This week, Blue Ventures held an Open Day for the village. We had posters, made by the volunteers, about the inter-relationship between the mangroves, seagrass and reefs, what a marine protected area would mean for the fishing stocks (and what would happen if there weren't any protected areas), what the women's association did, and two possible futures for a Vezo family depending on whether or not they used contraception.
There were also posters on alternative ways of making money and on the benefits of using a solar stove. For the children, there was a turtle racing game and a fishing game, where you had to cast your fishing rod into a marine reserve bucket and a non-reserve bucket.
The day kicked off with the biggest rainstorm i've ever seen. It was so heavy that Andavadoaka rock and split rock, our local landmarks in the sea were completely obscured in rain and cloud. We hastily rescued all the posters from the leaking classroom and prayed for some respite from the rain. This is Andavadoaka - one of the driest places in Madagascar - not Manchester. It's not supposed to rain this hard, for that long!
As the expedition manager, I had two main worries. One - that no one would come. Two - that everyone would come and we couldn't accommodate!
Happily, my worries were unfounded. The sun broke through the clouds and shone for most of the day after the initial downpour and just the right amount of people came. Children were dunked in giant blue buckets so that they could experience breathing using scuba (and received a sweet for their bravery).
Others played the two games, while plenty more were entertained by the volunteers, using them as portable climbing frames. Adults came too - and most seemed interested in the posters.
Our Malagasy staff were on hand to elaborate on the themes, and ensure that the conservation message was spread. Gail, our resident camerawoman this expedition, showed a slideshow of her photos to the delight of everyone, and Gildas and the ex-village president showed a crowd of intrigued and giggling adults how to use a condom - with a broom to demonstrate. The condom message wasn't restricted to the demonstration or poster. Oh no. Nearly all of the volunteers, and most of the staff had got the women's association to embroider messages on the back of t-shirts promoting condom use.
We were already exhausted by lunchtime - especially anyone who'd been dealing with the children (or climbed on by them) but there was still more to come.
In the afternoon, we held a pirogue race. Each pirogue had three vezu and one fazahar (tourist). While it might have been just a race for us, for the villagers it was an extremely serious business. Not only was their pride at stake, but there was prize money too. It had been a bad week for fishing because of the weather so the prize money was all important. There were about 25 pirogues on the beach, and each was assigned a vazahar to sit in.
Not wanting to be completely humiliated in the race, I chose wisely - or so I thought - chosing to go with Fila, known for his rowing prowess. I shook hands with my piroguers and stood waiting by the pirogue for things to get going. Nothing seemed to happen for ages and ages but then suddenly, a lot of shouting and we were off, my three fisherman running with the pirogue into the water. I lost one shoe. Then another, into the sea. And then I was neck deep in water, swimming (I'm short) and struggling to get into the pirogue. Suddenly, I felt two hands under my armpits and I was lifted up into the air, out of the water and onto the pirogue. I felt about five.
My own pride might have been dented, but I was not going to let it stop me from doing my bit and so I began to row as hard as I could. We rowed out to the motorboat marker, rowed round it and came back to the beach. All the other piroguers were also rowing as hard as they could, rowing for their lives, or at least for their pride and their supper. These are extremely are strong motivators.
Unfortunately for my piroguers, we only came in second to last. My pride wasn't totally dented then. My arms, however, were pretty destroyed! It was such hard work!!! But then the shouting and gesticulating started. There had been a false start, and it wasn't fair and the villagers were up in arms. The race was null and void. We couldn't allow it to count and we had to do it all over again. The shouting and arguing continued for a while. Our Malagasy staff, diplomats that they are, calmed the situation down but ultimately, it appeared that there was nothing for it than to run the race again! It was hard enough the first time, but could I do it all again?
"you don't have to row" said Justin. Just sit in it. And so I agreed. The pirogues lined up on the beach once again, but this time a member of each pirogue stood further back on the beach in a line, waiting for the signal. When it was given, we were all off once again. My piroguers weren't taking any risks with me this time. They made me sit on the pirogue from the start. But there was no way that I could sit in it and not paddle. So my
poor little arms got a second workout as I paddled for my life once more.
"Make it count" I coached myself each time I put the paddle into the water. "Make it count". Maybe it did. I don't know. I kept the rhythm, and the boat kept moving forward, so perhaps I was doing something right.
The second race seemed a lot further although perhaps it was just that my arms were aching with the effort of doing the whole thing twice. I don't know. I hadn't used those muscles for such a long time. We did better in the second race, but we didn't win. We didn't even come in the first ten. The winner of the first race had also won the second - so the best rowers evidently did win. My piroguers seemed happier with their placing in the second race. And I got my shoes back. So, as with most things here, it all turned out all right in the end.
The day finished with a bit of entertainment. By which, I mean the staff and volunteers sung a conservation song in Malagasy written by James, our boat driver. The village were suitably amused and impressed. Some even donated money into a hat for us! It was pretty funny and we sung to huge applause and only a little laughter.
An English speaking competition then, and finally Bic's fin-fish presentation and a film about overfishing in Indonesia before heading back to Coco Beach for supper. Everyone agreed that it had been a fantastic day. Some staff suggested that we do it all again in a few months - maybe in as little as three. I tentatively agreed. I think my arms will just about have recovered by then!
Tuesday 25 March 2008
Meal musings
We get three meals a day at Coco Beach. Breakfast (with the bread of varying degrees of staleness, except when there is no bread, in which case we get bok bok (doughnuts) or rice cakes (like english muffins, only made with rice flour).
Sometimes there are scrambled eggs, other time a plate of fruit (banana or pineapple). Never both fruit and egg.
Lunch is the meal with the most vegetables as there's often a salad of sorts, plus rice, beans (or lentils) plus a stewy thing (usually fish, sometimes meat) or a plate of fish or squid, maybe some vegetables with potatoes (sort of like a stew) and sometimes something for the vegetarians - cabbage stuffed with pasta, or baked potato stuffed with pasta. A lunchtime treat is bok bok - which is basically deep fried fish in a doughnutty batter. Vegetarians will get either aubergine bok bok or, (rather pointlessly I think), potato bok bok. Frankly, if potato is going to be fried in any way, I'd rather just have chips. But anyway.
And then in the evening, there'll be more of the same, only fewer vegetables (never a salad) and you get dessert (usually fruit but sometimes ridiculously sweet peanut thingies). Anyway...
So, the vegetables tend to come from Morombe and the abundance of them depends very much on how recent a delivery we've had. The Coco Beach staff never need to go out shopping for their food supplies. For vegetables, bread and drinks they radio through their order to someone in Morombe and a 4x4 brings the delivery seemingly as and when it can - when the road isn't too washed out or dangerous and when the car works.
Meat is usually goat and tends to come from one of the Coco Beach goats (they proliferate much like rabbits) so no shopping required there. Same with chicken (rare), eggs and turkey. Not sure about the zebu meat.
The fish meanwhile, comes straight from the sea each day. It's so much better than a supermarket, though not quite as predictable. Every day, (weather permitting) a fisherman or two, or three, or sometimes a boy, will land on the beach in front of my hut in his (and
it's always a he) pirogue. Sometimes the pirogues are the ones with sails and a balancoire. Other times, it's the kind which you have to row, much like a canoe. They are never motorised. None of the villagers have boat with a motor on. The fisherman will walk up the beach, to the kitchen and present whatever fish he's caught to the kitchen staff or to the cook.
It seems such a luxury - to not even have to go shopping for your food, just to wait for it to come to you. Our cook will then make the meals based on what has been caught that day. Unfortunately, as all of this is totally weather dependent, we've had some rather lean fish periods this expedition. At least twice this expedition, the fishermen have been unable to go out and fish cos the sea was just far too rough. That meant no fish for about five or six days. That happened again this week as we had a bad storm the last Monday we
sent emails, and the sea was pretty rough for the rest of the week.
This meant, not only that was there no fish for five days and we had to have a few totally vegetarian meals. However, if that wasn't bad enough (for the meat eaters, anyway), our usual delivery from Morombe couldn't come cos the roads were too bad, and so first we ran out of bread and then vegetables. Think we even nearly ran out of chickens and goats! Then we ran out of potatoes. They NEVER run out of the potatoes
Thankfully, things have improved now (Sunday) as we got a delivery on Friday. But the fish situation isn't quite yet better.
The fact that the fishermen bring us what they've caught seems to have escaped one volunteer who complained this expedition that we were getting too many of the small fish - the pink eared emperors. He didn't like them so much as the big fish such as the barracuda and the tuna and so why couldn’t we have some more of them instead!?
We've had a number of weird complaints over the past four expeditions - but that one really took the biscuit. He clearly was not listening to the lectures where we've talked about the importance of creating a marine protected area because the area is getting rather fished out and there are not many of those big fish left. I tried to explain that what fish we ate was at the mercy of the weather, the conditions and what the local fishermen had caught. I hope that he got it.
Sometimes there are scrambled eggs, other time a plate of fruit (banana or pineapple). Never both fruit and egg.
Lunch is the meal with the most vegetables as there's often a salad of sorts, plus rice, beans (or lentils) plus a stewy thing (usually fish, sometimes meat) or a plate of fish or squid, maybe some vegetables with potatoes (sort of like a stew) and sometimes something for the vegetarians - cabbage stuffed with pasta, or baked potato stuffed with pasta. A lunchtime treat is bok bok - which is basically deep fried fish in a doughnutty batter. Vegetarians will get either aubergine bok bok or, (rather pointlessly I think), potato bok bok. Frankly, if potato is going to be fried in any way, I'd rather just have chips. But anyway.
And then in the evening, there'll be more of the same, only fewer vegetables (never a salad) and you get dessert (usually fruit but sometimes ridiculously sweet peanut thingies). Anyway...
So, the vegetables tend to come from Morombe and the abundance of them depends very much on how recent a delivery we've had. The Coco Beach staff never need to go out shopping for their food supplies. For vegetables, bread and drinks they radio through their order to someone in Morombe and a 4x4 brings the delivery seemingly as and when it can - when the road isn't too washed out or dangerous and when the car works.
Meat is usually goat and tends to come from one of the Coco Beach goats (they proliferate much like rabbits) so no shopping required there. Same with chicken (rare), eggs and turkey. Not sure about the zebu meat.
The fish meanwhile, comes straight from the sea each day. It's so much better than a supermarket, though not quite as predictable. Every day, (weather permitting) a fisherman or two, or three, or sometimes a boy, will land on the beach in front of my hut in his (and
it's always a he) pirogue. Sometimes the pirogues are the ones with sails and a balancoire. Other times, it's the kind which you have to row, much like a canoe. They are never motorised. None of the villagers have boat with a motor on. The fisherman will walk up the beach, to the kitchen and present whatever fish he's caught to the kitchen staff or to the cook.
It seems such a luxury - to not even have to go shopping for your food, just to wait for it to come to you. Our cook will then make the meals based on what has been caught that day. Unfortunately, as all of this is totally weather dependent, we've had some rather lean fish periods this expedition. At least twice this expedition, the fishermen have been unable to go out and fish cos the sea was just far too rough. That meant no fish for about five or six days. That happened again this week as we had a bad storm the last Monday we
sent emails, and the sea was pretty rough for the rest of the week.
This meant, not only that was there no fish for five days and we had to have a few totally vegetarian meals. However, if that wasn't bad enough (for the meat eaters, anyway), our usual delivery from Morombe couldn't come cos the roads were too bad, and so first we ran out of bread and then vegetables. Think we even nearly ran out of chickens and goats! Then we ran out of potatoes. They NEVER run out of the potatoes
Thankfully, things have improved now (Sunday) as we got a delivery on Friday. But the fish situation isn't quite yet better.
The fact that the fishermen bring us what they've caught seems to have escaped one volunteer who complained this expedition that we were getting too many of the small fish - the pink eared emperors. He didn't like them so much as the big fish such as the barracuda and the tuna and so why couldn’t we have some more of them instead!?
We've had a number of weird complaints over the past four expeditions - but that one really took the biscuit. He clearly was not listening to the lectures where we've talked about the importance of creating a marine protected area because the area is getting rather fished out and there are not many of those big fish left. I tried to explain that what fish we ate was at the mercy of the weather, the conditions and what the local fishermen had caught. I hope that he got it.
Muddier than a muddy thing
This week, I finally left site for the first time for more than a day. It was very exciting! We had a group of 9 volunteers and three staff members, and we went up north to a village called Bevatu (big stones) to survey some mangroves and some baobabs.
We left after breakfast and travelled on the sea by sailing pirogues. We had three altogether. The wind wasn't too bad and all in all the journey took us three hours. In three hours in the Uk you can get from Manchester to London and across London to my parents' house in Wembley. Three hours here gets you barely 20 kilometres (as the crow flies) if there is some wind (though not necessarily in the right direction).
It's pretty peaceful travelling by pirogue. You can't really read like you would do on a train, and there's no way you could watch a film, like you might on a plane. The only thing to do is to sit and be. That's it. And maybe chat to your fellow passengers - who, in this case, were Eamonn (18 from Ireland), and Monika (45, from South Africa). Eamonn spent most of the journey sat on the balancoire though so I mostly chatted to Monika, or just sat in silence, enjoying the peace.
It felt like a holiday - being as I couldn't really do any 'work' whilst sat on a pirogue. We arrived at Bevatu at 11 O'clock and set up residence in the yard of one of the nahudas of the village. We left our bags inside a big wooden hut with a concrete floor. Also within the enclosure, which was fenced in with bits of wood, were two more small huts.
They don't get many tourists in Bevatu. So, we were quite an attraction to the children of the village who came to stare at us eat, wash, and sleep. They laughed a lot at us. When we were lying down, getting ready to sleep on the pirogue sail, they thought we were hilarious. As I said in a previous email, if you ever have a fear of being laughed at, then come to Madagascar.
In the afternoon, we surveyed the baobabs in the spiny forest. They're pretty characteristic trees. Absolutely massive trunks, with tiny branches on the top. My group measured (and some of them climbed) 26 trees in the spiny forest. Which is very very spiny. In fact, I would go so far as to say it's even spinier in Bevatu than it is round our way.
Also interesting is that most of the land is actually rock - old coral reefs, limestone. Pretty spiky and hard. And yet there are things growing in amongst the cracks and wherever there is soil in between the rock. The forest is in fact pretty dense, making walking through to the baobabs pretty tricky without scratches or other injuries. We saw some huge spider's webs too, and a few cool birds.
Back in Bevatu, we hung out with the children or each other before being served some rice, mashed beans and goatfish by the village women.
Bevatu is greener than Andavadoaka and has some huge tamarind trees in the village, and one on the beach, providing some much needed shade from the heat of the day. Like Andavadoaka, the beach is sandy and all the village pirogues are lined up at the top of the beach before the houses start. Like Andavadoaka, the toilet is a section of the spiny forest reserved for that purpose.
Unfortunately, it is inhabitated by a particularly vicious mob of mosquitos and most of us left Bevatu with many mossie bites on our bottom from whenever it was exposed. Not a very pleasant experience. All I can say is I dread to think what mine would have looked like if I'd had a particularly bad bout of constipation or anything (sorry peeps! Too much information, I know!).
We slept that night under the stars and on top of a pirogue sail. I had my sleeping bag, which is particularly warm one. I ended up sweating like I was in a sauna, but resolutely refused to get out of the bag because the mosquitos, sensing the fresh meat, had left the spiny forest and came to visit us on the pirogue sail. I didn't sleep much, due to the buzzing of the mossies. Although, I must have slept at least for a while, because you need to be asleep in order to be woken up as many times as I was woken up.
There were other noises too - children laughing (at first), goats doing their goat thing, turkeys gobbling and staring at us at dawn, women singing in harmony at 11.30pm (there had been a death in the village), men chanting something before dawn (announcing the deaths to the village before the sun came up).
Breakfast was freshly made bok bok (doughy doughnuts) which were delicious, and very very sweet coffee.
After that, we were briefed by our mangrove 'experts' (three volunteers who'd done some surveying earlier in the expedition) and headed into the mangroves. The mangroves were even denser than the spiny forest and we had much fun clambering over the roots and counting the trees. I got muddier than a very muddy thing. Back in time for a late lunch, and then we took our pirogues back. The journey took half the time because the wind was in the right direction, and then we were home.
So, that was my adventure. It was really great to see somewhere different. See a different village and get mobile phone reception for a short while too. The mangroves and baobabs were stunning.
Since getting back, the visibility has been good enough for us to go out diving again too and so I have been out on a few science dives. Had quite a few lovely dives, including one to a reef we discovered in Christmas, where I saw some
barracuda and a really cool stingray.
Okay, I'm running late for a staff meeting, so that's as caught up as I can be for this week. I have a cold and can't dive tomorrow, and I feel pretty run down, so I'm looking forward to a little bit of peace after the expedition ends on Thursday (hoorah). I hope to have at least a little bit of a rest before it all starts again a week today.
We left after breakfast and travelled on the sea by sailing pirogues. We had three altogether. The wind wasn't too bad and all in all the journey took us three hours. In three hours in the Uk you can get from Manchester to London and across London to my parents' house in Wembley. Three hours here gets you barely 20 kilometres (as the crow flies) if there is some wind (though not necessarily in the right direction).
It's pretty peaceful travelling by pirogue. You can't really read like you would do on a train, and there's no way you could watch a film, like you might on a plane. The only thing to do is to sit and be. That's it. And maybe chat to your fellow passengers - who, in this case, were Eamonn (18 from Ireland), and Monika (45, from South Africa). Eamonn spent most of the journey sat on the balancoire though so I mostly chatted to Monika, or just sat in silence, enjoying the peace.
It felt like a holiday - being as I couldn't really do any 'work' whilst sat on a pirogue. We arrived at Bevatu at 11 O'clock and set up residence in the yard of one of the nahudas of the village. We left our bags inside a big wooden hut with a concrete floor. Also within the enclosure, which was fenced in with bits of wood, were two more small huts.
They don't get many tourists in Bevatu. So, we were quite an attraction to the children of the village who came to stare at us eat, wash, and sleep. They laughed a lot at us. When we were lying down, getting ready to sleep on the pirogue sail, they thought we were hilarious. As I said in a previous email, if you ever have a fear of being laughed at, then come to Madagascar.
In the afternoon, we surveyed the baobabs in the spiny forest. They're pretty characteristic trees. Absolutely massive trunks, with tiny branches on the top. My group measured (and some of them climbed) 26 trees in the spiny forest. Which is very very spiny. In fact, I would go so far as to say it's even spinier in Bevatu than it is round our way.
Also interesting is that most of the land is actually rock - old coral reefs, limestone. Pretty spiky and hard. And yet there are things growing in amongst the cracks and wherever there is soil in between the rock. The forest is in fact pretty dense, making walking through to the baobabs pretty tricky without scratches or other injuries. We saw some huge spider's webs too, and a few cool birds.
Back in Bevatu, we hung out with the children or each other before being served some rice, mashed beans and goatfish by the village women.
Bevatu is greener than Andavadoaka and has some huge tamarind trees in the village, and one on the beach, providing some much needed shade from the heat of the day. Like Andavadoaka, the beach is sandy and all the village pirogues are lined up at the top of the beach before the houses start. Like Andavadoaka, the toilet is a section of the spiny forest reserved for that purpose.
Unfortunately, it is inhabitated by a particularly vicious mob of mosquitos and most of us left Bevatu with many mossie bites on our bottom from whenever it was exposed. Not a very pleasant experience. All I can say is I dread to think what mine would have looked like if I'd had a particularly bad bout of constipation or anything (sorry peeps! Too much information, I know!).
We slept that night under the stars and on top of a pirogue sail. I had my sleeping bag, which is particularly warm one. I ended up sweating like I was in a sauna, but resolutely refused to get out of the bag because the mosquitos, sensing the fresh meat, had left the spiny forest and came to visit us on the pirogue sail. I didn't sleep much, due to the buzzing of the mossies. Although, I must have slept at least for a while, because you need to be asleep in order to be woken up as many times as I was woken up.
There were other noises too - children laughing (at first), goats doing their goat thing, turkeys gobbling and staring at us at dawn, women singing in harmony at 11.30pm (there had been a death in the village), men chanting something before dawn (announcing the deaths to the village before the sun came up).
Breakfast was freshly made bok bok (doughy doughnuts) which were delicious, and very very sweet coffee.
After that, we were briefed by our mangrove 'experts' (three volunteers who'd done some surveying earlier in the expedition) and headed into the mangroves. The mangroves were even denser than the spiny forest and we had much fun clambering over the roots and counting the trees. I got muddier than a very muddy thing. Back in time for a late lunch, and then we took our pirogues back. The journey took half the time because the wind was in the right direction, and then we were home.
So, that was my adventure. It was really great to see somewhere different. See a different village and get mobile phone reception for a short while too. The mangroves and baobabs were stunning.
Since getting back, the visibility has been good enough for us to go out diving again too and so I have been out on a few science dives. Had quite a few lovely dives, including one to a reef we discovered in Christmas, where I saw some
barracuda and a really cool stingray.
Okay, I'm running late for a staff meeting, so that's as caught up as I can be for this week. I have a cold and can't dive tomorrow, and I feel pretty run down, so I'm looking forward to a little bit of peace after the expedition ends on Thursday (hoorah). I hope to have at least a little bit of a rest before it all starts again a week today.
Wednesday 12 March 2008
International Women's Day
March 8th 2008
Today is International Women's Day. This was news to some of our international volunteers who had never heard of it before. Most of the men (and some of the women) made asides wondering when International Men's Day was.
According to an email that my mother sent me, International Women's Day has been celebrated for almost a hundred years and is now celebrated in many countries worldwide including Madagascar. Previously I've celebrated by attending events hosted and promoted by Manchester City Council. I've sung with the women's contingent of the Manchester Community Choir, hosted a confidence building workshop for women, and connected with women involved in all sorts of different campaigns across Manchester at a day of events in the town hall.
I've been a feminist for as long as I can remember - at least for the past 30 years. There is very little about British society that's persuaded me that it's time to give up the fight for equality. And yet relatively, women in the UK have it pretty good.
I've been living here in this small Vezu fishing village for the past five months, and I'm still getting my head round how different my life would be had I been born here 37 years ago instead of the UK. I would be a grandmother. I would have around 8 to 10 children alive and perhaps others that would not have made it. My body would have suffered as a result of having been pregnant for much of my adult life. I would probably be on my second 'husband'. Perhaps my third (Vezu men are not known for being faithful). I'm not sure how I would spend my days. Perhaps washing the clothes by hand of the fazahar staying in the village or maybe on a small stall, chatting to other women, looking after my children and selling peanuts and beans. I'd be feeding my family on fish and rice and I wouldn't get to go out drinking and dancing at night in the way that many of the men do. What I do know is that I would probably be a member of the women's association if I was still the same 'me' and trying to work towards the economic independence of the women of the village. The life of the men in this little fishing village is not an easy one. But the life of the women definitely appears to be even harder.
So, marking International Women's Day with Andavadoaka's women's association seemed just as important to do as marking the day would be at home.
I started by meeting the WA on the beach outside Club Alo Alo at 8am Malagasy time (actually 8.45am by my watch). By 9am, all the women of the association had arrived. They were all wearing sarongs, white t-shirts and a cardboard crown on their heads proclaiming the slogan "women for development" in Malagasy. We all lined up on the beach in a crocodile, two abreast. Lalao stood behind me and I was glad of her support as I hadn't a clue what was going on. Led by Madame Ziza and her very loud whistle, we marched through the village singing. I didn't know the tunes or the words, so I just marched along and hummed snippets of the melodies or harmonies when I could. The singing was beautiful and initially I felt quite overcome.
It felt quite empowering to be part of this group of women, snaking and singing through the village. We marched through the sandy tracks of the main street and were observed by men, women and children all gathered together at the edges. Some cheered and clapped. James, one of our boat drivers, just put his hands in his ears and then heckled us through a loudspeaker.
Just before we arrived at the primary school, a very bizarre thing happened. A teenager took over the megaphone thing and started barking orders at us to march in a certain way. And even more bizarrely, we responded. We marched into the school playground and stood to attention, at his command! At the far side of the playground - just outside the tiny school - a group of men sat on small wooden benches. They were the nahudas (important men of the village) and Daniel, a BV staff member. A speech was made, a minute's silence, and then the flag of Madagascar was hoisted up on a pole while we sang two songs (possibly one being the national anthem).
Following this, I was ushered to one of the seats of the 'dignatories' and the speeches began. Daniel seemed to be the event's compere. One of the nahudas spoke, Madame Ziza, the women's association president spoke and all the while I grew more and more nervous knowing that in a few short minutes it would be my turn. As with most events in the village of Andavaodaka there were 'quite literally' hundreds of children there. I tried some quick calculations - there were at least 30 members of the WA there. So, it was feasible that most of the children were theirs, or their grandchildren.
There were a few adults in the playground too - some more BV staff members, Justin and a few more women and men from the village. Then, finally it was my turn to speak. Daniel handed me the megaphone. I was incredibly nervous. Public speaking at such an 'official' event is daunting enough in English, let alone in a language that I can barely pronounce. I got through the few words that Lalao had written for me and sat down to applause. Phew. I had managed to pronounce the very last word incorrectly however, which produced a ripple of laughter. Frankly, if you are ever paranoid about people laughing at you, then come to Madagascar. It happens so frequently, that it's just not worth worrying about any more.
I sat down, still shaking, and passed the megaphone back to Daniel. There was dancing and singing then and much shaking of arses by the WA, to the amusement of the 300 or so children in the audience. Finally, one of the women from the WA spoke, but eschewed the megaphone. She drew more applause and was very charismatic and inspiring. I have no idea what she was saying. I hope that at least some of it was radical and calling for the emancipation of women! I have no idea what any of the speeches were about - not even mine! I had asked Gildas to translate mine, but it still didn't seem to make sense. Certainly all of the speeches included some sort of thanks to God for us being here.
The event dispersed then, and the male dignatories, Justin and I, the mercenary nun from the catholic school, the old Italian man who owns some land were all invited into the school with the WA for a drink. I had a fizzy orange (it was 10.30am) but I was shocked to see many of the women drinking beer! Malagasy women do not tend to drink alcohol at all, let alone in public. But then perhaps it's allowed on special events such as International women's day? I even saw a few women downing triple shots of togagash - the petrol-like homebrew that induces extreme drunkenness and memory loss!
There is a women's football match this afternoon and a party in the epi-bar tonight. I definitely won't be drinking togagash as this is definitely a March 8th that I don't want to forget.
Today is International Women's Day. This was news to some of our international volunteers who had never heard of it before. Most of the men (and some of the women) made asides wondering when International Men's Day was.
According to an email that my mother sent me, International Women's Day has been celebrated for almost a hundred years and is now celebrated in many countries worldwide including Madagascar. Previously I've celebrated by attending events hosted and promoted by Manchester City Council. I've sung with the women's contingent of the Manchester Community Choir, hosted a confidence building workshop for women, and connected with women involved in all sorts of different campaigns across Manchester at a day of events in the town hall.
I've been a feminist for as long as I can remember - at least for the past 30 years. There is very little about British society that's persuaded me that it's time to give up the fight for equality. And yet relatively, women in the UK have it pretty good.
I've been living here in this small Vezu fishing village for the past five months, and I'm still getting my head round how different my life would be had I been born here 37 years ago instead of the UK. I would be a grandmother. I would have around 8 to 10 children alive and perhaps others that would not have made it. My body would have suffered as a result of having been pregnant for much of my adult life. I would probably be on my second 'husband'. Perhaps my third (Vezu men are not known for being faithful). I'm not sure how I would spend my days. Perhaps washing the clothes by hand of the fazahar staying in the village or maybe on a small stall, chatting to other women, looking after my children and selling peanuts and beans. I'd be feeding my family on fish and rice and I wouldn't get to go out drinking and dancing at night in the way that many of the men do. What I do know is that I would probably be a member of the women's association if I was still the same 'me' and trying to work towards the economic independence of the women of the village. The life of the men in this little fishing village is not an easy one. But the life of the women definitely appears to be even harder.
So, marking International Women's Day with Andavadoaka's women's association seemed just as important to do as marking the day would be at home.
I started by meeting the WA on the beach outside Club Alo Alo at 8am Malagasy time (actually 8.45am by my watch). By 9am, all the women of the association had arrived. They were all wearing sarongs, white t-shirts and a cardboard crown on their heads proclaiming the slogan "women for development" in Malagasy. We all lined up on the beach in a crocodile, two abreast. Lalao stood behind me and I was glad of her support as I hadn't a clue what was going on. Led by Madame Ziza and her very loud whistle, we marched through the village singing. I didn't know the tunes or the words, so I just marched along and hummed snippets of the melodies or harmonies when I could. The singing was beautiful and initially I felt quite overcome.
It felt quite empowering to be part of this group of women, snaking and singing through the village. We marched through the sandy tracks of the main street and were observed by men, women and children all gathered together at the edges. Some cheered and clapped. James, one of our boat drivers, just put his hands in his ears and then heckled us through a loudspeaker.
Just before we arrived at the primary school, a very bizarre thing happened. A teenager took over the megaphone thing and started barking orders at us to march in a certain way. And even more bizarrely, we responded. We marched into the school playground and stood to attention, at his command! At the far side of the playground - just outside the tiny school - a group of men sat on small wooden benches. They were the nahudas (important men of the village) and Daniel, a BV staff member. A speech was made, a minute's silence, and then the flag of Madagascar was hoisted up on a pole while we sang two songs (possibly one being the national anthem).
Following this, I was ushered to one of the seats of the 'dignatories' and the speeches began. Daniel seemed to be the event's compere. One of the nahudas spoke, Madame Ziza, the women's association president spoke and all the while I grew more and more nervous knowing that in a few short minutes it would be my turn. As with most events in the village of Andavaodaka there were 'quite literally' hundreds of children there. I tried some quick calculations - there were at least 30 members of the WA there. So, it was feasible that most of the children were theirs, or their grandchildren.
There were a few adults in the playground too - some more BV staff members, Justin and a few more women and men from the village. Then, finally it was my turn to speak. Daniel handed me the megaphone. I was incredibly nervous. Public speaking at such an 'official' event is daunting enough in English, let alone in a language that I can barely pronounce. I got through the few words that Lalao had written for me and sat down to applause. Phew. I had managed to pronounce the very last word incorrectly however, which produced a ripple of laughter. Frankly, if you are ever paranoid about people laughing at you, then come to Madagascar. It happens so frequently, that it's just not worth worrying about any more.
I sat down, still shaking, and passed the megaphone back to Daniel. There was dancing and singing then and much shaking of arses by the WA, to the amusement of the 300 or so children in the audience. Finally, one of the women from the WA spoke, but eschewed the megaphone. She drew more applause and was very charismatic and inspiring. I have no idea what she was saying. I hope that at least some of it was radical and calling for the emancipation of women! I have no idea what any of the speeches were about - not even mine! I had asked Gildas to translate mine, but it still didn't seem to make sense. Certainly all of the speeches included some sort of thanks to God for us being here.
The event dispersed then, and the male dignatories, Justin and I, the mercenary nun from the catholic school, the old Italian man who owns some land were all invited into the school with the WA for a drink. I had a fizzy orange (it was 10.30am) but I was shocked to see many of the women drinking beer! Malagasy women do not tend to drink alcohol at all, let alone in public. But then perhaps it's allowed on special events such as International women's day? I even saw a few women downing triple shots of togagash - the petrol-like homebrew that induces extreme drunkenness and memory loss!
There is a women's football match this afternoon and a party in the epi-bar tonight. I definitely won't be drinking togagash as this is definitely a March 8th that I don't want to forget.
Sunday 9 March 2008
Good dives, cool coral, music
After the excitement of singing with the women's association last weekend, and then the drama of having to tell a bunch of staff and volunteers off for rule breaking, this week has been relatively quiet in comparison.
Mostly, we've been scuba diving and training up the volunteers in their invertebrates. The visibility has improved markedly and so we've been able to do lots of training and dives. Somehow, I've also rediscovered the wonder of the whole underwater world. The interesting thing is that I'm not sure how I lost that wonder, or indeed, if I did lose it at all. But after a week of non-diving or poor visibility, going back into the water and seeing stuff again, elicited almost the same response in me as I feel every time I'm diving after a long break.
Partly, it's because I've started to relearn all my coral species, and so I'm spending a lot of time marvelling at the different species and the variety there, and the beauty of it all. And possibly partly it's also because I've had some chilled dives with some chilled divers and it's been incredibly satisfying to try and communicate my feelings of wonder of knowing what stuff is to someone else.
This week I've marvelled at some nudibranchs (sea slugs) of varying sizes, including one as
tiny as my little fingernail, and another the size of my foot. I also saw two having sex on another dive. I've also marvelled at the beauty of the acropora species of coral, which is often more brightly coloured than some of the others (here at least) and there have been lots of 'recruits' (young coral) of those species that I've noticed this week.
I've also marvelled at the biggest, meanist stonefish that I've ever seen in 10 years of diving. It was about a foot long and had the biggest grumpy mouth that I've seen and huge bulbous eyes. That was especially cool.
I also saw a very big puffer fish that was so large that it had its own remora on the top (hitchhiking fish). I've had many hours... Or at least, lots and lots of minutes of joy, pointing out the difference between coral in a massive form and coral in an encrusting form (it confuses most people here, at least initially) and just really loved all the dives this week. I've felt incredibly lucky to be in this 'job' and to get to indulge my hobby on an almost daily basis.
Also of note this week is that I actually have gone without my five mm long wetsuit and dived in a 5mm shortie instead! In ten years of diving, I've barely done any dives in anything other than a long wetsuit (3mm or 5mm) as I get quite cold easily. But I decided that it's plenty warm enough here and if I don't dive in a shortie here, then I probably never will. So far, I've only been cold once.
In other news, the group of vols is still pretty fun to hang out with and so I'm enjoying the social aspect of the job right now.
On the fruit front, we've only had pineapple this week though there are watermelons available in the village at the moment. At this time, they're not very ripe and seem to taste (and the flesh inside looks) more like cucumbers than watermelons that I'm used to. We've been without our full generator for the whole week. So no lights at night, except around the eating area as there has been small generator since Tuesday. I've not done a lot of work on the computer this week as a result, which has been quite a nice break actually! Still, it's gone on for long enough now and I hope they'll get the big one up and running pretty soon.
Raj from BV's London office is also out here at the moment. Happily, he brought me presents - a food, toothpaste and CD parcel from my parents (thanks!), and a really really brilliant set of speakers for my ipod which are really good quality. It's made me very happy to play music again rather than just play it via headphones into my ears, or hear it at the epi-bar on the worst music system and speakers in the world ever.
Talking of playing music, I've also been practising lots on Louis guitar which has been good fun. Not enough courage to play in big crowds, but getting more comfortable with anyone walking past hearing what I'm doing which is progress at least. And the heat has come back. It got cooler for a while there and we were lulled into a false sense of security about temperatures dropping, but it's back up to being humid and in the mid thirties again. Ouch.
Mostly, we've been scuba diving and training up the volunteers in their invertebrates. The visibility has improved markedly and so we've been able to do lots of training and dives. Somehow, I've also rediscovered the wonder of the whole underwater world. The interesting thing is that I'm not sure how I lost that wonder, or indeed, if I did lose it at all. But after a week of non-diving or poor visibility, going back into the water and seeing stuff again, elicited almost the same response in me as I feel every time I'm diving after a long break.
Partly, it's because I've started to relearn all my coral species, and so I'm spending a lot of time marvelling at the different species and the variety there, and the beauty of it all. And possibly partly it's also because I've had some chilled dives with some chilled divers and it's been incredibly satisfying to try and communicate my feelings of wonder of knowing what stuff is to someone else.
This week I've marvelled at some nudibranchs (sea slugs) of varying sizes, including one as
tiny as my little fingernail, and another the size of my foot. I also saw two having sex on another dive. I've also marvelled at the beauty of the acropora species of coral, which is often more brightly coloured than some of the others (here at least) and there have been lots of 'recruits' (young coral) of those species that I've noticed this week.
I've also marvelled at the biggest, meanist stonefish that I've ever seen in 10 years of diving. It was about a foot long and had the biggest grumpy mouth that I've seen and huge bulbous eyes. That was especially cool.
I also saw a very big puffer fish that was so large that it had its own remora on the top (hitchhiking fish). I've had many hours... Or at least, lots and lots of minutes of joy, pointing out the difference between coral in a massive form and coral in an encrusting form (it confuses most people here, at least initially) and just really loved all the dives this week. I've felt incredibly lucky to be in this 'job' and to get to indulge my hobby on an almost daily basis.
Also of note this week is that I actually have gone without my five mm long wetsuit and dived in a 5mm shortie instead! In ten years of diving, I've barely done any dives in anything other than a long wetsuit (3mm or 5mm) as I get quite cold easily. But I decided that it's plenty warm enough here and if I don't dive in a shortie here, then I probably never will. So far, I've only been cold once.
In other news, the group of vols is still pretty fun to hang out with and so I'm enjoying the social aspect of the job right now.
On the fruit front, we've only had pineapple this week though there are watermelons available in the village at the moment. At this time, they're not very ripe and seem to taste (and the flesh inside looks) more like cucumbers than watermelons that I'm used to. We've been without our full generator for the whole week. So no lights at night, except around the eating area as there has been small generator since Tuesday. I've not done a lot of work on the computer this week as a result, which has been quite a nice break actually! Still, it's gone on for long enough now and I hope they'll get the big one up and running pretty soon.
Raj from BV's London office is also out here at the moment. Happily, he brought me presents - a food, toothpaste and CD parcel from my parents (thanks!), and a really really brilliant set of speakers for my ipod which are really good quality. It's made me very happy to play music again rather than just play it via headphones into my ears, or hear it at the epi-bar on the worst music system and speakers in the world ever.
Talking of playing music, I've also been practising lots on Louis guitar which has been good fun. Not enough courage to play in big crowds, but getting more comfortable with anyone walking past hearing what I'm doing which is progress at least. And the heat has come back. It got cooler for a while there and we were lulled into a false sense of security about temperatures dropping, but it's back up to being humid and in the mid thirties again. Ouch.
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