Vazaha's Story

Vazaha is six and a half, and lives in the village next to the Mangoky where the track to Beroroha meets the river, and where the old diesel powered pontoon ferry still struggles across when the river is low enough. Men and boys in the village work as ferrymen, punting rice, beans and people across the swirling sand-laden water in long dugout canoes, and are skilled in getting wild eyed Zebu cattle to swim across the shooting flow to the sand banks on the far side. Zebu are the most prized possessions in Bara culture and losing one in the river would be a disaster; Zebu are used to till the rice fields.

The small village was a natural place for HoverAid to establish it’s July camp, and soon the hovercraft had its own dedicated landing space next to the canoes on the short rocky promontory that defines the permanent edge of the river at the confluence with Miliou river. From this strategic location we could access the Mangoky, Miliou, and Mackay rivers in minutes, transporting mission doctors, survey teams, and a Dutch Christian TV crew to numerous villages during the month. After working in these more remote villages, it seemed only right that the doctors should offer their skills to the village that had hosted us, so we set up a field surgery outside our communications tent, with tables set on their sides to keep the wind out, and with camp lights above so that the doctors could operate into the night. Vazaha was the first of four people operated on that day.

“Our son has had a cleft lip since his birth. We planned to take him to Tulear to be operated but the fare is just too expensive if we all go there— it’s thirty thousand Ariary per person to travel in the district four-by-four pickup truck, and twenty five thousand if it's in the rice truck. My husband and I were doing our very best to save enough money for the trips and the likely costs of the operation, but we haven't managed to get much yet. When we heard that the doctors were in Beroroha and when I saw my son wave at them, I seized the opportunity to have Vazaha's lip operated, and it finally happened, thanks to God!”

Thirty thousand Ariary is about £8.50, or two weeks wages for a skilled ferryman. Sadly operations cost far more.

The Africa Inland Mission surgeons followed a method called the Rose-Thompson Straight Line Repair which, according to Dr Jonathan Lee, is often applied to simple-cleft lips. Starting by tracing incision lines on both sides of his lip they then closed them with carefully positioned stitches.

Vazaha cried at times but the surgeons, his father, and the Chef de bac (Chief ferryman) comforted him, promising that he would get some biscuits at the end of the operation if he stopped crying.

It was all over in just two hours.

Dr Clément advised his parents to give him soft food for the time being and to have the stitches taken out after 10 days. As Vazaha and his father were walking home his mother came down to the HoverAid camp. When she saw the result of the operation, she sang loudly and danced with such joy that she didn't seem to notice the crowds that were watching her. This is her song:

"Faly aho tonga ianareo vazaha;

Faly aho nahatongavanareo eto Beroroha;

Faly aho, misaotra anao Ry Andriamanitra."

"I'm happy you came foreigners;

I'm happy you came to Beroroha;