This is the beginning of the dirt road I biked down.
As I was biking, a few people were suspicious of me. Wondering where I was going, wondering where I even came from. I might as well been the only white foreigner to wander into this neck of the woods. I thought that was a possibility until... I saw... this....
An old beautifully constructed Catholic Church in the middle of nowhere alongside a dirt road... I'm not saying foreigners built this but this building has more foundation and money put into it then all the schools in my village combined, I'm only hinting at it.
So, I stopped. Chatted with these people
... And then I kept on going. I went through grass, through sand, through mud. I kept going when the road faded a bit only to find more people trekking too. So I went and found more beautifully and this time newly built structures.
Bad picture but this is an elementary school in the middle of rice fields! All i could think was How? ...Why? When? Wait... What!! It was SO nice! It had doors, it had windows and locks for God's sake! Freshly-painted-well-built-shining-as-if-the-gods-just-placed-it-there school in the middle of nowhere.
So, I kept going. I stopped and bought a coconut and sipped out of it while chatting. Bought some bananas and had a conversation about my geographical location and how I truly was in the middle of nowhere. Because, as I was going EAST, the direction towards the ocean, the ocean was unreachable. According to these people. I asked why? How could that be? There's a road and I'm going alongside the river, eventually there must be the ocean.
A kind man offered me his lakana (hand made canoe) in exchange for my new bicycle in order for me to make it to the beach...
So, I kept going. I didn't particularly like that exchange. Maybe next time.
What'd I see after those wonderful buildings and friendly folk? Not much. A heck of a lot of cows, rice fields, canoes, and people selling bananas on the side of this road, that was becoming less and less of an actual road. I was ten kilometers down this road I've never been. It still held so much mystery to me, I had to see more. But then... 
I went until my foot got stuck in mud and when I tried pulling myself out of this pit my expensive Malagasy flip flops broke and my shoe became lost. BUT luckily children were nearby and after laughing at me, they dug for it! And then I was the one laughing, the whole thing was ridiculous.
Ten kilometers in, and I decided to head back home. It was getting late and if i kept going I'd probably get stuck again or buy even more unwanted bananas. Ten kilometers in and allegedly only 12 more to go until who knows what I'll reach. I've been told the ocean is achievable. I was told that the road just simple ends. I was told there is more to see. And I believe it. There's no way knowing without going. And hell, with the amount of things I saw in this short distance that surprised me, I'm expecting a supermarket at the end of the road!
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