Monday 12th May

Andavadoaka village is not a large one by most standards, around 1250 people (including children - who make up the 65% of that total).
This week, it's hosting a huge inter-school sports tournament and is expecting huge crowds. It starts tomorrow, and already 65 competitors and 40 spectators have turned up from Morombe. The main street is littered with new stalls selling fried fish, cassava, manky orange/mandarin fruits and there's even a stall selling what looks like brand new clothes (as opposed to second hand clothes).
There is an air of market day about. Just a reminder for you about what the village is like. Andavadoaka itself is situated at the top of a beach in the area that lies between the beach and the spiny forest and hence is mostly sand. When I talk about the main street, what I'm actually describing is a path in the sand lined with wooden stalls and huts and a couple of single story, more solid buildings.
One of these more solid buildings is the 'supermarket' which is a general store, made from solid wood, with a concrete patio with small wooden seats outside and a corrigated iron roof. It sells everything from Pringles (at the price of an average day's wage for a fisherman) to single cigarettes to toga gashy (illegal moonshine), to chocolate, to tools, nails, rice, beans and medicines. Opposite the supermarket is a half-finished concrete building which will be a new 'pizza restaurant cum internet café'. It is owned by the same man who owns the supermarket and it will inevitably be solely used by Blue Ventures staff and volunteers and passing tourists (of which there are about 2 a week at the moment as it is 'high' season). Unless we boycott it. But I can't imagine that we will.
Volunteers still buy the vastly overpriced jars of Nutella, peanut butter, chocolate bars, and yes, the Pringles. So, I would imagine that they'd also buy internet access and pizzas at prices far above what the average Andavadoakan could afford. The few stalls (either wooden tables or just food laid out on rattan mats) that litter the sides of the main
road - a handful of them, don't imagine this is like the high street you know and
love at home - sell whatever has been brought in on boutre (ship) or zebu cart, or what has been caught or made locally. There are pretty much always fried or dried fish. There's nearly always cassava and sacks of rice. There's also often fish samosas, bok bok (sweet doughy balls) or rice cakes too (doughy spheres made from rice flour but with the texture of english muffins). For those with a sweet tooth there's usually bon bon kapiky(caramalised peanuts in a square) or coco bon bon (the same, but with coconut). They're yummy. But you can feel your teeth rotting as you eat them! As a price comparison, most of those items cost somewhere between 50 ariary and 300 ariary apiece. In English money, that's between 1.5p and 10p-ish.
At the moment there's also bananas, monkey nuts, and the lemony grapefruity fruit things. The lady on the stall opposite the supermarket has got herself a nice sideline in peanut butter at the moment. She will crush the peanuts for you as long as you provide the jar and then sell it for half the price of a pre-packed jar from the supermarket - and it will taste twice as nice.
Just like every high street in the UK, Andavadoaka's main street also has a coffee shop. This is a far cry from the Starbucks and Caffe Neros at home. It is a small wooden shack with a concrete floor and - like most of the houses in Andava - a reed roof. There is a doorway and a window with no glass in which a young lady often sits and looks out. It sells coffee from a thermos flask and rice tea (the water that's left after the rice has been boiled) for 100 ariary a mug (about 3p) and bok bok for the same price each. There are a couple of wooden chairs, and thin wooden benches and two tables. There are no pictures on the walls and no music playing. Out the back, there is space and pans for frying more bok bok (or fish) on the fire and to the back of that, another hut - presumably, the home of the family that runs the shop. It's a nice place to sit, munch bok bok and watch the world go by.
Which today, consists mostly of the children visiting the village for the sports competition. At a table sits a teenage girl doing her homework, and occasionally stealing glances at the strange white people chatting at the table. We have been here 7 months, but we are still a novelty. It is impossible to walk through the village without children running up to you and calling out Salama (hello). I wonder how many years we'd have to live here before we could walk through the village without attracting a second glance?
Update: the sports competition attracted so many people to Andavadoaka. It was bustling like a small town and felt like market day. There were bunches of bananas on sale, some 'greens' (oranges. But they're not orange) and guavas. I even spotted five tiny tomatoes on one stall and someone was making zebu kebabs. I bought some guavas - my first ever - and tasted them. They are now my favourite fruit since mangos. I was hoping that it heralded a new season of fruit and availability in the village, but two days later, the visitors are gone, as are the guavas. Oh well.
This is my last 'blog' from site as I'm off 'home' for a 'holiday'. Can't wait. Will be my first real break since christmas and my first break from Justin since before we came. I'm leaving him in charge. Eek! Luckily, this expedition is quite small in comparison to previous ones and they're quite young too. No real characters so far - but then you can't always tell this early on.
Back blogging in Mada in two weeks after my holiday! But then, I won't believe it until I'm on the plane. This is Madagascar after all, and anything could happen.