Excursions

The political situation here has become very tragic. Last Saturday TGV gave orders to his demonstrators to cross over the boundary lines of the president's palace (not actually his living space) in a community area called La Place de 13 Mai, which caused open shooting onto the crowd. The military here lacks resources like tear gas and rubber bullets and received an order to proceed with open shooting. A total of 70 people were killed and over one hundred injured. There are fingers being pointed in all directions but in my opinion it all comes back to the lack of true democracy here. All of the checks in the system are controlled by the president so he cannot be impeached even though he has violated the constitution... so sad that the people really have no voice after election time. The worst thing is that this type of uprising has happened almost every time there has been a change in leadership for the last 40 years! Now the TGV party has taken over several of the ministries and it looks like military rule is in sight. I and fifteen other students were staying with our host families in Antananarivo during this incident and were instructed to stay in our houses and then evacuated the following day. The news was incredibly graphic. I myself was with my two host siblings, ages nine and twelve, who were not even phased by the bloody images on the news while I could barely watch.

Due to this political crisis we have been essentially on lock down so to avoid holding up the program within safety restrictions we left for the rainforest. We might as well see the country while it is still safe enough to travel. First we headed off for Andasibe - a nature reserve east of Tana. On the way there we stopped for dinner and I had my first experience eating frog legs! Texture like shrimp, but tastes like chicken. Once we arrived at the park we went on two nature hikes, one in the morning and one at night. In the morning we saw a baby indri lemur (the largest surviving lemur species) that had lost its family. The sound of the cry that the lemur made was so sad as he looked for his parents. After stalking him for twenty minutes he found what we think was his family. They proceeded to eat figs in the tree tops and sing songs to declare their territory. One even threw a fig down at the ground and hit me right in the face - so funny. Next we left for a twelve hour bus ride on Valentine's Day to Ankarafantsika, another national park in the west of Madagascar. This forest is more like a deciduous forest in parts of the US but there were still plenty of lemurs to check out. One in particular we observed was a dancing lemur that jumped right up to a bench on the path. He didn't seem to be afraid of us at all and started compulsively licking the cement bench - apparently for nutrients from the dirt. He sounded a bit lonely and come to find out, lemurs of this species live in communities. Based on the food supply and birth rate, sometimes the size of the groups are too large to maintain so they all call a meeting and decide who must be exiled from the group. It seemed as if this monkey had been chosen and was now on his own. I am not sure if they can be readmitted over time but if so, he had a lot to work on with his bizarre cement licking habits!

We also visited a small village outside of Andasibe to spend the night. During our stay I played a short game of soccer with some of the kids in the street with a tied up bunch of plastic bags. After a short time we walked the rest of the way down the street and I saw a soccer ball for sale. I went back later and bought the ball hoping to play with the same kids again. While looking for them, a huge crowd of kids that seemed to come out of nowhere, gathered around to play soccer. One of the kids asked me in broken French if I wanted to play futbol. Of course I answered yes and so he took the ball and started running out to the field where the kids who cannot afford school play. Surprisingly enough to the group of mainly boys, I chased after them and chaos ensued. I drew lines in the sand as goals and next thing I knew, a pile of clothes ended up at either end. The game had begun! The boys wanted to pick teams and only allow certain people to play but instead we invited everyone – even the girls to play. It was a big hit and we played for a good portion of the night. A perfect way to relax after all of the stress in Tana.