The middle of the week and the trip

Last night, as I was about the send the blog, Llewellyn came past my squat in the passage and invited me to join him for dinner in the restaurant downstairs. I started to refuse but then thought "to hell with it" these trips get very lonely for me and it would be nice to chat to someone. He travels a lot and has been to the same places as me and more. At one stage I was hard pressed not to cry with laughter. I asked him what he did to amuse himself when he was away and he replied in a very deadpan voice "Well, I drink really heavily". I could not help myself, it was the last thing I expected to hear and I just burst out laughing. He was actually being serious and has been trying to give up drinking but fortunately he did see how I could find that funny and we had a good laugh about it together. It was an enjoyable evening and I was back in my room by 9:30pm. After being so tired earlier, for some strange reason, I was suddenly wide awake and stayed that way until 01:30 in the morning. I spent the time reading but got more and more frustrated with myself knowing that once again this morning I would struggle to stay awake. Eventually, however, the toilet gave up its mission to be a fountain and I managed to fall asleep in the quiet.

This morning the workshop participants only started arriving after the 9am scheduled start and there seems to be a be of reluctance of some to work. Everyone had just settled down though when we were rudely interrupted by loud banging from the floor above. Turns out this is another toilet story - the toilet above the meeting room is broken and has to be fixed today. It sounded like they were demolishing the place. The hotel management moved us from our room to the one next door. This was a minor improvement but a further waste of time. I had to get a bit tough with everyone (not my favourite activity) but it was necessary to get everyone going again.

We wrapped up at 12:30 for lunch and then everyone went off to do whatever it was they needed the afternoon off for. Tantely took me sight-seeing. It was really strange to have the afternoon off knowing that the work wasn't finished but in the end I had a blast.

First off we went to the Palace or Rovo (?) as it is called here. I was very glad that Tantely was with me as it is an isolated placed with a few riff raffs hanging about. Even Tantely was concerned and made sure that my camera's strap was firmly around my wrist so that it could not be grabbed from me. We had two suspicious characters offer to guide us around and I let Tantely decide on this. He thought they were okay so we agreed. They actually turned out to be really good and it was a very informative session. The Palace was under renovation because of the fire that destroyed most of it in 1995 but due to the current political situation there is no money available and the renovations have come to a standstill.It is a pity because it really is a beautiful place. Below are some of the photos from the palace.

From the Palace we went to the zoo. It was actually very nice. Most of the animals were indigenous which was good to see. For part of the time there we had the Curator as our guide. He is a friend of Tantely and was happy to take us around the lemur section and tell us a few stories about the animals and their collection from the wild. I was astounded to learn that Madagascar has 100 species of lemurs! The zoo has 80 species in its gardens which is also quite phenomenal. Here are some of the zoo's inhabitants.

Our driver had to leave us because the Ministry's car was needed elsewhere so we had to take a taxi back to the hotel. This was a tiny ancient little Renault that is the standard car for taxis here. They are so cute! I will try and take a photo of one for tomorrow because they really give the feeling of being in a world that is out of step with everywhere else.

All in all it turned out to be a fun day and a nice reprieve from sitting in a meeting room. That's it. Take care everyone!