Still Here....

I survived my first cyclone. As much as I joked about cyclones before getting to Madagascar, I never actually thought I would see one. I guess I was wrong about that. 

I'm still in Tana waiting to hear what happened to my town and to my house and to the entire East coast of Madagascar. I got to Tana on Sunday night, and the cyclone hit Tana late Monday night. During the day we did some cyclone prep. Since most of us didn't know we were going to be evacuated, no one had enough clothes. So we had to go fripping and buy new wardrobes. We also had to eat bagels and delicious food at the Cookie Shop in case it flooded after the cyclone. And then we also had to buy some groceries and boxed wine and candles. So we were all ready for this massive storm. But it seemed as if we were the only people who were concerned. The Malagasy people we saw didn't seem too worried, which was a little weird. Except my counterpart did call me and say that she wanted to move my stuff into the mayor's house so it wouldn't blow away. Luckily I had a key hidden in my shower...

So the cyclone hit late at night and I woke up to lots and lots of rain, the roof leaking and really loud wind. I'm not sure what I expected, but it wasn't as bad as I thought. It poured for most of the day on Monday and at one point we wandered out of the Meva to find food at the gas station. There were lots of trees and billboards down, and next door a huge tree had fallen on a car. But we didn't see any flooding so the damage looked minimal. And thanks to Peace Corps, the Meva had a generator that ran the entire time. So I had electricity and wifi through the cyclone. By around noon on Tuesday, everything was over and the sun started to come out. And the waiting began...

Unlike storms in the US, news about the storm wasn't instantaneously updated online. It was surprisingly hard to find any information about the storm, and the info is still coming very slowly. The storm apparently hit the coast (where I live) as a category 4 storm,  and now no one knows anything. All the cell phone towers are out so its hard to reach anyone from the coast and of 500ish communities that were affected by the storm, only about 80 had been reached today. Crazy. I can't go back to my site until I hear that I have a house and that the road still exists...and I still don't know when that will be. The newspapers today said that Vatomandry, Brickeville and Moramanga had been destroyed...and I live pretty close to Vatomandry. I have no idea what to expect.

But until I hear something from Peace Corps, I'm stuck here...sitting on a couch and reading news articles about Giovanna. And looking at the radar which shows another cyclone forming in the Indian ocean, and Giovanna turning around in the Mozambique channel and hitting Madagascar again. Yay cyclone season.

Giovanna prep

I'm surprisingly back in Tana after about 2 days away. I left on Friday to go to my VAC meeting with the 8 other volunteers in my region. We spent the weekend in Moramanga (3 hrs away) and hung out, ate some good food, and sang karaoke. But on Sunday, when we were supposed to be going back to site we got a nice little update from our security officer saying that we should not go back to site because of cyclone Giovanna which is conveniently heading straight to Tsarasambo. When I asked the PC security guy if I was going to have a house after this...he just laughed. And then asked if I lived in a sturdy house. I'm not sure how sturdy sticks and leaves are...but I don't think thats what he had in mind.

So I'm back in Tana with most of my region. Its fun to be preparing for the storm with friends, but I'm a little concerned about my house which I didn't have anytime to pack up or make cyclone prep. But most of us are in the same position...houses made of sticks, right on the coast, right where the cyclone is heading.

So now I have wifi and can spend hours on end staring at the satellite picture of pending doom.

 

So the cyclone is about the size of the country...and its heading straight to my house. And all the articles I've read say its going to be worse than the worst cyclone that has ever hit here. And that everyone needs to be self-sufficient for at least a week. And last bad cyclone it knocked out 40,000 houses and  destroyed 80% of the Tamatave port. And this might be worse. So thats what is going on in my life. 

So I'm in a concrete house in Tana, which is safer than my stick hut on the coast. But there will probably still be torrential rain and winds. Yikes. The other volunteers and I are going to go eat bagels for breakfast just in case we can't do that after this cyclone. And then we're going to stock up on candles, food, and other supplies....It should be interesting to say the least.

Vatomandry

Monica hanging out with my friends.

Madagascar?

Today I'm wondering whether I'm still actually in Madagascar. Its been a vazaha kind of day....

I finally had a friend come visit my site! Monica came to visit for a few days and when she showed up in Tsarasambo, the town went crazy. Now there was a second white person to stare at. Crazy. Things to do in my town are limited...so we did what everyone else does...walked to the market, sat on the bridge, and played with some little kids. Everyone in town was super excited to see another vazaha and they kept telling her how good she was at Malagasy and how bad I was at malagasy. This woman who I buy tomatoes from at the market kept saying..."Oh Monica. You're so good at Malagasy. Corey is still so bad." Yes, I'm still not fluent...but I also only ever talk to this woman about tomatoes, so I'm wondering whether she should be the true judge of my Malagasy skills...Anyway, it was great to have a friend come visit. And she showed up with a fully charged laptop and the newest episodes of Modern Family. So eventually we just kicked the kids out, and watched Modern Family and ate funfetti frosting. Not a bad way to spend an evening...

A few days later  we went to Tana on a brousse that left on time (shocking) and only broke down once (also shocking). Tana is an interesting city because its really the only huge city in Madagascar. And spending time in Tana is like stepping into another world, especially coming from my little town on the coast. First of all, its not super hot. Thank god. Second of all, there are lots and lots of cars coming from all directions making you feel close to death whenever you're in the vicinity of a road. And lastly, its full of vazahas...meaning there are lots of things for vazahas do including eating pizza, going to a grocery store, and using wifi internet.

Since neither Monica or I are here very often, we decided we needed to make the most of this trip. So we started off at Palladios, a really pretty restaurant with an outdoor patio, real cocktails and really good pizza. We quickly found out that they had a massive rat problem as well....the rats would hang out in the trees next to us, or jump from the trees to the roof over us. Sadly, I've started to get used to this...so it didn't actually bother me that much...the pizza was still delicious. And according to Monica, the rats could possibly be chinchillas, making the whole situation a little less gross.

And then today was full of surprises. I went to the office to check on my computer, and discovered that its not actually dead (false alarm) but it just doesn't recognize the battery anymore! So as long as I can plug my computer in...it still functions. That was a nice surprise. And another nice surprise...eating a bagel for lunch! After getting lost and walking in the completely wrong direction, we finally got in a cab and made it to The Cookieshop, an American restaurant serving bagel sandwiches, iced coffee drinks and brownies. Is this Madagascar? And let me just tell you, it was amazing. I had a real bagel sandwich with real bacon and real cheese and real mayo. And they had Starbucks-esque iced coffee drinks, and carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. Sorry for talking about food so much, but you just can't find this kind of food here! I don't think rice was even an option on the menu, which is unheard of in this country! We both left the restaurant with mild food comas...but it was worth it. Who knows when I'll find another bagel! (River Road still wins for best bagels though....)

And then, to make the day even better, we went and got massages. An hour, full body massage was $4, which is even affordable on my Peace Corps salary. It was super relaxing, although I did have to try really hard not to laugh through half of it. And since we did vazaha things all day, we had to finish with a taco dinner.

Wifi, tacos, hot showers, bagels and massages....definitely a nice mini-vacation. If only that quarterly report would finish (or start) itself...

Hello February

I was under the impression that December was supposed to be the hottest month in Tsarasambo, but unfortunately that is not the case. Its so hot here, I feel like I’m melting. Also, since my town doesn’t have electricity, I am unable to find anything colder than room temperature (about 90degrees) to drink. And to think that its winter in other places…

I’m back in Tana after a month back at site. Its nice to be back in the land of running water, wifi and English speakers. Unfortunately, I’m here to mourn the loss of my laptop which apparently couldn’t handle the heat and humidity of Madagascar. So I’m in Tana to use the work computers, do some stuff on the internet, and hopefully find someone who can revive my sad laptop I’m not hopeful though…

Back to the “Good Boat”

Life back at site has been…interesting, as always. The adjustment back to site after vacation was a challenge. In my month away I had forgotten the true meaning of boredom. I was quickly brought up to speed when I got back. But nothing that a fully charged kindle can’t handle…I finished the entire Hunger Games series in 3 days. (In my defense, my counterpart and doctor were on vacation so I didn't have any work I could do...)

As a first matter of business, the mayor decided it was time to fix my leaky roof since the rainy season had begun. The workers showed up with a bunch of ravinala to patch the holes. However, somewhere along the way they decided it would be better to just cover my whole roof with a bright green tarp. So now I get to be the one white person in town living in the one green hut. Yay for community integration. But at least it stopped the leaking…for a little while. If it rains hard enough though, the water manages to get under the tarp and into my bed. But, if I imagine that it’s a sprinkler…then I’m pretty happy.

So while my current hut was undergoing home renovations, workers were next door finishing the cement floor of my future house. It now has a floor, four walls and a roof. I’m hopeful that in the next three months they should be able to build 2 doors and a window. But who knows…

I feel like I run a daycare...

Being away from site for awhile reminded the kids that in 2 years I go back to the US. So when I got back, their immediate concern was figuring out what I was going to do with my chicken in two years. When I explained that I couldn’t take a chicken on a plane, they were really confused. After all, you can put chickens in a taxi brousse, on top of a taxi brousse, in your house, on your lap, in your purse….Anyway, they recovered from confusion and quickly started arguing over who would get to keep my chicken. And that conversation turned into a question about everything in my house, from my pencil to my flipflops to my spoons. I'm glad to know they will miss my silverware. It remains to be seen whether they will miss me.

And aside from marking their territory on all my possessions, they’ve almost moved into my house with me. I leave for 5 minutes and when I come back there are 10 kids reading magazines on my floor, or one time, three kids cooking corn on my stove. No joke. At least they offered me some…

So I have a consistent group of about 10 kids who always are in my house. Ad they are usually great, although it’s a love/hate relationship and I think they are catching on to that. Sometimes I love playing with them, especially when they ask me to turn up my music so they can dance to Rihanna. Othertimes I want to kick them out of my house so I have to lie and say I have work to do or I have to go to the market for the 2^nd time. But its funny because everytime they start to drive me crazy, they leave for a few minutes, and come back with food. Or they go fetch my water. Or watch my dishes. Or something else to make me feel guilty for ever being mad. I just can’t win! I do appreciate the help though.

 I also think I have a small problem…as in one girl thinks she’s coming back to the US with me. When she first asked, I laughed because I thought she was kidding. But she keeps bringing it up, and now she does all my chores every day, and when I asked her when her next big vacation from school was, she said “In two years when I go home with you.” Uh oh. I’m going to have to break the news gently.  

But aside from all my friends under age 10, I’ve managed to make some friends my age who work for another health related NGO, speak English, work in my town and know everything about American pop culture from Charlie Chaplin to the newest Justin Bieber song…So when I got back from vacation they said we were going to have a ‘fety’ to celebrate my bday/xmas/new years. So they came to my house and we went to Vatomandry where we spent the entire day trying to track down various people with questionable work hours and undetermined office locations. We weren’t too successful. We would wait an hour and a half for a 5 minute meeting…if that person even decided to go to work that day. So we really just wandered around in the blazing sun all day.  Eventually it was getting late so I thought that our day of delivering invitations was the fety and everyone would go home. But it turned into ‘sleepover at Corey’s’ which I didn’t realize was happening until they just never left. It ended up being fun though. We cooked dinner, and then our options were limited so we went to bed at the late hour of 8pm…

I wish I were fluent already….

I have good and bad days with Malagasy….some days I think I’m finally getting the hang of it. And other days I have absolutely no idea what anyone says. Sometimes when people start talking really fast and I know its hopeless to try to keep up, I just zone out and think about whatever I want to think about, and just laugh when they do. It has worked pretty well so far. Except for a meeting with some Americans which I happened to be at….and they asked if I could translate. I warned them about my limited abilities, but apparently I was better than no translator. So I did my best, which ended up being less than spectacular (I think I understood 1/100 words) and realized that translating is especially hard when you zone out halfway through every question.

The longest night of my life…

A few weeks ago, my town had a ‘ball’ which means the huge building across the street turns into a nightclub that runs a generator ALL NIGHT. Its still not clear what the occasion was, other than another Saturday night with nothing to do. I was all ready for my normal 10-12 hours of sleep when the music started. And it was so loud that it shook my house. And they played the same 7 malagasy songs on repeat…from 7:30pm-5:30am. I wish I were kidding..Earplugs and benadryl didn’t even help. I think it was quiet from 5:30-6, after which everyone got right back up to start their morning routines.

And, since I know everyone was dying to know, the really fat baby I mentioned awhile ago…well she is now 6 months old, and still very large. In fact, we had to weigh her in a duffle bag because she was too big for the shorts we usually use. But being fat in this country is a good thing. It’s a sign of wealth because it means you have enough money for food. It also means you’re comfortable where you live, which I found out because everyone in my town keeps saying how comfortable I must be in Tsarasambo since I’ve gotten so big… ‘Maventy Be Corey! Tamana Tsara’ And if it makes them happy, then I’ll go with it! (But I'm pretty sure I'm the same size as I was a few months ago..)

So that’s all that’s new in my life. If you’ve sent me a letter/package, THANK YOU! Its waiting for me at the post office, but I haven’t been able to get there in awhile…I miss everyone and I hope to talk to people in the next few days when I still have some internet!

Vacation Travels Part 4: Diego for New Years

Another 4 hour brousse ride to Diego. But we made it without a break-down…so that’s exciting. We got to Diego and went to the MEVA (PC house) to hang out for awhile. Then we indulged in some amazing vazaha food. I had spaghetti and it actually tasted like spaghetti. So exciting. We kept up with the vazaha food theme and decided to cook a feast for dinner. The girls cooked baked mac and cheese and the boys made cheeseburgers and we bought a box of wine and had funfetti cake. It was amazingly delicious. ( I realize that I write a lot about food…but its hard not too when all you eat here is rice). Anyway, after dinner we went out for some drinks and ended up at the casino in this really nice hotel. The owner is a Scottish guy who knows the names of all the PCVs and all the prostitutes. He gives both parties free drinks everytime they come in, a nice benefit of being a volunteer. A bunch of people played black jack and one of my friends ended up winning 140,000 Ariary ($70). Pretty exciting.

Emerald Isle

On the way to Emerald Isle

Paradise

Looming storm

The next day, bright and early, we hired a sailboat to take us to Emerald Isle. When I say sailboat, I don’t mean a fiberglass catamaran like you see in the bahamas. This was a Malagasy sailboat, with the mast made of a log and the bottom of the boat full of water. It was a 2 hour ride to Emerald Isle, and it was calm and beautiful. We got to the island and our captain dropped us off to hang out on the beach. When we got there there were only a few other people on the island so we had the whole beach to ourselves. Unfortunately, the boats kept showing up with more and more tourists. It was still beautiful though. We hung out on the beach, swam in the clearest water I’ve ever seen, and relaxed. Our captain went fishing and caught us lunch. We had a feast for lunch with fresh crab, coconut rice, and 5 different kinds of fish.  Unbelievable. We spent the afternoon on the beach and just as a thunderstorm was approaching, our captain decided it was time to leave.

So through the thunderstorm we went. It was slightly terrifying, and at times I thought I was going to die. But since everyone else was laughing about it, I tried to also. But it brought back memories of growing up when my dad made me go sailing with him…and I remembered clearly why I don’t like sailing. Although after sailing through a thunderstorm, I could probably handle Torch Lake now. We all survived though, and the only casualties were our bags that had gotten soaked, and our stomachs because I’m pretty sure everyone was feeling nauseaus.

New Years Eve day we splurged. We went to this beautiful hotel where they had a huge breakfast buffet with cereal (and milk!), eggs, steak, pastries, lychees, other really good fruit and really good coffee. We all thought we were getting a great deal, of all you can eat for 10,000AR ($5), but when we went up to pay the lady told us it was actually 20,000Ar. Woops. Another thing lost in translation. So that was a bummer, but the food was delicious, and still worth it. Later on we went back to the hotel to hang out at their pool which is also beautiful. Again we got screwed over on price, this time because it was Sunday and after 1pm. They have some weird pricing schemes. This time we told them we were volunteers and didn’t have a lot of money and asked for a discount. Apaprently you can bargain anywhere, because it worked. So we spent the afternoon at the pool with a swim up bar and lots of cute french kids running around and it felt like we were back in America. Weird.

For New Years Eve we all went out to dinner and then went out for drinks and then went into a club. The club was EMPTY, so it was about 12 Americans, 2 Malagasy people and some old French men and Malagasy prostitutes. (Diego is known for how much prostitution goes on there. Its really sad to see. But its seriously everywhere. Walking down the street you lose count after 50…Yikes). But we had fun dancing at the club and then we had champagne at midnight which was great. But after midnight the town goes crazy. Apparently the thought is that once everyone is sufficiently drunk (aka midnight) everyone should get in their cars and/or motorcycles and drive through the city while people on the street throw water at them. Each car had probably 15-20 people in them and then there were people sitting or dancing on top of cars. It was insane. And I’m pretty sure I witnessed 4 car accidents. So we spent New Years watching the shenanigans in the street for a few hours. It was pretty entertaining.

New Years "parade"

And then vacation was over, sadly. Well aside from the 24 hours I had to spend on a brousse just to get back to the capital. Luckily, it only broke down once…and if my mechanical skills serve me correctly, it was a spark plug issue. We were only broken down for an hour, which is almost a record. But now I’m back in the capital for a dayish and then I go back to site.

Its going to be weird going back to site because I’ve been gone for so long. My town probably thinks that I’ve gone back to the US, so I’m hoping they haven’t given my house away, and I’m also hoping that it still has a roof now that the rainy season has begun. Who knows, maybe in this month I’ve been away, my new house will be finished…but I think that’s a lot to ask so I won’t hold my breath!

I hope everyone had a great New Years and holiday season! I miss everyone so much, so keep those letters coming! I’ll write you back I promise.

Vacation Travels Part 3: Ankarana National Park

first lemur sighting in Madagascar. This one didn't dance.

  

We arrived in Ankarana not having any idea if there would be a place to stay, and wondering whether we would have to do a quick hike and then leave again. Luckily, we got there, found bungalows, and before we knew it they were cooking us lunch and we were drinking a cold Fanta. Nothing tastes better than cold fanta. Yum. After lunch we went on an afternoon hike to the BAT CAVE. 

Pride Rock is actually in Madagascar. Get it right Lion King.

This one didn't think anyone was watching.

But first, I had my first lemur sightings. Oddly enough they were singing and dancing just like the movie. But actually they were pretty awesome and got really close to us without getting scared away by the 8 cameras we shoved in their face.

We continued on our 4 hour hike and finally made it to the Bat Cave which was an enormous cave that we hiked into. As the name implies, there were thousands of bats and you had to watch where you were walking or you would get pooped on. Unfortunatly, half our group forgot their headlamps, so we were hiking in a cave in the dark. It was a little scary, but beautiful. We also saw a 400 year old baobab tree and hiked over the tsingys. At times I thought I was in Jurassic Park, or on an alien planet…hard to say which.

tsingy

Day two we did a day hike which was supposed to take us to the “green lake.” However, there was a miscommunication and our guides forgot to bring our lunch, and we forgot to bring our lunch, which meant that our day hike turned into a half day thing. But it was still really amazing. We hiked through more tsingy, through another cave (saw human bones), and had to cross a rickety suspension bridge which could only hold one person at a time. That’s a little scary, but it was fun. Our final destination was the “Big Hole.” They really do a good job at naming these places. The big hole was indeed, a really big hole. And it was really fun to throw things in. Apparently during the rainy season it fills up with water, but I don’t know if that’s actually true. It was dry when we saw it, with many pairs of shoes at the bottom.

The Big Hole

After hiking so far we were all exhausted so we hung around our bungalows, tried to find ripe jack fruit (failed), and watched movies. And then the next day we left for Diego.