Madagascar (Documentary, Discovery, History)

this sweeping landscape that stretches to the far mountains is not a continent it's an island at the dawn of geological time 150 million years ago gondwana a supercontinent made up of africa america and antarctica began to break apart madagascar separated from africa and began to drift on the turquoise waters of the indian ocean it was not until about 2000 years ago that the first humans arrived they were indonesians who had used the monsoon winds to sail their outrigger canoes all the way to the shores of madagascar down through the centuries the identity of the malgash people took shape and would be enriched by the contributions of arab and indian navigators on board le pono we'll be following in the wake of the taos and outriggers that sailed from muscat zanzibar and bombay to discover the sea routes that led to madagascar our voyage begins in ancient the land of salt in malgash though the town is still called diego suarez by its inhabitants with its grid work of streets lined with colonnade houses the town could be a french provincial capital of the 1960s lost out in the tropics the town was named after two navigators diego diaz and fernando suarez who discovered the bay on route to the portuguese colonies of india this bay is not only one of the largest in the world along with the bay of rio de janeiro it is also one of the most sheltered imaginee picture this bay that has 100 kilometers of shoreline and just one narrow inlet one kilometer wide that's what its name antonboku means a hole in the earth with a little entrance so from out at sea you can't see anything you have to get close you enter the channel and that's when you catch sight of the bed up until the 18th century pirates used this bay as a base from which to attack the french and english ships returning from india when the french colonized the island at the end of the 19th century diego suarez became an important port a gateway to the indian ocean where kimorans indo-pakistanis yemeni somalis and chinese immigrated and mingled with the older sakalava and antancarana populations that period has given diego suarez its present population a cosmopolitan mosaic of different races colors and creeds diversity but not a melting pot for each ethnic group has remained strongly attached to its origins and traditions so with all this in mind just who are the true malgash today even today it's hard to really say we've come to the conclusion that those who live in madagascar but let me tell you something less than 100 kilometers from diego suarez is the ankarana special reserve it is a shining example of all the beauty and mystery of this land of madagascar this forest of limestone needles carved out by the rain five million years ago is called the chingi a labyrinth of crevasses with their extravagant forms this maze of ravines and sharp cliffs opening into yawning caverns was used for centuries as shelters by the antankarana tribe the cliff people during their wars against madagascar's highland tribes [Music] in addition to the chingi the ankarana reserve is home to another of madagascar's mysteries the lemma [Music] this branch of the primate family which is not as highly evolved as monkeys and apes is found almost exclusively in madagascar when the vast island broke off from gondwana and drifted away there were no lemurs aboard they most likely migrated here on eyelets of floating vegetation navigators we could say but just how did the lemmers manage to keep other primates from settling on their territory for there are no monkeys or apes in madagascar therein lies another mystery [Music] [Music] foreign it's morning and lepona has weighed anchor as soon as we leave the shelter of diego bay we pick up the trade winds a powerful breeze that fills the huge sail of our three master more how fast are we going 13 knots perfect sailing [Music] [Music] [Music] once we've rounded cape amber we set our course south for nosy berafia in the radama islands we land on the long stretch of beach swept by the riptide these boats which are usually moored are perched high and dry on the outskirts of the village the sea is not very rough but for nosy barafias fishermen the conditions are far from ideal hey no need for traps nets or lines if the water is clear and visibility good the fishermen can simply dive to gather sea cucumbers its scientific name is holothuria and the chinese pay a fortune for it on account of its supposed curative properties when we go fishing for sea cucumbers we bring back a lot each fisherman takes 15 to 20 like this one we start diving around eight in the morning and go till about three in the afternoon and the next day it's the same routine 8 am to 3 pm and we can dive every day because sea cucumbers reproduce all the time [Applause] once they've gathered their day's quota of sea cucumbers the fishermen head for grand terre to sell their catch the cucumbers have already disappeared from the seas of china and are in serious danger here even though fishing is strictly regulated there's a lot of poaching for the malgash it's just a way of making a living [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] we want to go back home because we're from far off we're strangers here that's what the song says we want to go home to our village [Applause] [Music] as we leave nosy berafia and head south le poner runs into some heavy winds [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] um the next morning we're coming into majanga our southernmost port of call on this trip [Music] the pirags that are sailing back and forth across the bay of majanga are identical to those that for centuries carried out the trade between the city and india and africa this is the land of one of madagascar's 18 ethnic groups the sacalava they were formed over the centuries by intermarriage between east africans and yemeni which explains why majanga is the most muslim city of the island the city is a bustling hive of cars motorcycles and above all rickshaws the rickshaws were introduced at the beginning of the 20th century by the chinese who came to work on the railway line and now there are more than three thousand of them weaving in and out of the traffic i get up very early like all the rickshaw drivers i go get the rickshaw at the depot sometimes i clean it up before i take it out to work at noon i'd take a break for lunch and at the end of the day when i finished i bring the rickshaw back to the boss's garage that's when you have to pay the rental it's money 1 euro 50 for the morning and 1 euro 50 for the afternoon and that's how it goes every day that's the life of a rickshaw driver there's no special position you use to pull a rickshaw there's no particular technique but it's important that the rickshaw be in good shape and the passengers have to be seated rickshaw driver is a really tiring job it means sweat and more sweaty thank you rickshaws have existed in the city for about a hundred years but daos have been around for much longer even though motorized freighters have been in use for a long time there are still quite a few wooden dowels sailing the coasts of madagascar that are exclusively wind powered these cargo ships from another age invented by the arab navigators were masters of the indian ocean for more than one thousand years it was thanks to these vessels that the indo-pakistanis were able to gain commercial domination of the entire region for example the owner of that dao is a koran it's the same thing here in majanga it's the koran indians who own everything there really aren't many malagash in the business facts while the dow stranded on the beach like wounded birds wait for the rising tide to bring them back to life slender sailing perrogs continue to glide across the estuary of the betis boca river we follow them and after a few kilometers find ourselves in another world a wash in the water time wow they bring all that to this market here foreign the former capital of the sakalaba kingdom was the hub of a very prosperous agricultural region many indo-pakistanis came to settle here and became wealthy traders when the regional capital was moved to majanga most of the banyans meaning the hindus and the karens the indo-pakistani muslims left maravoi and moved to the new capital which was the case with the family of abdul tayab and yes that means i speak the language my mother tongue is in school we spoke french and we read the quran the holy quran in arabic so i learned arabic here in the quranic school we mix all the languages together my children are merchants but my grandchildren won't carry on the family business here because their horizons have been expanded they look to france europe their world is vaster we have education now information the day is drawing to a close the last rays of sunlight set this giant bow bob aglow this tree several hundred years old is the living witness of majanga's history and its present vitality [Music] [Music] le pono has once again taken to the sea like every evening since we left diego suarez the captain holds his traditional meeting with the passengers in the lounge to give them a rundown on the weather and our next day is stopover [Music] [Music] leaving mazanga we change direction with the ship under full sail we set our course north for nosi iranja a small island paradise near nosy bay a turquoise blue sea intense green vegetation no see irunja lulls beneath the warm sunbeams lapped by the waves of the indian ocean nothing seems to disturb this perfect harmony not even the fishing party that's underway at the far end of the beach just a few meters from the shore the young fishermen cast their net then they form a circle and advance making noise and splashing to scare the fish into the trap that they close little by little [Music] and so thanks to what seems an effortless game the village youngsters have put lunch on the table the youngsters with their open generous nature seem to enjoy living together the picture seems too good to be true yet gilbert the son of the village chief confirms our impressions here in the village you have the wise folks the elders they organize the social life of the village but you also have the young people the girls and boys we see problems there's no conflict because the elders give advice to the youngsters so everybody in the village gets along fine they will [Music] wow in this village where everybody seems content just living together there's even an artiste javier meaning january for that's the month he was born in is a musician and passes his time singing in the village lanes someday the old folks don't have jealous dreams of glory they carry on living as in the past taking what nature offers whether it be fish or coffee but the young dream of a different life le pono lying at anchor is a reminder to them that nosy bay is not far away norsi bay with its shops and tourist hotels i'm not familiar with that place now if you had a good reason to live somewhere else why not leave but you never know what your life will be like somewhere else so i think it's better to stay put i'd be willing to leave but only if i were rich i didn't choose to live in that house roofed with corn husks but it's mine because i'm poor and that's why i stay here but if i get rich someday maybe i'd leave i might even go to another country but in the meantime since i have no money i'll stay right here le ponna takes to the sea for the last time on this voyage next stop nosy bay [Music] we drop anchor at north bay in spite of the wind there are still some ragged clouds clinging to the distant peaks the zodiac boats are lowered and we head for elville the capital of nosy bay uh over the past few decades north bay has become one of the most popular tourist sites of the indian ocean nevertheless elville has managed to keep its authentic malgash character even though the french influence here dates back to the mid-19th century about 50 years earlier than the rest of madagascar threatened by the marina tribes from the highlands the sacalava sovereigns requested military support from the french thus in 1841 the sacalava queen tsiomeko granted the island of nosy bay to admiral de el who was governor of il bourbon now reunion island in exchange for his protection the courthouse the prison the government house most of the colonial buildings that give the town its quaint charm date from that period when the french arrived here in nosi bay there were already prosperous indian and arab merchants doing good business in this bay which is one of the best sheltered on the island they had set up a trading post called ambanoro marudoka which means literally the place of many shops [Applause] not far from the ruins of the old trading post lives a community of sakolava maolide is 89 years old he spent his life sailing the indian ocean now he's come back to live out his old age here in ambanoro i started sailing on indian boats twice my grandfather and grandmother were pure arab slave traders sold them here to the indians my grandfather and grandmother were born in africa they were abducted by the arabs to be sold here like every day while the men are out fishing the village women get together to chat and do their makeup a ritual that probably goes back to their african ancestors [Music] you had the arabs and the indians these huge warehouses now overrun by the vegetation give an idea of the vitality of the trade that the indo-pakistanis had developed here in ambonuro there was no one here before the arabs the arabs were the first group of people to settle here in amben then around 1839 the indo-pakistani started arriving but they came here because they knew it was already a trading town a center of commerce so ships that came from bombay from zanzibar and they would trade the abolition of slavery in the french colonies in 1848 would give the french the new rulers of the island the opportunity to put an end to the commercial dominance of ambenoro the arabs leave nosy bay and the indians transfer their activity to elvis where even today their business is still thriving the history of nosy bay like that of northwest madagascar in general has been continually enriched by the arrival of new immigrants the sacalava the arabs the indians the french but russians why are there russian graves in hellville cemetery the key to this mystery is to be found in the bay a few hours away from nosi bay the aptly named russian bay [Music] okay in the morning we board a dowel and set our course for russian bay this boat belongs to nikola a frenchman who's been living in the region for about 20 years he has a passion for antique boats and the stories and legends that go with them when he saw the pirags endows of madagascar it was love at first sight so he dropped anchor here had his own dow built and now spends his time and energy to showing off this magnificent coast to travelers and at the same time he tries to recreate the magic of the voyages of days gone by [Music] [Music] oh these are cargo boats that go all the way back to the arab conquests the arab trade routes in the northern indian ocean and even now it works when you're lucky enough to see a site like that at dawn those vast sails the conch shell they blow the whole atmosphere of loading that's busy and serene at the same time because these are sailing ships and they have the sort of serenity of a huge caravan getting underway i said to myself a sail like that just has to stir your imagination the 90 kilometers of coast between nosy bay and the radame islands are off the path of the trade winds so they still have these light thermal winds in the morning and during the day like what we're getting right now we get these thermals 300 days a year we get this weather 300 320 days a year we don't even worry about the weather we'll be getting and ever since the dawn of time there have been sailors who all of a sudden after months of hard sailing on the high seas they see that it was amazing the coast treats us to a series of breathtaking spots one after the other in different styles and they all made good hideouts it was quite something for the slave traders the smugglers everybody but just what were the russians doing here in this bay that now bears their name the story begins in february 1904 war breaks out between russia and japan the russian fleet in the baltic sets sail to hook up with the pacific fleet part of the fleet takes the suez canal route and the other part with the bigger boats rounds the cape of good hope they rendezvous at madagascar [Music] after a few months the fleet is once again reunited but russia has already lost the war [Music] what remains of the 20 000 russian sailors stay here a few wrecks at the bottom of the sea some blue-eyed malagash on the shore there's not the slightest trace there's only the elusive memory of an incredible maritime adventure [Applause] [Applause] our madagascar adventure is drawing to a close now it's time to take a look at the interior of the island as we did when we landed at diego suarez on the hillsides here they grow ylang ylang a plant that comes from malaysia and which is now a gold mine for norsi bay the ylang ylang plants are pruned regularly to keep them low so that picking is easier i'm good oh once a day they bring the flowers to the distillery the essence that they extract with these old copper charcoal heated stills will be used in the world's most famous perfumes so even though madagascar is opening up to the world the traditions brought over from africa are still alive in the villages the chumba or ancestor cult is one of the most common during the trances that may last several hours the living enter into contact with the dead [Music] [Applause] [Music] one [Applause] [Music] hey this cult has existed for a very long time it's the ancestor cult worship of the ancients when the elders die their spirit inhabits us the elders live within us they enter into all the living people in a way it's the old ones that direct the living yet stay who guide us um uh [Applause] the last paddle strokes the last crossing we're headed for the loco bay reserve [Applause] so here in the heart of this primeval forest is where the lemmers live they are true natives of madagascar they witnessed the arrival of the first navigators from indonesia and all those who followed to forge the malgash people [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Stop Over - Documentary, Discovery, History

Views: 10,390,360

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Keywords: travel, adventure, boat, sail, trip, ocean, sea, river, sailboat, cruise, stopover, stop, over, Queen Elizabeth 2, Royal Clipper, Le France, Le Norway, Sun Boat II, Classica, Vat Phou, Bolero, Wind Song, Grigoriy Mikheev icebreaker, Silver Cloud, Stopovertv, Discover, Travel, travels, explore, Stop Over, History, Madagascar

Id: FOvlQhPm23g

Length: 58min 8sec (3488 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 28 2015