A whole new world

Our travels on the way to Senegal consisted of a flight from Nosy Be to Diego Suarez, Diego Suarez to Antananarivo (at which case we landed 2 hours late and almost missed our flight to Paris, I had to chug my entire water bottle at security to rush to get on the plane... quite a sight to see :) ) Antanarivo to Paris. We stayed in Paris for 14 hours with Nicola's dad who lives just outside of the airport area. After relaxing in Paris and getting a brief flash of familiar life we hopped on a plane and flew right in to Dakar. I was cold for the first time in months! This trip was so quick that we arrived at customs and they asked for an address of residence and we couldn't even answer that question... it occurred to me that I wasn't even sure who was picking us up! Talk about flying by the seat of my pants!

After all of the madness of traveling for 36 hours, we finally arrived late on Tuesday night. I knew right from the start that this was going to be a lot different than I had expected, we drove from the airport to the hotel on a highway... something that does not exist is Madagascar. Dakar is a very big city and much more developed than I had expected, I even took a hot shower the first night. The next day we left the hotel and went right to our new classroom area to meet the other 21 students on the Senegal Arts and Culture program. We were greeted with a warm welcome and invites for lunch so the four of us slowly got to know everyone. That night we were whisked away by our new homestay families. This fast transition served as a serious shock to me - I had no idea what I was getting myself into. My homestay family is great but it is a very different situation than my last family. My family owns what looks like an apartment building right off the main street. One of the other girls in the program, Sally has been living on the second floor with them. I moved into a room that is located right on top of the building, accross from the room where the 12 sheep live, these are the family's pet sheep (a fitting place for a Shepard to live ;) .) Dinner was also something I was not expecting at all. We eat dinner every night at 9:30 off one big plate that is in the middle of the table. Generally, people in Senegal eat off this plate together with their hands so you can imagine my surprise when I sat down at the dinner table for fish and rice! After getting used to it, I think I like eating off the same plate, less dishes to wash but more body to wash instead :)

It has definitely taken a few days for me to get used to things around here by I am growing to love Senegal more each day. The Islam culture is something I never quite understood fully and living in the midst of it this last week has given me some new insight. There are announcements all over the city for the call to prayer five times a day and people will even stop on the side of the road and pray. Fridays are mosque days here so the whole city is dressed to the nines on Fridays. Also, my homestay family is polygamous so my homestay father spends half of his time with his other family. My homestay mom, Be, is a really great woman. She used to be a teacher and is so patient with Sally and I as we try to speak French and Wolof with her. She has nine children, one of which lives in the building with his wife and daughter. We have spent the last few nights staying up late talking and getting to know each other, maybe not the same situation I had with Eva but I love my family here as well.

Last week the program coordinator, Sara pulled me aside and asked me if I knew a man named Jim Gonia. I said yes wondering how she knew him (he was the missionary that lead the group to Madagascar in 2005). She explained that her husband is a Lutheran missionary and Jim is his new boss. He happened to be in Senegal for the last week to check on everyone so last night we had dinner, what a small world! There is a saying in Malagasy, Boribory ny tany, that means the world is round so we will meet again, very appropriate for this scenario.

On our way to the village stay and and excursion to Saint Louis, can't wait to see more of Senegal!

Madagascar 2: Escape to Africa (Senegal)

Ok... so HUGE change of plans. The situation here in Madagascar has changed drastically. In short, the military is no longer taking oders from the president, riots and demonstrations have been taking place every day and places all over Antananarivo have been broken into and burned down due to individuals taking advantage of the situation. Even our "safe place" in Majunga has been tear gased almost every day in the last week due to the crowds of protestors. This is likely the start to a civil war if the proposed negotiations are not successful. Seeing the counry that I love start to collapse into shambles is heart breaking but I still have hope for change. Our group has moved to Nosy Be, a tourist destination island (or heaven as we like to call it) off the west coast of Madagascar. The political situation has little effect here, in fact we spent all day yesterday snorkeling and seeing the AMAZING aqualife here off the coast of Madagascar... clearly no exposure to mutiny and fires. This was part of the schedule but now is the only safe place for the group to be located for what looks like the remainder of the semester. This is all in response to the fact that the State Department has issued a Travel Warning, a step up from what was a travel advisory. This change has caused the Peace Corps and embassy employees to evacuate the country. There are safe places for people to live and be only minorly effected by these problems but the worry is that international flights will be cancelled and evacuation will not be possible at all. That being said, Kenna, another CU student here on the program, and I received news late on Thursday night that CU has a policy that students must cancel their program and be evacuated from the country as soon as a travel warning is issued. With a lot of phone calls and confusion it has been decided that Kenna and I, Nicola, and Michael (University of Peugeot Sound students) are all going to be evacuated and relocated to Senegal to continue with an SIT program very similar to our own. We depart Monday morning from Nosy Be to Tana, Tana to France, and France to Dakar (capitol of Senegal). This has been a very sudden change and a little difficult to take in since the other 12 studens are staying here in Madagascar. After having some time to process the idea, I am stoked to have the opporunity to travel to a completely different country and learn in the structure of the program that I signed up for.
Dakar is the place we will be spending a great amount of the time. It is the most western point of Africa on Cape Vert with a populaion of one million. It is known for its great musical culture and peaceful transition out of colinization. It is going to be quite a voyage but before I left Colorado my family gave me a bracelet that reads "embrace the journey" and I intend to do just that! Veloma tompoko Madagascar, Asalaamaalekum Senegal

Voice

The last week has been very different from all of the rest. Demonstrations have been taking place in Majunga now too. Tear gas fills the street almost every day to deter the looters from unrightfully crippling family run businesses in the Mahabibo market. We have been having amazing classes but being sent home right away to stay out of the chaos. On one hand I feel very over cautious and ridiculous by keeping ourselves safe while the Malagasy people are exercising the only voice they have in streets - risking their own lives. On the other hand, it is irresponsible to put ourselves in an unsafe situation - this is not our battle to fight. These problems of inequality and corrupt leadership have been prevalent since the end of colonization in 1960, not to mention the nature of colonization in the first place. But, life must go on with or without political crisis. People have to work to live here so this fight can only be sustainable for a time and so class continues.
We have started our unit on NGOs and the Madagascar Action Plan (MAP) this week, my favorite unit so far. This has entailed paying field visits to schools, hospitals, and various NGOs. One of the places that impacted me in particular was a safe home for youth that have been victims of domestic violence. The staff reminded me very much of the staff at Project YES (the youth based NGO I have worked for in Lafayette). They were all very caring, knowledgeable, and clearly overworked for the cause they believed in. It was a very small center with few resources but overflowing love and kids everywhere! We found out that the center does not receive any funds from the government and there is only one other place in the entire country that offered similar services. The center was making a huge difference for those kids in Majunga and struggling to make ends meet like many other non-profits in the US right now. It reminded me how lucky we are to have government funded programs to provide services such as these that seem like essential human rights, not just an extra service that happens to be provided in the area if it can stay afloat.
Another very interesting thing we learned about this week was the MAP. It is a program implemented over the course of ten years to improve eight different categories including rural development, education, health and family planning, environment, and the economy. The program receives funding from many countries but mainly the US. I have been very skeptical in the past of USAid projects and it is really neat to see a program move closer to their goal with help from the US. I pray that this current political situation does not set Madagascar back from the steps it has made.