Madagascar Travel Pack

Amazon USA - Madagascar Travel Pack (Globetrotter Travel Packs) - 4^th edition.

Guest article by: Authors ~ Derek Schuurman and Nivo Ravelojaona

Now in its 4^th edition, the Globetrotter Travel Pack to Madagascar is the sole guidebook to this beguiling Indian Ocean island off the eastern coast of Africa to have been co-authored by European and Malagasy authors. It is also the only Madagascar guidebook to include a large and detailed fold-out map tucked into the back sleeve.

The 4^th largest island in the world, Madagascar is above all known for being one of the world’s ‘Megadiversity hotspots’ as defined by Conservation International. Due to its geographical isolation of some 165 million years from Africa and then later from India, this island continent is a veritable treasure trove for naturalists and in excess of 80% of the life forms found there, exist nowhere else. However centuries of habitat destruction and more recently, mining and illegal timber extraction, as well as conversion of wetlands for riziculture, have led to many of its compellingly unique plants and animals being classified as endangered.

For tourists, Madagascar offers not just the opportunity to get to know sometimes critically endangered wildlife up close – and as is outlined in the book, often with relative ease - but also the chance to enjoy extraordinarily varied and photogenic landscapes, and to become acquainted with the multilayered and complex culture of the world’s only Afro-Asian nation.

The book has a detailed section with vital travel tips for visitors, as travel to the country should be planned carefully given its difficult geography and limited infrastructure. The book also reviews many of the best places to stay at all the sites of biological interest, as well as at some of its choice beach locations. The authors, London-based Derek Schuurman and Antananarivo-based Nivo Ravelojaona, have worked together in responsible tourism to Madagascar for 22 years and as such, have extensive experience to fall back on and substantial information which was utilised in the compilation of this book.

The book is divided into its highly contrasting regions, each of which is like a different country with its own climate, and often locally endemic assemblages of plants and animals, as well as different tribes of people resident there. In each of the regions, the most prominent highlights are featured and the book contains numerous photographs, mostly by renowned photographer Gerald Cubitt, affectionately regarded as ‘the Godfather of Wildlife Photography’. With responsible tourism in mind, special attention has been allocated to promoting public awareness of initiatives aimed at conservation, particularly where these benefit and are managed by local communities.

In summary the book showcases the best of what Madagascar has to offer potential visitors, with expert guidance as to where to go at different times of the year and how to make the most of any trip to the country.

Publisher: New Holland/Struik

Amazon Canada - Madagascar Travel Pack (Globetrotter Travel Packs)

Amazon UK - Madagascar Travel Pack (Globetrotter Travel Packs)

Sylvie's Story: A Timothy O'Mahony Novella

  Sylvie's Story is an adult thriller for a mature audience. 

A short summary to introduce the story - A Timothy O'Mahony novella which details a story of a woman on the run from a dictator in the Congo. Sylvie sells herself to men under a false name to earn enough money to get herself, her mother and sisters out of the Congo. Her luck seems to change when  a wealthy Frenchman offers to take her to France to work there as an escort. All seems to be going well and when Sylvie meets a man who used to know her father, she thinks he will help her.

What has my curiosity brewing here, besides wanting to know if this man will help her is this novella can also be read in conjunction with another of the Timothy O'Mahony novels. It can be read either before, after or during the reading of Green Blood is for France.

 
Excerpt of review by M. Ferguson about 'Green Blood is For France'  - Absolutely super read - "I could read and reread this book. It is a gripping crime novel set in the politics of modern-day France - with the personalities of the last few years thinly disguised. The author clearly knows France well. The book ranges from the west coast of Ireland to West Africa, but is mainly centered in high circles in Paris (all totally convincing)."

Now this may seem off in a way to show a beer commercial here but it is to give you a feel for what the Congo is like with these "Sapeurs" - The Society of Cool and Elegant People.

 

Excerpt from Sylvie's Story (Kindle Locations 8 - 9 )

With a motion of her head towards the main door, she reminded him of the presence of the muscular , shaven-headed bouncers, members of the male haute-couture cult of the cloth known in the Congo by its French initials SAPE, which stood for The Society of Cool and Elegant People. They were known as ‘Sapeurs’. They stood near the bar, looking nonchalantly into the wall-length mirrors around the room in which they could keep track of every woman’s and client’s movements in the club.

The Sapeurs ’ whole lives were devoted to finding the money to purchase designer shirts, ties, shoes, tuxedos or any other type of leather or cloth apparel showcased in the chic streets of Paris near the Church of the Madeleine, whatever the expense. They wore Weston lizard-skin shoes, Francesco Smalto suits, Yves Saint Laurent blazers and Christian Dior dress shirts. Their scents came from Jean Paul Gaultier or Lolita Lempicka. Officially, there might be only a couple of dollars a day coming into their hands, but the clothes on their backs were worth several thousand. To be leaders in fashion was their religion. A bad dresser had no more human value to them than one of the dead bodies the Dictator had left to rot after the massacre at the Beach landing.

Sylvie's Story is available on Amazon.

Links in USA & Canada

An Immoral Proposal: Forbidden Love Under Apartheid

Guest article by: Jennifer B. Graham

Picture this. She’s from a lower socio economic family, left school at sixteen, works as clerk in a factory. He’s from an affluent background, private school education, university degree, member of exclusive social clubs, home in the leafy suburbs. What’s the likelihood of their having a relationship: Intimacy? – Probably not. Physical? – For sure. But would it last? Not a chance. In fact, they’re courting danger. You see, she’s Brown and he’s White. Big problem. This is South Africa 1974, the height of apartheid.

In her first memoir, Jennifer B. Graham takes an emotional journey back to her childhood in a hostile land that legally classified her as a “Coloured” – officially defined by the apartheid government as a “person who fails to pass for white.” Throughout her fragmented life, coupled with being both Non-black and Non-White, struggling to find a place to belong, she carves out her version of an ordered world. Her quest is exacerbated by the love of a man who dared to make An Immoral Proposal.

My birth certificate classifies me as “Cape Coloured”

            (` Coloured ` as in mixed race).

The ‘Cape’ part is easy to understand, that’s the region where I started life, but ‘Coloured’? Who are the Coloureds then?     ~ Jennifer B. Graham (Kindle Locations 104-106).

Review by L. Wilden on Amazon: A beautiful story...thank goodness the world has changed! 

This is a well written story which I was so sorry to finish...I wished it was longer! It is very true I think, to the South Africa I visited in 1969, but as a tourist I could only imagine the troubles and miseries happening under apartheid.

This is a very real account of two peoples' lives almost ruined by the State. This exciting account is a wonderful, lasting account of perseverance and joy growing from the darkest place. I felt encouraged and uplifted by this story!

Available on Amazon