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Pyrate, pyrate, burning bright

Is it any wonder some memories are a bit hazy?

 

During the summer, we attended a party at the house of my good friends who are generally known as the Weasels, for reasons too tedious to go into here.¹ Parties at their house invariably involve fire, mediaeval weaponry, and a muchness of alcohol. During the evening, someone (I can’t for the life of me remember whom) strongly recommended that I read the Tim Powers book On Stranger Tides, upon which the latest Pirates of the Caribbean movie had been loosely (very loosely!) based.

The next day, when the hangover had dissipated, the burns soothed, and the photos of Mr Weasel with his beard aflame duly uploaded and laughed at, I vaguely remembered this book’s title and downloaded the sample to my Kindle. Later that summer, sitting on a dhow in the Mozambique Channel, I began reading.

Now, it may be that there are better places to read a book about pirates and voodoo than on tropical beaches and boat-decks above coral reefs whilst drinking copious quantities of rum, but personally I can’t come up with a better one. Certainly, I consider this to be the best book I read in 2011, and have since re-read it in dreary old Blighty, and still hold this opinion. It has all the good bits of the POTC films without any of the naff bits. Or mermaids. There’s a wonderful blending of the natural with the supernatural, and the fact with the fiction. Many of the characters genuinely existed, and, on searching Wikipedia at a later date like the sad little nerd I am, I realised that several of the events referenced in the novel actually happened (although probably without the supernatural voodoo explanation offered by the author).

Whilst doing my internetty-research, I kept finding reference to A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates, so eventually I tracked down an electronic copy here. It is very clear that Mr Powers used it heavily as his source material for the above novel, and it’s fascinating reading. Admittedly, the veracity is dubious – the author’s true identity unknown and writing for a public who loved sensation more than truth, but there are certainly many facts in there. What I found most intriguing was that Madagascar was on the Pirate Round, and that many of Captain Every/Avery's associates had settled there and still have descendants alive on the island today. Even those pirates who didn't settle would frequently visit the island in order to replenish stocks and careen their vessels.

Having learnt this, I resolved to read Robinson Crusoe (Daniel Defoe is popularly thought to have been the author of A General History of the Pyrates, although nothing has ever been proven), and The Diary of Robert Drury - an account (also believed to have been written by Defoe) of a shipwrecked sailor who washed up on the shores of Madagascar, and was kept as a slave for ten years, before finally escaping and returning to England. The latter was long thought to be a complete fiction, based on the fantastical nature of the tale, until recently the wreck of the ship was discovered and archaeological evidence shown to prove that there was indeed a Malagasy settlement exactly as described in the tale.

Yarr!

Then I accidentally discovered the Game of Thrones novels and have become distracted by trashy Swords-and-Sorcery. But mostly swords. But I’ll let you know how the pirates got on when I get back to my educational and improving reading. 

1 I often think that there ought to be a less patriarchal collective noun for their household, since the “Weasel” derives from Iain’s nickname, and might be thought to exclude Bryony who is a person in her own right and not at all a possession of Iain’s. But nicknames are an organic thing, and “Weasels” seems to have stuck.

And then I drifted of down the road to Mombasa

I don’t have any grandparents of my own. I lost all mine relatively¹ early on, due to various smoking-related diseases, or dementia, or other such carelessnesses on my part. I don’t have many other elderly relations either, other than a Great Aunt who is utterly fabby and entirely unlike the Great Aunt in the Swallows and Amazons books. This means I have an inclination to adopt elderly people in place of my absent grandparents, provided they are sane and reasonably non-flatulent. Ideally I’d like to have Dame Judi Dench as a grandparent, but until I find her forlornly by the side of the road looking for an adoptive grand-daughter to rescue her, I have Tim’s grandfather.

Tim’s grandfather is fantastic. He’s approaching ninety-seven, but still has all his marbles, plus several extra he won in a round of Bridge. Given people in my family seem to start losing it at around fifty², I find this rather wonderful.

Grandpa, winning at cards. Again.

Grandpa is still as sharp as a razor, can play whist all evening and win outright, and on the way home can list who played which card in which order for every hand throughout the night. Me, I daren’t play against him – one of Tim’s aunts is invariably in disgrace for making the “wrong” call, and I doubt I’d play to an acceptable standard either.

But the best thing about him is his stories – by the time one gets to nearly-ninety-seven, there’s very little that one hasn’t done or seen. Grandpa has served in the army, and is proud of the fact that he shot a German after the war was officially declared “over” (“Well, I told him if he went on burning those documents I’d shoot him, and he went on burning them, so I shot ‘im!”). He tells stories of attending a court-martial (not his own) in Antananarivo (“No, not many lemurs there, but we were only there for a day.”)

There's the saga of trying to get a column of supply trucks across an African desert, double-declutching all the way, and smoking the leaves confiscated from the local drivers en route (“They said it was marijuana but it didn't really do anything – quite a disappointment!”). He avoided trouble when he overslept after an epic gin session only to find that the unit had moved on without him (““What time is it?” I asked. “Oh, about eleven in the morning” said my medic friend. “Eleven! And we're due to move out today! We'd better get a move on!” “Oh, the unit left yesterday. We tried to wake you, but couldn't. Don't worry though – I told everybody you had malaria.””). I think the court-martial he did receive was for cannibalizing some of the more decrepit trucks for parts to fix the others, and consequently arriving with fewer trucks than ordered (“Well, I pointed out that at least I had arrived! They let me off in the end...”)

After the war was over, he worked for the company which installed the elevators at Buckingham Palace (“We had to design corgi-guards for the elevator doors. That was a challenge”), got used to working with the royal family wandering by (“The Queen Mum was lovely. Very gracious. And drunk as you like by midday!”), got threatened with prison by Black Rod (“Well, you see, a question had been asked in Parliament about when the lifts would be finished, and they said “three months”. So they said to me “you will finish the lifts in three months”. And I said “We can't – the parts are on order and won't be manufactured for another six months!” And that Black Rod, he said to me “Parliament has said you will install them in three months. Are you aware that if you don't do it in three months that will count as Contempt of Parliament, and you can go to jail?”)

The thing is, Grandpa's stories are fascinating (and a lot more audience-friendly than the tales my own Granddad would tell me,³) but we've heard them all many times before. It just takes the phrase “And another time on the road to Mombasa....” and we all zone out. Whenever someone new visits, Grandpa delightedly begins recounting narratives to a new audience who listen with amazement. At that point, I start to think “Actually, these are quite impressive, aren't they?”, and wonder whether anyone ought to be writing them down for posterity. But I wouldn't have a clue where to start.

Still, I'm sure there's plenty of time. Grandpa's currently making plans for his 100^th birthday – I think we're all having a huge family shindig in Rhodes!

Winner!

 

1 See what I did there? “Relatively”, when talking about relation- Oh, never mind.

2 With the exception of my fabby Great Aunt mentioned above.

3 My granddad, of whom I was very fond, was an ambulance driver on duty in Benfleet on the night of the 31^st January 1953, and therefore was called out to Canvey Island. It clearly affected him, and I think he still suffered post-traumatic stress about the incident. He would tell tales of breaking off the rooftops of houses to find drowned corpses huddled in the attic, where they had scrambled higher to escape the rising sea and then become trapped in the icy water. Or the miracle baby, whose entire family had perished in their sleep, but the crib had floated and the baby was saved. That last one sounds suspiciously like an urban (or possibly rural) legend to me, but Granddad always swore it was one of his friends who found the baby.

 

Day Fourteen – The End of the Tale

And that, as they say, is that. It chucked it down with rain the night we got back from Lokobe Reserve. 

The global HQ for Air Madagascar

 The next day we got up early and headed to Tana. We followed the repeated exhortations from the guide books, our guides, and the hotel staff, and prepared to look around the town. As per advice, we locked SD cards and valuables in the hotel safe, hid spending money across a variety of pockets, and made sure we had a sacrificial wallet containing a feasible but not excessive amount of money to give up if we were mugged. Having considered all these aspects, we walked into the main street unacompanied by guides for the first time in our holiday. We felt very conspicuous and very white. Being vaguely surrounded by beggars and people trying to sell us three-foot-long carved wooden galleons (unfortunately I didn't know the Malagasy for "Are you mad? That will never fit in my suitcase!"), we moved through the throng. We had a brief look around the town centre which was a bit like Basildon but hotter, saw possible signs of the political situation (a lorry-load of youths distributing bread to some people, and causing consternation and panic amongst others), drank a lot of rum in the Cafe du Gare, spent another night in Tana Plaza, and headed back to the UK the next day. There was a while when we thought our holiday would involve an unscheduled day in Nairobi, but they held our connecting flight so that we were able to make it despite an eight-hour delay (Many thanks to the Dutch cycle tourists who translated airport announcments and found us free food in the interim). Sadly our luggage didn't get that flight, but it showed up eventually, smelling of vanilla and lemur pee. Much love to Auntie C for collecting us from the airport despite a stinking cold, but she was thankful not to be able to smell us at that point.

In summary, Madagascar is a lovely country, two weeks is not enough time to spend there, and I'm determined to go back.

Day Twelve – Now for some luxury

In order for Mark and Liz to make it to the airport on time, we had to get up obscenely early. We motored into Hell-Ville in the dawn light, accompanied by a pod of three dolphins – or porpoises. That was the end of our time on the Salaama Tsara, and we said our farewells. 

Hell-ville harbour

More harbour

 We were met by our next guide, who took us to our hotel, a somewhat lavish affair. Although the room was not large, after a week of washing with brackish cold water we both spent some time gazing at the eight-nozzled shower with awe.

Having showered, we explored the hotel, accidentally wandered through someone's luxury apartment (we thought it was the restaurant!), and sat on the beach watching two people take a zebu for a bath.

Zebu. Bathing. Obviously.

More clichéd sunsets

Day Thirteen - Strictly Lokobe

 Having not been permitted to explore Lokobe when we were camping on the edge of it (it is classed as a “Strict Reserve”, which is not quite a national park, but similar), we booked a day-trip back there. We were told sternly that we would need to wear trousers and boots, so it was quite a contrast when we were introduced to our guide, Michaela, a young woman in a sequinned kaftan and flip-flops.

As our driver, Jean, drove us out of the hotel (in a car with a cracked windscreen), he halted before we got to the road. “What's wrong?” we asked, wondering if the car was broken.

“Chameleon” he answered, pointing at the hedge.

“Where?” we asked. “ I can't see anything other than that bright turquoise bit of- Oh, right.”

They weren't subtle.

We were driven through Hell-Ville, past the large cemetery with goats perched on the tombstones (sadly, I felt obliged to respect the fady prohibiting photography of tombs), through ylang-ylang plantations, and to the village of Ambatozavary. 

Ylang-ylang tree. They were all grotesquely stunted, but more sad than horrific.

Ylang-ylang blossoms

Ambatozavary (and pirogues)

 There, we boarded a leaking pirogue, were handed a paddle each, and we set off around the coast. Michaela hitched up her kaftan, sighed, and concentrated on bailing. She said she much preferred taking people on trips to Komba.

Traditional kayaker's photo (with paddle across face)

After about forty-five minutes, we landed in Ampasipohy, a small and rather charming little village. I think it is what Komba would have been like ten years ago. Yes, there were children singing and souvenir stalls, but far less blatantly than on Nosy Komba. 

 From Ampasipohy, we walked into the forest, having been warned to keep quiet so's not to disturb the wildlife. Thus it was that when we saw a maki, we said in hushed tones “Look, a lemur!”, at which point Michaela rolled her eyes and yelled “MAKI MAKI MAKI!” until the lemur wandered over to see if we had a banana.

Oooh, yeah!

Grey-backed sportive lemur. Nocturnal, hence the large eyes and peevish expression.

Boa. Sitting in a tree so close to the path we suspected it was planted by the guides.

Mantella frog (that's a thumb bottom left, stopping her hopping away. She's tiny!)

Vanilla flower

Spider. Seriously. Even the guides had to look twice when Tim pointed it out.

Crab spider (sorry for the focus - the web was moving in the wind)

Gecko licking nectar off banana flower

A walk which entailed much wildlife later, plus a translation confusion over the use of the Quinine tree (apparently Italians, who comprised the rest of the tour group, consider it to be “medicinal” as opposed to “with gin”), we headed back to the beach. 

Pirogues

Gift shop

Lokobe

There, we were served vast amounts of sea food and rum, and the Italians insisted on presenting a group of happily-minding-their-own-business local toddlers with colouring pencils, thus teaching them the art of begging from vahaza. 

 

Day Nine – The Nightlife of Mahalina

 The next day was a relatively gentle day – not that we'd had much exertion since joining the Salaama Tsara. Denis and Henri took Tim, Mark, Liz and me for a morning snorkelling trip where we found lobsters (which we were unable to bring back for lunch, despite Henri's exhortions) and Tim found a stingray, but otherwise the reef there was fairly quiet. On the way back to Mahalina, there was a vast amount of fishing excitement as Henri hooked a Kingfish which took over forty minutes to land.

Denis with Kingfish

 Mark and Tim were excited because this was EPIC fishing, and in the absence of Herman they got to have a go at steering the boat. The main reason for my excitement was because this would be something other than mackerel to eat (much as I love fresh fish, after three days of it, mackerel can become monotonous). It was only when I googled it later that day (yay for 3G Kindles!) that I discovered that the Kingfish is also a member of the mackerel family. Oh well!

Kingfisher hunting crabs

Back on the beach in Mahalina we sat around playing cribbage, drinking rum, and chatting. “Did anyone else see the snake spoor?” asked Gayle, whose hut was next to some scrubland.

“Snake spoor? I wouldn't have a clue what it looks like, but there's no reason to worry – there are no venomous snakes in Madagascar,” I replied.

The chatting continued, we drank rum, watched the moon rise, looked at the Milky Way, spotted fireflies, and Mark decided the only thing missing from his life was a cigarette. He'd noticed the crew smoking in the evening, so wandered over to ask if he could have a cigarette too.

“Hi guys, I was wondering about those cigarettes-”

“IT'S NOT MARUJANA!!!” *giggle*

Eventually, we headed for bed. In the middle of the night I woke up with a funny feeling in my foot as if someone had just tickled it. “Must have been a dream caused by the rum and the talk about snakes” I thought, before experiencing it again. I grabbed the torch just in time to see a small rat run away from me, but fail to escape due to the mosquito netting.

“Tim! Wake up! There's a rat somewhere in the bed and I need you to help evict it!”

Tim blearily gave the bed a search, and the rat was chased round and round inside the mosquito net in circles until we lost track of it. “I think it's gone” declared Tim, putting out his torch and going back to sleep. I spent the rest of the night in a somewhat wakeful state, turning the torch back on at every noise.

Moonrise from Mahalina

Day Eight – onwards to Mahalina

 We relocated to a place called Mahalina. On arrival, just as there had been at Russian Bay, we noticed a gaggle of people sat around under a washing line strung with embroidered tablecloths and proffering carved wooden souvenirs. This, we were to learn, was the way the gift-shops operated. Either the boat-operator or the camp caretaker would inform the local trader(s) that a bunch of vahaza were due to arrive, and a dhow would drop them off in advance, they would set up their wares, and then leave later that day. It was relatively civilised – there was no pestering or harassment, and if one wanted to purchase a souvenir one walked over to the washing line, and if one didn't, one remained in the campsite and wondered why a tropical beach paradise had a tradition of making elaborately embroidered tablecloths.

Mahalina was a strip of beach on the edge of a mangrove swamp, and not much else. Fresh water was extremely scarce, and we were warned to be prudent when washing with our rationed bucket of “fresh”¹ water. Again we had A-frame bungalows with tattered mosquito nets as accommodation, but this time they were on the beach, not on stilts.

Accommodation and shower (the bamboo screens back left, plus the bucket)

The afternoon was spent collecting “pretty” shells and sand dollars from the beach, and watching the world go by from our table. The caretaker had a small (about three years old) child named Ali, and Ali had a puppy (named Bobo) and a kitten (named Cat). The three of them together were quite hilarious, since the kitten thought it was a puppy, the puppy was convinced that it could climb like a cat, and Ali thought that they were toys to be dragged around by whichever appendage he could grab. We noticed that in this place, the sacred rock (identifiable by the red cloth tied to it) was fenced off – probably to stop Bobo breaking the “toilet” fady. 

Ali, Bobo and Cat

 

My notes become a little hazy at this point, but I think it was on this evening which the rum-for-tourists ran out (in terms of the bar, rum was free and we were charged for the mixer) and we moved on to drinking the rum-for-the-crew. At least, we think it was rum, but it might equally have been engine-degreaser. Denis seemed amazed when we said we liked it, though I do recall my vision going sporadically black at points.

The sunsets were terribly cliched

1The water was brown and murky and the bottom of the bucket couldn't be seen. The only thing “fresh” about it was that it wasn't salty.

Day Seven – How to respect the Sacred Tree

The next day dawned exceedingly bright and very early, but we found we didn't mind. Since we had no electric lights other than a couple of torches, we all happily adapted to a sunrise-to-sunset clock – and when the sun rose at about five-thirty, by six o'clock it was far too bright and hot to stay in bed for long. 

We breakfasted on fresh fruit and black coffee, consoled Mark for his murderous sentiments towards the chickens adjacent to his hut, and then it was all aboard the Salaama Tsara for a morning of snorkelling on the coast of South Afrika Island. I found a stingray (happily some distance from me), Mark found pretty shells on the beach, and Tim stayed in the water so long that we began to wonder if he'd ever return. As we chugged back towards Russian Bay, we passed a peculiar beehive-shaped island named Ankivonjy, and watched flocks of beautiful white birds with long tails flying around the cliffs.

“What are those called, Henri? The white-tailed birds”

“Them? Called “white-tailed tropicbird””.

Yup. So much for imaginative naming.

Boatlife

After lunch back in Russian Bay, Henri took us for a stroll through the nearby village and up the hill. The first thing he showed us was a large tree with a set of logs (for use as seating) arrayed around it. This, Henri explained, was the village's sacred tree. When a boon was required, one would come and tie a white cloth and a red cloth to the tree, leave a case of beer, offer rum, and later one would return (presumably after fulfilment of the boon) and pour the beer on the ground with elaborate ritual. We listened in interest, and then, aware that the Malagasy have many fady (taboos) relating to their spiritual beliefs (such as not pointing at tombs, or photographing them), we asked whether it was permitted to photograph the tree, and walk as close to it as we were.

“But of course,” replied Henri, looking bemused.

“Well, we just don't want to offend anyone, so please tell us if we're about to do anything inappropriate, since this sacred tree is right next to our campsite. Is there anything we must be careful not to do?”

Henri thought for a few seconds, before responding solemnly “Just don' mak' the toilet on it, OK?”

Following that revelation, the rest of the walk with burrowing crabs, a fish sunbathing in a mangrove tree (mudskippers seem terribly confused creatures), a sea eagle, and a plethora of children making rude noises and laughing at the vahaza had a lot to live up to. 

Mudskipper. In a mangrove tree.

 But it managed it, with the addition of further rum and fireflies on the beach near the sacred tree when we got back to camp.

Day Eleven – Nosy Komba (please exit through the gift shop)

Souvenir stall in Lokobe - note the tablecloths

The island of Nosy Komba is for the tourists. It's where you go to have a lemur sit on you, and to buy embroidered tablecloths. Some aspects are interesting, such as the people wearing designer jeans coupled with the traditional Malagasy clay face-paint (the clay acts as a moisturiser and a sun screen, as well as allowing intricate doodles on the face). Others are annoying, such as the children all attempting to out-volume each other in their “traditional” (allegedly invented in the last twenty years) greeting songs. But we went to the petting zoo and played with the snakes and chameleons, fed the Maki lemurs (who have great banana faces), bought some vanilla, and admired the T-shirts for sale emblazoned with the traditional Malagasy “ALOHA!”.

St Mark of Assisi

Liz, discovering that lemurs tickle

Tim of the Jungle

Communing with nature

Srs 'nana face

Silly 'nana face!

This giant tortoise sneaked up on Mark and startled him. I think that's a record for giant tortoises.

We returned to Lokobe via a fairly dull snorkelling expedition and settled down to enjoy our last night with the boat. I left a banana near the tents in the hope of luring more lemurs down, and we were not disappointed.

Is that a banana?

Tastes like a banana...

OMG! It *is* a banana!

Woo! BANANA!

I also discovered that when one goes to the toilet at dusk and spots something brown and glistening perched on the seat, it's quite a relief to realise that it's a frog. 

Sorry for the lack of focus - oddly enough I didn't have the right lens to hand