Year: 2020
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A Few Words About My Father
At times like this, weird things come into your head. Like how I’ve never heard my Dad sleep for so many hours without snoring. Or how all life is sacred, and with the exception of mosquitoes, any animal in my house has to be trapped in a cup and released outside. Mom is telling me…
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The Sky is NOT Always Blue in California
People in California’s Bay Area awoke this morning thinking, “I must have a few hours left to sleep” because the sky was so dark. A dingy sky carrying smoke and ash from the fires plaguing the state obscured the sun and cast an eerie pall over our neighborhood. There was no odor of smoke in…
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“Artisans” documentary series – final (?) episode
Some of you may have seen my “Artisan” series of mini-documentaries. The plan was to highlight different occupations in Madagascar’s informal sector that involve a specialized skill. Jobs that don’t really exist in the West, with detail that may even surprise some people in Madagascar. I didn’t expect the project to take over two years!…
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Every Day is a Surprise. Also, People are A$$h0Le5. (part 2)
And so, my motorcycle was repaired, and I planned for the next day to be completely uneventful – one of those days where you catch up on tasks that have been piling up. But I was wrong. The morning was pretty routine, and then I went to my place of work, where I saw that…
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Every Day is a Surprise. Also, People are A$$h0Le5.
Life is funny. Some days you wake up and things are – meh – run of the mill, nothing to write home about. Other days you wake up and experience a day you never imagined. I’ve had three traffic accidents in the last month. In the first, I was found at fault – a “tuktuk”…
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When Langtang Vanished
April 25, 2015. I was enjoying an idyllic vacation in Mauritius, swimming with the largest animals in the world. When we returned to the dock, my phone rang: how quickly could I get to Nepal? There had been an awful earthquake, thousands had perished, and many were still missing and/or trapped in the hills and…
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Reunion Island: a Little (Volcanic) Piece of France in the Middle of the Indian Ocean
Living in Madagascar, people would sometimes ask, “Don’t you get island fever?” Of course, this never happened – given that it stretches the distance from New York City to the tip of Florida, it’s more like a small continent than an island. Still, from time to time, it’s nice to visit some of the smaller…
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Onward to Mahajanga, Madagascar
In my previous post I talked about our meticulously planned trip to see all four islands of the Comoros archipelago, which was so rudely interrupted by political violence…and so we shifted to Mahajanga, on the west coast of Madagascar. I’ve blogged about Mahajanga before, and I’ve even made videos similar to what I plan to…
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Mayotte: From Above and Below
During my time in Madagascar, I had the opportunity to visit nearby Mayotte a few times. Never heard of it? It’s and island in the Indian Ocean – part of the Comoros Archipelago, claimed by the Comoros as its fourth island but administered by France as its 101st Department. If you want to know more…