road to madagascar

since we already decided to travel madagascar next month, it's only wise to start planning. gosh i'm excited. i read this list about '40 life instructions', and one of it states 'go travel to places you've never been before once a year'. i like this list i have it pasted at my work cubicle wall. although the writer of that list better not know that i've made my first trips to LA and Vegas already this year.

frankly, i wasn't even sure where madagascar is. my memory of madagascar (apart from of course, the animation movie), was this piece of madagascar national stamp i had when i was small. it was of a female lion, or was it a panther? well, place of wild animals was the impression i had of this country.

so when my friend mentioned there's ticket promotion, and apparently this is very rare, i got excited. i mean, it's madagascar. in africa. who needs to go korea, or taiwan, or australia, when like 90% of the ppl i know already been there? those are well-known places. hardly surprising, right? i'm sure there are lots of walking dictionaries around when coming to these kind of places.

africa on the other hand, is really foreign. i don't even know what they eat (if they ever eat at all). in what kind of places do they stay? how's their way of life? those sorts of thing could be really enlightening to find out. that's what travelling is supposed to be all about, right?

however, having known little could be a disadvantage. is it safe? (ok this was the first thing i checked. wouldn't want to come in the middle of raging war, would i? ok so the government is apparently stable since 2002 power struggle ended. check!) i figured i should do some poking outs, finding out facts and tips about this far far away land.

i found this introduction from bbc webpage.

"madagascar is the world's fourth biggest island after greenland, new guinea and borneo, lies in the indian ocean off the coast of mozambique. because of its isolation, most of its mammals, half its birds, and most of its plants exist nowhere else on earth"

ok this sounds cool! i know this place is famous for 'lemur', but i have no idea how this lemur even look like. that cat-like creature in the animation? wait, or was that in ice age? i don't know.

i guess i have to see it for myself.


...ed