Nothing like the cartoon

I had to get tested at the airport. The website said it cost 30€ so I gave the lady 40. It turned out they changed it to 15€ for the quick test but the lady took both 20’s and gave me change for 25 in Ariary. At a terrible rate, of course. I protested and the lady showed me a sign saying the give change in AR. I’m not sure if she was playing dumb or really didn’t get it. I gave back all the change and insisted on my euros back. Once I got them back, we were ready for a new transaction. I gave her one of the twenties and got back the change for a 5 in AR. 

I got out of the building and met a guy holding up my name. We started walking when I got tapped on the shoulder by a girl. For a moment, only a single thought occupied my mind. Wow, she’s pretty! But then I got thoroughly confused. She was also holding a sign with my name. It turned out the guy was sent by the place I had canceled. He made a call, put me on, I told them I booked another place. 

I went with the girl to a comfy 4×4. The driver looked like he was 900 years old. His face lit up when he heard me say my hometown. He had spent time there and he had fond memories of the place, especially the local food. Small world!

Being on the right side of the road was now strange. 

First impressions of Madagascar boiled down to “damn, this is third world!”. 

I felt bad about the other hotel sending the driver. They were very helpful with arranging all the documents back when I still needed them, before Madagascar changed the rules, and generally seemed kind so I didn’t want them to lose money on me. I messaged them, they gave me the payment details and I paid them for the ride a couple of days later, when I set up mobile payment with my new sim card. 

The girl was not exactly a girl, she was 36. She did not look it. She was very friendly, gave me all sorts of tips and even went into town with me to get a local sim. The process of getting one includes getting your photo taken.

I didn’t want to ask any questions to not come across as rude or nosy. She volunteered a lot of information soon enough. The driver was her husband, he was 70. She casually mentioned his girlfriends and how she sees no point in jealousy. She said she wanted him to be happy and that we were all free. A very progressive stanze and I wished that I shared it. I mean, in theory it makes perfect sense. But I don’t really see myself sharing. 

At dinner on Friday I mentioned that I was looking for something to do and that I couldn’t find a car to rent online. She said I could take theirs, just fuel it up.

She’d come along. I was not about to pass up a free car, especially when I think about how much we paid for the Mazda in Mozambique. And I was happy to have company, I had been by myself for a while. 

The traffic is terrible. Complete chaos. All the types of vehicles you can imagine plus a couple that would probably never cross your mind plus pedestrians plus livestock, all in the street at once. It almost seems quicker to walk than to drive. And if you’re not a skilled driver, don’t even try it. 

At one point we got stuck for a full hour. While we were waiting, a million street vendors approached us selling anything and everything. They don’t move along when you indicate you don’t want any and it gets really annoying really soon.

I saw a police officer help some guys push a truck that had broken down out of a roundabout. I tried to imagine the same happening in Europe but couldn’t quite do it. 

Once out of the city, it gets a little better. But the roads are far from perfect. The potholes demand respect, a lot of them are big enough to cause serious damage. 

We got to Lemur park. They come really close but you’re not allowed to touch them.

When we got to the ringtailed I asked the guide if that was king Julien. His reply was perfect – yeees, I like to move it move it! 😀

The park is not very big so the tour ended pretty soon. The day was still young and we went to see some more sites. There was a nice river with a couple of waterfalls.

We had a nice time so we agreed to go somewhere again the next day. We found a park we wanted to visit and set out with google leading the way. After an exciting drive along a not-really-a-road, we found an entrance but not the correct one.

We couldn’t get in without a ticket and a guide that we were supposed to get at the main entrance. Rather than doing that, we decided to look for another place. Google tried. At one point we drove through a river. At a couple of points I wasn’t sure we’d actually make it.

So, even though we basically found nothing and spent the day just driving in nature, I felt good about the day. It was fun and exciting.

We even picked up hitchikers, they rode in the back, like in the movies.

The work week was stressful and I did nothing but work, eat, sleep and worry. 

The plan was to buy a vehicle and move on on Saturday. A lot of ads are priced in francs even though the currency was replaced by ariary 15 years ago, it didn’t exist any more. And it’s not just ads, I later learned. A lot of vendors would still tell you the price in francs. Buying a vehicle turned out to be harder than expected so we spent all Saturday looking at different ones. She let me have the car again and went with me to help and translate. We went to look at several cars and scooters. We couldn’t find a decent, reasonably priced one. I found an ad for one that was a little more than I was looking to spend but looked nice so we went to look at that one. It only looked nice. As we were about to leave, I saw a nice looking motorcycle. Is that for sale? No, but the scooter is. And the scooter was leagues above any we had looked at. The price was reasonable. We brought it down a bit more and I bought it.

But we couldn’t settle the paperwork until Tuesday, Monday was Easter Monday. So I was staying in Tana another week. 

So we went somewhere on Sunday again, with the scooter. We weren’t legal but the idea was that nobody was going to pull us over on Easter and if they did we’d bribe our way out of it. We went looking for a park. We had a minor setback when out transmission belt broke but we lucky enough to find a guy who could get a spare and replace it (on Easter).

I got coffee from a street vendor. Take a moment to imagine a cooffee cart and a cup you get from one. Do you have an image in your mind?

Now look at what this one looked like. How close were you? 🙂

We continued. Google at the helm. We failed miserably. We put the poor scooter through hell, driving it over terrain that scooters were not built to be driven on. Well, mostly driven, pushed and even carried a little a couple of times.

I may not have seen any exotic animals but I was an exotic animal, judging by the way people were looking at me. She said I was probably the first white person many of them had seen. It kinda made sense. A lot of tourists go to a touristy spot and stay there. Few travel by land, fewer still end up where we were. There wasn’t even a road there, let alone anything to attract tourists. A fun failure, all in all, no regrets. 

On Monday we went to some national park, not the one we looked for the day before. On our way there we stopped at a place where they let you feed the lemurs and interact with chameleons and snakes.

At the national park, they have hugely different prices for tourists and locals and I support that. I know that we have a lot of national parks back home that most of us haven’t visited because they are too expensive. We started a tour. The guide brought us to a place and said “this is a viewpoint but you can’t really see anything through the branches”. I giggled on the inside. It started to rain. The famous big lemurs were nowhere to be found. Half an hour into our 3 hour tour the guide suggested that we end it and go outside of the park where we were guaranteed to see them. Fine. We got there, completely wet by this point, to find one lemur sitting at the top of a tall tree in the mid distance. So, technically, we had a sighting and none of the other visitors that day did so yay.

When we got back to the car we realised I had a hole in my pocket big enough to fit a car key. It wasn’t far, somebody found it and returned it. 

We spent a lot of time together, went everywhere together and had dinner together every night. Sometimes we’d get a beer or two after. Thursday was one of those times. After a couple, I started looking at her differently. I figured I’d better excuse myself and go to my room before I act on these impulses. And so I did. But soon after I did, I got a message saying she was thinking about me. I replied I was thinking about her too. She asked if she should come to my room. I said yes. 

It felt good to touch somebody again, to fall asleep next to somebody. It also felt almost sad. I was putting distance between myself and something that I didn’t really want to be distant from. Not really, not even after everything. But it strangely also felt like a step in the right direction. 

We woke up early and the light of dawn slowly revealed more and more of the most beautiful figure I was ever this close to. It felt better. Next night felt even more right. And then it was time to leave. 

I got to a gas station with a couple of bottles. She warned me that I was driving through a long stretch of nothing and that I may not make it on a single tank. They wouldn’t fill bottles at the station but the clerk went into the trash and fished out an old engine oil canister, washed it out with gasoline and filled it up for me. He seemed even more grateful for the tip than I was for the can. 

I probably would have made it on one tank had I fueled up at the last station before the nothing.

I stopped for lunch at a small restaurant. It looked… well, like food poisoning. But the food was really really tasty. You get used to the way things look after a while.

I took a bunch of videos of the scenery and of the small settlements scattered across the large area, some not more than a couple of huts. I later found that what I actually recorded was the road, I didn’t position the camera properly. I did also take a couple of photos with my phone so I can share those. And no, I did not apply any filters to them. Those are the actual colors!

Late afternoon, I found a dreadful place to stay. But I was tired and the weather was getting bad so I didn’t feel like shopping around and I took it.

The hotel had a restaurant so I went to eat. It was the creepiest place ever, it looked like a wedding hall that had been deserted for 20 years, it had a Silent Hill vibe.

And the meat was inedible. I went to my room. The power went out. Creepy again. And then, with the power still out, a disturbing tune started playing outside, some carneval/ice-cream truck sounding melody. I quickly invited my rational side to please step in, and thankfully it did. And I did not get murdered by the ghost of the bride-to-be from the wedding hall. 

I continued towards Mahajanga.

Road signs are a bit special there. They’re made of concrete and hand painted. They’re like that all over the island, metal ones are very rare.

I had coffee at huts along the road. They cost next to nothing and are mostly quite good. Most of these huts offer breakfast too, simple things fried on the spot. And there are always children around. 🙂

I stopped at a restaurant with loud music. I ordered some food and a beer. Well, I hoped I ordered food but I wasn’t really sure. While I was waiting, some local kids asked me to buy them a bottle of rum (surprisingly easy to mime).

It’s dirt cheap so I did. I ordered another beer. Something was cooking but I wasn’t sure if it was for me. I finished the second beer and still no food. I wasn’t really that hungry anyways so I was fine either way but I didn’t know whether I should wait and I didn’t know how to ask. 

Finally I just asked for the bill, they didn’t mention food so I left. 

Near Mahajanga, my check oil light came on. I got help from a group of locals to find and add some, but the light stayed on. I bought the guys a drink and they gave me their number so I could call if I needed anything. 

I figured that the light must be broken and I kept driving. I later learned that it needs to be reset. 

I got to my accomodation for the week. It was terrible but the internet was good so it would do. I had a bathroom that wasn’t really private but I was told I would be the only one using it. Only that one didn’t have running water. There was a hose under the staircase at the ground floor where I could “shower”. It’ll do for a week. 

Morning walks, coffee, evening walks or drives all week long. Nothing exciting. More cows in traffic than average, perhaps. The big baobab is really big. Sunsets were impressive, one turned the sky purple. Deep, proper purple. I didn’t know the sky could be that color. Again, no filters on any of the photos.

To be fair, there were interesting things there, I was just on the island for so long that they became mondane. The internet stand, for example. I actually love how “bare metal” it is. It looks like a joke but it does what you need it to do, it provides the service you need. No regard for esthetics, only functionality. It’s just that after seeing five, the sixth is just ordinary. Pretty much the same thing happens with everything else, like what the streets look like, what tools and technology people use but also with the beauty of scenery. Yes, it’s amazingly beautiful, but after a while it’s just what nature looks like. That’s why I say nothing exciting.

And then on Friday night I lost my wallet. Id, drivers license, bank cards, the works. There’s some excitement right there. I looked, I went back to the restaurant to ask. The restaurant owner took me to the police, they sent us to a different police station, for foreigners.

The police station was remarkably third worls. You have to see it to believe it. I sneaked a couple of photos but I didn’t dare risk too much. Also, I was pretty worried so photos were not exactly at the top of my priority list. Note the typewriter.

We didn’t accomplish much and we arranged to meet in the morning to go back and finish the process. I wasn’t sure what exactly the process was but it involved photos and coming back. I went back out to look, retracing my steps. I typed into google translate that I was after the wallet and the documents, not the money, and showed it to everybody I ran into. I went back to the first police station we went to because it was close to where I lost it, to ask if someone had brought it in. This time they took my info and number to call me if it was found. 

The next morning I made a sign, it offered a reward for the wallet. I showed it around for a bit and then set it next to me as I sat down for coffee. People were interested but no takers. A woman told me I should write it in Malagasy. I said I didn’t know how. She said no worries, that guy will help. They even got glue for me to put up the malagasy version.

A couple of hours went by and I became old news. I snapped anouter photo of an AK.

At 9:30 I came to the restaurant, as agreed. At 9:45 I called him, he said he’d be there at 10:30. I went back to the port with my sign. 

Going back at 10:30 I took a little shortcut through a one way street. I noticed the sign a bit late and it was a very short and wide street so I figured I’d be fine. I was not fine. There was police at the end. I apologized, told them about the wallet, how looking for it distracted me from noticing the sign. They said I had to pay a fine. I said I couldn’t. No wallet. I showed them the papers they gave me at the station the night before. They insisted. I insisted back. They insisted more. So did I. They couldn’t articulate the thought in english so one of them walked me back to the scooter and pointed at the fuel tank. How you will put? To that I opened the seat and pointed at the canister of gas. They were still not dissuaded. But after a couple of minutes they just handed me my papers. I thanked them cordially and hurried to the restaurant, I was now running late. He didn’t mind. As a thank you, I fueled up his scooter along with mine. I had some cash in my bag so I didn’t lose everything when I lost the wallet. So, yes, technically, I could have paid a fine. 

We went to get my photo taken. I’ve taken document photos before plenty of times. Never like this. First of all, this happened outside.

Second, this happened with the kind of camera you would dig up from a drawer and give your 4yo to play with. And finally, this cost 50 cents. As expected, these were incredibly ugly photos but I had no reason to care. We went to the police, they said come back at noon. We made use of the time by going to the local TV to place an ad about the lost wallet. Then we went to look in on the mechanic fixing his truck. We got held up there and got to the police at 12:50. The guy had gone out to lunch. When he came back he said he had urgent business to tend to and he’d call us in an hour. We went back to the mechanic. 16:40, still no call. We went back to the station. He sent us out to type up the document ourselves and come back for him to stamp it. We went out to find an internet cafe to translate the document and print it out. We eventually found one that was open. The computers were a blast from the past but we got it done.

We were back at the station at 17:35 with the docs printed out. At 18 he called us in and processed it in a minute and a half. A minute of that was attaching the photos to the document.

As we’ve established, driving in Madagascar is dangerous. The roads are terrible and you have to keep your focus, especially on a scooter. So, driving at night is a really terrible idea. So I went ahead and did it. It was actually quite pleasant. I had to drive a little slower but not much. And the cool night air felt good. 

After a couple of hours I got tired. I got a room at a national park along the road. Those really are everywhere. The parks, I mean. The guy who gave me the key took the money because reception doesn’t open until 8 AM and I wanted to leave early. I wonder if he kept the money and accused me of running away without paying. 🙂 

The road was getting worse and worse. After a while it could hardly even be called a road, it was just terrain.

The scenery, coluds and the light created a very special athosphere.

Sunset found me in the middle of nowhere and it was a proper african picture postcard sunset. The trees, the mountains, the colors, you could show it to anybody and they would immediately recognize it as Africa. 

And I caught one of my favorite “right place right time” photos.

I reached a village and found a house with a sign that said hotel. No english. Hotel? Oui. Excellent. So she waves me over to a table and asks me what I want to eat. I stop her when I recognize french for chicken. I get a decent chicken soup. I was eager to get to my room as soon as I finished. I try asking about it. I get out my phone and try asking in french. She looks at me with a blank expression. Types in something that google didn’t recognize. I type in I need a room, she answers ok and keeps staring at me. I type in where, she points to the village ahead. I guess hotel doesn’t mean the same thing here. I carry on. 

I asked in the village ahead. I was led into a suspicious dark alley. There was a bar. I asked about the price, it as 4€. You can’t argue with that. 🙂 A narrow path between houses led us to a small yard and the room. The room itself was spartan but ok. The bathroom was, and I have pics to prove this, a barrel with rain water placed between two houses and walled off by a wooden door. 

I settled in and went to the bar. The locals invited me to sit down with them and I bought a round. 5€ for the 6 of us. I could get used to those prices 🙂 

They told me to put my scooter inside, it would be safe in the bar for the night. I never parked IN a bar before. 🙂

Early next morning I went to shower. I asked for a towel and mimed towelling off. I was pointed to the barrel. I tried again and there was a spark of understanding in the ladies eyes. She brought me soap. Sure, I could use that too. I tried yet again and got the towel, I was all set for my barrel experience. Not at all a bad one, I must add, the water was clean and warm. 

I asked for coffee in two places, they didn’t have any yet, it was too early. The third had some weak excuse for coffee. The fourth got me a decent cup.

I was going to Nosy Be. No, it’s not pronounced nosy bee. 🙂 In case you’re wondering, the o in Nosy is pronounced uu, as in put or foot, so it’s more like noosy. Be is like bet but without the t. 

More bueautiful secnery. Boooriiing! 😀

I had a strange moment when I felt just how far from home I was. Let me try to explain. I’ve seen chameleons a bunch of times, but they were in captivity. So they were just exotic animals in cages. But now I saw one just crossing the road. This is normal here. I was so far that chameleons weren’t even exotic.

So I went looking for the port. It seemed straightforward enough, turn left at Ambanja, get to Ankify, find the port. I got off the main road in Ambanja, to an unpaved road. Then a worse unpaved road. Reached a muddy part I couldn’t pass. Turned back, looked for alternative routes. Reached more dead ends. Reassessed my internal definition of drivable road and tried again. Drove past a truck stuck in the mud. Got stuck in mud myself. Lost my slippers in the mud. Ran out of roads, followed footpaths and finally, well, nothing, basically. Just drove through the forest with a vague sense of a general direction.

Eventually I found a path again. Then a small road, then a bigger road, then asphalt again. I got back to Ambanja having spent the better part of the morning exploring muddy dead ends. And then I found a different road from Ambanja to Ankify. Asphalt all the way. The great Troll in the Heavens was smiling down on Google. 

I got asked for my papers at a checkpoint. So, by law, scooters with 100+ cc need to have a document called a gray card. Mine was a 125 so it needed one. However, instead of actually getting one, the guy who sold it to me just put 100cc on the receipt. Strangely, this worked, I was fine every time I was pulled over. But this particular police officer asked for the gray card. I pretended I didn’t know what that was. I showed him the receipt and the insurance slip again. He tried to ask about the gray card again, but finally just gave up and sent me away. 

I wanted another coffee. I stopped at a place, asked for coffee, a couple of guys nodded their head yes but the guy at the other side of the table, let’s call him the bartender, yelled no, no coffee. Maybe he didn’t like me? 

I was fine at the next place. The bartender even posed with his daughter for me. 🙂

I got to the port. Let’s do that imagining thing again, imagine a ferry. Have it?

It was the cutest thing. It could maybe fit 2 cars. It was me with the scooter, a bunch of sacks with live animals inside, some furniture and a couple of people. It cost 23000 money which is around 6€. It took a couple of hours to get across.

I was stopped by the police, they checked my passport for some reason but quickly let me go witho no hassle.

Hell-Ville looked like a metropolis after the last couple of days. There was asphalt and concrete houses. And what I believe was my first (possibly only) metal road sign. 🙂 And yes, it IS actually called Hell-Ville!

I googled accomodation but didn’t make a booking because I wanted to negotiate the price. And negotiate I did, from an initial 60 000 to a wonderfully acceptable 33 000. The room was good, it had a bathroom with a working shower. I had stopped taking that as a given and appreciated it. 

They also offered food and it was great! I never ordered anything specific, I let them surprise me, and I was rarely disappointed. In the 3 weeks I stayed there, the worst I got was still pretty good. 

The island is not very big. The roads are not very good. I caught the sunset at Mont Passot. 

The check oil light on my scooter came on again. I added a bit of oil and tried to reset the light again but the button didn’t work. I took the dash off and managed to break the button off completely. I took the dash to a guy fixing phones in the street and he soldered it back on. It still didn’t work, though. But I managed to fuck up the rev counter in the process. Oh, well. 

Morning walks, work, lunch, work, evening walks, and the week was over. 

I worked out on the terrace, it was a really pleasant work environment! I’d order coffee every morning and they would bring me sugar. One day it invited a cute guest!

On Saturday I took a trip to Nosy Iranja. A nice looking speed boat. And as we were speeding towards the island, I found myself bored out of my skull. Wow, you ungrateful little shit, I thought. Then some islands came into view, I started taking photos and the bad feelings went away. 

The twin islands are really movie scene beautiful. We went for a walk to a viewpoint as a group. I did the touristy walk across the white stretch of sand. Lunch was great, I had a couple of beers and I fell asleep on the boat ride back. 

On Sunday I found a ranch with horses, got a nice tour. It was just me and a guide. I got to ride a horse on a sand beach, that’s something straight out of a movie. The horse I was riding loved the sand. I was warned about it but I was still not able to stop him from throwing himself to the ground. We got back without me getting off at any point. When we got back the owner took one look at us and started laughing, he knew what had happened.

I asked him about a restaurant and he recommended one owned by some Italian people. I found it and asked the waiter if he spoke English. He didn’t. I remembered that the owners were Italian so I asked, not really expecting he would speak it. But he spoke it flawlessly. It turned out that Italian is actually popular on Nosy Be due to a lot of tourists. I used it on several occasions after that. 

I went further north. I stopped for ice cream. It was hands down the best ice cream I ever tasted. It was actually made from whatever it was called, real vanilla, cocoa, rum and raisins. It was 2€ a scoop. That’s insanely expensive here, no local would ever pay that. And I was already getting accustomed to living a semi-local lifestyle so I resented them for the tourist trap prices. But it was a place for europeans and they could get away with it. It was packed full in spite of the prices. 

I headed back south. I wondered aimlessly for a bit and found a remote beach. There was a small settlement and a couple of people. One tipsy old guy walked up to me and started following me down the beach, trying to talk with the few words of english he knew. When I reached the rockier part, he finally gave up and left me alone. I enjoyed a bit of quiet time with noone in sight. You’d think you’d be alone a lot on Madakascar but somehow there’s always people around. No idea where they come from at times, but there’s always somebody. You stop to rest in the middle of nowhere and someone walks by. And there’s nothing around, you really can’t guess where to or where from they’re going. Even here, I saw a couple of people walking on the beach in the distance. But once they got out of sight, I was completely alone. I went for a nice relaxing swim.

The old guy was there when I came back. He said he was a fisherman and offered me a boat ride, I refused. He walked me bact to my scooter and asked for money, I gave him a little to get him off my back.

I enjoyed the sunset in a beautiful bar with a tasty mocktail.

The kitchen didn’t open until 7. I wouldn’t have minded the wait but I had my heart set on trying lobster for the first time and they didn’t have it. I found a place that did and it was meh at best. I guess I’m not a fan. Or they messed it up, I have no way of knowing. Either way, I don’t think I’ll try it again.

On Wednesday I went for a drive after work with no particular destination in mind. I stumbled upon a nature park, one with no road. You need to get one of those cute little traditional boats. It’s called a pirogue. Maybe you knew that already, I found out after I got in one. 🙂

Once again, Italian came in handy. I knocked the price down a bit and got in the boat with two locals. They gave me a paddle too. The boat is surprisingly agile.

We got to a nice beach and took a trail inland. We hard lemurs shriek, I never imagined they could be so loud. After a while we were able to see them too. It was getting dark and cameleons were up in trees for the night, they looked adorable with their tails coiled in a disc. We even spotted a tiny tiny one which is, according to my guide, a very lucky find. 

I got to taste real curcuma, straight out of the ground. And some white root that tasted like a mix between coconut and chesnut, I immediately forgot what it was called. I found out again some time later but I forgot again.

It was night by the time we went back. The small boat silently gliding over the calm, moonlit water, nothing but nature all around, it was so soothing. I was actually glad I came so late, I think I got more out of it than a day visit would have offered. The photos are… well, my phone tried.

I tried to capture the serenity of the boat ride in a photo, but night mode on my phone just made it look creepy.

Driving back, I reached into my pocket for my phone. It wasn’t there. I stopped and checked again, still gone. I checked the scooter. I checked under the seat even though I knew I didn’t put it there. I headed back looking intensely at the road. I asked everybody I encountered, in an attempt at French plus mime. I got back to where my scooter was parked before, nobody had seen my phone. I checked my bracelet a lot but it couldn’t connect. I found my guide, he checked the boat for me, even though we both thought I didn’t leave it there. He got on the scooter with me to help me look. We stopped everybody we ran into but this time he did the talking so they actually understood what was going on. Every time we stopped to ask, I would check my bracelet. We stopped a car that was driving towards us, he hadn’t seen it in the road. We were still asking people but chances of finding it were getting slim. We asked one last guy and he also said he hadn’t seen it. But as he was saying that, I looked at my bracelet and saw that it was connecting! You lying old bastard, I thought, as I was hitting the “find device” button. The phone started ringing. Not on the old man, though. Some distance away, near the edge of bt range. And I immediately felt embarrassed for having suspected the poor guy. It was just a freaky coincidence that he happened to be at that exact spot and we wouldn’t have found it had we not stopped to ask him. To make me feel even worse, the guy looked genuinely happy for us to have foud it. I should really make an effort to not be such a dick and think the worst of people, I thought.

I took the guide back to the village. We exchanged contact info, he offered to organize an excursion for me on the weekend.

I went to dinner on Thursday. The dish was on the expensive side, but ok. The portion was on the tiny side, but ok. Desert was terrible, but ok. And then he wanted to charge me extra for fries that came with the calamari and that really pissed me off. I told him to get his boss. He said his boss couldn’t come. For some reason I didn’t want to let this one slide. I paid for everything else but left without paying the extra charge.

There were other lousy restaurants too, with uncooked meat, burnt sugar with water sold as caramel, a “large” pizza barely bigger than my hand.

But what never failed was the street food. It looks awful but tastes amazing. And it costs next to nothing. To go orders come wrapped in notebook paper or, at more high end places, plastic bags. I particularly liked cassava, both cooked, fried or grilled.

I visited Lemuria Land on Saturday. I paid the entrance fee and haggled over the price of a tour with a guide. We couldn’t agree on the price so I said I’d visit the park without a guide. Very soon, his colleague caught up to me and offered a tour at the price I offered.

The park is rather small but very nice. Some animals are happy to interact with people. The tour also includes a visit to the essential oil distillery where they process Ylang-Ylang. You get to smell the pure oil that’s used in parfumes. There’s also a part where they craft furniture and souvenirs out of salvaged driftwood.

On Sunday, the guide from the pirogue park arranged an excursion to a small island. Without realizing it, he wore the perfect t-shirt, with this journy’s trtademark – an AK. 🙂

He was really great, he put in a lot of effort to show me everything there was to see, including a horned spider! Horned! Spider! I mean, really, if there’s one thing a spider doesn’t need it’s horns! 🙂

The island is beautiful, mostly untouched nature.

I saw a couple of kids playing with a home made vehicle of some sort and I couldn’t help wondering what life was like growing up here, on a remote little island. They do have a school but not much else. What opportunities do they have in life? Are they happy? They actually all look much happier than us so maybe they got it right and we live life wrong. I still probably wouldn’t trade lives, though.

There were a couple of girls making some sort of food that looked awful. The guide noticed my interest and told me it was coconut fried with sugar. He encourage me to try it and it was the tastiest candy ever!

The higlight of the excursion is swimming with turtles. We were warned not to touch them because they bite quite hard. You wouldn’t guess it by looking at them, they look so calm and peaceful.

Oh, and a pirogue with an engine is a very special sight! 🙂

The work week was peppered with afternoon drives, sunsets and mocktails.

I saw bicycles made of bamboo. I also saw a cast/splint made of bamboo on some poor guy’s leg. I thought this would be a terrible place to get hurt.

I left Nosy Be on Friday. I got to the port and was offered a ride on a boat (not a ferry) for 40k. I refused, said it cost me 18 to get there. They said fine, 18, but an extra 5 for loading my scooter onto the boat. We settled on 20k total. I later learned that I remembered the price wrong and I actually paid 20something coming to the island, not 18. Honest mistake.

They sail all sorts of vessels, it’s really amazing to see. They also drive all sorts of stuff but we’ll get to that later.

I made my way north. It got dark and I wanted to find a place to stay. As you can not really see from the frames extracted from the action cam, there was a surprising number of people in the road and segments were not ideal so driving in the dark was beginning to be a chore.

I thought I’d ask a police man about a hotel. I pulled up next to him, said hi and asked if he spoke english. He replied in malagasy. “Something something malagasy something Madagascar”. It was enough to get the message. He wouldn’t speak anything but malagasy, he made no effort to hide his contempt for foreigners. I smiled, said sorry, no malagasy. He repeated his phrase more loudly and energetically. I bet in his head he was Vin Diesel shouting “this is Brazil!”. I left without saying anything else. Outloud. 

There were bonfires all along the road, I don’t know if there was a special occasion or if that’s just what they do in the evening. I wanted to stop and sit by the fire for a bit, but, of course, not nearly enough to actually stop and try to ask people if I may do so. So many stars were visible, I stopped and stared for a while.

I found a hotel. The bed reminded me of that one day I spent in a holding cell in my home town. And the bathroom was less than ideal. But it was 7€ for a decent meal and the room so I really couldn’t complain.

I stopped for coffee the next morning and got a thermos full of coffee. Not that I was complaining. They also left me unsupervised with a can of condensed milk. I ate a couple of tea spoons, it’s so delicious. Surprisingly, it’s not often you find real milk, they mostly use this instead.

The roads were interesting. The colors were amazing.

I got pulled over by a couple of cops. They did their best to get me to bribe them. First they asked about my malagasy drivers license. I knew I didn’t need one so after a bit of back and forth, they gave up on that and moved on to a certificate of vaccination. They wanted a printed version. I had a digital one. They insisted that was no good. They spoke very little english. To get his point across, he took my passport, held it up and said ok. Then he took out his phone, took a photo of the passport and said not ok. I kept insisting on no photo, digital document, is ok. After a while they handed me my documents and straight up said they’d let me go but I should give a little money. I said oh, no, I don’t have money, and left.

While they were bugging me, they also pulled over a guy in a van that hardly seemed up to code. They let him go. It’s a good thing I have a photo because you wouldn’t believe me if I just described it.

Meanwhile, right next to us, there was a guy with a couple of old canisters and a couple of sticks. I’ve heard professional drummers on real drums sound worse. I tipped him while we were still on the malagasy license story.

I picked up a Hitchhiker. He was walking somewhere so I figured he wasn’t going far. My bag was tied to the seat behind me so we had to untie it to make room for him. He put it on his back. Still a suspicious dick, I looked in the mirror every time he moved to make sure he wasn’t going through it. Of course, he never was. I kept waiting for him to tell me to drop him off but he never did, he stayed on all the way to Diego.

His backpack was cute. The black one is mine 🙂

Diego-Suarez was actually renamed to Antsiranana in ‘75 but noone actually calls it that. And I told you about francs already. Apparently, not big fans of change, the Malagasy.

Diego is a proper city, asphalt, concrete, tall buildings. The goat at the gas station was not surprising.

I sat down for a beer and got it served in the fanciest manner.

I got a cheap room. It looked like a prison, no windows. Shared bathroom. But it would do for a night. The irony of the hotel name was delightful.

A lid came of my salt shaker at lunch and I ended up with a ton of salt on my fries. They were kind enough to take it away and put it back in oil for me, to wash away the access salt. I ordered lemon juice and got a whole large pitcher of juice.

Soon after lunch I started feeling a little off. I went back to my room and soon got very sick. I threw up a couple of times and spent the rest of the day in bed. I finished an audiobook, the subtle art of not giving a fuck. Not the worst use of my time.

I booked a more expensive hotel hoping it was nicer. I got there early the next day and wanted to see what they say if I just ask for the price without mentioning my booking. They wanted more than double. I got my reservation out and they accepted the price.

It was raining and I didn’t know what to do so I sat down for coffee and pondered meaning and what I was doing wrong with my life. Something was missing, I wasn’t happy. The rain stopped and I went exploring the peninsula to the north.

On the outskirts of teh city I came across another quary with people crushing rocks manually.

The road was muddy and difficult to drive on. The parts that weren’t dangerously slippery were uncomfortably rocky and I was not enjoying my little excursion at all.

I craved a little comfort. The new hotel wasn’t doing much to help with that.

Looking back on the photos and videos, parts were quite nice. If I had a vehicle that was better suited for the terrain, I probably would have enjoyed it.

I even found an abandoned airstrip. I heard Clarkson yelling “poweeeeer!” as I hit the accelerator. I know Top Gear did a special on Madagascar, but I haven’t seen it yet. I didn’t want spoilers.

I returned from the peninsula and explored the city a little bit. I found the market street. Also, some nice views at the edge of the city.

On Monday I exchanged my terrible room for a less terrible one. In this one the shower wasn’t broken but water kept coming and going. So did electricity.

I was running low on cash. With no cards and no NFC anywhere, the only way to get money from friends was Western Union and that’s a very expensive way to transfer money. The girl from Tana offered to help me out using the mobile carrier mobile money service which was much more affordable. She sent me 500€ which is way more than I expected her to trust me with, but for some reason she did.

My mum updated me on the latest with my biological father. Let me give you a bit of background first. We were never close. He was terrible to me all my life. A couple of years ago I decided to move back into our family house. My parents were separated, he was living on the top floor, mum on the ground floor. She had too much space and I was not enjoying living in the city (and paying the high rent) all that much any more so it made sense. We were just about done with renovations, made a studio apartment in the back for me, redid everything else. It was becoming a nice place to live. And then one day he burnt the top floor. Everything was gone, the roof was gone too.

And the ground floor got extensive water damage while the firemen were trying to put the fire out. So I offered to get a loan and rebuild the house. And put him in a home, after such an accident I didn’t feel comfortable letting him live there unsupervised. He agreed, but then the hellspawn that is his daughter (note how I am avoiding calling her my half-sister) started filling his head with objections until he changed his mind. I got a loan and used it to buy an apartment in the city with a studio right next to it, so that mum and I can be neighbors. We left him the house. And now, he was talking about selling the house. And I have no doubt he was serious. When I moved back in, he blackmailed me into buying him a car in exchange for the piece of land right next to the house, otherwise he would have sold it to some guy who wanted to turn it into some eyesore storage space. So not only did he burn my inheritance, now he was going to deprive me of it completely. Oh, well, fuck him and the house. He did nothing but leech money off me for the last 20 years, I haven’t needed him in forever and I damn well didn’t need him now. But it still left a bitter taste in my mouth. 

I felt tired, fed up with traveling, but at the same time I had no desire to go back to Croatia.

Extending the visa required a million documents and a dozen visits to several offices with the officials playing their version of hide-and-go-seek with you. It took 3 days. 

On day two, a guard in front of an office sent me away to get a face mask. While getting it, I lost my phone. I looked, couldn’t find it. I wanted to find it from my laptop but there was no wifi at the hotel. A local that was often at the hotel, perhaps even working there in some capacity,  took me back to his house to get online and look for it. It failed, it was unreachable. Then he went with me to the police to report it. I bought him lunch to say thank you.

The fun part is that the guy in the office never showed up and I didn’t even need the mask. And when he finally did, on day 3, I went in without a mask and nobody said a thing.

I went to get a replacement sim card. They insisted on my passport so I had to go to the immigration office to get it back from them. When I came back the power went out and they told me to come tomorrow. I said I’d wait for the power to return, I needed internet for work. They sent me to an office across town and I got a replacement sim and a portable router. I got back to the hotel and there was no water or electricity again. I was at the end of my rope with this place. I went out to eat and look for a different hotel. I found one I liked, with a generator and water, but we couldn’t agree on the price. I spent the night in the lousy one and found a decent one the next morning. Then to immigration again, this was day 3. I got sent back to the first office I came to and there I was told to come back in the afternoon. In the afternoon I waited for half an hour and finally got it done.

At the old hotel, I asked for my money back for the 2 nights I paid for in advance. They said that the guy in charge wasn’t there. Booking.com said he offered 3 free nights in leu of money. I had no interest in going back to that place. I went back a couple more time, but I wasn’t able to get my money back. It wasn’t a lot, it didn’t really matter. It just felt bad to let them keep it because they definitely didn’t deserve it.

I went to Ramena on Saturday. I got lost in the suburbs a bit going there. Once I left the city, the road was in great condition. This was a welcome change!

I didn’t even go see the famous beach. I sat down for breakfast, met a local who was keen on being my guide, we had a couple of beers, some rum, and then we went sights seeing.

The road leaves the town and follows along the beach. There’s a toll booth, that part is a nature reserve or something.

There were some huge canons at a beach fort, that was cool.

And some beautiful coves. And a road with deep sand, we spent more time pushing the scooter than riding it. And riding it in the sand, when we could, was very demanding.

It took forever but we finally reached the next village. There was a surfing competition at a beach but that was only fun for a bit. We had a nice lunch and went back. I paid for everything and gave him a little cash that was left over. 

On Sunday I asked the hotel to start the generator for me at 7 AM and they did. I broke my coffee cup, they cleaned it up for me and got me another cup.

I went back to Ramena. They had a ramp at the entrance to the town center now and they wanted to charge me for parking. It wasn’t there the day before. I turned around and found an alternate path to the square.

My guide from the day before tracked me down as soon as I arrived and helped me get an excursion to a beautiful little island in an amazing azure bay. Going there, we had to wait for a bit at a shallow part for the tide to rise. I used the time to go snorkeling, it was actually quite nice. Nobody else joined me but it was their loss.

The bay really is special, the color is amazing!

The island is uninhabited, there are only a couple of gazebos there. The boat crew dropped us off and left. They came back after a while with a bucket of freshly caught fish which they then cooked for us and it was amazing.

I saw a guy carry salt in a hollow coconut shell. It was clearly the first thing he could find to serve this purpose, it wasn’t a bowl made out of a coconut, it was just a piece of shell and for some reason I found this so interesting. It reminded me of how far from home I was. 

My guide took me to a viewpoint, you can see the whole island and the bay from it. Along the way, he picked up some garbage and ranted about how it’s terrible that people litter here. I wish I had the power to make him mayor.

It started raining all of a sudden. I went for a swim in the rain. It stopped as abruptly as it started. As we were leaving, the island was framed in a rainbow.

The sea was rough going back, the tall waves were super fun but getting soaking wet in the wind was not much fun at all. They gave us a tarp to hide under but it didn’t help much. The wind died down as we reached Ramena. The high tide made the restaurants very interesting.

My tee was soaked so for the scooter ride back, I “wore” a large bright orange scarf I bought from some girls on the island. I did not feel any shame at all! 🙂

On Monday, I went out for my morning walk and found myself near a square where a toon was playing and people were standing all formal. Traffic was stopped and nobody was walking in the streets, they were all standing still. I kept walking and some locals started shouting things at me. Maybe that was the anthem or something, perhaps I offended them by walking. I never checked up on it.

I bought a can of tuna at the store but I didn’t think to check what kind of can it was. It was the kind with no easy open lid. I opened it with a nail clipper and a tea spoon.

The police lost my report of loss for the phone. The guy told me to let him know the IMEI number of the phone again and gave me his phone number. I would guess that email would be more convenient in case of a lost phone but no, phone number. I went back the next day, the guy wasn’t there, nobody spoke any english so they got a prisoner out of a cell to translate for us. I could not make this up. They sent me to a different office to file a report again. The next time I went there, they got the same guy out of the cell again and told me that my report was at a court and that it would take a month to process. The prisoner added his comment after he translate what they said: they’re lying to you. It never went to any court and it doesn’t take a month, they just don’t want to do it.

On Friday I went to settle the bill, I had coffee every morning and I only payed for the first one, I owed them for nine. But the price was more than nine times the price of the first one. They said that the price had changed since I arrived. I laughed and paid what they asked. A couple of minutes later the lady came to my room and brought me the difference. I said it was ok but she insisted, said it wasn’t right because they never told me that the price had changed. I left a nice tip when I left.

Saturday morning I went scuba diving. No problems this time. We did two dives, one to 14 meters, the other to 18. I took my gopro with me. It’s waterproof to 10 meters but I risked it. It was not damaged but it didn’t exactly work either. Pretty soon the water pressure presses the power button and it just stops recording. So, even though it can take the pressure, you still need a case if you want to take it diving.

It was the first day of my vacation. I took the last two weeks on Madagascar off work. It was going to b exploring the island, beaches, sunsets and wind in my hair. Instead, it was crash and hospital and stitches and 40 hours on a public bus and infections and more doctors and hospitals. Spoiler alert, I survived 🙂

There are tons of animals in the roads. They are usually very chill. But I ran into one that was not. It was a turkey. It was on the opposite side of the road doing it’s thing. It suddenly got scared an started running across the road. It gave it all it had, legs and wings at full power, and charged straight into me. Just a bit less of an effort and it would have missed me but it really gave it all it had. It hit me just below the headlight and the impact was enough to knock me over. I went down and slided on the ground for what seemed way longer than it actually was. I gave out a cry of anger and pain. I tried lifting the scooter off myself but couldn’t. I saw blood literally squirting from somewhere above my eye. I couldn’t get up. I gave another loud cry, this time of pain and fear. Some locals came and lifted the scooter off me. I tried getting up but it was too much for me and I went back down. Blood was everywhere. A strange thought visited me: Is this it? Is this how my story ends? But I’m not done yet… They helped me up and off the road. They put some powder or sand or something on my head wound and that got the bleeding down to a drip. They told me I was bleeding a lot and I needed to go to a hospital. They would take me. With what vehicle, you ask? A motorcycle, of course. Three of us, the driver, the translator and me. I barely had enough composure take my bag with me.

We got to the hospital. It was a gray concrete house. It looked nothing like a hospital. They washed my wounds outside, with rain water from a bucket. They stitched me up without an anesthetic. They gave me a shot of antibiotics and put betadine on my wounds, no bandages. I don’t remember how much they charged me but it wasn’t a lot.

As far as motorcycle accidents go, this was not a bad one. It could have gone so much worse. That being said, it was still kinda bad. I’m no John McClane or, you know, whoever his modern counterpart is. I don’t have that gene that turns pain into chest hair and sexy looks. The pain of having large portions of my skin scraped off was brutal and you could tell as much by looking at me. 

They suggested I put my scooter in a taxi and go to the nearest town. They also suggested that we take the motorcycle back to the crash site but I really didn’t feel like doing that. They went and got my scooter for me, I waited. Then we waited for the taxi together. I was expecting a pickup but a tuk tuk came. They examined the scooter for a while, they wanted to put it in the tuk tuk but finally they suggested I leave the scooter there and come back for it. I agreed. The translator went with me. They got me to a hotel. It was a total dump but fine. There was no electricity in the whole town. I asked if there would be internet once the power returns and they said yes so I took it even though the price was at least 50% more than it was worth. I tipped the translator and asked him to share it with the guy who drove the motorcycle to the hospital. I hope he did. I got blood on him and his motorcycle, he deserved a tip for that alone.

I tried to get some food at a couple of local restaurants. I couldn’t communicate so I gave up. 

Sleeping was a challenge. Even the slightest movement woke me up. The sheet kept trying to grow into me.

The power came back at some point during the night, my laptop charged. I asked for internet, there wasn’t any. I felt cheated and miserable, unable to fight against the injustice. I asked the night before. I would have found a better place had I known.

I limped towards another hotel. There was a big slash in my ankle and I did my best not to bend it. I paid 5k for wifi and let people know I was ok. The girl from Tana said to come back there and it was by far my best option.

I got a tuk tuk back to where I left my scooter. They charged me half of what they did the night before but I was sharing a ride now.

It’s not considered impolite to stare, people even nudged friends and pointed at me to take a look. I didn’t really mind. 

When we got to the scooter they offered to take it back in the tuk tuk. They wanted four times the fare I had just paid so I said no on general principle. I’d just drive it back. It actually seemed like the more comfortable option. I’m not even sure what they had in mind but they must have wanted me to share the front seat of the tuk tuk with the driver which I don’t think I’d enjoy very much when I was healthy, let alone now.

I drove very slowly. I was literally slower than some bicycles. I reached a police checkpoint. I showed them my wounds and the blood on the scooter. I explained I couldn’t wear my helmet over my head wound and they didn’t bother me about it, they wished me a safe journey and let me go.

I got back into the town and quickly found a taxi bus that would take me and the scooter back to Tana. I paid for my ticket. They offered to wash the blood off my scooter and I said it was fine. I’m not sure why I wanted to keep it but I kinda did. People saw the for sale sign on my scooter. It was there since before the crash and now I edited the price. We needed to get to where the bus was departing from. Two guys took the scooter and the third guy and me got in a tuk tuk. When we got there, the guy wanted me to pay for the tuk tuk. I was not doing that. Again, the cash value was negligible but the idea of them driving on my scooter and having me pay for a ride did not sit well with me at all. The guy grunted and paid for the ride.

They washed my scooter anyways. I wasn’t happy about it but I wasn’t getting into it.

First they put me in the back of the bus, but they reconsidered and let me have the front seat. I was sharing it with a girl but I was still more comfortable that I would have been in the back.

In Ambanja we stopped for lunch. The market had tables with cooked food and I got a dish. It turns out that the flies favored the taste of my wounds over anything else there. And there was no shortage of them. I barely made it through my lunch, I can not describe how annoying it was to have hundreds of tiny feet poking at my wounds. And I couldn’t really do anything, swatting them was not an option. I ate as fast as I could and got back to the bus, there I wrapped my leg in tissues to keep the flies off. Of course, the paper got attached to me and grew into the scabs.

Some guy asked about my scooter. I told him the new price and he seemed interested but we left it at that.

Some time later, the bus driver answered his phone and than handed it to me. It was the guy from before calling to say that his son wants to buy it, in Tana.

The drive was not exactly smooth.

Around 3 AM, we stopped somewhere and a guy walked up to my window and said his brother would meet me in Tana to buy the scooter, he was the son of the guy who called. I wasn’t holding my breath but I was polite to the guy.

We had a flat tire twice. The third time we got one, we hade no more spares. We spent 7 hours waiting in some village with no reception.

I ate at a local restaurant, the meal was cooked right there on a fire and was very good. When you first come, you have to force yourself to look past how things look. After a while, you get used to it and it becomes normal.

For a while, I was doing quite well, considering. I even got a pic touching an AK! 🙂

After a while my mood dropped. My leg had swollen considerably. I was in pain. I was constantly harassed by flies. My left eye was swelling shut.

I snapped, hit the bus with my fist, started cursing loudly and shouting I need to get to a doctor. But we weren’t going anywhere, the driver was still gone. People said they would find a local doctor for me. After a while,  a kid in short jeans and a very dirty undershirt walked up to me and said he was a doctor. I was not convinced. But he went away and came back with a syringe and some medicine. He had obviously washed his hands. We sat down at a table of a closed restaurant and he gave me a shot with chickens running around us. I think I came across as a bit of a dick at first so I tried to make up for it by giving him a tip when he charged me for the antibiotics.

It was dark by the time the driver came back. He changed the tire and took us to a shop. He asked me to lend him 130k, he’d pay me back in Tana. I did. 

We got to Tana at 6:30 AM after 40 long hours. They wanted to charge me money to unload the scooter from the bus but I told them to talk to the driver, I paid for my ticket.

I sat down for coffee while I waited for the buyers for the scooter and for the driver to get my money. It was cold and it reminded me of home. I kinda liked it. They buyers came, they were happy with the scooter and they paid up. The driver said he was still waiting for the cash. I said I would call him and I left. The girl called him a couple of times for me in the days to come but he never paid us back. Oh, well.

I spent some time looking for an affordable taxi. I didn’t want to pay a tourist price. I eventually got one at a price I had in mind.

I got to her house and she took really good care of me. She helped me with my wounds, she went with me to find a doctor. The first one we saw tried to give me a shot but she missed my vein twice. I didn’t want an intramuscular shot so we went to a different place. 

I walked as much as I could and my ankle wound would often open. The swelling was getting worse. I have photos but I chose not to include them. I’ll include one of the leg 3 weeks later when it looks much better.

I went to the hospital again to ask for a compression bandage. They said I needed to get an x-ray and ultrasound of the leg. It seemed excessive but I went along with it. Both were fine. Finally, they cleaned my wound almost as if they were trying to hurt me as much as they could. Finally, they gave me a compression bandage which was all I wanted in the first place. 

In a couple of days the swelling went down. 

We decided to go on a roadtrip to tsingy de Bemaraha. The two of us, a Belgian woman and a Japanese guy. It was like an opening to a joke. I was ok to drive. My leg hurt a little but it was manageable. We headed out at 3 AM on Saturday.

We got to Morondava by late afternoon and we were at the baobab alley at sunset. Keep in mind that the photos are stills from a video recorded out the window of the car while I was driving it.

It was nice. But the next morning, at dawn, it was epic! I know, the stills suck, but believe me, it really is a site to behold. 🙂

We pressed on towards the Tsingy. Sand road. We got to the first river. We had to wait for the ferry for a bit. We noticed a drip under the car. It was diesel, the tank was punctured. A local used soap to stop the leak, to hold us over until we could find a shop. 

You climb the ferry using ramps, it feels exotic and dangerous to do it, even though it’s perfectly safe. 

One of the guys from the boat went with us to help us find a shop. We found a place that could do it. They took the tank down and used those welding sticks that you melt with heat. They actually started a small fire on the tank which didn’t feel safe at all. But they obviously knew what they were doing. My companions took the photos/videos of the welding process but they never sent them to me.

A legion of kids gathered around us. They wanted to interact and I wasn’t really in the mood so I took out my laptop and played a movie for them. They were entertained and I was left in peace so it was a win win. 

We got to the last village before the Tsingy and found a place for the night. I cleaned and bandaged my wound. The beds were terrible, it was hard to sleep. And it still hurt when I turned which didn’t help. 

Next morning we picked up our guide and climbing gear. We drove to the Tsingy.

There was a soldier there with an AK. I went for it, I asked him to let me hold his gun for a pic. He didn’t even take the bullets out of the gun! It was more than a pic, it was an achievement. 

I put my bandaged foot in my shoe and tried to walk as if nothing was wrong. I made the walk, I made the climb, I made it back. But I paid a price. It hurt. We were supposed to go to another, smaller, one but I said I’d wait for them. It was too much for my leg. The rest of the group was on the fence for a bit but finally they all decided to skip the activity and we went back.

We drove for a bit and found a hotel. We woke up early and we reached the river before dawn. We had to wait for a ferry. As dawn was nearing, I walked out of the car and to the river bank. As far as “I was in a place at a time” experiences go, this one was pretty epic. The area is flat and the river is wide. On the left, the sun was nearing the horizon, the sky was burning orange. Above me, it was still grey. To the right, I was still dark and the full moon was about to set. A surreal display. And sharp pain in my leg to keep me grounded. In some strange way, it was like it added to the experience. 

We got to Morondava in the afternoon.

I was in so much pain I decided to resort to drugs. It turned out Tramadol was OTC there. In case you’re not familiar, to describe it in a word, it’s ecstasy. They told me to take two if I need to. I took four. I felt great for a while but next morning I felt dizzy and sick. I even threw up. I was not fit to drive so the Japanese guy took over. He was not a hundred percent up to the task but we moved forward. The car started making noises and soon broke down, a wheel bearing gave out. We barely made it to a mechanic.

The girl and I took a bus to the nearest city to get the parts, the other two stayed with the car. The bus ride was torture, I got so sick, I was dangerously close to throwing up on the bus. She took such good care of me, got a bag for me just in case, blew on my neck and fanned me to help me through the worst of it. The bus ride took too long, everything was closed by the time we got there so we got dinner and found a hotel. We got the parts next morning and headed back. Buses don’t leave on a schedule, they leave when they’re full. And by full I mean full, way more people than actual seats. And when I say bus, I mean (mini)van.

Everybody was super careful with my leg, though, even in the crowd nobody ever so much as touched me, they all made a real effort to protect me. 

We got the parts to the mechanic and went for coffee.

Yes, that’s where we sat down for coffee. No, it no longer seemed strange in any way.

We got some fried chicken in the street. Not the feet, though. 🙂 And we saw the towns only site. A rather large church for such a small town.

It was afternoon by the time we got the car fixed so we stayed at another hotel. This time I wanted a nice one and I didn’t mind the price. We found a really nice one, it almost felt like a European one. Hot water, internet, comfy bed, the works. 

The day before I left, I took out my stitches myself, with a nail clipper. It seemed fitting to do it this way. 

She went with me to the airport to see me off. 

My hand was still in hers as I turned away, my arm extended behind me. Another half step and I felt her hand slip, her fingers sliding along mine, then just her fingertips and then we broke contact. I paused for a split second, took a breath and walked away without turning back. 

I was going to get some snacks, drinks and some souvenirs at the airport. Everything was closed. There was a single cart that sold snacks and drinks but they didn’t take ariary. So, even though I kept a little money, I was effectively broke. With 4 flights ahead of me. To Mauritius, to Istambul, to Rome, to Zadar. 25 hours. I had hoped I could maybe get two seats to myself on the plane to Istambul so I could get some sleep. No such luck, the flight was fully booked. By the time I got to Rome I was exhausted. Walking was getting difficult. I was hungry and thirsty. Still broke, though.

I finally boarded the last flight. 

I had a fantasy about how this story would end. The airport. I clear customs. I was there, she was there waiting. A hug that tells a story of a million words, only more accurately. A kiss that says “I’m ready now”. Happily ever after. 

I got to the airport and… there was nobody there. My friend was an hour and a half late to pick me up. I was tired, I was hungry, I was in pain and I was broke. All I had was ariary which I couldn’t exchange anywhere. So the wait felt like forever. I was in a foul mood.

So, I do not get to use my dream ending to this story. I will borrow one instead. From one of my favorite videos ever, by exurb1a. 

Earth lovely 

Existence interesting

Ice cream, Hugs, Parks, Lunchtime bongs 

Life alright 

Life not so bad 

Everything cool maybe Bye.

Epilogue

I went to the doctor when I got back. One cracked rib and some torn ligaments. Again, as far as motorcycle accidents go, not bad.

My first week back, she sent me a message. It said she’d like to meet, talk to me. And I said ok.

I was going to dinner with her parents that evening and the two of us were going to meet before that. But she canceled last minute because she had too much to drink. This is where it gets very soap opera. I went to dinner with her parents. My mum was joining us but she was running late. The reason she was running late was that my ex’s friends called her to come help. My ex was pretty out of it so my mum took her to our place and put her to bed. 

We had a nice dinner and went home. I went to bed. At some point my mum came over and slept on my couch because her studio apartment reeked of alcohol.

My apartment and my mum’s studio share a terrace. I went out there to drink my coffee in the morning. My ex came out. “Well, you look like shit”, she said. I did, I was covered in scabs and limping. We hugged and god damn it, for the first time in 6 months, I was home. For the 5 seconds the hug lasted.

I had wondered what she would have to say for me to forgive her and I could never think of the words I’d need to hear to really let it go, until she said them. I will not share them with you but I will say that I felt no more anger towards her. 

We talked for a while and then she went home. She sounded different. I liked it. Maybe, said my heart. Naah, said my brain. 

Her mum told me that she said, after her visit, that we should not be left alone together or it would start all over again. “So, yes?”, said my heart. Naah, said my brain. “Yes”, my heart insisted. “Maybe”, my brain yielded.

We met again. Kissing her felt right. She spent the night. We decided to spend the weekend together.

At one point she said she couldn’t lose me now because she didn’t have me. I said wrong on both counts. You do have me. And I can feel from the way you hold me I have you too. We are together, it’s just that we know we’re breaking up again on Monday.

But Monday came and neither of us wanted to break up again. We talked a lot. We were still scared, not sure if we could fix everything that was broken the first time around. But we both wanted to try. And somehow it felt like we actually had a fighting chance. 

I was there. She was there with me. We’d be all right.

There’s one more thing I want to share with you. It’s a collection of veteran cars you can’t believe still run. Some of them are really cool! Enjoy!