Majunga

We arrived in Mahajanga on February 16 and have been here for the last ten days. It is a beautiful coastal town and we are finally able to stay here with a host family for more than a weekend. Our classroom looks directly out onto the ocean and the beach is only 20 away. I finally feel at home somewhere. My host family is amazing to say the least. I live with Eva, 28 year old mother of two. We have pretty much become best friends because we spend every night hanging out and talking together. Her husband, Liva, works for a business that transports mainly tourists in luxury vehicles around the country. He arrived from one of the trips the second day I had been in Mahajunga and had to depart for another trip the following day. So it has just been Eva, myself and the two kids. Nomena is six and plays from the moment he wakes up until the moment he falls asleep. He is attending Catholic school and practices his French with me sometimes. He is getting pretty good at it and it helps me with my French too. FyTia (which means love in Malagasy) is a spunky two year old. She is adorable and she loves to joke. Frequently she calls me Abby Belou (Big head Abby) in Malagasy – hilarious.

Not only have I been learning Malagasy at home with the kids but also in class. It is making me much more confident in my French skills to learn another language taught in French. The Malagasy language is very beautiful and some of the words have funny translations. For instance, the word for fiancé is fofombady which literally translates to: smells like a husband but not yet. My name phonetically in Malagasy means together which seems so appropriate for this situation. We live in a one room house so alone time is something that has become foreign to me. The tight living quarters and modest bathroom situation is not nearly as difficult as I had imagined. I have grown to love talking to Eva before I fall asleep every night. I think I may do my independent study in April here so that I can stay with Eva again.
The other night we had moved the dining room table out on the porch to have lunch and once it came time for dinner, the mosquitoes were huddled in swarms outside waiting for their next meal. So instead I insisted that we have a “picnic” on the floor together. So we laid the table cloth out and set up a picnic inside protected from the mosquitoes. After dinner I decided to show Nomena a game on my ipod and sat on the floor near the picnic with him. Suddenly, Eva says, “Abby!” and I feel something slimy jump into my shorts. Immediately I start yelling and jump straight up into the air and rip my shorts off (because I was wearing them under a dress) imagining the things that could have made their way into my clothes. Once I calmed down and saw everyone laughing and staring at me I saw a tiny little frog the size of a quarter sitting on the floor… Mon ami le crapeau. Ever since this occasion Eva has joked with me about having another picnic with the crapeau – very funny 
The surrounding area has definitely taken notice to our presence here in Mahajanga. It has spread across the neighborhood that there is a vahaza (white foreigner) staying with Eva. On Sunday night the neighbor girls came into our house speaking quickly and with purpose to Eva. I hear Eva say to them, ask Abby. So the seven year old comes right up to me and says very seriously in French, “What would be the price for English lessons for one hour next Saturday?” I busted out laughing and told her that my French is terrible and she does not want lessons from me but again she continues in a serious tone, “What is the price, what is the price?” It was so strange to hear a seven year old so persistent to learn so finally I agreed to next Saturday only if they come together and do not pay any money at all. So great that now I have officially have found a job here – right out on the porch of our house! Now, I can stay here in paradise forever!

Excursions

The political situation here has become very tragic. Last Saturday TGV gave orders to his demonstrators to cross over the boundary lines of the president's palace (not actually his living space) in a community area called La Place de 13 Mai, which caused open shooting onto the crowd. The military here lacks resources like tear gas and rubber bullets and received an order to proceed with open shooting. A total of 70 people were killed and over one hundred injured. There are fingers being pointed in all directions but in my opinion it all comes back to the lack of true democracy here. All of the checks in the system are controlled by the president so he cannot be impeached even though he has violated the constitution... so sad that the people really have no voice after election time. The worst thing is that this type of uprising has happened almost every time there has been a change in leadership for the last 40 years! Now the TGV party has taken over several of the ministries and it looks like military rule is in sight. I and fifteen other students were staying with our host families in Antananarivo during this incident and were instructed to stay in our houses and then evacuated the following day. The news was incredibly graphic. I myself was with my two host siblings, ages nine and twelve, who were not even phased by the bloody images on the news while I could barely watch.

Due to this political crisis we have been essentially on lock down so to avoid holding up the program within safety restrictions we left for the rainforest. We might as well see the country while it is still safe enough to travel. First we headed off for Andasibe - a nature reserve east of Tana. On the way there we stopped for dinner and I had my first experience eating frog legs! Texture like shrimp, but tastes like chicken. Once we arrived at the park we went on two nature hikes, one in the morning and one at night. In the morning we saw a baby indri lemur (the largest surviving lemur species) that had lost its family. The sound of the cry that the lemur made was so sad as he looked for his parents. After stalking him for twenty minutes he found what we think was his family. They proceeded to eat figs in the tree tops and sing songs to declare their territory. One even threw a fig down at the ground and hit me right in the face - so funny. Next we left for a twelve hour bus ride on Valentine's Day to Ankarafantsika, another national park in the west of Madagascar. This forest is more like a deciduous forest in parts of the US but there were still plenty of lemurs to check out. One in particular we observed was a dancing lemur that jumped right up to a bench on the path. He didn't seem to be afraid of us at all and started compulsively licking the cement bench - apparently for nutrients from the dirt. He sounded a bit lonely and come to find out, lemurs of this species live in communities. Based on the food supply and birth rate, sometimes the size of the groups are too large to maintain so they all call a meeting and decide who must be exiled from the group. It seemed as if this monkey had been chosen and was now on his own. I am not sure if they can be readmitted over time but if so, he had a lot to work on with his bizarre cement licking habits!

We also visited a small village outside of Andasibe to spend the night. During our stay I played a short game of soccer with some of the kids in the street with a tied up bunch of plastic bags. After a short time we walked the rest of the way down the street and I saw a soccer ball for sale. I went back later and bought the ball hoping to play with the same kids again. While looking for them, a huge crowd of kids that seemed to come out of nowhere, gathered around to play soccer. One of the kids asked me in broken French if I wanted to play futbol. Of course I answered yes and so he took the ball and started running out to the field where the kids who cannot afford school play. Surprisingly enough to the group of mainly boys, I chased after them and chaos ensued. I drew lines in the sand as goals and next thing I knew, a pile of clothes ended up at either end. The game had begun! The boys wanted to pick teams and only allow certain people to play but instead we invited everyone – even the girls to play. It was a big hit and we played for a good portion of the night. A perfect way to relax after all of the stress in Tana.

Manahoana!

So far this trip has been filled with surprises, laughter, and lots and lots of French and Malagasy. As you may know, Malagasy government is going through some leadership changes. On Monday, the day before we left on our journey to Madagascar, riots broke out in the streets of Antananarivo. The president Marc Ravalomanana had shut down a local television station due to a special showing from Ratsiraka, the socialist president from 1972-1991 who has been exiled to France. This breech of constitution caused the people to riot in the streets and the local town square. This causes a lot of looting which followed by fires to several grocery stores and the president's privately owned radio and television station. The numbers of people killed in the fires are not exact quite yet but it is looking around one hundred, Many of the people killed in the fires were looters themselves. The rioters are asking for regime change, the mayor of Antananarivo (Tana), Andry Rajoelina. The problem is that the mayor is only 34 and the constitution states that the president must be 40 years of age. Also, international organizations are still recognizing ravalomanana so there is a lot of confusion. As of now there is a transitional government in place and more exciting news to come.

What this means for our trip is a whole other story. Once we arrived to Antananarivo after 30 long hours of traveling, we were taken to a hotel 30km outside of the city in a town named Ambohimanga. There we have been participating in orientation and waiting out the situation to assess our safety in Tana. The plan is currently that we will be moving our first section of the program to Mahajunga, 500km west of the city. The program will still remain the same; we are just going to play things by ear to do our best to stay safe.

We have been able to leave the hotel area several times, first to the market and second to the historic site of the king and queen of the Merina people (one of the eighteen ethnic groups in Madagascar.) The market was an adventure to say the least. We were each paired up with a partner and each given 9,000 Ariary ($4.50) to buy a few items at the market on Monday. The purpose of the activity was to practice our Malagasy and to get an idea of how much things cost. Our first venture outside the hotel was funny to say the least. All sixteen of us standing at the bus stop looking at what seemed like an already saturated bus, wondering how we all would fit. It was the equivalent of a 15-passenger van with 25 people. Several even standing on the bumper! Once we squeezed on we took the taxi-brousse and shouted Misy Miala to get off at the next stop. We unloaded and took in the smells, sights, and sounds of the market. There were chickens roaming the streets, raw meat hanging from the ceiling of stands, straw baskets, and piles and piles of clothes. We were set on purchasing a kilo of luscious grapes we found on a side street of the market. We had been told to think of 200 Ariary as having the purchasing power of one dollar even though it is only worth about ten cents. We asked the woman shakily in Malagasy how much the grapes were, She replied 360 Ar – we counter with 300 Ar after much confused discussion between the two of us and she agrees. A dollar fifty worth of grapes seems reasonable right? Turns out once we go to pay she said trios-mil (3,000) not trios-cent (300). We had just bought a small bag of grapes for the equivalent of $15! Kenna and I grabbed the bag, paid and then walked to the next stand. Once we got there we realized, we can't eat grapes anyways, it doesn't have a peel! We had just spent $15 dollars on grapes we couldn't even eat. Turns out we could eat them after all but one could just imagine the laugh we had after that experience. We did end up getting a deal on a pineapple (anana for Kirsten) and an orange soda. Quite a new experience.

Several people expressed interest in how to send me letters, the address is:

BP 8172

Antananarivo (101)

Madagascar

Make sure to send US mail only, things like fedex cannot be sent to bp addresses. I would also love to send all of you a postcard as well so if you could send me your address that would be awesome! Hope things are well in the States, see you all soon!