So this is awkward...

So my photography business in Tsarasambo is booming…everyone wants pictures all the time. Which is interesting to me because right now is the “krizy” which is the time of year when no one has money for food. So people are coming to my door asking for money, followed by people at my door asking for pictures (which they pay for…) I don’t understand. 

My biggest client base is teenage girls who walk by my house on the way to middle school. And they’re nice and friendly and I like talking to them. And I don’t mind taking their picture…But yesterday a group of girls asked if I would go down the street to the rice paddy/watering hole/laundry/bathing spot and take their picture there.  I of course said yes, and we went down the road. And before I could do anything, the girls were standing in their underwear in the watering hole wanting me to take pictures of them. WHAT. OMG. WHAT. I didn’t know what to do so I acted really embarrassed and ran away after making up some excuse about my camera being dead.  So that happened…Now when they come back to ask if my camera is charged, I need an actual explanation for why I don’t want to take those pictures. 

I can only imagine what the talk in town would be…

Medical Mission with CRMF

After a few weeks at site I headed to Tamatave to help with a medical mission. I managed to catch a private taxi brousse which was great...until they told me I had to pretend to be married to the guy if the police asked...something about not having the right permits to be driving a non-family member? Who knows. Anyway...

I got to Tamatave and met up with a medical team from the NGO Caring Response Madagascar Foundation and they needed PCVs to help translate. It was a two week medical mission, the first week was spent training Malagasy midwives and doctors and doing a practicum at the clinic, and the second week was free clinics in rural areas. I got to translate for pediatric consultations, ultrasound appointments, and other random things that popped up . It was nice to feel useful, and I definitely learned a lot…

I also saw some pretty crazy things. Live birth...so messy. And then I saw a doctor milking a baby boy. (True story! Apparently babies, regardless of gender, can grow breasts from the hormones in breast milk, and therefore can be milked). One of the doctors wanted to show my friend and I this…so she milked the baby boy. I was supposed to explain to the medical student and the mother what was happening…but the entire thing was lost in translation. It’s hard to explain in Malagasy why its possible to milk a baby boy…I’m pretty sure the mother was very confused. 

I could only help them for a week because then I had to go to Tana for my one year conference with my entire stage. One year into our service and our entire group (27 of us) are still here! That is rare in PC so we felt pretty good. And Peace Corps rewarded us with good food…The week of training was really helpful and it was so nice to see everyone again. Back in Tana we went out for lots of good food (BAGELS AND LOX HAS COME TO MADA) and caught up on internet time. All good things. And now back to site for a few busy weeks until girls camp! 

Something New

It’s been a busy couple of weeks since I got back from Manakara. I finally have a project that is getting going, so that has kept me busy at site. 

I’m working with four other volunteers to plan and organize a girls camp to bring girls from our sites on the East Coast, to the capital. We’re going to focus on health and education through visits to the University the American Embassy and some health NGOs. Its going to be a really great project if we can pull it off. However, like everything in this country, things are complicated.  For example, timing. This was/is a huge issue because I had to start advertising before I knew if we had funding. So I crossed (and am still crossing) my fingers and hoping we get funding so the thing I’ve been advertising actually happens.

 Since each volunteer can only bring four girls, its very competitive. All expenses for the girls are paid, and to select the girls, we have an application that will be read by a selection committee. However the fact that its an application process is a new concept for many people at my site. Most things are decided in informal ways (i.e. the mayor decides, the people with money decide, anyone important decides…you get the point). The fact that girls are going to be chosen based on their essays is a new idea. When I went to talk to the mayor about the project he said, ‘So, you’ll choose a girl from my house, right?…’ and when I told the head of the village that the girls had to fill out the essays themselves he said, ‘but they have bad handwriting…can’t the parents do it for them?’ 

 I also made the mistake of telling a few girls about the camp before it was publicized in town…this backfired because within 5 minutes of mentioning a trip to Tana, all the kids in the neighborhood were saying ‘Corey is taking Litisia to Tana for free!’ I had Litisia’s dad come to my house (seriously 3 minutes later) asking when and why I was taking his daughter to Tana. Never underestimate how fast word spreads in a tiny village…

So that’s the news with my new project…I go back to my site in the next few days, and I’m interested to see all the rumors that have been started about the project in the week and a half I’ve been gone…