Easter on the Island of Lemurs

We spent this Easter in Nosy Komba - the island of lemurs.

The island of Nosy Komby (pronounced nossi koomb)

The dining terrace of our hotel.  

The very unsafe balustrade of the dining terrace.  Tripadvisor will be hearing about this.

The Mozambique Channel

The Bambina took delight in holding a chameleon.

The Bambino loves tortoises, turtles, dinosaurs...pretty much all reptiles, actually...

The Bambino meeting the locals.

We took lots of photos of the lemurs too but the Frenchman has them on his iphone and I haven't had the chance to download them yet.

The positive side of expat life in Madagascar

Expat transfer season is coming up soon.  With that in mind, we can't help but wondering whether we'll stay or be sent somewhere else.  We've had our fill of Madagascar and love the idea of moving to yet another country, but as I contemplate our last two years here, I realise that, however much we complain about the dirt, the pollution, the poverty and the lack of choice for schools in this city, we still have it pretty good.  So if we do end up staying (and the chances are good that we will), at least there'll be more of these positive aspects of life in Tana:

 We live in a residence (some people call it a compound) with streets that are paved and guarded, and kids can walk, run and ride their bikes anywhere they want within the residence.  The residence gives them a freedom that they would never have back home in Paris or in pretty much any other modern city.  My six-year old Bambina leaves the house by herself and takes off on her bike and I don't have to worry about it.

Horse-back riding lessons for children and adults of all ages, at reasonable rates and not too far away from where we live.  The Bambina has a lesson every Sunday morning and the Bambino likes to try out a pony whenever we go. 

Lots of rain and every now and then a rainbow.

 A heated swimming pool in our back yard and lots of opportunity for friends to come over and play - school gets out at 12:20 three times a week.

 Lots and lots of yard space.  

Very cheap manicures, pedicures, massages and haircuts.   A haircut for the Bambina costs about 2 euro.  A pedicure costs about 10 euro.  A message costs about 5 euro for an hour!

Adventures in mud

We often head out to the Club Olympique de Tananarive (the COT) on Sunday simply because, well, there's not much else to do in this city on Sunday.  When we're in Paris, we head to the park.  There are no parks here.  Or we go to a museum.  No museums here either.

So, if we're not exploring this grand island, we head to the COT, play tennis (well, the Frenchman plays tennis), swim, eat lunch, and hang out with friends.

Except that we're in the rainy season.  And yesterday it rained.  Hard.

And since Madagascar has a lot of dirt (red dirt, mind you) and very little pavement, well, there's a lot of mud here after a rainstorm.

Needless to say, our kids had a lot of fun!

South Africa - Part 3: The Spier Wine Estate

Imagine that you're in France and you stop at a wine estate in Bordeaux.  If they're open, the owners will let you taste some of their wine - maybe - and then you may buy a bottle or two.

While you and your spouse are tasting the wine, your kids are.... doing what?  Running around and making a lot of noise while the owners say "Attention" every minute or two because your little ones are about to step on and/or break something?  Or maybe just being bored and asking "Can we go yet" every minute or two.

Now let me compare this scene with Spier Wine Estate, about a 45-minute drive from Capetown, South Africa.

You arrive in a HUGE parking lot.  There are at least 50 other cars there.  The first thing you bump into on exiting the parking lot is a large market with all kinds of South African crafts.

Then you walk by a deli that sells Spiers wine and lots of yummy foods (think ham, cheeses, jams, relishes, pickles, chips...) and there is a huge picnic area out back where you can eat their food.  There are two play areas for the kids, both with all-natural wooden equipment.  There is a duck pond.  There is a restaurant where you can have lunch or dinner with their wine.  And then you can also taste their wine for a small fee.

Oh, and there's a hotel there, too, in case you would like to make the Spier Wine Estate your base for exploring the winelands of the Western Cape.


When it comes to marketing wine, the French could maybe learn a little from the South Africans, n'est-ce pas?

South Africa part 1 - Pilanesberg Game Reserve & Sun City

Things I learned during the four days spent in Pilanesberg National Park, South Africa:

- Seeing animals in the wild is a very different experience than seeing them in a zoo or on a nature documentary.   It's breathtaking.

- It's important to choose a game reserve with a high density of animals.  Children get easily bored in the car when there are no animals around.  The Bambina preferred to play on her Nintendo DS while she waited for us to spot the animals.  

Kruger National Park has more animals than Pilanesberg (or so I'm told) but there are also many many many more people there, so you have to deal with the crowds and all the cars.

- Don't be surprised when you discovered that the kids very obviously prefer the day spent at the completely artificial, 100 percent plastic amusement park, Sun City, complete with mega-high water-slides and tidal wave pool, over the hours spent on safaris gazing at wild animals on the game reserve.

Formula marketing again.

Seen in our local Jumbo store:  this sign in the infant formula section.

The manager at the Jumbo store doesn't seem to think it's a problem.  After all, the sign is just there to tell people where the infant formula is.

And what about the cute little white baby sucking down the bottle of formula?  What kind of message is that sending?

The International Code on the Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes says:

There should be no advertising or other form of promotion to the general public of products within the scope of this Code.

and

there should be no point- of-sale advertising, giving of samples, or any other promotion device to induce sales directly to the consumer at the retail level, such as special displays, discount coupons, premiums, special sales, loss-leaders and tie-in sales, for products within the scope of this Code. 

Interestingly, Article 9.2 of the Code also specifies that:

Neither the container nor the label should have pictures of infants, nor should they have other pictures or text which may idealize the use of infant formula.

I would argue that this sign is a "special display" and that, given that the Code prohibits photos on the containers of the cans, a display sign with a warm and fuzzy photo of the mother with a baby drinking from a bottle should also be considered a "promotional device to induce sales" of the infant formula at Jumbo.

Of course, given that there is no real government or law enforcement agency here in Madagascar these days, I doubt that much if anything will be done about this infraction.

You know you live in a developing country when

1.  You pay top dollar for bottom of the barrel no-name imported brand canned and packaged food at the grocery store - when you can get them.

2.  Your tap water is so full of chlorine that the kids' bath has a light green tint to it.

3. Your kid speaks at least two languages, and sometimes three, depending on what country you're living in at the time.

4. You have grown an affection for scenery filled with dirt roads, gutters and rice paddies.

5. You never walk anywhere anymore and you're no longer used to driving in vehicles that are not 4x4.

6.  You expect to get a stomach bug about once every three to four months.

7. You buy meat the same day that the animal was killed and you age it in your refrigerator.

8. Your definition of a "really good restaurant" has evolved to being a restaurant whose food doesn't make you sick.

9. A chauffeur drives your kids to school every day.

10.  You count down the days to Christmas vacation months ahead of time and can't wait to experience cold and snow.

Things our kids have seen and done this year

Our kids have seen a lot this year.  

This summer, they looked down on this gorgeous view of the Dordogne river in the Périgord region of southwestern France.  Even on a cloudy day, the scenery was beautiful.

They saw the countryside of Madagascar, too, which is beautiful in its own way.

They saw the Eiffel Tower a few times, and took a boat ride along the Seine river in Paris.

 And scenes from a city in the developing world have been part of their daily life this year.

They saw their share of cameleons, tortoises and lemurs.                                                                                                                    

 They've gone for a ride on a taxi "pousse-pousse".

We haven't been able to continue the Bambina's swimming lessons here in Tananarive so instead, the she's been learning to ride a pony.  The Bambino likes to just sit on the pony once in a while.

And they did a fair bit of swimming in the Indian Ocean (the Bambina did snorkeling and diving as well).

Our end of year treat: skiing in the Alps!

Nestlé at it again

I have been meaning to post on this story for quite some time.   I have already written how Nestlé's Nido is harming African babies. Now I see that it's not just the Nido that's the problem.

A few months ago, I walked into a store that happens to be the official distributor for Nestlé products here in Tana.  I saw this display.

The idea was obviously to display ALL Nestlé products together.  The first thing that struck me was that the Nido had, once again, been placed in close proximity to the baby formula, Guigoz 1 and 2, but at least this time they were on different shelves.

Encircling the products was a yellow ribbon with a teddy bear decoration throughout and the following message:

 "Nestlé - pour une croissance saine".  

Translation: Nestlé: for healthy growth.   

Apart from Nido, Guigoz formula and baby cereal, the display contained Kit Kat, Choco Crunch cereal, and Quik chocolate powder.  All these products are supposed to be for "healthy growth".  Surely they must be joking.

Behind the cashiers was a posterboard clearly intended for employees of the store.  The posterboard had the Nestlé Nutrition logo on it and showed what employees are not allowed to do under the International Code on the Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes.  No promotions.  No point of sale advertising.  No special displays.  There were diagrams indicating all these prohibitions but the writing was all in English.  Have I mentioned that Madagascar is a francophone country?

I asked to speak to the manager of the store.  I was led to his office.  He was a pretty nice French guy.  I had a friendly conversation with him and then said "I see that you are making an effort to adhere to the International Code for the Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes."

I then explained that the display was in contravention of this Code.  He expressed surprise and said that he would contact Nestlé immediately, as it was they who put up the display.

I thanked the manager, went to purchase my things, and left.

The next week, lo and behold, I got a call from Nestlé Nutrition.

"We would be interested in knowing why you think the display contravenes the Code.  We are not marketing breastmilk substitutes.  We are marketing all Nestlé products together."

He wasn't joking.  This was his argument.

"Listen", I said.  "If you are going to follow Nestlé's own watered-down interpretation of the Code, you will, at a minimum, remove the Nestlé Guigoz first stage infant formula from the display. And if you are going to follow my interpretation of the Code, you will remove the first and second stage Guigoz from the display."

He still didn't understand what was wrong with keeping them in the display.

"It's advertising", I said.

"But it's not advertising the formula in particular", he replied.

"That doesn't matter", I countered.  "Putting baby formula in a display that says 'for healthy growth' is advertising the formula, whether or not you put a KitKat bar and breakfast cereal beside it."

He said he would like to meet me so that I could show him the relevant portions of the Code and he could explain to his superiors.   I agreed and we met up the following week.   By that time, the Nestlé Nutrition man had already faxed a photo of the display to his superiors in Kenya and Mauritius and asked for their opinion.

His superiors agreed with me and told him that either the milk had to be removed from the display or the ribbon had to be removed.  He removed the ribbon.

I told him that he should also put the Nido milk with the other powdered milk being sold in the store rather than in the same area as the infant formula.  He refused.  He said that he wanted to keep the Nestlé products all together.

"But you know", he said to me, when we were back in his office at Nestlé Nutrition, "we don't really focus on stores.  The stores are already informed and are generally compliant, with the odd exception now and then.  Our main job is to inform hospitals about the Code, when we deliver them our infant formula for newborns".

Now ain't that a wolf in sheep's clothing.

Madagascar: It's less of a shock the second time around

We've just returned from our two-month vacation in paradise boring France to our home in the dirty, polluted, third-world city of Antananarivo on the paradise island of Madagascar.

Seriously though, last year, when we arrived here for the first time, it was a bit of shock for all of us (even, dare I say it, the Frenchman). This time around, I think we're all happy to be back "home" from vacation. Here are thirteen things I love about living in Madagascar:

13. The vast sky - kind of like in Montana or Saskatchewan. It was the first thing I noticed (after the shacks on the street, that is).

12. We may have the odd case of malaria on the coast but there's no yellow fever here.

11. There's no polio, either, and very little typhoid fever, I daresay.

10. There are some very good restaurants and it's been about eight months since I've felt sick from food I've eaten.

9. Cheap domestic help - we have a nanny, cook and chauffeur.

8. Horseback riding, complete with lessons (English saddle though, which kind of sucks).

7. Lots of neat stuff made out of wood, straw and/or pretty stones.

6. It's close to Mauritius and South Africa, among other great places to visit that are hard to get to from Europe and North America.

5. Did I mention that I have a cook? Who stays until 7PM to clean the kitchen while I get the kids ready for bed?

4. Beautiful, clean, white sand, EMPTY beaches.

3. We might not have parks or playgrounds here but we do have an enormous backyard, as do all our friends who host playgroups every week.

2. Real whales at Isle St. Marie (everything we've heard about it, at least - we're waiting for the Bambino to grow a little before we visit).

1. The size of our house - it's about three times the size of our apartment in Paris.

Guest-posting on Infant Formula Marketing in Madagascar

Hey everybody, I'm guess posting on Blacktating this week on the subject of infant formula marketing in Madagascar - Nestlé and Blédina say they don't do it but they do!

Colours where we live

Sunset over Tana

A store at the marché artisanal

This plant has red leaves - all year round.

The beach at Nosy Bé

Buying at the Source - Factory outlets in Madagascar

You can buy this princess constume in Europe for about 30 euro.  It was made here in Madagascar.  We visited the factory recently and bought it for the equivalent of about five euro. 

There are other factories here as well.  There is a factory that makes clothes for Jacadi.  Take a look at this dress.  Jacadi is selling them at 69 euro a piece in Europe.  It's made here in Madagascar.  We bought one at the factory for a friends of ours back in Paris, for 15000 ariary - the equivalent of about 7 euro.  Actually, we bought another one too because at that price, why not? 

Here's another gorgeous one, also for 69 euro.  It cost us 7 euro, once again. 

While at the factory, I took a peek at the actual factory floor.  I wanted to know what the working conditions of these people were like.  The workers were mostly women - about 200 of them sitting down in chairs at sewing machines.  The factory floor was well-lit and the chairs looked decent.  Unfortunately, I was not allowed to take a photo.  They work about 45 hours per week.  And they probably make about 150 euro per month.
 
Should we feel guilty that we are exploiting people in a third world country when we buy these clothes?  My university friends would say that we should abstain from buying things from any of these places.  My thinking, having witnessed the conditions here as well, is that people would be far worse off if these factories didn't exist.  No, the working conditions are not perfect, but they are not what I would call Dickensian either - they get overtime, weekends, statutory holidays, and a ways that allows them to feed their children and buy school supplies.  They are unionized.  Do conditions need to improve for the workers?  Yes.  They need better wages and a shorter workday for starters.  As the economy of the country evolves, so will working conditions and wages.

Of course, as wages and working conditions in Madagascar improve, their products will become more expensive and the people in the developed world will, in turn, have to pay even more for them than now.

The BCG Vaccine - is it worth getting?

I found this box of unused vaccines against Tuburculosis (aka the BCG vaccine) sitting in our refrigerator yesterday.  In the days prior to leaving for Madagascar, the Frenchman, being French, was intent on getting the Bambino jabbed with the BCG vaccine.  I think that France is the only country that actually even recommends this vaccine anymore.  You certainly never hear about it in the UK, Canada, the States or Australia.  (Oh yeah, I think they maybe still recommend it in Romania.  And Mexico).

I managed to convince the Frenchman to give a pass on this vaccine for the Bambino, for a few reasons.  Yes, there is tuberculosis in Madagascar.  But the BCG vaccine is not known for being that effective in preventing transmission of tuberculosis. Clinical trials in the UK have shown an efficacy of about 60 to 80 percent (which is already not great for a vaccine).  The efficacy rate falls as you get closer to the equator, sometimes to zero percent effectiveness.  No one really knows why.  But according to the World Health Organization, the BCG vaccines currently in use are produced at several sites around the world and are not identical to one another.   And it is not known whether the vaccines produced at one site are more effective than the vaccines produced at other sites. 

Since 2007, a new and apparently improved BCG vaccine is being used.  I haven't seen any data to suggest that it is, indeed, any more effective than the old vaccine.  And lookie here, The World Health Organization questions the safety of the current BCG vaccine.  From the WHO site:

BCG is widely used and the safety of this vaccine has not been a serious issue until recently.  There is concern that the use of the vaccine in persons who are immune-compromised may result in an infection caused by the BCG itself.  Also, even among immune competent persons, local reactions, including ulceration at the site of vaccination may result in shedding of live organisms which could infect others who may be immune-compromised.

The other thing that bothers me about the BCG vaccine is it can result in false positives on future tubuculin skin tests - which means that if your child ever wants to, say, work in the health care industry one day, he will have to get an X-ray to prove that he or she does not have TB!  The skin test won't suffice.

And then there is the post-vaccine bump, puss and permanent scar left on your child's arm.

My cousin Wolfgang, who happens to be a microbiologist and a travel doctor in Berlin, doesn't have a problem with the BCG vaccine per se but he does recognize its lack of effectiveness.  When I talked to him about whether to have the Bambino vaccinated, he recommended testing the Bambino for TB once a year, instead, using the tuburculin skin test.  If the test result is negative, no TB.  If the test result is positive, the child then gets an x-ray to ensure that he has simply developed immunity to TB (this is what usually happens when you are exposed to TB) and does not actually have TB.  If the child has developed TB, then the TB gets treated.   Most of the American parents that I have met here have chosen this route for their children.

Since arriving in Madagascar last July, I have surveyed lots of families of a few different nationalities about the BCG vaccine.  So far, all of the French parents that I have met have had their children vaccinated with the BCG vaccine and all but one of the non-French families have refused the BCG vaccine for their children (the one non-French vaccinated child I know was born in Mexico, where they give the BCG vaccine routinely at birth) -yet more evidence that the way you parent really is a cultural thing, even when it comes to vaccines!

Getting used to insects, spiders, Other Things.

It's hard to get your children to maintain an open mind about things in life that they have never seen before when you yourself scream when you see THIS swimming in your pool one morning. 

Can anyone tell me what it is?  The Malagasy have a word for it but don't know what the translation is in French or English.  I'm not even sure that it's an insect.  It might be a small animal.  Yikes!

On another note, I took this photo just outside the Jumbo grocery store.  The photo doesn't really do them justice.  Trust me.  They are HUGE.  We are talking the size of my hand.  I don't think I have ever seen spiders this size before.  I haven't shown them to the Bambina yet!

The cockroaches are also the size of the palm of my hand but in my earnest bid to get rid of them from my kitchen as soon as f-ing possible, I didn't bother taking a picture.

Nestlé's new way of harming African babies

This globetrotter parent has noticed that if there is one thing that pervades the world, it's the Nestlé brand.  And if there is one thing that Nestlé like to sell, it's infant formula.

Nestlé and other infant formula manufacturers have, or so they say, committed themselves not to market their infant formula for babies under the age of six months.  Now, in my opinion, if they really wanted to adhere to the International Code of Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes, they wouldn't market their infant formula at all (including the formula for babies 6 months and up) and it would be available exclusively in pharmacies and not in grocery stores.  But I digress. 

Knowing full well that they are unable to advertise their infant formula for younger babies, Nestlé advertise other products instead.  Here in Tananarive, they advertise their powdered whole milk, called Nido.  Note that "Nido" means "nest" in Italian and is very close to the French word for nest as well ("nid"). So not surprisingly, the Malagasy people (most of whom speak French) tend to think of Nido as milk that is meant for babies. 

But it's not.  Nestle Nido is just plain old whole milk in powder form with some vitamins added to it.  It has not been adapted for babies.

Yet the other day, I asked our driver, as we passed by a huge wall ad for Nido, "Is Nido milk for babies?"

"Yes", he replied.  "You give it to babies if you can't breastfeed."

Then I asked our cook, "Do the Malagasy give Nestlé Nido to their babies when breastmilk is not available?"

"yes, yes", she replied.
I explained to her that Nestlé Nido was, in fact, whole milk, and not infant formula.  She was very surprised and kept asking, "Are you sure?".

Then I said to our nanny, "Would you give Nestlé Nido to a baby?"  She gave me an unequivocal yes and was also surprised when I told her that Nido was not infant formula.

Nestlé don't appear to be doing much to correct this mistaken belief about their product.  They of course do not expressly state anywhere in their advertising that Nido is for babies and to their credit, their advertising portrays a glass of milk on it, not a baby bottle.  BUT (1) a can of Nestlé Nido looks just like a can of infant formula for babies (same 400 gram metal can with plastic top), (2) the name "NIDO" is suggestive of babies and (3) they don't say anywhere on the packaging or in their advertising that it is NOT for babies, except in the FAQ of Nestlé Nido's internet site. 

Worse, in the shops here in Tana, Nestlé Nido is placed on the shelf right alongside infant formulas.**

And as the Nido whole milk powder also happens to be cheaper than real infant formula (in the shop where this photo was taken, the Nido cost 14000 Ariary whereas the Nestle Guigoz 2ème age cost 18,000 Ariary), people have no hesitation in buying Nestlé Nido for their infant.

One final anecdote from my friend Natasha, an American here in Tana who has a nine-month old baby.  One day, Natasha was telling someone that before arriving here in Tana, she had purchased a year's worth of infant formula in Switzerland and had it shipped here.  She didn't want to be stuck purchasing infant formula in Madagascar, as she had no idea where the formula that is sold here might have been manufactured (much of it comes from Kenya or China, I am told). 

The person responded, "Oh well, if you ever run out, you can always buy some Nido."  Dooooooh!

** Funnily enough, in the large grocery stores in Tana such as Jumbo and Leader Price, where Europeans tend to do their grocery shopping, Nestlé Nido can be found in a separate aisle from the infant formula, alongside other whole milk powders.

Nannies in the Colonial World

The typical expericance with nannies in former colonies can be described as follows:

1. Move into house. Say hello to the cook, the gardiner, the chauffeur and the nanny. They come with the house. You cannot fire them. (Well, you could try, but it would be hard and you would be in the bad books of half the local families, so not worth the risk). Welcome to your household for the next five years.

2. Hand the baby over to the nanny.

3. Kiss your baby good-bye.

4. Expect to see your baby again when he is five years old, unless you ask nanny before then if you might be permitted to, er, maybe hold or even (gasp!) feed the baby.

5. Expect nanny to take offence when you ask her this. After all, who are you to interfere with her job of raising your child. Go and find some other colonial mothers to play cards with!

6. Expect the baby to be speaking nanny's dialect better than your language by the time baby is two years old.

This is the scenario that people had warned me about and sure enough, our nanny, who has just started today (she didn't come with the house) seems kind of surprised that I, er, still expect to be with my 4 month old baby quite a bit and that (gasp!) she can't feed him (he's "still" breastfed, as she noted.)

"And when will he start to drink milk from a bottle?", she asked me.

"Never", I replied.

I think she realised then that I wouldn't be a typical neo-colonial mom.

Preparing Your Child for Life in the Third World

When I told our almost-five year old daughter that we were moving to Madagascar, I thought that I had been pretty thorough. We looked for Madagascar on the map, together. I showed her photos of lemurs. I showed her aerial photos of the capital city, Antananarivo (Tana, for short). I told her that the people there speak Malagasy (or malgache, as it is referred to in French), and that their skin was a different colour from ours (most are of Indonesian/Polynesian descent; some are black African).

What I didn't tell her was the following:

- The city is dirty. The roads are very dusty and there is garbage everywhere.

- The city is very polluted. You can't walk down the street unless you don't mind inhaling car fumes that were banned in the 1970s in Europe.

- Poverty and misery are everywhere, staring at you in the face.

The first day after our arrival in Tana, we drove (or should I say, our chauffeur drove us) down the main avenue of the city.

Bambina: Mommy?

Me: Yes.

Bambina (staring all around her, wide-eyed): I think the people here are very very poor.

Me: yes, they are.

Bambina: Mommy, why are the buildings here all falling apart?

Me: Because people here are very poor, honey. There is no money to fix up and maintain the houses and shops.

Bambina: In Rome, the buildings were beautiful. I want to go back to Rome.

The next day, in the car, after passing the umpteenth child with extended hands at the window of our car, the Bambina blurts out, angrily:

Naughty mommy for not telling me that people in Madagascar are poor. Naughty!

And every day thereafter, moaning and growing that Madagascar (or at least Tana) was not beautiful, that everyone is poor here, that the people here wear dirty clothes and have no shoes, that there was too much dust everywhere, that she missed her old house, her old friends and her old city.

My daughter was suffering from culture shock.

Yep, I should have told her more about the poverty and misery before we arrived. I think she has only just recently forgiven me for this error in judgment. The next move, I'll be sure to prepare her a little better for the shocking reality of the third world (not that I'll need to now that we are here).