In search of the coin with the lowest value in the world

I was trying to explain arranged marriage to the woman. She said, "Boy meets girl. They kiss and fall in love. The parents arrange the marriage". I said, "No!". I was travelling through the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar, to find the coin with the lowest value in the world.

I had just landed in Nairobi airport in Kenya from India. I was on my way to Antananarivo, commonly known as Tana, the capital of Madagascar. The small concourse was filled with people. There was barely any space to walk around. The display boards were not working. I had to find out the gate number for my flight to Tana. There were a million people in front of the information desk, all of them trying to find their gate numbers. But I have been through Nairobi airport several times before. I walked to the coffee shop at the end of the concourse and ordered a coffee. As she was giving me my coffee, I asked her, "Can you tell me my gate number?". She stared at me, then smiled and checked her computer. I got my gate number. The coffee shop computers have access to the departure information.

I was seated at the gate waiting for my flight to Tana. There was an Indian businessman from Gujarat seated next to me, also waiting for the same flight. There was a flight to Mogadishu, Somalia before the flight to Tana. The waiting area by the gate was full of Somali women clad in burqas. Even their eyes were not visible. The flight to Mogadishu got announced and the Indian businessman said, "I have been to Somalia". I said, "Really!" He said, "I was landing in Mogadishu, when anti-aircraft fire broke out. The pilot dodged the fire and landed!". He then said, "If you change $100, you get a wheelbarrow full of money. A security guard with an AK-47 delivers the money to your hotel room". 

I asked, "What do you sell to Somalia?". He said, "Water filters". I said, "Are you going to Madagascar to sell water filters?". He said, "No. I am going there to buy. Not sell. I buy vanilla". Madagascar is the world's largest producer of vanilla. I asked, "Can you recommend a shop in Tana where I can buy vanilla?". He said, "Give me the name of your hotel. I will get a box of vanilla delivered to you". He then said, "If you want Indian food, go to the Tsaralalana area. There are quite a few Indian restaurants there". I said, "I don't eat Indian food, when I travel". He said, "I eat only Indian food, when I travel". 

The immigration line for foreigners in Tana airport was not too long. A security guard standing next to the immigration officer asked me something in French. I did not understand. He got angry, snatched the immigration form from my hand and wrote '30', circled it and handed it to the immigration officer. I got stamped in for 30 days. He had been asking me about the number of days I planned to stay in Madagascar. It was the sixth French speaking country that I was visiting, after France, Switzerland, Monaco, French Canada and Mauritius. Yet I hardly knew any French. I had gotten my visa in their consulate in Chennai in southern India. He was an Honorary Consul. I went to his office where he was working and he asked me, "Have you brought your passport?". I gave it to him. He swiped it and the printer printed out a visa sticker. He stuck it on my passport and said, "Have a good trip!". I asked, "How much do I have to pay?". He said, "Nothing. It is gratis!". 

I took a Citroen taxi from the airport. Tana was full of ancient Citroen 2CV taxis. I was desperate for some water. Nairobi airport did not allow me to take a bottle of water and strangely, there was no water on board the flight. I asked the taxi driver to stop for some water and I bought a bottle. She said, "Mille quatre cent (1400 Ariary)". The next day, I was watching a group of people play Fanorona, a game of strategy and luck, in a street corner. One man told me, "The game is older than chess". Next to the people playing Fanorona, two little girls, aged about 10, were selling a myriad items on the pavement. They held up a bottle of water towards me. I decided to buy it and asked, "Mille quatre cent?". They said, "Non. Mille sept cent (1700 Ariary)". The two little girls then screamed out together, "ONE THOUSAND SEVEN HUNDRED" in English. They were very pleased with themselves at their English and were giggling their heads off. They were ripping me off by 300 Ariary, but I decided to buy from them.

I asked the girls if they had an Iraimbilanja coin. They had never heard of it. One Iraimbilanja is one-fifth of one Ariary and is the coin with the lowest value in the world. One Iraimbilanja is 1/10,000th of one cent. I am a numismatist and wanted that coin badly. One man who was playing Fanorona overheard me talking to the girls and said, "You might get them in a banque. Nowhere else". I negotiated with a Citroen taxi and spent the rest of the afternoon visiting banks. Not a single bank had the coin. "No, we don't have them". "I haven't seen them in 5 years". "You won't get them anywhere". "You might get old coins in smaller towns". "They are not minted anymore". A woman banker told me, "You will get it on eBay. They will ship it to you from London or New York". "I am in Madagascar and I want it from Madagascar", I said.

For dinner, I ordered a 'Three Horses Beer', a popular Malagasy pilsener and wanted to have a burger with zebu (Malagasy humped cattle) meat. The waitress took the order and then asked me something in French. I did not understand her question. She repeated it and I still did not get it. A woman sitting at the next table turned towards me and said in an American accent, "How do you want your meat? Rare, medium or well-done?". I had gotten used to India where all the meat is well-done. I said, "Medium-rare". The woman told the waitress in French. I then said, "I want extra raw onions. Can you ask her to get it?". She said, "I don't know how to say 'raw' in French". She then told the waitress, "Oignon. No grill". The waitress nodded and went off. She then brought a plate with my burger and fries. In another plate, she had brought about 10 cut slices of raw onions. She kept both the plates in front of me and stood there to watch what I did. I opened my burger and put one slice of raw onion. The waitress smiled at me and went off. The American woman said, "You wanted onions. You got them".

From Tana, I was planning to travel south to Antsirabe. In 2013, there were no buses in Madagascar. The only public transport option available was to travel by taxi-brousses (bush taxis). The taxis were ancient Peugeot 405 cars into which they try to squeeze in as many people as they can. I went to Fasan'ny Karana, the taxi-brousse station in Tana and bought a ticket for the next day. That turned out to be a big mistake. I got back to my hotel and the receptionist said that there was a package for me. The Indian businessman in the flight had sent a small box of vanilla to me. 

The next day, at Fasan'ny Karana, the taxi drivers knew that I had already paid for the ticket to Antsirabe and did not have a choice. The taxis kept filling up and leaving, while I was still in Tana, waiting. After waiting for more than three hours, I got a seat in a taxi. I was in the front seat, next to the driver. Two people had to share that seat. I was squashed in with a young woman. She knew English. She said, "Do you know the meaning of Fasan'ny Karana?". I said, "No". She said, "It means 'Indian cemetery'. Indian Hindus and Muslims, both, cremate or bury the dead there". I said, "Can you check if anyone has an Iraimbilanja coin?". She checked with the driver and the people in the rear seat. Nobody had one. On the way, the car tyre got punctured and the driver took one hour to change the tyre. She said, "We have to reach Antsirabe by sunset. There are bandits". We did manage to reach just before sunset. From the taxi-brousse station in Antsirabe, I got a cycle-rickshaw to my hotel. There were hand-pulled rickshaws too, but I was reluctant to use them.

I walked into a bar in Antsirabe and was having a bottle of 'Three Horses Beer'. I saw several young women sitting by themselves at different tables. They were all heavily made-up from the neck up, with lipstick, mascara and eye shadow. They were all holding a tab in their hand and appeared to be on video calls. I asked the waitress, "What is going on?". She said, "They want to escape from Madagascar. They are talking to men in Europe". "They are trying to get married. They come here for the Wi-Fi", she added. An old European man, who was clearly a septuagenarian, came into the bar accompanied by two Malagasy girls. They were probably 12 or 13 years old. I wondered what was going on. After some time, I noticed that the man had his hands inside the girls' dresses. I threw money on the table for my drink and started to walk out in disgust. The waitress came running across, "Sorry. Madagascar is a poor country. We need the money". I did not reply to her. I continued walking out. 

I was having breakfast in my hotel and there were a group of young British girls, probably 10 years old, travelling with their teacher. One girl asked her teacher, "Can we get English bread, please?". "No, you can't. You won't get any English bread for the next 10 days", said the teacher. I sympathised with the girl. Even I was feeling the need for English bread. I really didn't feel like eating baguettes. The hotel owner came over and asked me, "You are going to Fianarantsoa, right?". I said, "Yes". He said, "There is a couple in their own car, who are going to Fianarantsoa tomorrow morning. You can go with them". He introduced me to the couple. They were a young man and a woman in their 20's. They said, "We will charge you the same as the taxi-brousse fare". I said, "Okay". "We will leave tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. Don't have breakfast here. We will take you to a boulangerie (bakery)", they said. 

We left the next day at 6 a.m. and they took me to another bakery. Bread was being freshly baked. I could smell it. I had chocolat au pain. I had three of them, even though I am diabetic. I couldn't resist the freshly baked bread. And I had two cups of freshly brewed French press coffee. We were back on the road again, the two of them in the front and I was in the rear seat. The woman asked me to show my hand. She pinched the skin on my hand and said something to the man in Malagasy. She told me, "Your skin is so dark. Indians in Madagascar don't have such dark skin". I said, "I am from southern India. People in the south of India have darker skin". "Dark skin is beautiful", she said. She then asked me to explain arranged marriage among Indians. It is the most frequent question that I have been asked, during my travels. As Henry Rollins says, "A great way to learn about your country is to leave it". I said, "What do you think it is?". "Boy meets girl. They kiss and fall in love. The parents arrange the marriage", she said. I said, "No!". She pointed to the man and said, "That's what happened with us. We met in a bar". I was trying to explain arranged marriages in India, a topic that I had little knowledge about, since I hadn't had an arranged marriage. She interrupted and said, "I give up. We will never understand it".

They dropped me off at my hotel in Fianarantsoa and I paid them. It was a Chinese owned hotel. All the signboards and the menu were in Chinese, not in French. The Malagasy receptionist helped translate everything for me. I had tried the banks in Antsirabe and could not find an Iraimbilanja coin. The receptionist said, "There is a bank right next door". I went over to the bank. One woman in the bank said, "No. We don't have them". Another woman then said, "Wait. Let me check in the vault". She then came back and said, "I have two Iraimbilanja coins!". "You can take both of them", she said. "How much do I have to pay?", I asked. She said, "Nothing. You can take them!". I had gotten the coin with the lowest value in the world. I had gotten two of them!

Madagascar is one of my favourite travel destinations. It can't be beaten for exoticity. What is the most exotic place that you have ever visited?

Afternote

I shall publish the second and concluding blog post about my travels through Madagascar next week. In addition to the guidebooks, I got a lot of information from Lonely Planet's 'Thorn Tree' travel forum. Particularly, from a woman who writes under the handle 'marogisa'. Unfortunately, Lonely Planet has decided to shut down the travel forum. I had been using the forum since 1997. Luckily, the old information is still searchable. 

Have you read my previous blog? "Gorilla attack in Uganda": http://kodavarthi.blogspot.com/2020/11/gorilla-attack-in-uganda.html?m=1

 Copyright © 2020 by Shyam Kodavarthi. All rights reserved.