The past week or so has been one of the worst since moving to Mada. The only good thing about this is that it can’t get much worse haha.
On Feb. 13th, a big group of “lehibes” (important people) from USAID came to my site to hear about the projects going on here. There was a BIG community meeting with probably 100 people plus lots of visitors, and it was an exciting event for my little town. Cecelia, a PCV from the big town over came and we watched and helped translate as needed. It was great to talk to all the visitors and at the end of the day they invited me to go with them the next day to a town I’d never seen! I love getting to see other places, and the offer of a free ride in an NGO car was hard to pass up. So I ran home, gathered my stuff and went to spend the night at Cecelias. Good timing too because I needed to charge all my stuff.
At Cecelia’s we hung out and talked with her sis who is visiting from the US for 3 months and I plugged in all my stuff to charge before I went to bed. My phone, laptop, kindle, and ipod were literally 6 inches from my head. I didn’t sleep that well because of mosquitoes and the insomnia from Mefloquin…but I would wake up, see my laptop flashing, look at my phone and doze off again. The last time I looked at my phone was 2:45. Awhile later, I woke back up and didn’t see my laptop anymore, figured Cecelia moved it (I’m not sure why that seemed like a rational thought) and went back to bed. Around 4:30 I woke up again, put on my glasses and decided to look for my stuff. I wandered through her dark house and didn’t see any of my stuff. Even my backpack full of clothes and a toothbrush…WEIRD. So I decided to ask Cecelia if she had moved all my stuff in the middle of the night.
I peered into her room and aksed if she moved all my electronics. She and her sis both jumped out of bed because of course they didn’t move my stuff in the middle of the night. We turned on the lights and running through the house, realized we had been robbed. And none of us woke up. Luckily, Cecelia lives really close to the police, so we ran downstairs (yes she lives on the 2nd floor), woke up the guard (yes she has a guard), and ran down the road, swearing/crying/wondering how this happened! We woke up the police and they came back to the house with us. We started looking around and found my backpack and papers strewn about the street about 50km away. We found my clothes and Cecelia’s kindle in the bushes. And we found Cecelia’s wallet resting nicely on top of her fence (yes she has a fence). Other than that, EVERYTHING was gone. Combined, they got 2 laptops, 2 ipods, 1 kindle, 2 cameras, 2 phones, my wallet and all forms of ID and a lot of cash. Interestingly, they left Cecelia all her US ATM cards and her ids which they dumped on the bathroom floor.
The police told us to come back at 8:30 to file a report, which is conveniently after all the brousses leave for Tamatave and Tana. Our stuff was most likely on one of those. We called PC and luckily some staff were in the area anyway, so they came to help us get things in order. And while we waited for PC some of Cecelia’s coworkers came and drove us to the brousse station and checkpoints to alert the police to what happened. Unfortunately, Cecelia and I both realized pretty quickly we wouldn’t see our stuff again. We got back and sat around thinking about what happened. She lives on the 2nd floor of a fortress-with a family downstairs, a guard, a locked gate, with a bell…and someone managed to climb a drainage pipe and come in and knew exactly where all her valuables were in the dark. They managed to pull out a bag under Cecelia’s bed while she and her sister slept in it. Not to mention how close they were to us to get our phones and computers. CRAZY.
PC got to our town and we went to the police to write a report. From the get-go everyone assumed the guard played a role…fitting since he claimed to have finished his last round before 3am. We went to the police and gendarme and I decided I should call my dad. I realize that at 3am in the US, getting a call to “check my insurance” seems silly…but it seemed like the logical next step. Sorry dad! Anyway, we went to the bank which is one of my least favorite places in this country. Of course they were still on their 2.5 hour lunch break, so we waited. Finally it opened-and what a long process. First we had to handwrite a report explaining what happened and apologize for losing my ATM card. Then had to wait in another line to withdraw money. But wait, I had NO ID, so I had to go have my picture taken….(This is a high quality pic...red, puffy face, big bags under my eyes…a great souvenir). We took the pics to the bank and glued them onto my report. Then we waited while they scanned and sent the pic to Tana for facial recognition. That took another hour. And finally they gave me my money only to have me fill out another form to request a new ATM card. Again, the no ID was a problem, so we had to call PC and look up my passport numbers. So frustrating. We finally got done a few hours later and went back to Cecelias house. I stopped at my house to get wine and goldfish crackers which I had been saving for the right moment, which seemed to be this. I went back to Cecelias, not wanting to go back to site yet. I dragged my blanket into her room and we tried to sleep, slumber party style. The next day I got a new phone, emailed the fam and went back to site. The craziest thing about all of this….it happened on the exact ONE year anniversary of Cyclone Giovanna that destroyed my house. I can only hope Feb. 13 2014 is a little better…
Back at site I felt a little better. I know the people, the kids keep me company, my neighbors lives 5 inches away, and all was well…although much quieter! Except I started feeling pretty sick pretty quickly. Nauseous, vomiting, no appetite, really tired…my friends would come over and make me eat, or bring me lunch from their house which was really nice. I finally called the doctors and they said parasites. Gross. So I got meds and I’m finally feeling better! I can eat 3 meals/day without vomiting…but like I said-its been a pretty shitty few weeks. But, life goes on. I’m mad at the burglar but thankful we didn’t wake up. I’m mad at the parasites, but I got my revenge. I guess this is just another story for the books….
Now I'm in Tana for a few weeks, going to training and helping to translate for an Operation Smile mission. Should be good.
