Mieke Boynton, Madagascar (Travel (2019))

I travelled to Madagascar last year to photograph the magnificent 30m-tall baobab trees in the aptly-named "Alley of the Baobabs" near Morondava. I had wanted to see these ancient, magnificent trees for many many years, so it was certainly the realisation of a dream when I saw them in real life! I discovered so much more while I was there though. Amazing animals (many of which do not exist elsewhere)... fascinating plants (likewise) but the biggest surprise of all came when I realised my favourite photos were of the Malagasy people. I really don't like it when people take photos of me, so I'm very careful not to take photos of other people without their acknowlegement, and I soon discovered that tourism has made the Malagasy people wary of giving "something for nothing", and they are very aware that a photograph has value. In many cases, we were asked for "cadeaux" in exchange for portraits, which was very confusing at first, but we soon found out that it was French for "gifts" and because we were white, they assumed we were French! In the end, most of my photos were of children who were delighted to have their photo taken, and a few instances when the adults were also obliging. It's these photos I'd like to share, as they bring back happy memories of the lovely people we met along the way.

Images have been resized for web display, which may cause some loss of image quality. Note: Original high-resolution images are used for judging.