A Malagasy Christmas

Yu and my boss.

Secret Santas in Mantasoa. People got creative...especially with that cabbage.

Santa came to Mantasoa.

This is what December in Madagascar looks like.

Dreaming of a White Christmas?

In honor of the holiday season, I’ve been listening to the Charlie Brown Christmas cd on repeat, with the N’SYNC Christmas album sprinkled in there. But its just not the same. Not that I really miss the snow, but I do miss how pretty white christmas lights are, and how nice it is to sit by a fire with hot chocolate and Christmas cookies. But I’m just going to have a different kind of Christmas this year. No snow, no 24/7 Christmas carols on the radio, no last minute Christmas shopping at the packed mall…just sun, palm trees, and the beach. The only thing I can complain about is that I can’t be with friends and family at home. And that I’m spending my bday on a 16 hour busride…with no AC and lots of people crammed inside. But that’s okay.

But anyway, I’m back in Tana after two weeks of training. We went back to the training center in Mantasoa for two weeks of electricity, hot running water, and snack time. (True story. We get snacktime twice a day because sitting through lectures all day makes you hungry). The first week was IST with everyone from my stage. We surprised PC by not having any ETs (early terminations) so it was all 27 of us. Before IST started we spent the weekend in Tana, enjoying wifi at the Meva (PC house), mexican food, and time to hear everyone’s crazy stories. Unfortunately, two people in our stage also got pickpocketed so that was a downer.

IST is somewhat of a rite of passage because it means you have survived three months on your own, not knowing anyone, not speaking the language and not having anything to do. Most volunteers say that the first three months are the hardest…so everyone was excited to have made it this far. To celebrate, PC surprised us with lots of American food. Sandwiches, hotdogs and hamburgers, pizza, fried chicken and tacos! This probably doesn’t seem like a big deal to anyone else, but for the volunteers, who have been eating mostly rice, pasta, potatos and vegetables,  seeing lunch meat, cheese, mustard, mayo, pickles, lettuce and tomato seemed like a slice of heaven. Not to mention the giant bowl of popcorn that was full all day every day.

Along with the American food, the volunteers made an attempt to get in the xmas spirit by decorating the training center, having our boss dress up like Santa, blaring xmas carols and doing secret santas. Unfortunately, the good food and good times also meant that almost everyone would get sick from the change in diet, the large quantity of food, and the traveling. I’m pretty sure every session we had about 4 people in bed recovering from stomach problems. The food was worth it though.  

After IST everyone headed back to Tana except for 8 volunteers who stayed for a second week of training about malaria, child/maternal health and project design and management. Our day off in between training we had a movie marathon and managed to watch 6 movies including all 4 Twilight movies. (MK and Mere, sorry for making fun of you so much for that…) But in our defense it was pouring rain all day so we didn’t have many other options…We did play in the rain at one point though.

For the second week of training the 8 of us brought our Malagasy counterparts with us. The information was really helpful, but it was really hard to sit through 5 days of training where we sat in one room from 8-5. I thought I would be excited to have a busy schedule at training, but now I realize that I like all my free time at site. The training was pretty helpful though. And during our sessions all the volunteers wrote some pretty good group poems, made training superlatives, and passed notes. It was almost like elementary school.

And other things that are very “Madagascar”…

·      My ATM finally came to the bank. But the bank is about an hour and a half from my site, and I didn’t have time to go back there before I left for training/vacation. Luckily there are no privacy rules here, so the bank gave my ATM card AND pin number to my friend because he said he would see me “sometime soon.”

·      I have also been suffering from some “malagasy ailments.” Every time I get bitten by a mosquito or bed bug or some other random bug that likes to eat my arms…I swell up a lot and then it gets infected because I scratch it. So the other day I had about 8 bandaids on my arms and legs trying to prevent me from scratching….It only helped a little. And then I got some weird skin fungus which apparently everyone has here. So yay! Apparently it will go away…in 6 months?

So that’s about all that’s going on here. I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays! I wish I could be celebrating with everyone. But I’m thinking of all of you and I miss everyone!

Five Months Down. Lots to go.

Five months ago I left home for staging! Its crazy to think that now I'm sitting in Madagascar, moved into a hut in my village, and am somewhat able to communicate in Malagasy. I guess a lot has happened in 5 months! 

Back to the land of internet so time for an update...although there hasn't been too much going on since I wrote at Thanksgiving. I'm back in Antananarivo for the weekend until our IST conference. My whole stage is back together for the first time since we all moved to our sites, so it is exciting to hear about everyone's towns and what everyone is up to. But its also a weird feeling going from my tiny village where I go to bed at 730pm and speak Malagasy all day, to a house with 30 PCVs in a place with hot showers, wifi, and English speakers. Its culture shock all over again. But I really do like the hot showers...and I even had nachos for dinner last night. Word on the street is that there is even a place where I can buy a bagel and cream cheese. If this is true, I will be a very happy person.

So since I last updated...I have acquired crayons and magazines (thank you Katie Leight), and the kids have gone crazy. They come and color in my house almost every day, and now I have an entire wall covered in pictures. And they really like looking at People magazine and describing what is happening in all the pictures....the girl with green eye shadow is really sick, and the girl wearing a dress with a big slit accidently ripped her clothes, and it goes on...Its pretty entertaining. The kids have also become really helpful and fetch my water and then bring me fruit. I can't eat the fruit fast enough to keep up with what they bring me. Lychees, pineapples, mangoes and bananas. I cannot complain. When I'm not melting in the humidity, I really love the East Coast. We will see what I think when the rainy season starts...


Lychee season changes everything in my town. People stop working, stop going to the clinic, stop doing everything except going into the forest and fetching lychees. All day every day. And now is one of the only times of year when people have a lot of money...so now people are drunk all the time, there are random fights in the market, and new market stalls appear every day. Its like a whole new town!

Last weekend there was a little goodbye party in Vatomandry for two PCVs who were finished with their service and then two other volunteers from a different NGO. We had a delicious dinner and even had cocktails with fresh mango and pineapple. It was a nice change from the cooking I do for myself. And then we went to a bar downtown and observed the crazy antics of drunk people in town. These two crazy men started fighting really close to us, and one guy ran over to a nearby fence, pulled out a huge stick and then ran down the street screaming. He didn't reappear the rest of the night, so I'm still not sure how that fight ended. It was a good time and I got to say goodbye to the volunteers who are leaving my region! In the morning, we woke up at 5am to watch the sunrise on the beach and it was beautiful. I'm pretty sure thats the only sunrise I've ever been awake for...and it might be the only one, but it was definitely beautiful.

I also have made some friends my age which is unbelievably exciting. They are health workers in nearby towns and in their 20s too...unlike many of the other people my age, they aren't married and don't have children! So we have a little more in common. One day they showed up at my house and said we were going to Vatomandry for the day to hang out on the beach. It was a fun surprise, so we went out to lunch (cow hoof soup) and then hung out on the beach all day. It was a nice change from the 3 year olds I usually socialize with...but I do love the 3 year olds too.

And I also had a Little Miss Sunshine moment, when I was taking a brousse to a friend's site about an hour away. Our brousse stopped to pick up some new passengers, and when the driver tried to restart the car it wouldn't start without a running push from about 5 of the passengers. I just laughed. And then on the way home, the brousse I got on had about 36 people in it already. When I sat down I had to misplace a small baby, who then was quickly put back on my lap. Oh Malagasy transportation...

But thats about all that is going on here in Madagascar. I'm hanging out in Tana for the rest of the weekend and then heading back to Mantasoa to the training center for our in-service training followed by a week of malaria training followed by a vacation for xmas and new years. Should be a good time.

 I just got a big batch of letters, so if you wrote me recently...I probably got it and I'm writing you back!! And keep the letters coming...they keep me sane.

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season! I keep forgetting that its that time of year...but someone should make a snow angel and drink hot chocolate in my honor. I'll melt in the 100 degree weather in return.