Having a baby in Madagascar

My partner’s step-sister had her 2nd baby today at Antsiranana hospital It has been interesting to see the similarities and differences between her Madagascar experience and my British one.
Complicated birth
We were all a little nervous leading up to this as she lost a healthy baby last year due to strangulation by the cord [...]

Small town / fish bowl life

Went to Diego airport today to see friends off.
Any visit to the airport means seeing familiar faces and them seeing you.
I realise I’m already getting used to the fact that this is a small town and your life is on show. In London people would know what I was doing because I told them, [...]

Talking to myself – lonely expat behaviour?

I have started talking to myself in public again. The last two weeks have seen a resurgence of this habit, a behaviour I developed in Madagascar in 2006, but had lost during my stay in England.
I didn’t really notice I did it until I returned to England. I found myself doing it in shops [...]

Culture ain’t just about rice

I found this poster in the library in the Department of Anglo-American Studies at the University of Antsiranana.
I love it because not only does it remind us that we are the strange ones but also it shows how cultural difference goes much deeper than whether you eat rice every day or not. When you [...]

Are Malagasys racist?

One reason I chose to live in an ‘exotic’ country is because I enjoy getting to know people from different cultures. But I’ve found a society so obsessed with race and ethnicity that I often long for the interracial mixing of Britain (and if you disagree that races mix in Britain – you [...]