Hotel Coco Lodge Mahajanga

... got no choice Me and you are subject to The blues now and then But when you take the blues And make a song You sing 'em out again Song sung blue, weeping like a willow Song sung blue, sleeping on my pillow Funny thing, But you can sing it with a cry in your voice And before you know it start to feeling good You simply got no choice Song sung blue Song sung blue Funny thing, But you can sing it with a cry in your voice

... first place we went to was a mostly vaza (white person) joint with a loud jazzy type band and really swanky furniture. After a shot of homemade pineapple rum (yum!) we headed out to a dance club with some guys that Rose had met in tow. Once they had served their purpose as a free ride (not to sound cruel, but they were sketchy), we ditched them in the club and proceeded to have a blast dancing to crazy loud techno and Malagasy music. It was at this ...

... of the students below in their dim, sweaty classes, and the occasional rise of my dad's voice as he pointed out a meaning of a certain Hebrew word in the Bible in Malagasy. There was never absolute silence, for Madagascar is a living land, but there was space, immensity, and the exaggeration of one sound or movement. If a chicken pecked at the dirt, squawking once for its fellows resting somewhere under the guard's houses, the sky and the space and the sunlight seemed to ...