Guitar heros

Andy White – I have some news for you. Not only will Madagascar be the next big thing in football due to the generous donations from my friends, colleagues and family, but they might also become the best guitarists on the planet and sweep up all the folk awards – whatever awards there are for folk…or maybe they’ll be more interested in rock, but whatever the weather, they LOVE the guitars I bought for Akany. Locally-crafted in Tana, I got a nice deal on two beautifully toned guitars. Now every kid at Akany wants to be a rock star. Some are keen to get technical, learn the chords and build up their callouses – others ignore my instructions on chord formations, but have excellent natural strumming technique so they just sit back and imagine themselves sounding really really good. 

But to build up those callouses takes time and I remember what it was like ie. HURT LIKE HELL and it still does if I don’t pick up a guitar for a while. So it’ll be slow going and there may not be time for everyone to have a go, but I’m so happy to be making some of them feel a wee bit rock star. Even before the formal lessons, I’d take the guitars onto the lawn in front of the volunteer house and leave them with their audience of each other, strumming away tune-lessly but all eager to have a go “Because I’ll DEFINITELY sound better than her” and then not sounding any better but loving the five minutes of fame.

A mighty good investment for the entertainment and happiness of the children at Akany. Thanks for your donations everyone!

Redemption

Teaching teenagers can be challenging, as you may imagine (or in my case, remember what a nightmare I personally was at school!). There are the academics and the non-academics. I categorise myself in the latter, so have sympathy for the vocational training girls who were a little raucous in class and were asked to think about their actions. Fair enough, study sucks in my eyes too, but I didn’t come to Madagascar to raise my voice at children. Eight very solemn girls waited in the evening for me to finish teaching guitar to the boys and upon my exit, grabbed my attention to read out an apology, so thoughtful, sweet and genuine I almost cried. “Dear Denise, we are terribly sorry for being wrong in class. We wont do it again and we are very sorry Denise. The CAMS girls.” There was a sincerity I have never seen before. Needless to say, they were most obliging when I taught them guitar today, all very patient and helping each other with learning chords and strumming. And they made some beautiful pressed flower paper for me. A mutual respect seems to have developed – now that’s what I call redemption..

The wilderness and the wildlife

Madagscar’s national parks have many different landscapes and terrains. There’s also the most incredible fauna diversity; when it comes to figures, I can never remember, but it was pretty evident just walking through the tropical rainforest and dry national park over 4 days that chameleons are plentiful, lemurs are something to behold, and frogs are, well, just everywhere. Lemurs aren’t that shy in these parks as they’ve become accustomed to the human invaders, so it is quite a sight to see them jumping about less than a meter away from you through the trees, stopping occasionally when they find a good leaf or two to nibble on. Our guide said they like bananas, then walked on ahead, so being the naïve lay-people we are, the thought of enticing a lemur down from the trees with a banana on a stick seemed like a good idea. The lemur thought it was a great idea – until the banana (via stick) MOVED DOWN THE TREE!!! “How did that banana do the that? Bananas don’t move! I don’t like this at all. But that banana does smell nice. I wonder if I could just grab- OW it moved again! This is not usual. I’m abandoning banana mission, I think it must be controlled by aliens or something, hey other lemur, watch out for that moving banana. There’s something very suspicious going on here.”

The trademark ravanala (traveller’s tree) spans itself across the skyline like a rising sun, canyons hide the most beautiful treasures of delicate, picturesque waterfalls, a boa constrictor curls motionless next to the entry point of the swimming hole, and tiny frogs jump out right from under your feet as you tramp through puddles. And then there’s the beach. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I at least expected a clothes shop. Mangily is an hour’s 4x4 drive from Toliar, on the south west coast. The lack of fresh vegetables on this sandy village was made up for by the steady supply of meaty fish called Margarette andd langoustine. Fish at least twice a day and I didn’t get tired of it for the 4 days of beach bumming we did after 4 days hiking through those tough trails which rewarded us with their incredible diversity and beauty. 

Even the animal parks in Madagascar are excellent. The Lemurs Park near Tana is a lemur refuge where they aren’t in cages, they have territories and run wild, great for getting up close and personal with them. Lemurs do bite though, so there are guards to shoo the ones with reputations away from the paying tourists and there really is no way to contain them within the park except to chase them, so there are also guards for that. We saw several dancing Sifakas bound over the high wall with ease, the road is not too far away so I hope they have at least learned the road rules ie. Don’t dance in front of a truck!