Africa / Madagascar offers peace – and lemurs – in abundance |
Madagascar, by rights, should be rich and flourishing. It has everything: natural resources, a heavenly climate, picture-book scenery, tropical weather, friendly people. But it is one of the poorest countries in the world – on account of centuries of exploitation, first by the French, and latterly by corrupt elites.
With luck, all that is about to change. If the new regime (which came to power in October when a student-led revolution sent the last one packing) can resist the lure of looting, it could just succeed.
No jet skis, no music, no bars. Maybe a lone fisherman or a sailboat in the distance
No jet skis, no music, no bars. Maybe a lone fisherman or a sailboat in the distance
As yet the spacious main square of the capital, Antananarivo (known as Tana), is not safe at night, when it becomes the domain of pimps, prostitutes and pickpockets. Theft is common, but there is surprisingly little violence, and drugs are not a problem – people are too poor to interest the dealers. There’s a thriving practice of superrich elites kidnapping each other for massive ransoms.
Tana sprawls across a river valley and several hills, and consists mostly of multicolored houses and churches, dominated by the hilltop palace. The streets are jammed with traffic, the pavements with people, children everywhere, but no one hoots or curses. Women seem obsessed with washing: everyone’s clothes are spotless and riverbanks and roadside grass are covered in laundry, washed in the river and laid out to dry.
We had lunch in the well-known Café de la Gare, housed in the old station, which was built sometime around 1900, and ate zebu........