Archive for the ‘Fiandanana’ tag
Final day of the Village Trek
Taken from the Madagascar Team 1 Journal, originally by Ben
After spending an evening on a beach, several members of the team found that their tents had leaked with the heavy rainfall, through the night. Martin was so upset, because his tent was wet, that he began to threaten anyone whose tent was dry.
In theory, today was the last day of the village trek, and instead of aiming for our previous destination of Sandrakaley, we set off for the small town of Fiandanana, where, it was hoped, we could obtain transport and reach our project site within a reasonable time. Fortunately, the terrain was similar to the previous day: that is, it was reasonably flat and the team were able to make good progress, eventually reaching Fiandanana by lunch time, which followed an increasngly familiar routine and menu, rice and soup.
However, lunch was overshadowed by the need to find suitable transport. The vehicle turned out to be an old Peugeot pickup with no hand brake, no speedometer and a red light flashing DANGER when the engine started (or attempted to). It was also decided that only half of the team could tavel the necessary 25km with their kit at one time. Hannah and Oli, the leaders of the day, had to decide who would go first to set up the tents and prepare for the arrival of the other half; this task was made increasingly difficult by the driver who insisted that the journey to Sandrakaley would take at least 3 hours one-way. It also meant that the group at Fiandanana would not arrive in Sandrakaley until at least 22:30. Unfortunately, it took the first group just 5 hours to reach their destination due to the pickup breaking down.
In the first group, we had stopped at the local shop and bought food and drinks including the much needed Thee Horses Beer, essential for a long journey. On arrival we (group 1) prepared a large meal, while thinking of the others stranded, eating just the dried food and rice - and no beer; they did, however have some real Madagascan wine which resembled river water and red dye, more than it did, Vin de Pays, or anything else. On boiling it to make it drinkable, and to remove the suspected large amounts of alcohol, Andrew O apparently became quite high on the fumes!
Due to the lateness of our arrival (it was dark) we spent the night in the school house, rebuilt between 1994-97 by Feedback Madagascar - it seems to be holding up to our treatment so far. The villagers are very friendly, and, as in other villages, are fascinated by what we are doing, our food, equipment etc.
The project phase should, hopefully, enable us to have a greater understanding of rural life in Southern Madagascar, by aiding them in developing the country and its people.
