My odd Tana life

Mother and child outside my house

Today's blogpost is written by Anri-Louise, who I introduced to everyone previously here. She gives her perspective on life in Antananarivo, the capital city of Madagascar (photos by Anri too)...

Ah, life here is interesting … Earlier this week, having just arrived home after a long day, I found myself once again standing in front of my red gate delving into the depths of my backpack trying to discover the ever-missing house key. As usual, the neighbours stood staring at me, the strange vazaha (foreigner). I could have ignored the stares and taken my time to find my keys, but when my dear, faithful taxi driver pulled up next to my gate, parking himself in the middle of the wrong side of the road, lined up with the oncoming traffic to ensure my safety, I decided scaling the wall would be the better solution.

This wall-mounting procedure is quite a sight, but the neighbours have witnessed it once or twice before, so I am not too fazed about it. Today it turned a different corner. The process involves me (not-so-elegantly) struggling onto the wall, and then hanging my backpack and camera bag over the strategically-placed spikes. Thank goodness the Malagasies are short, so the spikes take some maneuvering skill, but at a manageable height. So, balancing precariously with my feet on both sides of the spikes, while considering my pants and muscle-tearing possibilities, a loud cheer erupted - complete with shouting, whistling and clapping of hands. What more can I say … the few neighbourhood stares had been exchanged for a peekpeak-hour, overloaded taxibus fanfare.

Life here is never dull. Unusual. Odd. Extraordinary. Bizarre. Harsh. Effort-filled. It is many things, but never dull! There is playing Call of Duty with the Midges. Reading (and interfering with) Rob’s blog. Dropping off photos to strangers in the streets.  Laughing at the crazy man with the whistle trying to direct traffic, or the other one running up and down next to our house singing and shouting. Practicing my science experiments before doing them with the kids and showering my entire upper body with water to the amusement of the cleaning staff. Free taxi rides, again, again and yet again from the same faithful life savers. Mistaking the Malagasy word for “to pee” with “friend” (or vice versa). Publishing a Grade 3 newspaper. Seeing three girls from my home group being baptized. Falling on my bum in the mud on the way to church. Watching people dry rice on the streets, turning the grains with their feet. Church leaders’ meetings changing venue because we are growing. Children digging through rubbish dumpsters. Playing stone-catching games, or at least attempting to. Boys swatting flies with plastic bags at the meat markets. Men playing cards. Ladies gossiping and laughing behind their hands. Rain coming down in torrents … inside the house. Life.

This is home. It is the place where I have to be and where I love being. There is life, love and laughter here. And this is good. There is sickness; there are troubles and struggles and faithful friends who pick up the phone to call and encourage. And this is good too. Life isn’t always easy, but it is very very good!

Mof kondro, or "friend banana in dough", is one of the yummiest treats in Madagascar.

The things children play with in Tana. Yep, all of the above - broken handbags, pails, chickens, stones. What a beautiful, uncomplicated way of growing up.

Gambling...

The back o' yir head is ridicilous

I really laughed a lot as I wrote yesterday's post about my social struggles with girls. In fact, I discovered this video on YouTube several months back, and felt a lot better about my own shortcomings once I'd watched it. It's become a favourite, which I've shown to the Midgley boys, my students and a few ex-girlfriends ...

Mad TV - Can I Have Your Number

One of those I "dated" (for want of a better word) for a long, long, long time, a certain Wendy Waterston (who happens to know me as well as anyone, and who became a very good friend once we broke up), had this to say: "Hey chap, this guy is totally not like you - your moves are much less subtle ... Ha Ha. He gave up so quickly - you would never have surrendered, that's what makes you so special, 'ey."

I've used it to show my students what not to do around girls, and the Midgley boys love to quote various parts of it. A few months ago Evan fell backwards off the bath, cutting his head quite badly. He was taken to a doctor who superglued it closed. (Yes, that's apparently what they do now.)

Back at home his mom was showing him the repair job in a mirror. His wisecrack, despite all the pain? "The back o' my head is ridicilous!"

Take 1: The first time Evan hit his head and, Take 2: The second time he hit his head - a mere month later.

Social Suicide

Me, around the age when it all started to go wrong

I stood on the pedestal on that bare stage at our all-boys’ high school, surrounded by my choir comrades and sang my heart out, trying not to be the false one, trying not to be the one fingered for being off key. And on looked the choir members from our sister school and the Afrikaans girls’ school down the road – those schools off-limits to us on a normal day, but now, oh now, what bliss, what heaven, as long as I could keep my choir-boy, angelic, alto-voice soaring the way it should...

And afterwards we sat out on the lawn in front of the imposing edifice that was my school, and chatted way into the night, waiting for everyone to be picked up by their parents. I remember going home on a cloud, amazed that one particular (Afrikaans) girl would pay attention to me, and even more amazed that it was all so natural chatting even though we were culturally so different ... and that I didn’t say anything stupid, and that my brain and heart and mouth actually stayed in sync... And that moment a quarter of a century ago was probably the last time that they did (stay in sync). I never saw her again. I don’t even recall her name.

I remember the first girl I fell madly in love with. She and I grew up seeing each other every year on holiday, and would while away our time from dawn to dusk playing in rock pools, or building sand castles or stealing Milo powder from her mom’s kitchen to eat with teaspoons out on the back steps together. In one of our annual plays (put on by us kids for our parents) when I was only about 10 and she 11, she played Beauty and I was the Beast. And she was beautiful! But as we got older and my feelings for her grew I couldn’t tell her. I would become tongue-tied, and say stupid things, and write ridiculously corny Valentine’s cards... We grew apart. Sadly, I have no idea where she is today.

I guess it’s time to admit; my life is littered with accounts like that and I suck when it comes to social interaction with girls ... that I like! I was shy, I was a loner. And mostly, when I was attracted to someone I would either become a useless blob of jelly, or would “make a move” and then just keep on a-moving until I had run so far away that they weren’t even visible on the horizon. And being a competitive runner, I did get quite good at running away...

Another of my many social inadequacies is the fact that I don’t take hints well, that I struggle to “read” a situation... Like the girl I was involved with who started backing off, waiting for my pursuit. And I, absolutely detesting game-playing, let her go. One of my friends described her as “a Bond girl”. Oops... And so, the very next lady I dated, after some time started to withdraw (looking for space to make a decision it turns out) and I pursued with all I had, using techniques that would have made the most intense stalker proud. I even followed her to two different countries. One day she, in utter desperation, said goodbye to me. She “defriended” me from Facebook and Skype and marked my mails as spam. We spoke again. Once.

Anyone who would like to give me advice on what I can change, how I can overcome my social inadequacies... please don’t. I doubt whether I’ll take the hint. I may just find the advice too depressing to contemplate. In fact, the last bit of advice from my good friend Kim (the passive observer and active commentator on many of my “soapie-clichéd” relationships) was the following well-worn saying: “If you love someone set them free. If they come back it was meant to be. If they don’t, track them down and kill them.”

The things children say...

Evan and Reece at the dining room table

It was a typical supper setting – Andy, the eldest, was jabbering away about something as usual, Sue was cutting Evan’s food and listening to something he was saying, Kim and I were chatting about something mundane, when Andy stopped abruptly and said, “Mommy, you weren’t listening to my story!”

“Yes, I was,” she said. “I can do more than one thing at a time.”

“Yes, she’s got three ears!” responded Reece in his matter-of-fact way.

And apparently Sue, like any archetypal mom, has more of these bizarre anatomical features. She used to tell Andy when he was little, and being naughty, that she had eyes in the back of her head. One day he was playing and shouted out excitedly, “Look at me, mommy, look at me.” At the last minute she looked away. “You weren’t looking! ... or were you using your back eyes?” he asked innocently.

Apparently the boys have got into their heads that all girls wear glasses:  “Auntie Anri wears glasses, and mommy has some too...” Reece once again had his two-cents worth: “And uncle Rob ... He likes to wear women’s clothes, so he should have just been a girl...”

Well, thanks for that observation, Reece, but I'm quite happy as a man...

Fourth member of the Trinity

George, Collin and Kim supervising the distribution of food

On Saturday, just before heading for home, I asked Kim what he was going to preach about the following morning. His joking-reply, “The fourth member of the Trinity”, instantly reminded me of a trip he and I took together several years ago...

It was November 2005, and Malawi, the warm heart of Africa, was in the grip of a severe drought. Our church in South Africa received a hefty donation to supply maize to relating churches in Malawi and we’d been asked to organise its distribution too.  The maize was bought and a small team, led by one of the church’s elders was to drive up and spend 5 days in and around Blantyre.

Unfortunately, at the last minute, the elder had to withdraw from the trip, and so, for only the second time in the history of that church, a team sans eldership input went out to share the good news, represent the kingdom and, while we were about it, hand out some food. The team consisted of three deacons (myself, Kim and a chap called Collin) and one pleb (George) from another church. The Landrover trip took 2 days – crossing through a ravaged Zimbabwe, into Mozambique (where we overnighted) and finally into Malawi.

Some ladies dividing up food on day 1.

George seemed a bit shell-shocked, this being his first trip up into Africa, and so uttered hardly a word, but for the rest of us it was right up our alley. We decided to cook for ourselves that first night under Mozambican skies, after a previous negative experience where the beef we ordered turned out to be donkey (well, we couldn’t prove it, but it sure was tough, didn’t taste like beef and we hadn’t seen any cows since South Africa...) We arrived in Blantyre the following evening exhausted but ready for the adventure.

On the first day we travelled to a most beautiful area north-east of the city – the tea-growing region of Mulanje – where we handed out a truckload of maize and Collin and Kim preached (if my memory serves me right). The second day we were going to drive a bit further afield, which required an early start. I got up, staggered bleary-eyed through to the room the other three were sharing and, when asked, boldly announced that I would be teaching on “The Father of God” that day. Well, needless to say, I was mocked for the rest of that day and for years thereafter about the fourth person of the trinity - grandpa to Jesus.

The congregation crammed into the little church

We arrived at the little church, and Collin preached up a storm outside (literally), which drove us into the steamy mud interior. While he continued speaking I watched the ladies collect rainwater, which was leaking through the grass roof, in their shoes, then pass them to the windows, where they would empty them out and start the whole process again. And nervously I waited for my turn to speak about the father-heart of God, the father-heart of God, the FATHER-HEART of God!

My mockers sat behind me as I launched into my teaching, and it all went pretty well. That was, until I called up a young girl from the front row to illustrate my point. Now understand this, many of these kids have never seen a white face before. Trying to show how much He loves us, I sat her on my lap and threw my arms around her in a mock embrace. At first she just looked shocked. Frozen. Statue-like. Terrified of what this stranger would do next. And then she let out a wail and fled to the safety of her mother’s arms. And that was the end of that teaching. I think Kim may have rescued the situation by summing up what I meant to say. I don’t really remember... The details have faded, but I don’t think I’ll ever forget the incident itself.

Later, once the rain had cleared, I practised my crowd-clearing ministry by chasing and tickling the kids, we handed out more maize, and headed back to our Blantyre base most satisfied... Two more days of ministry and food distribution followed but I didn’t teach again on that trip. I think Collin and Kim were too terrified about what would come out.

Since then, whenever I’ve been called on to teach in the many churches we’ve visited in Africa and here in Madagascar, I remember the tiny village in Malawi, the terrified child and the father of God...

Postscript: Kim now leads Tana City Church here in Antananarivo, Collin is on eldership at 3Ci in Pretoria, and George (now a good friend) is no longer a pleb ...

 

Foot in mouth disease

Peanut butter: "dairy" goodness

Did you know that peanut butter was classified as dairy? Me neither.

Let me give you some context: There are three major retailers in Madagascar where one can do one's food shopping - Jumbo and Leader Price, which stock primarily French products, and Shoprite, which stocks mainly South African stuff. It is much cheaper than the other two, is just down the road from where I live and I visit it almost daily. 

The second part of our context-setting involves an outbreak of foot and mouth disease in a far-flung corner of Limpopo province in South Africa in October last year. It was caught quickly and didn't extend beyond one farm (which has since been declared free of the disease). Unfortunately, we the consumers, along with Shoprite, were affected by it ... in faraway Madagascar. 

Firstly, shortly after the outbreak, one of our favourite retailer's containers arrived in port here, containing a variety of products, including butter. It was promptly turned back to South Africa. They weren't allowed to unpack anything for fear that other products had been contaminated by the supposedly-infected butter. And so we started noticing shortages on their shelves. 

But the funniest incident occurred more recently:

In order to prevent similar problems the suppliers despatched a new container from SA, and this time made sure there was no dairy in it. But when it arrived at this end of the short voyage the customs officials once again rejected it. Why? Because it had peanut butter in it. And there was no persuading them that peanut butter was made from peanuts and contained no dairy. The ingredients mentioned no dairy but it had the word "butter" plastered on the side, which was enough for them! And so, once again, off went the whole container-load of products back to South Africa and the shelves get emptier and emptier...

It would be hilarious but for the fact that all imported goods, including dairy products, have become so much more expensive to obtain in this impoverished nation. My milk comes from Egypt, cheese from South America, the butter is from France or New Zealand and much of the yoghurt comes from Mauritius... I heard today that the government is starting to import sugar and rice. I just pray, for the people's sake, that there's no peanut butter in the same container...

Pineapple-boy strikes again

Sue, praising Evan about something, called him a hero.
Most indignant at his mother's slur, he replied, "I'm not a hero! I'm a PINEAPPLE!" 

For context see my previous post "Pineapple-Boy"

Tana's traffic

A typical, large Tana taxi

Stimulus: "An agent, action, or condition that elicits a physiological or psychological activity or response".

Have you ever met people who respond completely incorrectly to stimuli? I’m one of them socially but now’s not the time or place to open that can of worms. What I’m referring to is the irrational reaction to stimuli on the roads here in Tana – how the locals tend to overreact, panic or just respond totally inappropriately.  

It happened to me when I knocked over a young girl a few months back, as she ran backwards and forwards, tracking my manoeuvres to avoid her. And I see it almost daily. Like the incident this week when a child was pushing a cart loaded with water drums across the road, with a taxi approaching from one direction and a car from the other. They all seemed to see each other at exactly the same time, and all swerved TOWARDS each other, stopping millimetres from tragedy. It’s at times like this, while wincing and with eyes screwed shut, that the thought flashes across one’s mind, “Am I ready and willing to perform CPR on a bunch of complete strangers?” 

Vehicles generally avoid small potholes by veering towards oncoming monstrous trucks, pedestrians dodge fellow pedestrians by stepping INTO the choked road, and cyclists, instead of yawing safely towards the side of road, normally go the opposite way. The roads, as a result, are kind of terrifying on both my bicycle and motorbike, and I’ve had several near misses while staring at the whites of other shocked commuters’ eyes.

Traffic also seems to portray the underlying mood of a day. Some days it flows pretty well - everyone is calm and courteous; pedestrians walk cautiously and look both ways before crossing. And then on other days all hell breaks loose and it’s like a Turkish bazaar out there – blinkered, desperate mothers dash between cars dragging three screaming children; drivers make insane overtaking moves; scooters with multiple passengers swerve drunkenly from lane to lane – the whole mass acting like some alien life force, bent on bringing an end to traffic as we know it, has occupied it... On days like these defensive driving goes out the window, and prayer and adrenaline take over. 

And don’t even get me started on the arrogant military / government motorcades, which can blow past the airport-bound traffic at any time and seemingly from nowhere, with whistles blowing and horns honking (honking actually isn’t a violent enough term to describe it). Vehicles literally dive out of the way to avoid being run off the road. Anri described how she was in a taxi chugging along the digue (dyke) road, which has rice paddies on both sides, when the driver violently veered and wobbled onto the barely-existent verge in fear of the police cavalcade rapidly bearing down upon them.  As they shuddered to a stop she had visions of the vehicle rolling down the embankment into the dark mire, with all the passengers sardined inside. Terror mixes with anger, but cautiously, breathing semi-normally, one makes one’s way back onto the tarmac ... before being forced off some way down the road by the next politician racing somewhere important!

The roads can be irritating, they can be wild and I’m not sure if I’ll ever get used to their madness, but it is real and it is very-much part of life here in Madagascar.

Bill Clinton, I presume?

"I don't know! Justin Bieber? Bieber's mom?"

In trying to instil a love of poetry in my Grade 8 students, as well as awaken an ability to pen it, I've been looking with them at how poetic song-writing can be. The other day, just for fun, I played some music from my era and later, but well before theirs, and asked them to guess who the artists were. Here were some of the results: 

Bruce Springsteen: Bill Clinton. (Well, at least they had the nationality correct, and Clinton was also "the boss", but I wonder what his band would have been known as?)

While playing Louis Armstrong singing La vie en Rose one of the boys shouted out that it was Ray Charles. “No, it’s Charles Dickens” countered another. (I hadn’t realised Dickens was so big in the music industry. Perhaps Queen Victoria used to hum the popular ballad Great Expectations quietly to herself. And I'm sure Oliver Twist was a real foot-tapper.)

Whitney Houston: Michael Jackson.  (Close enough).

Boy George was “a woman who ended up in prison”. (Again, close enough, except if you look at what she, I mean he, looks like now...)

It was suggested that Bohemian Rhapsody (sung by Queen) was by The Backstreet Boys. (I have never listened to them myself, but I’m pretty sure Freddie Mercury would be turning in his grave being compared to the boy band.)

In what I took as quite a compliment, one of the students thought that I was singing (although I don't actually remember who was) until he explained: “But it’s really bad. Just like when you sing.”

Erasure was Elton John, Grace Jones was Bob Marley, Depeche Mode was the Beatles and Evanescence was “the mother of Justin Bieber”. I was sure they’d know Kylie Minogue, Michael Bublé and U2. (I mean, who doesn’t know U2?) They didn’t.

But with just one note of Baby the whole class erupted, “Justin Bieber-e”

I won’t be playing any general knowledge board games with them anytime soon. And I may move to jazz-appreciation next...

My life as a woman

WARNING: This post is not for sensitive viewers and contains photos of a distressing, disquieting nature!

I was a cute baby, no question - chubby, with curly blonde hair, and gorgeous eyes. But the problem was that random strangers would often come up to my parents and fawn over their beautiful “daughter” – me!

Fortunately I grew out of that phase, and in no time was a strapping young lad (well, maybe more stringy than strapping). Unfortunately I had an older sister who liked to play dress-up with her little brother more than with her dollies - like when she dressed me in her teeny weenie red bikini. It was an easy fit, and posing like a lady, with the ever-present pout, came quite naturally. I responded to people’s shock and laughter and quite enjoyed the attention I received. And so it all started…

I was an actor at heart while growing up – possibly and probably because of my mother’s influence. In Grade 1 I took the role of Roo in Winnie the Pooh, and in Primary school I acted in all the annual school productions. Every holiday we children, as “The Natures Valley Amateur Dramatic Society”, would cobble together a play for our parents and next-door-neighbours and I was regularly given “normal” roles like the cow in Jack and the Beanstalk and the Beast in Beauty and the Beast. But finally, arriving at an all-boys’ high school I was presented with some unique challenges to have fun and to shock anew – by playing female roles in our school dramas. They weren’t big parts, but I relished them, and I didn’t mind that the other pupils mocked me and called me names. Grade 8 saw me acting as a fairy in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, while roles of the Player Queen in Hamlet and Potiphar’s Wife in the musical Joseph followed. What made them even funnier was that I was anything but effeminate.  Other roles, like when I was a policeman in The Pirates of Penzance just weren’t as much fun or as much of a challenge…

The sight of me chasing after Joseph singing, in the deepest voice I could muster, “Come and lie with me, love”, or doing a supposedly-seductive yet disturbing dance for Jacob’s son was, even if I admit it myself, hilarious. My “Hamlet” character was probably the most gratifying though. I laughed every time I had to get into my costume and have my makeup applied (firstly because of how people reacted) – the false eyelashes, false nails, real fishnet stockings … the whole toot. I even had my own pair of stockings at home. Our troupe was the comedy relief of the play, a lot of which came purely by chance. 

One evening I was running down a corridor to get to my stage entrance, slipped in my shoeless, stockinged feet and piled into a set of drums offstage to a loud “ke-rash”. Then, in one of the scenes the king was supposed to run up to me and jump into my arms. Unfortunately, when he did, he ripped my dress to the waist and left me standing sheepishly bearing my padded bra to a full audience… Finally, one evening we were making our entrance, as regally as possible, on a cart being pulled by some minions, when the cart’s wheel got jammed in a hole, flinging the king and I to the ground in a heap, me on top of him – all legs, dress and wig-askew.

I had a serious crush on the friend who helped
me out with this outfit. I don't think me dressing
like a woman helped my cause at all though.

As I grew older, virtually every fancy dress party I attended saw me go as a woman – once again because I was assured of a reaction. Everyone kept telling me what a stunning lady I made, what perfect legs I had, and how the outfits “brought out the colour of my eyes.” I guess that’s the beauty of mascara! There were two incidents that got me to stop, however. 

The first was at a New Year’s Eve party where another man told me that if I ever decided to cross the line, not just cross dress, he’d be waiting for me. The second was at a church party where one of my work colleagues thought I was a lady of the night. I still remember the horror on his face, as he backed up against a wall, seeing me rush towards him to give him a hug and a kiss on the cheek. He hadn’t recognized me at all! (He swears that he doesn't remember the incident.)

I did, however, come out of the cross-dressing closet one final time two years ago when I was asked to play “Oprah” at a classy ladies’ evening at church. And so I fished out the old stockings, had a deep cake of foundation plastered on my face and donned a fancy, frilly dress for my last big hurrah.(A quick aside - I didn't look at all like Oprah, but that didn't seem to matter. I still won one of the prizes on the evening, and everyone wanted to pose with me.)

My legs aren’t what they used to be, it’s getting harder to walk in high heeled shoes, and my hair has receded, but you never know, the old-age home setting is yet to be explored …

My "lady of the night" look, but wearing my brother-in-law's boots!

A just-discovered picture from Facebook: Me as "Oprah".
Yes, well, my interviewing style was pretty good, even if I didn't look like her.

My "Oprah" legs

"Oprah with "Ellen". It was the only wig we coud find at such short notice.
They should have just called me the "butch Indian-looking interviewer".

"Madagascar's Pierced Heart"

This is an excellent National Geographic Article and Photo Gallery published last year about the situation in Madagascar. Read it if you have the time, and if not, at least try to browse through the excellent, yet disturbing, photos.

Article:  http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2010/09/madagascar/draper-text

Photos:  http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2010/09/madagascar/maitre-photography

After a relatively quiet time here politically, the storms are again starting to rumble, with planned presidential elections postponed indefinitely, the former president laying criminal charges against the young upstart who overthrew him, and more revelations about those who helped finance the coup in 2009. And still the "innocents" continue to suffer. We only have One hope, and in Him we put our trust!

The second -lyn

I've previously written about the "-lyn" sisters at my school. Lilyn, second-eldest of the four is most dear to my heart, she with the naughty laugh and knock-kneed gait. I teach grades 7 to 12, but every morning, without fail, I find this little grade 3 and her closest friends waiting for me at the gate to say good morning and walk with me to class. And of course, to ask to be "put upside down and tickled" or tossed over my shoulder. And once satisfied, off they run again to play. Last week I was taking my time getting to lunch, when I heard a little knock on my door. It was one of the grade 3s: "Mr Robin are you coming to lunch?" she asked. "We missed you." It's the real things like this that keep me going on the difficult days ... 

And it's not just "Kevin". He only responds to Kev-eeen.

Lights out!

Snuffed out

Well, after a few days of pretty good rain, and more expected, it looks like the drought has probably been broken here in Tana. But I’ve been struck again by how, when there is even a hint of rain or one little sneeze of lightning, the electricity supply goes down, and we’re left to enjoy life by candlelight.  The other ironic thing is that "they" (the unnamed, easy to blame powers-that-be) cut off my water supply in the midst of one of the storms a few evenings ago (all that water outside, the dearth of water inside...), leaving me waterless, powerless, desperately in need of a shower and so bored that I ended up taking photos of my solitary candle.

In a country that has its fair share of rain, with several cyclones expected to batter the island most summers, it’s amazing to me how badly prepared it is to handle it – from the electricity, to the water supply, to the stormwater system alongside the roads. 

But there is always something to laugh about or at. Most funny stories I can’t recount here on this blog, because people involved actually read it... But I was just chuckling this morning, on one of my regular trips to the supermarket.. 

In South Africa, at supermarket checkouts one always finds little snacks – chocolates, sweets, cold drink cans, or ice cream cones – just begging to be bought and enjoyed on the ride home. Well, here, with the dairy industry in turmoil, they have a freezer-load of frozen potato chips. Yep, frozen potato chips. I could just imagine the little child eagerly peering over the rim into the ice cream freezer and then excitedly tugging at his mom’s shirt saying, “Oh cool! Mommy, pleeeeeez can we buy a big old bag of frozen chips?” Or not.

Which reminds me of when I was in Mongolia a few years ago and was surprised to see all of the little shops selling ice creams on the sidewalk. There’s nothing unusual about that, I suppose, except that it was -10 degrees Celsius outside. Those Mongolians sure do like their ice cream!

Amateur!

By the pool. Little Abigail contemplates a swim

My memory clearly isn't what it used to be, because I was convinced that as a school boy my English was extraordinary. I remember writing phenomenal, mind-blowing poetry and being fêted by all my English teachers for my frightful ability. But this past holiday I was sorely brought down to earth when I discovered an old school magazine from my Grade 12 year. There were no poems, no articles, no sports reports, no one-liners even penned by me. All I did find was that I had taken many of the photos which appeared in it.

When I was a young boy my father gave me a couple of photography tips, I bought a basic book on the subject, and ever since then I have loved taking snaps. I owned a couple of point-and-shoots, and finally a really nice SLR film camera, which I shared with my dad (Whenever the topic of photography comes up he still makes a point to tell everyone that I dropped it off the Great Wall of China 10 years ago and that it has not been the same since - all true, of course). 

I now take most of my photos with a beautiful D7000 from Nikon South Africa. Photoshop is like a swear word to both Stefan at Nikon, and my friend Kim Midgley here in Madagascar, but I do admit to touching up the odd photo or two. Today I was most honoured when one of my students, looking at my photo album on Flickr, commented on the image of the seagull: "You couldn't have taken that. You must have downloaded it - it's too good." 

Thanks to those who have commented on my photos in the past, and who believe in my ability more than even I do. I'm a real amateur, but I love creating images that are hopefully able to tell a story, and bring joy to many ... and it's a hobby that keeps me semi-sane on the difficult days.

And now, because I am out of words, I leave you with a few of my favourites from my holiday-past in South Africa.

Beautiful simplicity. I love the grace of a seagull in flight. (And interestingly, this was hardly altered at all - I just took
the picture on a vivid setting on the camera, played with levels and cropped it slightly.)

Beach cricket, kind of. My niece has much work to do on the finer complexities of the game.
Feel free to leave a comment below if you have a clever, witty comment for this hilarious pic...

Bushed. All that swimming, running around and general adventure leaves my niece ready for an afternoon nap.

Between sand and sky.  Mgwalana, Eastern Cape, South Africa - a holiday paradise, especially for the kids.

But I'm not really shy! And she's not. She's a headstrong, beautiful handful.

Building castles in the sand. One of the little friends my niece made while on holiday

Bowl. This fish was so unmoving that it pretty much was a still life.

Black and White. Visiting friends on my first weekend back home I took this pic of their daughter, who is about to enter high school. I hate posed pictures, and so love the natural feel of this one.

Boris Yelpsin. Named after the Russian president of the 1990s.

Bottle. Walking along the beach I saw this bottle and wondered what stories it could have told.

A Malagasy's regret

Not the student who wrote the poem. But here, one of the Grade 9s
listens intently to a classmate giving a speech.

After yesterday's hilarious post, I thought I should do something a bit more serious today, and so I am including a poem written by one of my students in her December Creative Writing exams, lamenting the coup d'etat in Madagascar (overthrow of the president and government) in 2009. I thought it was amazingly insightful, emotion-filled and well written, especially as English is her third language, and it was written under the stress and time constraints of an exam... Enough said.

A Malagasy’s regret

The country’s burnt

The country’s cursed

And I stand here

With nothing left

The country’s dead

The man has fled

And I am helpless,

With no worth

What did I do

to stop this coup?

Nothing, nothing;

Not a single thing.