The Wonder List with Bill Weir (2015) s03e02 Episode Script
Madagascar: The Richest Poor Country in the World
1
[dramatic music]
[light music]
♪
[engine revving]
- I've filled a few passports
over the years,
followed more than a few
dusty roads to the end.
♪
And for some reason, this is
the place that sticks
in my favorite daydreams
and haunts my worst nightmare.
[men chanting
in native language]
Maybe it's the creatures,
exotic in every way.
[chanting continues]
Maybe it's the people with a
bloodline unlike any other.
[engine revving]
[chanting continues]
Or maybe it's the landscapes
they share,
the kind found nowhere else.
[chanting continues]
This is Madagascar.
[chanting continues]
And it is most definitely not
a cartoon.
[chanting continues]
It is a real-life drama
with two possible endings
[chanting continues]
Survival
[chanting continues]
Or extinction.
My name is Bill Weir,
and I'm a storyteller.
I've reported
from all over the world,
and I have seen so much chang.
[upbeat rock music]
So I made a list
of the most wonderful places
to explore
right before they change
forever.
♪
This is "The Wonder List."
[percussive music]
♪
Welcome to the strangest plae
in the world,
proof that when it comes to
life on our big blue marble,
geography is destiny.
See, this is what the Earth
looked like
100 million years ago,
when Madagascar was part
of Africa.
But then the earth moved,
creating an island
about the size of Texas
1,700 miles out
in the Indian Ocean.
And on this isolated wonderlad
cut off from the continents,
life evolved in the most
interesting ways.
[engine revving]
Isn't this the coolest thing
you've ever seen?
Look at this.
It's the Baobab Alley.
Got to be one of the most
surreal forests
anywhere in the world,
one of my favorite spots.
I came here years ago.
I said, "I'm going back.
I'm riding a motorcycle
through the Baobab."
And it's a good place to start,
because this tree
is a great representation
of how special
Madagascar is in the world.
Most of the species
of the Baobab exist only here.
The rest of the world
has monkeys; they have lemurs.
The rest of the world
has lions and tigers and bears.
They have fossa.
The rest of the world has geckos
and lizards.
Kids here have pet chameleon.
Is that right? Chameleon?
- Chameleon.
- Thank you; this my French
professor over her.
80% of the life-forms
in Madagascar exist
nowhere else on the planet.
They have such rich ecological
treasures in this place,
but as you can see
at the same time,
it is one of the poorest
countries in the world.
So here's the challenge.
How do you protect what's let
of the natural forests,
of the lemurs and the chamelen
and the Baobab
and lift these folks out of
crushing poverty
at the same time?
[horns honking]
- [speaking in native language]
[horns honking]
- To search for clues,
we must wade into
an African-Asian melting pot,
20 million descendants of
warriors, rulers, and slaves,
tribes still divided
by skin color, bloodline,
and class.
This was a French colony
for about 60 years.
But after declaring
independence in 1960,
there have been coups
and assassinations,
despotic dictators,
and failed democracy.
While one crisis after anothr
slashed and burned
the economy,
desperate people slashed
and burned the vast majority
of Madagascar's forests,
which is sobering,
because while it may look lie
any old jungle
[lemurs howling]
[laughs]
This is the only place
on the planet
where you can still hear thi.
[lemurs howling]
It's like a car alarm.
- It's a siren going off,
basically, yes.
- My goodness.
This is Rainer,
a German biologist,
who came to study as a young
man and fell in love,
with the country and his wif,
and never left.
And these are indri,
some of the world's biggest
lemurs.
[lemurs howling]
Is that a call and response?
- Yeah, that was one group's
territorial call.
So usually all the individuals
in the group
would join in calling,
and then the neighboring group
would respond
to that.
- That's so cool.
[percussive music]
The locals call them Babakoto
after an ancient story
about a boy named Koto,
who lost his father
to an accident in the forest
and was nursed by lemurs.
- And as soon as the boy
was healthy again,
the indri brought him back
to the village.
- [laughs]
- And so the villagers said,
"Well, it's very sad that your
father died,
"but you actually have a new
father now,
which is the indri,"
so that became the father
of Koto, Babakoto.
- Babakoto.
[percussive music]
♪
That's the Madagascar version
of "Tarzan."
[laughter]
- More or less, yeah, yeah.
- Raised by the lemurs.
[laughter]
♪
Because they eat such a wide
variety of plants,
indri cannot survive captivit.
You will never see one
in a zoo.
So to help lemur lovers
get a closer look,
Regis spent months earning te
trust of this family.
And that is no easy task
in a land where
subsistence hunting is commo.
And when you go home,
do they eat lemur?
- [speaking native language]
- "There aren't any lemurs let
near my home," he says.
"They have been hunted out,
and the forest is gone."
[percussive music]
♪
So what's the solution?
Well, Rainer has some ideas.
and they involve showing off
some more fabulous creatures..
after dark.
♪
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[crickets chirping]
- About 85% of the people
on this planet
have access to electricity.
In Madagascar,
it is less than 15%.
Not many advantages come with
being one of the
darkest places on Earth,
but for those who like to gae
at stars
and nocturnal critters,
there is no place better.
- [speaking native language]
- [speaking native language]
- Oh, okay. Here you go.
- Oh, yeah.
[laughs]
I was just sleeping,
and half the world showed up.
But Junot and Davinia aren't
here for fun.
They are doing actual scienc,
capturing amphibians
to test for chytrid,
a disease that is wiping out
frogs around the world,
but for some reason, not her.
[both speaking native language]
- Chytrid has also arrived
in Madagascar.
But for some reason, we don't
observe any mass mortalities
of amphibians.
So we don't know why that is.
- Are there theories that the
secret to saving
the rest of the planet's fros
are locked in this guy someho?
- Maybe.
- No telling what mysteries ae
hidden here
just waiting to be unlocked.
Consider that half of the
world's chameleons
come from Madagascar, and thy
just discovered 11 new specie,
all equipped with the skills f
a mutant superhero
Tickling.
[laughs]
That assassin's tongue,
spring-loaded,
faster than a blink
If you leave him here,
he will then adapt the color
of my love handles.
The ability to change color
to suit their mood
or their movements to
disappear
I love it.
- Yeah.
- Tentative.
- Well, that'sthat's also a
camouflage,
because it actually mimics
branches
like moving in the wind.
- Moving in the wind.
Really?
Oh, that's brilliant.
And maybe best of all,
the ability to see
everywhere at once.
- Even a Malagasy proverb
referring to those eyes,
so you should behave like a
chameleon in life,
like, always one eye to the past
and one eye to the future.
- Ahh, wise.
As far as these little dudes
are concerned,
past and future are written
in the trees,
as their habitat gets smaller
and smaller.
So that is the natural rain
forest on top of the hill?
- Yeah, that's one of those
fragments that remain now,
because as you can see,
it's like more of those
fragments all around.
- Right.
- And if you imagine that this
was all, like, continuous rain
forest formerly.
- And this is the result of
slash and burn.
[gentle guitar music]
♪
Around here, people turn the
forest into charcoal
to burn or sell.
In low wetlands, they cut don
the trees to grow rice,
and in the rain forest, timbr
mafias poach precious rosewod
to fill China's demand for
expensive furniture.
[faint laughter]
[sighs]
It's so quiet here, you can hear
children's laughter
from that other valley in the
wind.
So this is a nursery down here
where they growing
replacement trees for what's
been slashed and burned.
And when you look around, you
realize
whole lot of slash and burned
part,
very little nursery.
These are your babies.
- Over the years, we have
probably planted,
wow, let's say 1,500 hectares
or so.
- Wow.
- So that's 1,500,000 trees.
So that'sthat's quite a lot,
but then still,
1,500 hectares in nothing
compared to
the extent of the forest that,
like
- Has been damaged.
- Has been damaged, exactly.
- And to fight the devastatin
of precious wetlands
- [laughs]
- [speaks in native language]
- His secret weapons
are female entrepreneurs.
How does a family in Madagascar
work?
Is the man in charge
or is the woman in charge?
- Mm.
- [laughs]
[laughter]
- [speaking in native language]
[laughter]
- Usually, the man is in charge,
but the woman manages the money.
- Ahh.
And there is not much to
manage.
Like so much of the nation,
they are subsistence farmers.
They eat what they grow
with little left over to sel.
These are families that survie
on less than $2 a day.
Yeah, can I see this?
So imagine the impact of
selling a handicraft
to tourists for $10.
Oh, this is cool.
By turning their weaving skils
into an income stream,
Rainer hopes they'll stop ther
husbands from cutting down
all their raw materials.
- They can actually prevent te
men
from converting that part
into rice fields as well,
because they earn much more
money than the men do
from their handicraft.
[light music]
- I leave here with mixed
emotions
♪
Overwhelmed by the size of
their need
but inspired by this little
business
as new and fragile as the
seedlings in that nursery
but just as hopeful.
♪
And while some tackle this
country's problem
with science and economics,
it's telling that our next
guide uses a mixture of sciene
and spirits.
- Ahh.
Yep, turns out that to
understand Madagascar,
we have to understand the
behavior of ghosts.
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
- [speaking in native language]
- It is market day in the
village,
my last chance to soak up a
little day in the life
of northern Madagascar,
where people are friendly,
or shy,
or both,
except for the angry man
with a stick.
- Whoa, whoa, whoa.
- And just when I think we're
about to be shut down,
in swoops a savior.
- [speaking in native language]
- Was he trying to shake us
down?
[light music]
- In this dysfunctional plac,
not many are willing to stand
up to authority.
But Philippe is a prince.
I love your hat.
Do you know what your hat
means?
- No.
- Do you know what Milwaukee is?
- Uh-uh.
- It's a city.
- Really?
- In the United States,
where I was born.
Anybody wearing a Milwaukee
hat in Madagascar
is very cool by me.
[laughter]
His dad was a Frenchman, who
disappeared when he was born,
his mom a Malagasy tribal
queen.
- Vazaha, yeah.
- Yes.
- He couldn't afford school,
but he soaked up all he could
from visiting scientists
studying his home forest.
- Yeah.
[laughs]
- Right.
- Really? They can see that far?
- Yeah, yeah.
[light guitar music]
- He learned biology from
Americans,
English from a Canadian
anthropologist.
In return, he taught them how
to find the tiniest chameleon.
- They're so delicate.
Look at those little, tiny,
tiny feet.
He taught them the movements
of the mongoose
- Oh, yeah.
- Yeah.
- Wow, that's a beautiful tail.
And where to find the
friendliest brown lemurs.
[laughs]
What's going on?
What's happening?
Oh, now there's two.
Oh, hello.
Aren't you
[sniffing]
Ahh, I love the smell of fresh
lemur in the morning.
[laughs]
Hey.
- Yeah, what's going on?
[light guitar music]
♪
[light mystical music]
♪
- Wow, here we go.
We're in it.
- Oh, wow.
♪
It's massive.
Look at that.
♪
Millions of years ago,
this was all corral reef,
until Madagascar heaved out f
the sea.
Time, wind, and water then tok
over,
carving the karst into steak
knife and saw blade
and needlepoint canyons.
Whoa, look at that.
Are you kidding me?
Talk about a death trap.
The tribes who ran barefoot
through this
called it "tsingy,"
which means "tiptoe."
[camera shutter clicks]
Everything here wants to poke
you.
- Yeah.
- [laughs]
The rocks, the plants
But while this is a jagged,
angry place for human beings,
it turns out to be a wonderful
haven
for all other kinds of life.
You see, the tsingy is like a
Manhattan apartment building
with different tenants at
different levels.
Up top, you've got your lemurs
and your lizards frolicking
in the sun, and then down in the
middle regions,
you can find bats and parrots,
and then way down there,
where it's humid and lush,
there are orchids and insects
the size of your fist.
[light mystical music]
♪
Anywhere else in the world,
this would be a gold mine of
tourism, but we see just a
handful of people
the entire day.
And the only bit of
infrastructure to hold us
is this scary bridge
built not by the government
but local guides,
the same guides who do their
best to protect
the delicate canyon known as
Tsingy Rouge.
I've never seen anything like
this before.
♪
Yeah, it's like being in
inside a giant candle
or a pastry or something.
♪
But this is just an interestig
corner of the backyard
for the local kids.
I'm Batman.
[laughter]
Yeah, close.
Yeah, you got it.
According to Philippe, some f
the money from admittance fes
pays for books and a teacher,
making them luckier than mos.
Because many school around te
country are cutting back
to half days for lack of
funding.
It seems like the children of
Madagascar need education
more than anything, right?
- Yeah, yeah.
- They need it to balance the
kind of ancient thinking
that makes this waterfall
sacred.
- I see.
- Make a prayer here.
- Right.
Traditional belief is common
and powerful in Madagascar.
And while science and religin
don't normally mix,
Philippe uses whatever he can
to keep his neighbors
from cutting the forest.
You're trying to spread
spiritual belief
- Yeah, yeah.
- More fadi, more tradition
to keep people away from
destroying places like this.
Interesting.
"Fadi" is a set of ancient
taboos,
and he uses them to remind
neighbors not to cut the Baobab
or eat the lemur, because the
spirits of their grandparents
might live inside them.
- Right.
A foot in each world.
- Yes, yeah.
- He tells me that this
generation has been raised
with much more respect for
ghosts than the government.
Are you hopeful that this
president will be better
than the last?
[horns honking]
- Poverty breeds corruption,
and vice versa,
a vicious cycle,
but what would Madagascar lok
like with real wealth?
Next stop, the richest corner
of the country.
[percussive music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[light piano music]
♪
- What's amazing about our
ever-crowded world
is that you don't have to
travel between distant natios
to see the real wealth gap
♪
Either in America or
Madagascar,
where heaven is just a quick
boat ride to Nosy Be,
"big island," full of French
and Italian resorts.
It is the richest spot in the
poorest of countries
♪
Thanks to a mixture of forein
investment
and tropical splendor
♪
Water that holds endless
delight
for Europeans in flippers
♪
And survival for everyone els.
Can you imagine three
days on that ship?
- Sleep on the islands.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Yeah.
- M'Madi runs fishing and
snorkeling trips for tourists
out of the resorts.
See, what's the difference
between you and them?
Why aren't you doing
that for a living?
- I see, yeah.
- Yeah.
- He's modest.
- [speaking in native language]
- The real reason is that he
speaks English and Italian.
His travel agent mom made him
get an education.
- Does anybody have children?
- Yeah.
- You all have children?
- Mm-hmm.
- What do you hope they are
when they grow up?
Do you hope they're fishermen
or something else?
- Are people a little bit
richer now that tourism
has come,
or do you feel the same?
- [speaking native language]
- Yeah, they canthey
have the money now.
- You have a little more money.
- Yeah, yeah.
[light bouncy music]
♪
- In their own ways, M'Madi ad
the fishermen are harvesting
the tourist-friendly waves.
♪
While high on a hilltop, I met
a woman who profits
from the colors in the sky.
I am fascinated that your
backyard
is the most unbelievable view in
Madagascar.
Is that why you picked this
neighborhood?
- [speaking in native language]
- Absolutely, yes, because of
the view,
and because of the tourists,
so I can sell my goods here.
- Ahh.
- [giggles]
- Linda first came here ten
years ago,
and while her friends saw
sunset-ogling crowds,
she saw customers.
So she built a store and a hoe
right here
and makes almost enough to sed
all three kids to school
and occasionally head to markt
to splurge on meat for dinne.
When was it butchered?
- [speaking in native language]
- [speaking in native language]
- This morning.
- This morning.
- It's very fresh, yeah.
- Very fresh, okay.
- [speaking in native language]
- [speaking in native language]
- It's about $1.20.
- Yeah.
Ange is our translator on ths
journey,
and through her I learn thata
single cut of beef
costs two or three days' pay.
- And, you know, the things
here they are buying
day-to-day,
so this is one of for today,
and they will come back again
tomorrow.
- So people shop day-to-day.
- Yes, yeah, 'cause they don't
have lots of money.
- So let me ask you, I see women
around with
something on their face.
Is that a traditional cosmeti,
or what is that?
- Yeah, it'sit's
it's [speaks indistinctly],
and it's, like, a mask,
and the put it for a week or so,
and yeah, they're getting white,
so white means you are pretty.
- You mean it's to lighten their
skin.
- Yes, yeah, yeah.
- Really?
[light music]
♪
Through Western eyes, this my
all seem so primitive.
But compared to the rest of
Madagascar,
this is a vibrant middle-clas
town,
and their economic engine
is tourism.
What's doeswhat does tourism
mean to you?
- But here's the catch.
Tourists only come if the
country is stable.
♪
So the fate of these folks
rests largely in the hands
of the men running this
country,
which seems like a good reasn
to go see the man in charge.
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[light music]
- This earth is rich.
The people are not.
This ground is full of nickel
and iron and gemstones.
The people who walk above it
have virtually nothing.
♪
Ask why this is, and most wil
blame politics
and human nature.
- Corruption, yeah.
- Ndranto is a
forester-turned-activist,
and in an age of censorship
and political turmoil,
he takes a risk by speaking
out.
- Why is that?
- Pull them down if someone
succeeds, yeah.
- Nanie runs the efforts
of the World Wildlife Fund here
and has similar frustrations.
- It is a rich country with lots
of resources,
but the richness doesn't
translate into wealth
for the people, and it is
- Who's to blame for that?
- I think it's governess in
general,
the successive governments, but
then we are also supposed to be
a democracy, so somewhere,
I mean, even the people
have some part of responsibility
in that.
- Yeah, how is this
administration
compared to the last few?
- [laughs]
- Her laugh is loaded,
and it's tough to explain.
You see, when I first came hee
a decade ago,
I came to tell the hopeful
story of a leader named
Marc Ravalomanana.
He went from rags to riches
selling milk and yogurt
and then became president wih
vows to fight against
corruption and for the
environment.
Animals lovers rejoiced,
but when people caught wind
of his plan to buy a $60
million jet from the family
of Walt Disney, they got angr.
The protests were whipped toa
froth by a former radio deejy
named Andry Rajoelina,
who convinced the military to
throw out the yogurt guy
and put him in power.
- We went through a five-year
political crisis
starting in 2009.
- Yep.
- And we have a government who
was not necessarily ready
prepared toto lead.
- After the coup, the already
bad economy got worse.
Foreign aid investment dried p
for five long years.
But in 2014 Madagascar finaly
held an election,
and just over 50% of the vots
went to this man.
Mr. President, a pleasure to
meet you.
- It's a pleasure.
Welcome.
- His name is Hery
Rajaonarimampianina.
And he is the deejay's former
finance minister.
I've been all over your country.
- Yeah.
- For the past ten days or so.
- Mm-hmm.
- You have a beautiful land
full of beautiful people.
But I'm worried about their
future.
- Yeah.
- Are you worried
about their future?
- [speaking in native language]
- You're the man to make the
change.
Okay.
After seeing the last few
presidents enrich themselves
while everything in the country
for the common man didn't seem
to change, why should they
believe you're different?
Why do you think they chose you?
- He describes an ambitious
plan to revolutionize
the nation's energy grid with
wind, solar,
and hydroelectric dams.
How will you pay for these
projects?
- I've seen projections that
there may be 40 million people
in Madagascar by the middle of
this century.
The population will have
doubled.
And at the current rate, all the
forests will be gone.
What do you think we'll see in
the year 2050?
- But his critics say they hae
heard such promises
many times before.
- Law enforcement.
- Why? Because of corruption?
They look the
other way?
- Corruption.
- They're not listening to you.
- I'm meeting with the
president in a
few hours.
- Yeah, yeah.
- What should I ask him?
What would you ask him if you
could sit down
with him?
- Is there a timber mafia in
Madagascar?
- Everyone I talk to says
everyone knows who they are.
If everyone knows who these
people are,
why not just go arrest them?
- How do you sleep at night?
I mean, how do you remain
optimistic?
- I try.
[laughs]
- You know, you have this
seemingly impossible job,
and what's the answer?
- If you work at the local
level,
you can really change things.
The communities are really
hungry for better lives,
for schools for their children,
better health,
more revenues, but they also
deeply understand
that they cannot achieve all
that
without a good and healthy
forest to get the woods
and reefs to get the fish.
- Do you hope a leader will
rise,
someone who's capable?
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[somber music]
♪
- Riding through the Baobabs,
a plume of smoke
catches my eye.
I follow it through the thors
to a lovely little family
turning trees into charcoal,
because what choice do they
have?
I came looking for physical
signs of hope,
and to be honest, at times,
the search was grim.
But I did find hope in guys
like Regis.
How do you convince a fellow
Malagasy
that that indri, that lemur is
more valuable in the tree
than in the pot
when they're just trying to feed
their families?
- Yeah
[speaking native language]
- I tell them, "You need the
forest, because you are farmers.
"If the forest is gone,
"there won't be any rain
for your fields.
"Lemurs disperse seeds, so you
need the lemurs as well
to protect the forest."
People are recognizing this,
and I know people who have
stopped slash-and-burn
agriculture because of it.
[light piano music]
♪
[lemurs howling]
Regis and the indri forest,
Philippe and the Tsingy
Rouge
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The women learning a
sustainable business
one handicraft at a time.
- [speaking in native language]
- They are all sort of a
neighborhood watch
looking out for the wild thins
in the absence of a functionl
society.
In the middle of this century,
2050,
my kid will be my age.
If she comes here, what will she
see?
- Well, I suspect that
in the areas
like this
where we are at the moment,
there will still be forest left.
But then in other areas where no
tourists go,
I think there won't be any
forest there.
[light music]
We can save parts of
Madagascar,
but I am pretty sure that we
can't save everything.
♪
- After a journey like this
one,
you bring home a lot of mentl
souvenirs
♪
A new appreciation for roads
that are paved,
fields that are lush,
a society that works.
I went to this place called Nosy
Be,
and I met this woman, this mom,
and she makes these.
♪
You bring back fresh remindes
of our shared humanity
♪
And how for so many kids,
geography is destiny.
And you wonder, how much plant
will be left for them
if the only renewable resoure
is hope?
♪
[dramatic music]
[light music]
♪
[engine revving]
- I've filled a few passports
over the years,
followed more than a few
dusty roads to the end.
♪
And for some reason, this is
the place that sticks
in my favorite daydreams
and haunts my worst nightmare.
[men chanting
in native language]
Maybe it's the creatures,
exotic in every way.
[chanting continues]
Maybe it's the people with a
bloodline unlike any other.
[engine revving]
[chanting continues]
Or maybe it's the landscapes
they share,
the kind found nowhere else.
[chanting continues]
This is Madagascar.
[chanting continues]
And it is most definitely not
a cartoon.
[chanting continues]
It is a real-life drama
with two possible endings
[chanting continues]
Survival
[chanting continues]
Or extinction.
My name is Bill Weir,
and I'm a storyteller.
I've reported
from all over the world,
and I have seen so much chang.
[upbeat rock music]
So I made a list
of the most wonderful places
to explore
right before they change
forever.
♪
This is "The Wonder List."
[percussive music]
♪
Welcome to the strangest plae
in the world,
proof that when it comes to
life on our big blue marble,
geography is destiny.
See, this is what the Earth
looked like
100 million years ago,
when Madagascar was part
of Africa.
But then the earth moved,
creating an island
about the size of Texas
1,700 miles out
in the Indian Ocean.
And on this isolated wonderlad
cut off from the continents,
life evolved in the most
interesting ways.
[engine revving]
Isn't this the coolest thing
you've ever seen?
Look at this.
It's the Baobab Alley.
Got to be one of the most
surreal forests
anywhere in the world,
one of my favorite spots.
I came here years ago.
I said, "I'm going back.
I'm riding a motorcycle
through the Baobab."
And it's a good place to start,
because this tree
is a great representation
of how special
Madagascar is in the world.
Most of the species
of the Baobab exist only here.
The rest of the world
has monkeys; they have lemurs.
The rest of the world
has lions and tigers and bears.
They have fossa.
The rest of the world has geckos
and lizards.
Kids here have pet chameleon.
Is that right? Chameleon?
- Chameleon.
- Thank you; this my French
professor over her.
80% of the life-forms
in Madagascar exist
nowhere else on the planet.
They have such rich ecological
treasures in this place,
but as you can see
at the same time,
it is one of the poorest
countries in the world.
So here's the challenge.
How do you protect what's let
of the natural forests,
of the lemurs and the chamelen
and the Baobab
and lift these folks out of
crushing poverty
at the same time?
[horns honking]
- [speaking in native language]
[horns honking]
- To search for clues,
we must wade into
an African-Asian melting pot,
20 million descendants of
warriors, rulers, and slaves,
tribes still divided
by skin color, bloodline,
and class.
This was a French colony
for about 60 years.
But after declaring
independence in 1960,
there have been coups
and assassinations,
despotic dictators,
and failed democracy.
While one crisis after anothr
slashed and burned
the economy,
desperate people slashed
and burned the vast majority
of Madagascar's forests,
which is sobering,
because while it may look lie
any old jungle
[lemurs howling]
[laughs]
This is the only place
on the planet
where you can still hear thi.
[lemurs howling]
It's like a car alarm.
- It's a siren going off,
basically, yes.
- My goodness.
This is Rainer,
a German biologist,
who came to study as a young
man and fell in love,
with the country and his wif,
and never left.
And these are indri,
some of the world's biggest
lemurs.
[lemurs howling]
Is that a call and response?
- Yeah, that was one group's
territorial call.
So usually all the individuals
in the group
would join in calling,
and then the neighboring group
would respond
to that.
- That's so cool.
[percussive music]
The locals call them Babakoto
after an ancient story
about a boy named Koto,
who lost his father
to an accident in the forest
and was nursed by lemurs.
- And as soon as the boy
was healthy again,
the indri brought him back
to the village.
- [laughs]
- And so the villagers said,
"Well, it's very sad that your
father died,
"but you actually have a new
father now,
which is the indri,"
so that became the father
of Koto, Babakoto.
- Babakoto.
[percussive music]
♪
That's the Madagascar version
of "Tarzan."
[laughter]
- More or less, yeah, yeah.
- Raised by the lemurs.
[laughter]
♪
Because they eat such a wide
variety of plants,
indri cannot survive captivit.
You will never see one
in a zoo.
So to help lemur lovers
get a closer look,
Regis spent months earning te
trust of this family.
And that is no easy task
in a land where
subsistence hunting is commo.
And when you go home,
do they eat lemur?
- [speaking native language]
- "There aren't any lemurs let
near my home," he says.
"They have been hunted out,
and the forest is gone."
[percussive music]
♪
So what's the solution?
Well, Rainer has some ideas.
and they involve showing off
some more fabulous creatures..
after dark.
♪
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[crickets chirping]
- About 85% of the people
on this planet
have access to electricity.
In Madagascar,
it is less than 15%.
Not many advantages come with
being one of the
darkest places on Earth,
but for those who like to gae
at stars
and nocturnal critters,
there is no place better.
- [speaking native language]
- [speaking native language]
- Oh, okay. Here you go.
- Oh, yeah.
[laughs]
I was just sleeping,
and half the world showed up.
But Junot and Davinia aren't
here for fun.
They are doing actual scienc,
capturing amphibians
to test for chytrid,
a disease that is wiping out
frogs around the world,
but for some reason, not her.
[both speaking native language]
- Chytrid has also arrived
in Madagascar.
But for some reason, we don't
observe any mass mortalities
of amphibians.
So we don't know why that is.
- Are there theories that the
secret to saving
the rest of the planet's fros
are locked in this guy someho?
- Maybe.
- No telling what mysteries ae
hidden here
just waiting to be unlocked.
Consider that half of the
world's chameleons
come from Madagascar, and thy
just discovered 11 new specie,
all equipped with the skills f
a mutant superhero
Tickling.
[laughs]
That assassin's tongue,
spring-loaded,
faster than a blink
If you leave him here,
he will then adapt the color
of my love handles.
The ability to change color
to suit their mood
or their movements to
disappear
I love it.
- Yeah.
- Tentative.
- Well, that'sthat's also a
camouflage,
because it actually mimics
branches
like moving in the wind.
- Moving in the wind.
Really?
Oh, that's brilliant.
And maybe best of all,
the ability to see
everywhere at once.
- Even a Malagasy proverb
referring to those eyes,
so you should behave like a
chameleon in life,
like, always one eye to the past
and one eye to the future.
- Ahh, wise.
As far as these little dudes
are concerned,
past and future are written
in the trees,
as their habitat gets smaller
and smaller.
So that is the natural rain
forest on top of the hill?
- Yeah, that's one of those
fragments that remain now,
because as you can see,
it's like more of those
fragments all around.
- Right.
- And if you imagine that this
was all, like, continuous rain
forest formerly.
- And this is the result of
slash and burn.
[gentle guitar music]
♪
Around here, people turn the
forest into charcoal
to burn or sell.
In low wetlands, they cut don
the trees to grow rice,
and in the rain forest, timbr
mafias poach precious rosewod
to fill China's demand for
expensive furniture.
[faint laughter]
[sighs]
It's so quiet here, you can hear
children's laughter
from that other valley in the
wind.
So this is a nursery down here
where they growing
replacement trees for what's
been slashed and burned.
And when you look around, you
realize
whole lot of slash and burned
part,
very little nursery.
These are your babies.
- Over the years, we have
probably planted,
wow, let's say 1,500 hectares
or so.
- Wow.
- So that's 1,500,000 trees.
So that'sthat's quite a lot,
but then still,
1,500 hectares in nothing
compared to
the extent of the forest that,
like
- Has been damaged.
- Has been damaged, exactly.
- And to fight the devastatin
of precious wetlands
- [laughs]
- [speaks in native language]
- His secret weapons
are female entrepreneurs.
How does a family in Madagascar
work?
Is the man in charge
or is the woman in charge?
- Mm.
- [laughs]
[laughter]
- [speaking in native language]
[laughter]
- Usually, the man is in charge,
but the woman manages the money.
- Ahh.
And there is not much to
manage.
Like so much of the nation,
they are subsistence farmers.
They eat what they grow
with little left over to sel.
These are families that survie
on less than $2 a day.
Yeah, can I see this?
So imagine the impact of
selling a handicraft
to tourists for $10.
Oh, this is cool.
By turning their weaving skils
into an income stream,
Rainer hopes they'll stop ther
husbands from cutting down
all their raw materials.
- They can actually prevent te
men
from converting that part
into rice fields as well,
because they earn much more
money than the men do
from their handicraft.
[light music]
- I leave here with mixed
emotions
♪
Overwhelmed by the size of
their need
but inspired by this little
business
as new and fragile as the
seedlings in that nursery
but just as hopeful.
♪
And while some tackle this
country's problem
with science and economics,
it's telling that our next
guide uses a mixture of sciene
and spirits.
- Ahh.
Yep, turns out that to
understand Madagascar,
we have to understand the
behavior of ghosts.
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
- [speaking in native language]
- It is market day in the
village,
my last chance to soak up a
little day in the life
of northern Madagascar,
where people are friendly,
or shy,
or both,
except for the angry man
with a stick.
- Whoa, whoa, whoa.
- And just when I think we're
about to be shut down,
in swoops a savior.
- [speaking in native language]
- Was he trying to shake us
down?
[light music]
- In this dysfunctional plac,
not many are willing to stand
up to authority.
But Philippe is a prince.
I love your hat.
Do you know what your hat
means?
- No.
- Do you know what Milwaukee is?
- Uh-uh.
- It's a city.
- Really?
- In the United States,
where I was born.
Anybody wearing a Milwaukee
hat in Madagascar
is very cool by me.
[laughter]
His dad was a Frenchman, who
disappeared when he was born,
his mom a Malagasy tribal
queen.
- Vazaha, yeah.
- Yes.
- He couldn't afford school,
but he soaked up all he could
from visiting scientists
studying his home forest.
- Yeah.
[laughs]
- Right.
- Really? They can see that far?
- Yeah, yeah.
[light guitar music]
- He learned biology from
Americans,
English from a Canadian
anthropologist.
In return, he taught them how
to find the tiniest chameleon.
- They're so delicate.
Look at those little, tiny,
tiny feet.
He taught them the movements
of the mongoose
- Oh, yeah.
- Yeah.
- Wow, that's a beautiful tail.
And where to find the
friendliest brown lemurs.
[laughs]
What's going on?
What's happening?
Oh, now there's two.
Oh, hello.
Aren't you
[sniffing]
Ahh, I love the smell of fresh
lemur in the morning.
[laughs]
Hey.
- Yeah, what's going on?
[light guitar music]
♪
[light mystical music]
♪
- Wow, here we go.
We're in it.
- Oh, wow.
♪
It's massive.
Look at that.
♪
Millions of years ago,
this was all corral reef,
until Madagascar heaved out f
the sea.
Time, wind, and water then tok
over,
carving the karst into steak
knife and saw blade
and needlepoint canyons.
Whoa, look at that.
Are you kidding me?
Talk about a death trap.
The tribes who ran barefoot
through this
called it "tsingy,"
which means "tiptoe."
[camera shutter clicks]
Everything here wants to poke
you.
- Yeah.
- [laughs]
The rocks, the plants
But while this is a jagged,
angry place for human beings,
it turns out to be a wonderful
haven
for all other kinds of life.
You see, the tsingy is like a
Manhattan apartment building
with different tenants at
different levels.
Up top, you've got your lemurs
and your lizards frolicking
in the sun, and then down in the
middle regions,
you can find bats and parrots,
and then way down there,
where it's humid and lush,
there are orchids and insects
the size of your fist.
[light mystical music]
♪
Anywhere else in the world,
this would be a gold mine of
tourism, but we see just a
handful of people
the entire day.
And the only bit of
infrastructure to hold us
is this scary bridge
built not by the government
but local guides,
the same guides who do their
best to protect
the delicate canyon known as
Tsingy Rouge.
I've never seen anything like
this before.
♪
Yeah, it's like being in
inside a giant candle
or a pastry or something.
♪
But this is just an interestig
corner of the backyard
for the local kids.
I'm Batman.
[laughter]
Yeah, close.
Yeah, you got it.
According to Philippe, some f
the money from admittance fes
pays for books and a teacher,
making them luckier than mos.
Because many school around te
country are cutting back
to half days for lack of
funding.
It seems like the children of
Madagascar need education
more than anything, right?
- Yeah, yeah.
- They need it to balance the
kind of ancient thinking
that makes this waterfall
sacred.
- I see.
- Make a prayer here.
- Right.
Traditional belief is common
and powerful in Madagascar.
And while science and religin
don't normally mix,
Philippe uses whatever he can
to keep his neighbors
from cutting the forest.
You're trying to spread
spiritual belief
- Yeah, yeah.
- More fadi, more tradition
to keep people away from
destroying places like this.
Interesting.
"Fadi" is a set of ancient
taboos,
and he uses them to remind
neighbors not to cut the Baobab
or eat the lemur, because the
spirits of their grandparents
might live inside them.
- Right.
A foot in each world.
- Yes, yeah.
- He tells me that this
generation has been raised
with much more respect for
ghosts than the government.
Are you hopeful that this
president will be better
than the last?
[horns honking]
- Poverty breeds corruption,
and vice versa,
a vicious cycle,
but what would Madagascar lok
like with real wealth?
Next stop, the richest corner
of the country.
[percussive music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[light piano music]
♪
- What's amazing about our
ever-crowded world
is that you don't have to
travel between distant natios
to see the real wealth gap
♪
Either in America or
Madagascar,
where heaven is just a quick
boat ride to Nosy Be,
"big island," full of French
and Italian resorts.
It is the richest spot in the
poorest of countries
♪
Thanks to a mixture of forein
investment
and tropical splendor
♪
Water that holds endless
delight
for Europeans in flippers
♪
And survival for everyone els.
Can you imagine three
days on that ship?
- Sleep on the islands.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Yeah.
- M'Madi runs fishing and
snorkeling trips for tourists
out of the resorts.
See, what's the difference
between you and them?
Why aren't you doing
that for a living?
- I see, yeah.
- Yeah.
- He's modest.
- [speaking in native language]
- The real reason is that he
speaks English and Italian.
His travel agent mom made him
get an education.
- Does anybody have children?
- Yeah.
- You all have children?
- Mm-hmm.
- What do you hope they are
when they grow up?
Do you hope they're fishermen
or something else?
- Are people a little bit
richer now that tourism
has come,
or do you feel the same?
- [speaking native language]
- Yeah, they canthey
have the money now.
- You have a little more money.
- Yeah, yeah.
[light bouncy music]
♪
- In their own ways, M'Madi ad
the fishermen are harvesting
the tourist-friendly waves.
♪
While high on a hilltop, I met
a woman who profits
from the colors in the sky.
I am fascinated that your
backyard
is the most unbelievable view in
Madagascar.
Is that why you picked this
neighborhood?
- [speaking in native language]
- Absolutely, yes, because of
the view,
and because of the tourists,
so I can sell my goods here.
- Ahh.
- [giggles]
- Linda first came here ten
years ago,
and while her friends saw
sunset-ogling crowds,
she saw customers.
So she built a store and a hoe
right here
and makes almost enough to sed
all three kids to school
and occasionally head to markt
to splurge on meat for dinne.
When was it butchered?
- [speaking in native language]
- [speaking in native language]
- This morning.
- This morning.
- It's very fresh, yeah.
- Very fresh, okay.
- [speaking in native language]
- [speaking in native language]
- It's about $1.20.
- Yeah.
Ange is our translator on ths
journey,
and through her I learn thata
single cut of beef
costs two or three days' pay.
- And, you know, the things
here they are buying
day-to-day,
so this is one of for today,
and they will come back again
tomorrow.
- So people shop day-to-day.
- Yes, yeah, 'cause they don't
have lots of money.
- So let me ask you, I see women
around with
something on their face.
Is that a traditional cosmeti,
or what is that?
- Yeah, it'sit's
it's [speaks indistinctly],
and it's, like, a mask,
and the put it for a week or so,
and yeah, they're getting white,
so white means you are pretty.
- You mean it's to lighten their
skin.
- Yes, yeah, yeah.
- Really?
[light music]
♪
Through Western eyes, this my
all seem so primitive.
But compared to the rest of
Madagascar,
this is a vibrant middle-clas
town,
and their economic engine
is tourism.
What's doeswhat does tourism
mean to you?
- But here's the catch.
Tourists only come if the
country is stable.
♪
So the fate of these folks
rests largely in the hands
of the men running this
country,
which seems like a good reasn
to go see the man in charge.
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[light music]
- This earth is rich.
The people are not.
This ground is full of nickel
and iron and gemstones.
The people who walk above it
have virtually nothing.
♪
Ask why this is, and most wil
blame politics
and human nature.
- Corruption, yeah.
- Ndranto is a
forester-turned-activist,
and in an age of censorship
and political turmoil,
he takes a risk by speaking
out.
- Why is that?
- Pull them down if someone
succeeds, yeah.
- Nanie runs the efforts
of the World Wildlife Fund here
and has similar frustrations.
- It is a rich country with lots
of resources,
but the richness doesn't
translate into wealth
for the people, and it is
- Who's to blame for that?
- I think it's governess in
general,
the successive governments, but
then we are also supposed to be
a democracy, so somewhere,
I mean, even the people
have some part of responsibility
in that.
- Yeah, how is this
administration
compared to the last few?
- [laughs]
- Her laugh is loaded,
and it's tough to explain.
You see, when I first came hee
a decade ago,
I came to tell the hopeful
story of a leader named
Marc Ravalomanana.
He went from rags to riches
selling milk and yogurt
and then became president wih
vows to fight against
corruption and for the
environment.
Animals lovers rejoiced,
but when people caught wind
of his plan to buy a $60
million jet from the family
of Walt Disney, they got angr.
The protests were whipped toa
froth by a former radio deejy
named Andry Rajoelina,
who convinced the military to
throw out the yogurt guy
and put him in power.
- We went through a five-year
political crisis
starting in 2009.
- Yep.
- And we have a government who
was not necessarily ready
prepared toto lead.
- After the coup, the already
bad economy got worse.
Foreign aid investment dried p
for five long years.
But in 2014 Madagascar finaly
held an election,
and just over 50% of the vots
went to this man.
Mr. President, a pleasure to
meet you.
- It's a pleasure.
Welcome.
- His name is Hery
Rajaonarimampianina.
And he is the deejay's former
finance minister.
I've been all over your country.
- Yeah.
- For the past ten days or so.
- Mm-hmm.
- You have a beautiful land
full of beautiful people.
But I'm worried about their
future.
- Yeah.
- Are you worried
about their future?
- [speaking in native language]
- You're the man to make the
change.
Okay.
After seeing the last few
presidents enrich themselves
while everything in the country
for the common man didn't seem
to change, why should they
believe you're different?
Why do you think they chose you?
- He describes an ambitious
plan to revolutionize
the nation's energy grid with
wind, solar,
and hydroelectric dams.
How will you pay for these
projects?
- I've seen projections that
there may be 40 million people
in Madagascar by the middle of
this century.
The population will have
doubled.
And at the current rate, all the
forests will be gone.
What do you think we'll see in
the year 2050?
- But his critics say they hae
heard such promises
many times before.
- Law enforcement.
- Why? Because of corruption?
They look the
other way?
- Corruption.
- They're not listening to you.
- I'm meeting with the
president in a
few hours.
- Yeah, yeah.
- What should I ask him?
What would you ask him if you
could sit down
with him?
- Is there a timber mafia in
Madagascar?
- Everyone I talk to says
everyone knows who they are.
If everyone knows who these
people are,
why not just go arrest them?
- How do you sleep at night?
I mean, how do you remain
optimistic?
- I try.
[laughs]
- You know, you have this
seemingly impossible job,
and what's the answer?
- If you work at the local
level,
you can really change things.
The communities are really
hungry for better lives,
for schools for their children,
better health,
more revenues, but they also
deeply understand
that they cannot achieve all
that
without a good and healthy
forest to get the woods
and reefs to get the fish.
- Do you hope a leader will
rise,
someone who's capable?
[downtempo rock music]
♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪
[somber music]
♪
- Riding through the Baobabs,
a plume of smoke
catches my eye.
I follow it through the thors
to a lovely little family
turning trees into charcoal,
because what choice do they
have?
I came looking for physical
signs of hope,
and to be honest, at times,
the search was grim.
But I did find hope in guys
like Regis.
How do you convince a fellow
Malagasy
that that indri, that lemur is
more valuable in the tree
than in the pot
when they're just trying to feed
their families?
- Yeah
[speaking native language]
- I tell them, "You need the
forest, because you are farmers.
"If the forest is gone,
"there won't be any rain
for your fields.
"Lemurs disperse seeds, so you
need the lemurs as well
to protect the forest."
People are recognizing this,
and I know people who have
stopped slash-and-burn
agriculture because of it.
[light piano music]
♪
[lemurs howling]
Regis and the indri forest,
Philippe and the Tsingy
Rouge
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The women learning a
sustainable business
one handicraft at a time.
- [speaking in native language]
- They are all sort of a
neighborhood watch
looking out for the wild thins
in the absence of a functionl
society.
In the middle of this century,
2050,
my kid will be my age.
If she comes here, what will she
see?
- Well, I suspect that
in the areas
like this
where we are at the moment,
there will still be forest left.
But then in other areas where no
tourists go,
I think there won't be any
forest there.
[light music]
We can save parts of
Madagascar,
but I am pretty sure that we
can't save everything.
♪
- After a journey like this
one,
you bring home a lot of mentl
souvenirs
♪
A new appreciation for roads
that are paved,
fields that are lush,
a society that works.
I went to this place called Nosy
Be,
and I met this woman, this mom,
and she makes these.
♪
You bring back fresh remindes
of our shared humanity
♪
And how for so many kids,
geography is destiny.
And you wonder, how much plant
will be left for them
if the only renewable resoure
is hope?
♪