Melange

First of all, I would like to apologize to all those who noticed my complete failure over the last month to update my blog. If you felt like I fell off the face of the earth, that is because the face of the earth is Madagascar, and I did. There is no way I am going to be able to fit everything into one entry, but here is my attempt at a recap of my experiences.

Village Stay-

For a week in the beginning of March, we said goodbye to our host families in Tana and headed out to the Bongolava region, an area northwest of the capital in the highlands. We spent a couple of days in a town called Tsiromandidy preparing for what many of us have come to consider one of the highlights of our program—the so called “village stay.” Since most of our program is based in urban areas (by Madagascar standards) we were all placed with families in rural settings for a week period of time where we practiced speaking Malagasy and living life mora, mora (easy, easy). As it turns out, this means a lot of aimless wandering through rice patties, planting manioc, playing soccer and drawing pictures with small children.

My host family was incredibly kind and hospitable (I think, let’s be honest I didn’t understand a lot of what they were talking about. They could have been making fun of my headlight lamp or bug repellant but I prefer to remain optimistic) and I had such a positive experience trying to understand what was going on and how I should approach weed wacking with a metal shovel. I had only two major setbacks while in the village, and each both entertained and scarred me at the same time.

The first occurred on my first night with my family. Like most areas of Madagascar, the main type of kabine (bathroom) is a latrine. For those unfamiliar with a latrine, it is generally a hole inside of a tiny hut. I have never really had a problem using this type of setup, and so after dinner when I needed to go to the bathroom I didn’t have any qualms about bringing my flashlight on a nighttime bathroom adventure. However, when I opened the door (piece of tin) my headlight lamp illuminated about twenty massive cockroaches scurrying around the walls and on the floor. My time here has actually greatly reduced my sensitivity to such creatures, however one’s chances of being touched by a cockroach increase dramatically when there are more than a few, and I didn’t feel personally capable of using the bathroom at that time. Instead, I decided that I would simply pee in nature next to the bathroom and then go lock myself in my room and try to forget about what I had just witnessed. I really feel like I must have done something karmatically displeasing in life however, because at the moment I was ready to use my improvised bathroom, a brilliant flash of lightning lit up the sky and my family’s confused faces as they observed me standing in front of the bathroom with my pants around my ankles. Of course being the considerate family that they are, about eight people followed me into my room asking what was wrong, and grabbing my Malagasy-English dictionary to find the word “fear”. The next thing I know, my host mom brought in a small bucket, set it down next to my bed, and said “kabine kely” (little bathroom). I have never been so relieved to see a bucket, no pun intended.

As luck would have it, my second most challenging situation also included bathroom difficulties. Most people in Madagascar are religious, and I realized before I even arrived in the village that I would most likely be required to attend a service. What I didn’t really imagine was that this service would require me to sit outside on a tarp with zero shade in a dress for four hours listening to a sermon that is completely in Malagasy, and then parade around in a strange circle to drop my donation into a tin box. After the service, I was fairly exhausted and went back to my house feeling a bit like sleeping for the rest of the day. After sitting for that long, I really had to use the kabine, and so I headed to the tiny bathroom hut. I was literally in the kabine for 30 seconds before all of the sudden, my right foot followed by my left foot followed by the rest of me collapsed along with the floor down towards the 20 or so foot drop, and lots and lots of unsanitary matter that I won’t describe here. Luckily, I somehow grabbed onto the wall and managed to keep the upper part of my body from falling down, and although I have very little upper body strength, I somehow managed to pull myself out of the hole and onto some non-collapsed ground (which immediately began to collapse) before jumping out the door. It took me a moment to process how I had ended up covered in god knows what, and then I decided I had better tell my family that I just broke their latrine. I can’t really describe the expression on the entire villages’ faces when they stopped what they were doing and turned to look at me covered in muck and blood from where I had cut my legs and side other than to say that incredulous isn’t a strong enough adjective. I could tell that they all felt bad but that they were also very amused, and so in the Malagasy tradition, literally twenty people followed me into my room after I had bathed to sit and to comfort me. After a phone call to my director detailing the world’s most embarrassing injury, he spoke with my host family and explained that when Americans go through traumatic events, they like to be alone to wallow. 

The rest of my stay wasn’t nearly as eventful, and I was surprised that despite the ups and downs, I was really sad to leave. I think there is a lot to be said for living life simply, and if it was possible I think I might choose to sleep and wake with the sun, and spend my days doing just what is necessary to get by comfortably. That is not to say that there aren’t some serious concerns for the people I spent time with, and that poverty doesn’t play a large role in their daily lives but I found myself, as usual, with more questions than answers about the importance of existing one way. Perhaps there are more paths to finding a sense of fulfillment in life than many of us consider. 

Mahajanga-

Following the village stay we headed back towards Tana making a quick one night stop in Ampefy, a lakeside town that the program thought would help us transition back into life with running water and electricity. Arriving back in Tana was a strange sensation, because for the first time since we got here, it really felt like I was going home. My host family thought my village stories were hilarious and they seemed happy to have me back in the house. We only had about a week with them however, before we moved onto our next part of the program in Mahajanga (including a two night stop in a national park where we “camped” and went looking for lemurs at all hours of the day!).

Whenever you read about Mahajanga or talk to Malagasy people about it, the only thing they really say is that it is hot but breezy. I can honestly say that in my entire life I have never been so overheated. It was literally so sweltering in the afternoons that people just lay on the sidewalks in the shade, and there is no movement in town from 12-4pm. In fact, we were often the only people walking around in the blazing heat looking for somewhere to grab lunch or a random internet café that may have been crazy enough to stay open during the afternoon. Locals tend to think that Vazaha are insane because we have a tendency to walk long distances when we are clearly poorly acclimated to the heat and look very sweaty. Luckily, Mahajanga also happens to be on the ocean, and so we were able to spend our many free afternoons exploring town and hanging out near the water, including watching some of the most spectacular sunsets I have ever seen.

Mahajanga was a two week visit, which by SIT standards is a long enough period of time for a host family stay. My family in Mahajanga was very different than my family in Tana, and my host mom is probably one of the strangest and most entertaining people I have met. The very first night that I met her (my host dad was only around for a day later in the week because he works in the north) she told me that we weren’t going to take my things home, but instead we would go to a party. I was rather bewildered when we drove 40 minutes out of town and down a bumpy dirt road until we reached what I can only describe as an American dance party. Her entire family and several people of questionable relation were eating snack foods and dancing in the living room to pop and rap music, and I was given very little choice as to whether or not I wanted to participate. So, my host family’s first impression of me was awkward dancing with a bunch of strangers followed by my inability to stay awake after 5 hours of this, and what I can only assume was confusion as to why I declined to sing karaoke in Malagasy.

The best part about Mahajanga as a town is the night life. Because it is so hot during the day, people generally take naps during the heat and then head to the “Bord de la Mer” (boardwalk) along the ocean, where they drink and eat brochettes (meat or fish skewers) that are cooked at hundreds of table side grills. Then everyone wanders up and down the boardwalk where you can buy balloons or rent what look like beat up children’s Barbie cars that have no motor and enjoy the cooler weather with family. There is even a man powered Ferris wheel that my friend and I decided to brave after a couple of drinks that was surprisingly fun despite making you feel like death is imminent.

Part of our time in Mahajanga was devoted to preparing for the part of the program that I am currently on—our independent research projects (ISP). For this last month of the program, everyone in my group has chosen a research topic and a different part of Madagascar to go and explore, which compared to the relatively rigid structure of our program is a pretty big change from what we are used to. I am currently looking into women’s health programs in a town called Morondava, which is on the southern western coast of the country. Three of my good friends from the program are also here with me researching different topics (storytelling, ecotourism, and the idea of marriage and divorce), which has been amazingly fun and reminds me a little of life at home.

ISP-

After departing from Mahajanga, we drove 14 hours back to Tana, which was actually not as difficult as I had anticipated. The weather in Tana felt cold to me, which was very strange after consistently feeling hot for over two weeks. My friends and I rushed around town buying groceries, meeting with advisors, and gathering supplies for our trip to Morondava which turned out to literally be the longest day of my life.

Although Morondava has an airport, it costs around 200 USD one way to fly while taking a “taxi-brousse” which is similar to a large van costs only 15 USD. So, to save money we all decided to take the taxi knowing that the roads were bad and that it would probably take close to 14 additional hours from Tana to reach our ISP site. In reality, it took us almost 20 hours to get to Morondava, which was hilarious and exhausting.

The taxis that you normally take for long distances are fairly standard, but are at least more comfortable than most city busses, which are notorious for holding upwards of 30 people in a standard 8 seater. Unfortunately, we somehow ended up in the very back corner of the bus which made getting in and out somewhat difficult on our numerous pee in nature stops along the road. We left Tana at around 3pm, and everything seemed to be going smoothly until around 8pm, when we pulled off the road in a small town with literally one road and a few food stands scattered here and there. At first we were really confused as to why we were stopped, but after talking to our friend who was in a separate taxi we were told that we had to wait for our police escort who was going to ensure that the cattle bandits (Dahalo!) don’t attack us in the middle of the night. Don’t ask me why they are just called cattle bandits when they clearly also attack people. And apparently, despite the fact that all the taxis were coming from the same place, we had to wait for over two hours for them to arrive. Since spending two additional hours in a taxi sounded unpleasant we decided to look for a bathroom and some food. When we talked to a shop owner he informed us that there is tsy misy kabine (there is no bathroom) and so instead we had to seek out the darkest alley we could find and pee there instead. If you haven’t noticed by now, being in countries like Madagascar automatically eliminates any qualms about discussing bathroom issues. I decided to call this new little pee spot “urine alley” and I actually look back at it rather fondly.

After our stop at urine alley we decided to split some brochettes, which were really delicious until we realized that they were reusing the skewers for the meat over and over again, which is essentially fairly disgusting when you think about how many people probably ate off those sticks. Anyways, we skipped seconds (mostly because they ran out of meat, we were hungry) and went on a yogurt search instead. Madagascar actually has some damn good yogurt, and I have become inspired to make my own when I head back to San Francisco. We each ate a couple of cups for 20 cents each, before heading back out to wait for the police to arrive. While waiting we met a hilarious Malagasy man who works for some sort of natural gas company, and he of course proceeded to call his daughter in Tana and wake her up to force her to speak English with us. It was like hot potato with the phone as we all tried to get out of chatting with someone who we knew nothing about and who was clearly delirious from being woken up abruptly.

At last the police arrived and our caravan took off down the road once more. I was feeling really happy to be moving again, and got through about 4 songs on my ipod before all of the sudden we pulled off the road again, this time for a real rice-including Malagasy meal at a tiny hotely (small restaurant). After that hour and a half break, we were on our way yet again and I managed to fall asleep for a few hours before our next incident. This time, it appeared that someone in our travelling caravan of taxis had a flat tire, and so all twenty or so cars stopped in the middle of the highway while we took care of it. It was close to 3am at this point, the 12 hour mark, and my three travel companions and I sort of felt like we were being slowly crushed in sardine can so we decided to get out. Hoping to avoid crawling over 10 sleeping people I decided to exit via window, which would have been brilliant if I was not so tired that my legs cramped up and I semi-fell out the window. Oops. After that we literally laid on the ground in the center of the highway for an hour while the tire was fixed, and then we decided to do some yoga so that our legs still functioned in the morning. I am pretty sure the hundred or so Malagasy around us thought we were a little odd at the very least as we stretched and laughed at the randomness of life in our loud and excited American English. One man in particular was very interested in my friend Cassandra and asked in what I assume was supposed to be English “can I flight you?” I suppose that is open to interpretation.

The rest of the trip was actually very drama free, and I was able to sleep for much of the remaining 7 hours. When I woke up, I was greeted by a beautiful sunrise over dozens of Baobab trees, and eventually during the last stretch, the town of Morondava. It is absolutely beautiful here, and slightly less hot than Mahajanga, and I am still pretty incredulous that every morning I get to wake up to a spectacular white sand beach and fun with my friends before I set out to learn about urban development. Whether or not I am going to be able to hack the taxi back is another issue, but for now, I feel like privileged doesn’t begin to cover how I feel about my experiences here. It continues to be my biggest challenge, but at the end of the day, I just really feel thankful for everyone and everything that has allowed me to be a part of this trip.