Donnerstag, 22. Oktober 2015

Salama Madagascar

“Again I am looking out of this window, a small, round and double glassed window with a small dot in the middle at the bottom. Somehow it is always a little foggy. This small window gives you a view trough the wide world, even if it’s so small you can the wideness better than trough any other window. My eyes are touching the white powderpillows of the sky every time filled with other emotions, this time with a smile.
Again, I leave thousands of kilometer behind be, flying over the wide dessert of this world, the endless deep oft he ocean and shimmering mountains.”

It pushed me far away from home to the incredible landscape of Madagascar. An island so different and special it could be count as a different continent. I missed living in the forest surrounded by nature and living under basic circumstances enjoying sun and be outside all the time. So I choosed it again, the dry forest close to the west cost of Madagascar. I am doing my practice semester of university here, working with three different species of chameleons. The project compares the three species in considering ecologically impact and demographic structure. Somehow the life here is familiar to me but there is a big difference to Costa Rica, staring by basic things like dry forest and French.

After arriving in Antananarivo I spend like 2 days there, but from my perspective its not really worthies to be there longer...
So I drove 13 hours by bus, crossing the highlands of Madagascar to get to the small town on the west cost called Morondava. Looking out of the window a sad feeling appeared inside of me. This highlands used to be covered by forest – 90% of the former existing forest is burned down. Now it is just a plain grass landscape, dry, brown, sometimes burned down and covered by black ash. Sometimes a small rice plantation gives your eye a green refreshment





I live now in the Kirindy Forest, one of the few still existing dry forests here. It’s a field station again, living on small platforms, limited with power, no signal and no access to infrastructure. This means headlamp should always be carried with you, find things you do when you are bored, no running water, more animals than people and protects your stuff from curious insects.
I am already quite used to this lifestyle thanks to the experience in Costa Rica.
So lets see what this place provides to discover, what will I see and learn here and what will I keep for good...

Veloma e a bientôt