In that place, there would be a beach of fine sand, clear water and palm trees, the opulence  borne in by the ocean;  life would be lived simply and gently. There would be a sense of the carefree, a certain laziness, resistance, perhaps, to the imperatives of modern life; no haste here, no urgency.

That is what would undoubtedly be there, if Man were not Man, bringing his worst. Wars, famines, corruption, drug trafficking have stripped the archipelago to the bone; the hospital is lit by candles and the buildings are quietly decaying.

There remain the buffaloes, wallowing  in the wet sand at nightfall, the fishermen and their families too. Jeanne Taris has followed them, to tell the story of a paradise. Lost.

Jean Berthelot de La Glétais