Ganesha Chaturthi

Ganesha Chaturthi is a Hindu festival celebrating the birthday of the Lord Ganesha (also spelled Ganesh), the elephant-headed son of Shiva and Parvati. Ganesha is widely revered as the Remover of Obstacles. To celebrate Ganesha, communities come together to make offerings of fruit and money to the deity and pray that he will remove obstacles in their lives for the upcoming year. I was able to observe and participate in this celebration. On Sunday night, I went to a friend of a friend's home where about 80 friends and family members had gathered to eat and pray. In the main room was an alter with a large statue of Ganesha. As people arrived, they took off their
shoes, entered the room and waited to give their offerings of fruit and prayers to Ganesha. In return for your offering, you receive some fruit back. The room smelled heavily of incense and sweetness with a touch of coconut. After our prayers were offered, we sat down outside in plastic lawn chairs set up in rows facing a stage where a dozen or so men and women sat singing prayers and playing a harmonium, various bells and drums. The tunes were rhythmic and slightly somber but people swayed and sang along creating a palpable spirit of positive energy. After the singing came dancing. Two men sat facing each other, drums on laps, playing both with each other and against each other to create a sensational beat. The other men and women put down their instruments and began a call-and-response sort of singing as they danced counter-clockwise around them. Not long into the dancing I was called for to come on stage and join the circular dance and song. The rhythm of the drums echoed through the floorboards to my feet making all of our movements as fluid as the songs themselves.
After dancing, we went out to the back yard to sit at a long picnic table under a tent and were served rice and Dal and all sorts of other vegetarian Indian dishes that I need to learn the
names of. Being exhausted from hiking all day, I opted out of coffee, thanked my hosts and headed home.
Monday, the celebration and prayer continues much in the same way for the morning and afternoon. In the late afternoon, the statue of Ganesha is either carried or transported on a vehicle to a body of water. Everyone follows the statue in a colorful procession. Around 5:30 pm the statues are brought into the water, dunked three times and on the third time fully sunk where they are left to melt back into the earth. As the statue sinks last prayers are sung out as this is the moment when Ganesha is listening to all of the prayers so that he can help to remove obstacles in this coming year. I watched from a beach in Flic en Flac where multiple processions had met up to make a great big crowd. The statues were lined on wooden tables and were brought one by one into the ocean. By 6:30 all of the statues had been put in the sea and the festival was officially over. The beach, which only an hour before had been filled with colorful saris, magenta paint, flowers, candles, fruit and beautifully decorated statues, was dark and quite but the feeling of prayer and celebration remained and a cheshire cat moon smiled down.

la randonnée

Hiking Piton de la Petite Riviere Noire (Little Black River Mountain) - 828 meters, the highest point in Mauritius

Through friends of friends I found a group of Mauritians who organize hikes around the island a few times a month. The word "organize" should be used loosely here because I'm not sure putting 60 people on a bus, bringing them to a remote area, taking them on a 14 km hike and then leaving with whoever ends up back on the bus is the most organized outing. And, while playing with the English language, I think I must also attempt to redefine the word "hike" in a way which more appropriately describes my experience. Apparently what I know as hiking, is, in Mauritius, more like a walk or even a stroll through the outdoors. The hike began on a large, well cleared path, but after hopping over a small river, we took a detour directly into the forest. The hike took us scrambling up some small rock faces and through dense branches. It felt a
bit as if the forest was a kindergarten bully, attempting to trip and scratch me while pulling my hair (and probably laughing at me behind my back). After a few hours of battling the forest, we stopped in a clearing overlooking the valley of hills for lunch. We had some food, chatted, got rained on a bit and continued back into the forest which had gained a new and exciting element - mud! The same branches that were still threatening to permanently change my ability to see became handles on either side of a path of thick, oozing mud. The whole thing was pretty hilarious. The very last push to the top was the densest part of the forest. But just when I was having a hard time believing anyone had actually been down this "path" before, we reached a small summit and a torn white flag on a stick announcing we had made it to the top of the island. And the view was amazing. I'm not sure these pictures do it justice, but I hope they'll give you an idea.






This was were the path became quite steep. We assumed we were at the top which is funny looking back on it.







The view from the top.



























There are a few different groups of people that do this sort of hiking around the island, so expect more stories like this!

I live in Paradise

As my classes seem to eternally be starting "next week," I've been spending my weekends at the beach home of my host Rotarian, Jean Yves and his family. Last weekend the weather was perfect. Saturday friends and family went to a beach on a small island off the coast called Ile aux Cerf. The island is a public beach that can only be visited by boat. The green mountains of Mauritius made the perfect backdrop to the soft white sand and the aqua water (which was not, as some of them believed, cold). The channel of water shown here was about waist deep, making it the perfect stroll through paradise.
Sunday we took the De Fleuriot's boat out and ended up in a small bay where we all took turns water skiing and wake boarding. I attempted to water ski for the first time since the age of 10 and, although I was incredibly sore the next day, I managed not to embarrass myself too much.

Here is the beach on the bay we were skiing. The helipad is for wealthy people coming to the hotel located to the right of the trees.


Jean Yves and Alexandre getting the boat ready.

While this is not the best picture of the series, it's better than most of the rest in which I look somewhere between seriously concerned and slightly terrified.

Mauritius - history and economy

Mauritius has a complicated history of colonization. Before 1500, the island was known to Arab traders but in 1505, it was the Portuguese who landed their ships to find a completely uninhabited land. The Portuguese, however, did not set up a colony and it is unknown how often they may have visited the island. The Dutch were the next to come, landing in 1598 but it was not until 1638 that a settlement was established. Leaving in 1710, the French took possession of the island in 1715. The French governed until 1810 when the island as captured by the British. The British ruled Mauritius until 1968 when on the 12 March it became an independent nation.

The Dutch period: The Dutch were mainly interested in the timber found on the island, especially the black ebony. They were also responsible for the introduction of sugarcane, deer and other animals. Slaves were brought from Madagascar to work in the sugarcane fields.

FUN FACT: Mauritius is the only known place of the now extinct Dodo bird. The bird, who lived happily on the island before humans arrived, did not know to be fearful of the new inhabitants. Thus they did not flee the clubs of the Dutch. Deemed the Dodo bird and the easiest prey known to man, the birds were quickly clubbed to extinction by 1688.

Legend has it that the Dutch were driven off the island in 1710 by the rats they had themselves accidentally introduced.

The French period: So as to avoid any misunderstanding, the French renamed the island Isle de France in 1715 but it was not until seven years later that the French East India Company actually occupied the island. A motley crew of company officials, settlers and slaves from Madagascar, Mozambique and west Africa, along with Swiss mercenaries and pirates landed in 1721. Women were rounded up on the waterfronts of St Malo and Bordeaux and shipped over to help expand the population. Betrand-Francois Mahe de Labouronnais was appointed governor in 1735 and quickly developed Port Louis into the most important port in the Mascarenes. The cultivation of sugarcane and other crops was encouraged. In 1767, Pierre Poivre became administrator and introduced pepper, nutmeg, cloves and other spices to the island helping to further develop the colony as an agricultural and trading center.

In 1810, the British attacked Isle de France by landing 11,500 troops the the North of the island. Their intention was to neutralise the island so that it would no longer be used as a base for French attacks on British vessels bound for India. Meeting little resistance, the British troops march on the capital and the French surrendered. The British renamed the island Mauritius.

The British period: The first British Governor, Sir Robert Farquhar, encouraged the cultivation of sugarcane because it was the only money-making crop able to withstand cyclones. The attempts by the British government to abolish slavery in Mauritius were met with resistance from the planters who relied on slave labor to produce the sugar, but slavery was eventually abolished in 1835.

Indian migrants had been in Mauritius since 1736 but in 1835, the planters began to heavily recruit Indian workers to replace the labor lost to them by emancipation. With a significant population, Indian workers began to petition the British Government to improve labor conditions. Political reforms were passes in 1886 but the Indian population remained excluded. In 1901, Mahatma Gandhi had a brief stay in Mauritius which resulted in an Indian lawyer, Manillal Doctor, being sent to Port Louis to help organize the Indian laborers.

Party politics followed the constitutional reforms of 1886. World War I brought suffering to the island with drastic cuts in shipping causing food shortages and price increases, but World War II brought infrastructural development. In 1968, Mauritius became an independent country led by Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam.

CLIMATE: Lying within the tropics in the Indian ocean, Mauritius has a tropical maritime climate.

AGRICULTURE: Sugar cultivation remains the main component of the agricultural sector but faced with competition from other countries, reforms have caused a decrease in land used for sugarcane and fewer workers employed in the industry.

FISHING: Apart from the main islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues, there are a number of coral islands and fishing banks where fishing activities take place.

INDUSTRY: The manufacturing industries are mostly tactile and clothing. The manufacturing industries are important for the diversification of the economy away from sugar. Because of competition abroad, Mauritian manufacturing industries are attempting to cater toward the production of higher quality products.

TOURISM: The importance of tourism to the economy cannot be overstated. Some coastal villages are becoming tourist resorts; the beaches being lined with one high-end resort hotel after another.

TRADE: Mauritius' main trading partners include France, Britain, India, Australia, South Africa, Germany and China. The main imports are manufactured goods, machinery, transport equipment, dairy products, wheat, rice, textile fibers, mineral fuel and food items. The main exports are sugar, apparel and clothing, optical goods, watches and clocks, toys, sporting goods, jewellery, pearls and precious stones.

Arrival

I have arrived safe and sound in Mauritius after almost 2 days of travel (From New York, through Dubai, to Mauritius)

I am living in an apartment in Quatre Bornes which is located in central Mauritius. My apartment is a few streets up from the main road which is lined with small shops and restaurants. There is a wonderful market in the center of the city which changes from a fruit and vegetable market to a clothing and goods market depending on the day.

The bus station is conveniently located and the various bus routes can take you almost anywhere on the island.

The University of Mauritius is located in Reduit (near Moka on the map). Upon arrival, I discovered that the program I had been accepted into, MSc Applied Economics, is not going to run due to lack of enrollment. I've chosen instead to do an MSc Social Development which will also focus on development but with less of an economics approach. After getting my new coursework approved, I had to register, which turned out to be a bit of a hassle. But, after many hours at the bank and the university and a little help from my parents (thank you!), I was able to pay my tuition and complete the registration process. My classes being next week, although I'm still not sure of the professors or the locations - oh well!

By far the best part of my first week here has been my host Rotarian, Jean Yves de Fleuriot and his family - wife, Martine and two sons, Alexandre and Guillaume. They have all been incredibly welcoming and hospitable from the moment I arrived. I spent the weekend with them at their beach house in Post Lafayette, in the north-east of the island. I cannot thank them enough for their generosity.

Also incredibly welcoming, is m host Rotary club, the Rotary club of Curepipe (see map above). Although a bit exhausted and completely jet-lagged, I attended their meeting the night of my arrival. They have many ideas about community service projects we can work on together as well as tons of suggestions for people I should meet and places I should go. I know they will all be endlessly helpful to me while I am here.