing rains, the top level of terracing collapsed, wasting well over a week of work. Planting of the grass was postponed until well after the volunteers were to leave so much of the training had to be done without doing any physical planting.
