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!