No sleep

[8/7/07 NOSY KOMBA --- Dear Monies/Mock, I tried everything – falling asleep with my index fingers in my ears, smashing pillows on both sides of my face, breathing exercises to distract my mind – but when there is a bombastic Malagasy “sallegy” concert going on 100 feet from your thatched bungalow, there is really nothing you can do to sleep. I joined the party until about 1 a.m., but since my boat left early in the morning, I thought I would try to sleep at least a little. But Fandrana, the band, and its constant banging bass drum and asinine accordion riffs definitely won the slumber standoff, rattling my chest and making my ears scream high pitches until 6:23 a.m. (yes, I wrote it down). I think the band is kind of like the American or Euro version of techno, or it fills the same role. The chords and patterns repeat over and over. They pick up and drop off, but never go away, so you can dance until dawn. The dance that goes with sallegy appears to be inspired by the America’s own ass-shaking wonder, Beyonce. Endless booty shaking. Can’t get enough. For much of the night, the part where I wasn’t on the verge of lunacy, I wondered what the finale would be. Fade out? Big bang? Screams? What time? (not dawn, please God, not dawn). I never would have guessed a rapid-fire accordion solo of “Frere Jacques,” but that is what is so great about Madagascar. You never know what to expect. Hope you guys are doing well. Tell Hunter hello. – SUTTER]

No lemurs

[8/6/07 NOSY KOMBA (LEMUR flipping ISLAND) --- Dear Molly, I am the only person in the world who can go to a place called “lemur island,” hike around for 6 hours, spend the night, and not see one damn endangered primate. Apparently the lemurs know that all the banana-toting tourists show up between 9 a.m. and noon. At noon, they vanish into an underground lemur lair, not to emerge until the next morning, unless bananas are spotted. And while they’re hiding out, I’m traipsing all around the island with my eyes pointed up to the trees, hoping to see one, and tripping because I’m not looking at the path. I’m sure they watched on their digital surveillance system and laughed their lemur asses off. – John]

Shoes are for the weak-footed; that's me

[8/6/07 NOSY KOMBA --- Dear Christian, “Slippery, eh? Very careful, John.” That’s Gedeon, a 21-year-old Malagasy dude I met on the boat to this island and then climbed over its mountain with. He called out to me on our path down a steep slope of wet rocks. He then proceeded to skip down the trail with the grace of a gazelle. No need to heed his own advice, even in sandals without backs on them. I klunked my way down one cautious foot at a time. When we reached the base of the mountain, we had to climb across a rocky coastline to find the island’s main city, where we had started our journey about six hours earlier. It was all I could do to keep from rolling an ankle, but I saw several Malagasy people traversing the jagged terrain barefoot. Gedeon said it would be a pain to carry his sandals in his hands, otherwise he would be doing the same shoe-free waltz of death. (And this is coming me, a guy who hates shoes). Oh, and I almost forgot: on the way up the mountain, some of the inclines were so steep that a person with a large nose would be in a good position to smell the ground in front of him (or her), while walking. I saw a woman trudging up to her village, on the mountainside, with a bucket of laundry balanced on her head and no shoes on her feet. Boy do we clumsy Americans have things easy. This is a place of very impressive balance. ---SUTTER]

Rooster, party of one

[8/6/07 NOSY KOMBA (LEMUR ISLAND) --- Dear Dad, I just took a boat with 29 people, two ice coolers and one rooster across a turquoise bay to an island called Nosy Komba, or Lemur Island. The rooster was, surprisingly enough, a good passenger. Maybe that had something to do with the fact that his feet were tied together with twine. When a man picked the rooster up by his feet, to take him out of the boat, the rooster craned his neck all around to see what the hell was going on. The boat was the same shape as a pirogue canoe, but was fiberglass and had a 15-horsepower motor on the back. Still not as cool as the 1960s olive green boat we used to take to Lake Arcadia. Love, John]