Let's go to the beach, beach

[Lyric from "Starships" by Nicki Minaj-- which is a silly song to be quoting, but it's a favorite among the Sud Est volunteers, so it's very evocative of Peace Corps for me!]

I remember it distinctly, the day during training when we found out where we’d be serving as Peace Corps volunteers: our trainers put blindfolds on us then walked us to the basketball court at the PCTC, where a map of Madgascar had been painted, in order to place us on the map, literally, where we’d be serving. I remember whipping off the blindfold, looking down at where my feet had been placed, and exclaiming “I’m going to the beach!” Being close to the ocean wasn’t something that had been on the top of my priority list for site placement, but when it became my reality, I couldn’t deny my happiness. (Ironically, I had originally wanted to be close to either Tana or Fianar, and had specifically not wanted to be in the Sud Est, but it’s funny how much I now love being here, and do not like the Tana/Fianar regions!) A couple of our trainers that week were Sud Est volunteers, and they both told me how awesome my town was, and that it was about 10km from the ocean. And so ever since I got to site, I had wanted to find out exactly how to get there from my house. Sure, I go to the beach all the time when I’m in Farafangana or Manakara, but with the Indian Ocean so temptingly close to my actual home, I was dying to explore how to get there. My friend Matt was in Vangaindrano a couple weeks ago helping me with my painting project, and when I suggested we take the afternoon off from painting in order to go explore how to get to the ocean, he was game.

To get to the Indian Ocean from Vangaindrano, you essentially just follow the Mananara River, which forms the northern border of my town, all the way as it winds its way eastward and spills out into the ocean. So we set off in the direction of the river and followed alongside it as best we could. At first this took us on what was little more than a cow path, but soon it opened up and became an actual road. We kept riding east as the river hugged the tanam-bary, crossing rickety wooden bridges and traversing rock-studded roads. As we went we’d keep asking people “aiza ny ranomasina?” (where is the ocean?), and they’d keep pointing us in the right direction. After about 45 minutes of biking the road began to close up, lushly vegetated on either side by thick clusters of banana trees. And soon after that, I cried out “I see the horizon!”

The road spills into the small village of Ampatsinakoho, dead-ending at the small ravinala huts that fringe the shore. Crowds of small children encircled us and our bikes as we introduced ourselves and asked the name of the town where we were. And then I looked past the huts and saw it: the Indian Ocean, at last. Even though I’d seen it multiple times already, this felt like my beach, in my town, and so it took on an even more special meaning. The beach was crowned with rows up rows of wooden lakanas (canoes) used for fishing, and we had the good fortune to be able to watch a craftsman working on carving a new lakana out of a tree. In order to get in a bit of swimming we hopped back on our bikes and headed south along the shore, biking on top of a grassy knoll that framed the sandy beach below. After a quick jump in the water to cool off after an hour-long bike ride, jumping around in the now-familiar massive Indian Ocean waves, Matt and I sat on a dessicated tree to soak up the absolute peacefulness that this beautiful, deserted spot offered us. I sat and watched the horizon line off in the distance, trying to figure out why there were waves breaking so far off shore. I finally wondered out loud, and then to our astonishment, we realized that what we were looking at was not waves: we were seeing humpback whales, cresting out of the ocean and landing back in the water with a splash to rival the biggest wave out there.

We sat there for a little while longer as I tried to absorb everything around me. I luxuriated in the calm satisfaction of finally reaching my goal of finding the beach from my town, and in the magnificent reward the journey brought me. And I reflected gleefully, with an innate sense of wonder, just how lucky I am to live here. I don’t think it will ever get old.