In and out the ylang ylang forest in Comoros

In and out the bamboo forest, 

In and out the bamboo forest

In and out the bamboo forest, 

You are my Partner (Partiner?)

Patti, Patti, Patti, on my shoulder

Patti, Patti, Patti, on my shoulder......

You are my partiner!

[Flashback from 2014]

Feeling pretty fortunate - my current project in Comoros has all the elements I love in a project - human interest topic (Education), direct community engagement (getting to visit lots and lots of schools, interviewing teachers and parents,) lots of travel in exotic locations and a great team! My typical day starts with having meetings from 8am to around noon after which the next 7-8 hours are spent driving to the most remote of places to either hand out or collect surveys. Surveying a third of the primary schools in the whole country is quite an exciting task. I have seen so much of the different Comoros islands in the short time I have been here. We have gone to schools where there is no real road to reach, schools that are in villages almost hidden in the forests, schools by the beach etc. Today we went to one school that was on the top of a mountain and we had to walk for at least half an hour up the mountain with me trying to act as if I was not huffing and puffing - while I was clearly suffering in the heat in my work suit:-) The other night in the island of Moheli, we were driving through a road along a huge forest at around 8pm. It was pitch black (the area is uninhabited but there are also power issues in the country - it is usually very very dark at night without electricity in most areas, except for places with generators.) All of a sudden, the air all around us was filled with the most amazing scent. I thought I was imagining it - why would a forest smell like perfume....It turned out to be a forest of ylang ylang - a rare essential oil used in perfumes that coincidentally happens to be 30% of Comoros exports (I found out after googling it after the incident.) We rolled down the windows as we drove and I closed my eyes and lost myself in the enchanting scent from the forest deep in the mountain.