Declining fish catches

It's been another eventful week here in Andavadoaka. I interviewed two more women from the village on Monday. Celestine, who was around 50 years old had 12 children and 23 grandchildren. Though she wasn't quite sure. Susanne, the 70 year old woman, had 11 children but she wasn't sure at all how many grandchidren or great grandchildren she had. One of her grandchildren was sat next to her on the sand as I interviewed Susanne. She looked like a teenager and was breastfeeding her baby.
The name of the women's association in Andavadoaka is "women for development" and in all the interviews, the women talk of 'developing' women or the village being more 'developed' than 'before'. But when you ask them to describe what they mean by developed and developing, they cannot elaborate. It's as if they know it's a positive concept, but they cannot actually break it down and say what it means for them.
So far, it seems that the women have more 'festivities' now, can wear trousers and clothes (compared to when Susanne was a child when they had no proper clothes at all) and are more organised with doing things. Though she claimed that life was easier for women now, this seemed to be tied in to the fact that they have more material goods now than they did before. Fish and octopus catches have declined drastically. Both women described how daily catches used to reach 20 - up to 40, but now they are averaging about 4 or 5 octopus, maybe as few as 2.
Fish catches have declined similarly and pirogues have to go further and further out, and are catching fewer and smaller fish than they used to find just in front of the village. Last week I talked about how important the WA was for providing the women with financial alternatives. Celestine and Susanne highlighted the importance of the WA for a social support and network. All the women I spoke to talked about how great it was that the WA got together and sang and danced and hosted parties.
For Celestine, the festivities were her main reason for belonging to the WA and Susanne described how a WA in another village paid for her to return here to Andavadoaka when her husband died. Celestine wished for a road to be built to Andavadoaka as it would make it easier for the women to send their products out of the village and to sell them further
afield.
Susanne meanwhile hoped for a mobile phone to communicate with her family elsewhere in Madagascar and for a TV. The most rewarding aspect of the interviews was taking the women's photos afterwards and being able to show them the photo on the back of the camera. Their hysterical laughter and pleasure at seeing themselves on screen is quite a contrast to the way most of us western women react when we see our photos.

Independence day
The day the volunteers left Andavadoaka, the rest of the BV staff hopped onto the back of a 4x4 and went inland to the village of Befandefa for the independence day celebrations. Befandefa is a village inland from Andavadoaka and the administrative capital of this small region.
The 25th was the mayor's inauguration and we got there just in time to see the inauguration ceremony. This culminated in presentations and dances from different villages in the region. Morombe donated a zebu (which was slaughtered shortly afterwards) but other gifts were somewhat less extravagent and included some flowers and from us, some cash. Charlie danced with the family of Thomas - our boat driver and her boyfriend - while Becks and I were roped into dancing and singing with the women's association of Andavadoaka. All of this took place in the dusty large square of the village. The square was lined with lots of stalls selling food (bok bok, fudge, peanut brittle) drink (beer, rum, togagasy), had a flagpole in the centre, and at the east side an awning under which all the important people (including the mayor himself) were sat on chairs, watching the entertainment. The awning was flanked by two enormous speakers out of which was pumped very loud epi-bar music throughout the morning, afternoon and night.
It was interesting to see everyone in their finest clothes and there were some very impressive suits and dresses. The entertainment was followed by 'cocktails', toasts and lunch. We all got suitably tipsy on rum or whisky and spent the afternoon hanging out in the sun and entertaining all the children (and some of the adults too) by... Well, just by existing really.
Underneath the biggest (only?) tree of the square, a man spent much of the afternoon hacking the zebu to bits with an axe watched on by the hungry eyes of dogs and goats. Angelo bought a segment which was cooked up later by his wife. It wasn't much of a holiday for her as she not only cooked for her own extended family, but all of the BV staff as well (and kindly did an omelette for us non-meat eaters). We ate in the mayor's office and hten we headed back 'out' to the bar.
It was like a proper festival, except that instead of queuing for the toilet, you to head out into the spiny forest and try and find a cactus or spiny tree to give you enough cover. Sometimes I had to walk for quite a while before stopped feeling conspicuous. The most popular drink on offer was the togagasy - cheap, cheerful and very very strong. I did not partake. There were fireworks at 8 which sent many of the crowd running away in terror (they had probably never seen them before) and then more music and dancing.
Our crowd (BV staff, both international and Malagasy) went to sleep in the mayor's office on the floor at a very lightweight time of 11pm. However, the main party didn't kick off until midnight and continued right up until about 6am! One of the first things I saw that morning was an old man (maybe in his 50s) dancing on his own to the still-playing epi-bar music. It was a sight that would not have looked totally out of place at a British festival.
I enjoyed breakfast in the sun - coffee and bok bok, and avoided the eyes of the men who were still drunk from the night before.
Independence day itself followed a similar format to the day before, except that this time, all the villages joined a parade, and marched through the village singing. The women's associations from many villages had uniforms - and the Andavadoakan women managed to find two of their (new) uniforms for Becks and I to wear. We marched through the village singing, ending up back in the square for the raising of the flag again. Then followed four hours of 'play', as Gildas put it - as each group sang or danced or both to two songs. Sadly, the programme ran too far behind for the women's association of Andava to get their turn. I was most disappointed by this, especially as many groups were not really singing, just dancing to epi-bar tunes. However, there were a few groups who were very tuneful and fun to watch, so we were entertained for much of the time.
After a late lunch, the final of the football tournament took place on a massive football pitch. Andavadoaka played Lamboara. It was quite a lacklustre game really - possibly as a
result of the party the night before - and unfortunately, we lost on penalties. Gildas missed one, which was quite upsetting to watch. Being English, I'm not unfamiliar to losing a football game on penalties, but even so, it was quite hard to watch the jubilant Lamboaran sing and dance around after their final goal.
We got a lift back to Andavadoaka on a loaded 4x4 and were back in time for dinner. Much of Andavadoaka was partying again that night in the village (those that managed to get back from Befandefa), but we just could not take the pace and had an early night! I thoroughly enjoyed my first independence day in Madagascar, all the more so for being able to share it with my Malagasy colleagues. It was also particularly flattering to have been asked to participate in both of the days' events rather than just experiencing it as a spectator.

Wildlife update:
There is still plenty more positive news to counter the dead sharks and cats of recent weeks. As well as a few more whale sightings, we were extremely excited to get news from the guardian in Lamboara that the turtles that he had been guarding had hatched. Charlie zipped down there the following day and managed to get some film footage and photos of about 72 baby turtles scrambling out of the nest and into the sea.
Some of our volunteers had clubbed together to help pay for the guardian to guard the nest and so all our efforts have paid off. Sadly, only something like 1 in 10,000 turtles makes it from egg to an adult. Still, at least we've done our bit and stopped the nest from being excavated and the eggs from being eaten. Now, it's up to the turtles.
I'm also very excited to report my first ever sighting of a yellow-spotted scorpion fish, nestling in amongst some pocillopora coral. I don't know how rare it is, but I've never seen one before and it looked very cool - like a cartoon fish, red with yellow spots and big bulbous eyes. It was only about 2 or so inches long and well camouflaged.
I finally got to dive one of the deep dive sites to the south of Andavadoaka and enjoyed seeing one of the biggest groupers I've ever seen. It was probably as large as me, except with scarier looking teeth. It was hanging out with lots of other fish, who were most likely using it as protection against the school of gold spotted sweetlips that were swimming through.