Belo-sur-Mer, Madagascar - S Blyth
Belo-sur-Mer and the surrounding communities have a lot to offer residents, tourists and the occasional independent researcher who doesn't entirely fit into the tourist category, such as myself. And after living and working in these communities for nearly three months it seemed important to share some of the experiences that I enjoyed during my time there.
I arrived in Belo in early July to pursue my MSc thesis research on the ecosystem services that mangrove forests provide to neighbouring communities with the help of my research assistant Jean-Luc. My work has involved planning and organizational time in Belo-sur-Mer and visits to the villages of Antanamanimbo and Marofihitsy to determine the contrasting uses of the mangroves by the Vezo and Masikoro people.
Surveying households in the Vezo of Antanamanimbo is a very pleasant experience as the village itself is located on a long sandbar on the seaward side of an mangrove shrouded estuary. This picturesque setting is not only a feast for the eyes, but also allows you to eat big, fresh crabs from the mangrove or fish from the sea on the other side of the village. Most of the people are very happy to spend a few minutes talking about their lives and the relations that they have with the mangroves. Knowing that Jean-Luc and I were students the village president was more than willing to accept us into his community as his children while we were there.
I arrived in Belo in early July to pursue my MSc thesis research on the ecosystem services that mangrove forests provide to neighbouring communities with the help of my research assistant Jean-Luc. My work has involved planning and organizational time in Belo-sur-Mer and visits to the villages of Antanamanimbo and Marofihitsy to determine the contrasting uses of the mangroves by the Vezo and Masikoro people.
Surveying households in the Vezo of Antanamanimbo is a very pleasant experience as the village itself is located on a long sandbar on the seaward side of an mangrove shrouded estuary. This picturesque setting is not only a feast for the eyes, but also allows you to eat big, fresh crabs from the mangrove or fish from the sea on the other side of the village. Most of the people are very happy to spend a few minutes talking about their lives and the relations that they have with the mangroves. Knowing that Jean-Luc and I were students the village president was more than willing to accept us into his community as his children while we were there.
Home in the field, Antanamanimbo - S Blyth
The second village that I worked in was quite a change from the Vezo communities that most volunteers and visitors to the coast spend their time in. Going to Marofihitsy to survey was potentially difficult as past experience with the Masikoro people had shown that many of them are still scared by vazaha. Fortunately, as this village is on the road to Kirindy-Mite National Park and BV has done some work with them in the past the people there were not frightened to participate in my surveys and focus group. The village itself is located a half hour walk from the mangroves and is well separated from the ocean by the Belo-sur-Mer estuary. The people there are not fishers like the Vezo, but they still rely on the mangroves for their existence. In their own words ‘without the mangrove we would all be dead’.
Household surveys, Marofihitsy - S Blyth
On our first night working in Marofihitsy we were able to witness a traditional Masikoro funeral, fortunately not related in any way to a lack of access to the mangrove. Although I wouldn’t recommend searching for dead people just to experience local customs and take part in the celebration of the life of someone whom you have never met, this was an event that was worth being a part of and gave me a few ideas that might I might want to use to liven up my own passing one day.
There is no electricity in Marofihitsy, so you don’t have the throbbing music of the epi-bars of other towns or any lights besides that of cooking fires, the odd lamp or flashlight and the stars. Under these peaceful conditions we could hear chanting, singing and cheering off in the dry forest to the south and in the company of the local MNP agent we followed these sounds to investigate.
A few hundred metres from the village we found the funeral celebration in full swing in a clearing under a large tamarind tree. Around the clearing there were scattered fires and here nearly all of the village’s population was gathered to take part in the event. At the base of the tree there was a zebu cart on which the body of the deceased was shrouded in a mosquito net to keep away the insects. Around the tree and the body a group of dancers sang and stomped as they circled the tree. The song and dance was guided by two men who sang out instructions to the dancers who followed this lead and sang in response. With no speakers or instruments, the only sounds were those of the singers, clapping hands, stomping feet and the background murmur of conversation occurring around the fires.
This went on for some time until one man stood up and started to shout at the crowd and in our general direction. Not having a great understanding of Malagasy I took this to be a bad thing, as it usually isn’t very good to have someone shouting in your direction and under the circumstances I would have understood if I was unwelcome. However, what he was saying had nothing to do with me and when it was translated I was very surprised to learn that he was announcing that a ringa (wrestling) competition was about to occur. Now this is not something that has happened at any of the other funerals I have been present for in my lifetime, not even in Belo-sur-Mer just a few kilometres away. That said, it would add a great deal of excitement to otherwise sombre occasions and could be good opportunity to express life and vitality in the face of death and loss.
After this announcement the atmosphere in the clearing changed instantly. More wood was thrown onto the largest of the fires, flooding the clearing with its glow and warming those close to it. Most of the young women that were dancing or standing around the other fires moved to sit under the tree next to the fire. The rest of the crowd clear the space under the tamarind tree and the women by the fire began to clap and sing.
At first, boys and young men would dash out into the middle of the in ones or twos holding their arms in the air and celebrating like they had just won Olympic medals. Some would smack their blankets against the ground (Masikoro men all carry blankets, usually plaid, with them wherever they go) or mock threaten the women to sing louder whenever the music had dropped off. At one point a group of young men ran across the open space to join the women by the fire and show them how to sing with more energy, much to the entertainment of everyone present.
There is no electricity in Marofihitsy, so you don’t have the throbbing music of the epi-bars of other towns or any lights besides that of cooking fires, the odd lamp or flashlight and the stars. Under these peaceful conditions we could hear chanting, singing and cheering off in the dry forest to the south and in the company of the local MNP agent we followed these sounds to investigate.
A few hundred metres from the village we found the funeral celebration in full swing in a clearing under a large tamarind tree. Around the clearing there were scattered fires and here nearly all of the village’s population was gathered to take part in the event. At the base of the tree there was a zebu cart on which the body of the deceased was shrouded in a mosquito net to keep away the insects. Around the tree and the body a group of dancers sang and stomped as they circled the tree. The song and dance was guided by two men who sang out instructions to the dancers who followed this lead and sang in response. With no speakers or instruments, the only sounds were those of the singers, clapping hands, stomping feet and the background murmur of conversation occurring around the fires.
This went on for some time until one man stood up and started to shout at the crowd and in our general direction. Not having a great understanding of Malagasy I took this to be a bad thing, as it usually isn’t very good to have someone shouting in your direction and under the circumstances I would have understood if I was unwelcome. However, what he was saying had nothing to do with me and when it was translated I was very surprised to learn that he was announcing that a ringa (wrestling) competition was about to occur. Now this is not something that has happened at any of the other funerals I have been present for in my lifetime, not even in Belo-sur-Mer just a few kilometres away. That said, it would add a great deal of excitement to otherwise sombre occasions and could be good opportunity to express life and vitality in the face of death and loss.
After this announcement the atmosphere in the clearing changed instantly. More wood was thrown onto the largest of the fires, flooding the clearing with its glow and warming those close to it. Most of the young women that were dancing or standing around the other fires moved to sit under the tree next to the fire. The rest of the crowd clear the space under the tamarind tree and the women by the fire began to clap and sing.
At first, boys and young men would dash out into the middle of the in ones or twos holding their arms in the air and celebrating like they had just won Olympic medals. Some would smack their blankets against the ground (Masikoro men all carry blankets, usually plaid, with them wherever they go) or mock threaten the women to sing louder whenever the music had dropped off. At one point a group of young men ran across the open space to join the women by the fire and show them how to sing with more energy, much to the entertainment of everyone present.
Masikoro funeral gathering - S Blyth
After this display had carried on for a number of minutes one of the men entering the middle of the clearing wrapped his blanket like a sumo wrestler over his two pairs of brightly coloured shorts (another trademark of the Masikoro men) and removed his shirt. This was the challenge to the other young men that he was ready to fight and within seconds someone of similar size and age was following his lead and wrapping his own blanket around himself, removing bracelets and stepping out from the crowd. The objective of the contest is to flip your opponent over onto his back, relatively similar to any other wrestling other that the fact that this was happening at a funeral in the forest and in the middle of the night. There was no time limit to the fights and many ended before either person was flipped onto their back as one would leap away and disappear back into the crowd if they didn’t think that they would win after a few moments of contest. Some matches between more determined contestants would go on for some minutes and get quite heated, occasionally forcing the crowd to move out of their way and at one point nearly causing the combatants to crash into the zebu cart holding the body. There was also no set order or matching up of contestants. When the clearing was free someone would step out and challenge the crowd and then a person of comparable stature would step out to fight them, whether they were a small boy or young man.
Wrestling - S Blyth
Back in Belo the night life is usually not very exciting, but occasionally a boutry is completed and gives the village excuse for an all-night celebration prior to its launch. Personally I think that this is good reason for celebration, but perhaps not the best of ideas to do so on the night before you plan to pull many tonnes of boat down the beach by hand.
Boutry timbers - S Blyth
The launch itself is quite a spectacle and gives me real respect for any great feat of construction before the use of modern machines, particularly those that involve moving large and heavy objects by manpower alone. To pull the hull of a large boutry down the beach at low tide it takes a team of a few hundred, strong Vezo fishermen, along with anyone else who might be available and not too worn out from the night before to help. For the first launch that I participated in we had about 50 men trying to pull the hull of a small motorized boutry owned by a local hotel. Although not very big there was no way that it was going to move until everyone’s wives and children grabbed on to the lines and pulled as well.
With one nahoda standing in bow calling the pull, the teams grab the cables and everyone strains in time. The first few pulls have no effect and more people are called to move from the audience and join in, squeezing in to find places near to the boutry where they are less likely to have to pull in the mud or water once the boutry moves down the beach. Great excitement and relief come with the first feeling of movement from the massive blue and white painted hull begin to creep forward and somewhat depressing to have to let its bulk stop and to give time for rollers to be moved from stern to bow in order to aid its progress. However, once its motion has been started and the boutry’s steep prow begins to peek out over the slope of the sand you know that the force required to continue its first voyage over dry land is nowhere near as much as it took to start its journey.
With one nahoda standing in bow calling the pull, the teams grab the cables and everyone strains in time. The first few pulls have no effect and more people are called to move from the audience and join in, squeezing in to find places near to the boutry where they are less likely to have to pull in the mud or water once the boutry moves down the beach. Great excitement and relief come with the first feeling of movement from the massive blue and white painted hull begin to creep forward and somewhat depressing to have to let its bulk stop and to give time for rollers to be moved from stern to bow in order to aid its progress. However, once its motion has been started and the boutry’s steep prow begins to peek out over the slope of the sand you know that the force required to continue its first voyage over dry land is nowhere near as much as it took to start its journey.
Launching - S Blyth
When the boutry reaches its destination on the beach, where it will be lifted by the incoming tide, it is tradition for its owner to be dunked in the ocean. Symbolically, if they sink the owner now the boutry will not sink later when it is carrying its cargo of salt, dried fish, cement, lumber, sheet metal, furniture, beer or anything else you can think of up and down the coast.
So, studying the services provided by mangroves in the area of Belo-sur-Mer is not only sinking up to your knees in mangrove mud there are also a great many other things to enjoy. To work here is to be part of a celebration, whether it is the daily enjoyment of watching the lakas return in the sunset, honouring the life of a respected memory of the community or taking part in the birth of a new ship that will take Belo with it by wind and wave up and down the coast.
So, studying the services provided by mangroves in the area of Belo-sur-Mer is not only sinking up to your knees in mangrove mud there are also a great many other things to enjoy. To work here is to be part of a celebration, whether it is the daily enjoyment of watching the lakas return in the sunset, honouring the life of a respected memory of the community or taking part in the birth of a new ship that will take Belo with it by wind and wave up and down the coast.
At then end of the day - S Blyth
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