The Pousse-Pousse

  The other day, I experienced my first ride in a pousse-pousse. This is the way some people get around Toliara. It is the Malagasy version of a taxi, though it is actually a rickshaw. We decided to take one back from the craft market in the city. At first, I was scared to ride in one because they are so small compared to the large trucks and cars that push past them on the road. Sometimes cars even knock them over! There are two types of pousse-pousse. One type is pulled and steered by a bicycle and the other is pulled just by a person on foot. I imagine that it would be a hard job to have because you are either walking or riding in the hot sun all day.

  

  As you are riding, there are many things to see along the side of the road. There are crowds of people walking while balancing sacks or buckets of various foods and other things on their head. There are also carts pulled by zebu that could be trotting alongside you. Sometimes we had to stop because there was a jam of people riding bikes and of other pousse-pousse. There is also the risk that the bike pulling the pousse-pousse will break in some way. That happened with my mom and me. We were riding along and suddenly we heard a snap and then the bike wasn't able to pedal anymore. The person pulling us got off and fixed it really quickly and then we were fine the rest of the way.

  When I was on the pousse-pousse, I realized just how different the culture in Madagascar is from a lot of the rest of the world. I have learned a lot from this trip, and I think that it has been good for me to experience the kind of poverty in this country and the people living here. It's also a little weird to walk around town and have people staring at us most of the time because we look much different. It seems that riding in the pousse-pousse was one of my favorite things that I have done on this trip so far.

Abbie