Episode 3 : Destination Madagascar | M6 | Va voir ailleurs

Nicole Viala, 60, taxi driver in Marseille. A widow with three children and manager of a taxi company for many years, Nicole decided a few years ago to stop doing that and devote herself 100% to taxi driving. She loves her job and is one of the emblematic faces of the Marseille taxi world, but she can always think of a reason to complain. A moaner with a big heart, Nicole is active in the “Ariadne’s thread” association, which helps sick children in poor countries. Two years ago, she provided accommodation for Rudy, a little boy from Madagascar, who came to France for a heart transplant. She has maintained an extremely close relationship with him and his mother and her dream is to see them again. So Nicole has taken up a very daring challenge: spend two weeks 10,000 kilometres from home, in Madagascar. Reporters accompanied her to the island in the Indian Ocean, where she shared the everyday life of a bush taxi-driver. Together, aboard a patched-up pickup crammed with a good dozen customers, they covered 1,500 kilometres in the most remote corners of the island before reaching the passenger terminal at Fort Dauphin, the maritime port. On the way, Nicole discovered the sapphire mines of Entsoa and its miners, who descend into galleries more than 40 metres below the ground. She was also able to witness an exorcism ritual during which locals are “released from a spell”. An intense experience for the woman from Marseille, who, in addition to the sublime landscapes and unforgettable encounters, had to get used to the dust, to interminably long days and testing situations in one of the poorest countries in the world. How did Nicole react to this incredible adventure? After two weeks of adventure at the end of the world, did the “moaner” return to Marseille a changed woman?