Life as a volunteer teacher is not all school!
Theresa Haine recalls magical memories out and about in Madagascar
The new British Ambassador and his wife, who arrived in Madagascar shortly after I did, were both musicians. He was an excellent clarinettist and she a superb pianist and also a composer. I played the flute and was invited to join them for dinner and music on Saturday evenings when I was in the capital.
I feel honoured to have played music with them on and off for four years. They were wonderful people and even had me stay with them when I came out of hospital after a bout of hepatitis. I spent many hours of recuperation listening to Mervyn practising Brahms sonatas on his clarinet, with Beth accompanying him on the piano.
We also went on a memorable trip to the annual cattle fair at Tsiroanomandidy – three of us and the uniformed chauffeur in the ambassadorial landrover with the Union Jack flying proudly on the bonnet. Mervyn saw a small road on the map that ran parallel to the main road and decided that it looked interesting. It was, until we came to a very narrow part with high banks on either side and a little black pig appeared from nowhere and ran in front of us at about 3mph for a very long way! Finally the pig disappeared. We came to a river with no bridge and nowhere to turn round so the poor chauffeur had to reverse the landrover for what seemed miles. We eventually arrived in Tsiroanomandidy where the Ambassador and his wife were housed in the best hotel in town which provided them with neither towels nor toilet paper! Luckily the Quaker volunteer working there managed to supply them with those necessities and after the visit we returned, adventure-free, to the capital via the main road.
One Independence Day, I went with some of the older pupils to visit the the birthplace of one of the wives of a famous 18th century king of Madagascar. After a trek across the ricefields we arrived at a small hill with a path spiralling upwards to seven gateways at intervals with huge stones, like that of Christ’s tomb, ready to be rolled into place to close each one and thus make the hill into a veritable fortress. At the top there were wild chilli plants growing everywhere. My pupils picked and ate them with apparent enjoyment so I did the same. Aaargh! They burned my mouth and my face turned bright scarlet. My pupils fell about laughing. I soon joined in the laughter but that was the first and last time that I are raw chillies!