Op Smile 2013

I just finished helping out with another successful Operation Smile Mission in Tana.  Like the one I helped with in August, this was a 10 day mission with 60+ medical volunteers from all over the world. We had doctors and nurses from Sweden, Russia, Italy, South Africa, India, China….and the list goes on.

Myself and 9 other PCVs helped out as translators for the 10 days. It was an exhausting experience, but definitely rewarding and one of the most memorable experiences from my service. The mission began with one day of screening past patients, and 2 days of screening new patients. Last mission they screened about 300 patients in the two days…this mission they had over 300 patients the first day, and over 500 total. Needless to say, it was a chaotic two days. I worked as a “runner,” taking patients from station to station, which included walking up 3 flights of stairs for every 10 patients to come through. After 12+ hours…I was a little tired. I thought walking patients from station to station would be easy enough…but it ended up being a nightmare. The head of the hospital ward only wanted a few patients in the hall at one time, while the doctors wanted there to be a line, and the nurses thought it should be a different way. Every person we asked gave a different set of instructions so no matter what, we were making someone mad. It was a long two days, but we survived.

Saturday afternoon was announcement day when all the patients who were screened gathered together on the basketball court and waited for numbers to be called. The selected families were visibly excited which is unusual in this culture. They couldn’t stop smiling, they grabbed our arms and thanked us, and they showed more emotion than I’ve ever seen a Malagasy person show before. But in contrast, we had to see over 300 patients turned away, which was really sad. Every family has a story about why they need the surgery, how far they traveled for it, and how it would change their life…but the team could only select 200 for surgery (a Mada record). Its sad to see people turned away, but hopefully most of them will come back in September for the next mission.

Surgery week lasted from Monday to Friday. I worked in the pre/post op ward for the week along with 2 other PCVs and a lot of Malagasy students. It was a crazy week, but really fun. We helped with translating for patients before and after surgery. Since none of the doctors spoke Malagasy, we actually got to play a huge role in the week’s activities, and I felt useful! I helped the nurses take vital signs after surgery, I taught mothers how to clean the lips, I helped the pediatrician in pre-op check-ups, and I answered tons of questions from mothers asking why there was blood in the IV or where they could get diapers and what food they could eat. It was exhausting! I also got to work with the dentist who was fitting patients with obdurators (a plastic thing they put in the mouth to cover the cleft palate). Aside from that, we were kept busy with discharging patients, checking in new patients, and dealing with random people who showed up for unknown reasons. The pre/post op nurses we got to work with were a really fun group of people. We had a Russian doctor, and Mauritian, Swedish, Australian and American nurses! But we also had to deal with the crazy woman who ran the hospital ward.

The Malagasy nurse who ran the ward tried her hardest to make our life difficult. She told us that the hospital bathroom would be locked in the night, so if patients needed to use the bathroom they would have to bring their own bucket. (100 people in a ward with no bathroom sounds like a disaster to me). She didn’t want to let parents sit on the bed with their child for the entire 24 hours they were in the hospital. She completely cancelled visiting hours. And the list goes on…  She was a challenge, but we survived with some funny stories.

I can’t even imagine trying to coordinate the logistics for the mission, and while there were some small issues (running out of medicine, losing patients, losing records, etc. etc. etc….) the week was a success! The last night we had a final banquet at a really fancy hotel. It felt like a wedding reception with music from the early 90s, a dance floor and strobe lights, and a buffet. It was a great end to the week and I’m sad that I won’t be able to help out on the next mission..but by that point I should be done with service!

(Pictures to come if the internet decides to speed up!)

That Time I Slept Through a House Burglary...

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. 13^th, 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 2^nd 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 2^nd 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.

TED Workshop

I spent the past week in Mantasoa, at the Peace Corps training center. I love that place….its beautiful, we get delicious food, and it reminds me of Northern Michigan. Myself and 7 other volunteers joined 15 PC staff for a 3 day intensive workshop to plan the training for the incoming volunteers. The regional advisor from PC, who oversees 15 different countries, came in from S. Africa to lead it. We worked really long hours (especially compared to our village lives), and we went a little crazy by the last day....but it was a really fun week.

PC Training Center...int he rain! 

It was really interesting to see the process PC goes through to design trainings, and it was a really good opportunity to make our own mark on training…since we’ve all been through it before!  Each sector went through the whole process of determining the KSAs (knowledge, skills, attitudes) needed for each program, deciding what competencies were needed after training, writing learning objectives and then sequencing them and organizing sessions around the learning objectives….it sounds really boring, but it was actually the most interesting workshop/training thing I’ve done here! (I also think I liked it because it was really, really structured and detailed…and I like those things!)  

PCVs who attended the workshop....entertaining ourselves with self-timer pictures. 

We worked long days but we still had a ton of fun. Everytime we are in Mantasoa, we get fed really well. So much good food. Snack twice a day. And a huge bowl of popcorn all day, every day. Staff knows how to get volunteers to work…bribe them with good food! (And do our laundry in a washing machine!) I also recently acquired the game Cards Against Humanity (thanks JENNA!) so that provided hours of entertainment. Especially when our regional advisor decided to play with us. Aside from the awkward moments of laughing at politically incorrect humor with our boss’ boss…it was really fun. And good bonding, you could say.

Excited about delicious food!\

Back in Tana, I did “big city” things…went to the grocery store, ate Thai food, and caught up on internet times. I’m heading back to site now, hoping that the cyclone that was hitting the E. coast yesterday, didn’t do too much damage! 

Home for the Holidays

I didn’t think 3 Weeks could go so fast…but here are some highlights from my trip home! Definitely worth the 20 hour flight… to say the least!

• ·         SNOW! – walking around in it, having a white Christmas, playing with my dog in it, then after the initial excitement wore off… looking at it from inside a heated house and car.
• ·         FOOD! – food tour of the US was a success: Sansu, Altus, Charlie Kangs, Panera, Red Haven Grill, Pearls, Café Sante, Shorts, Wendys, Chipotle, Taco Bell, Breuggers, Noodles & Co. , plus Trader Joes!, and so many bagels.
• ·         Torch Lake – laying by the fire bundled under blankets, with family all around, making gourmet food (Kraft mac & cheese) and reminiscing about all the good times we’ve had up there!
• ·         All the siblings together again-I think the last time we were all together was 2 years ago at Brad and Jennie’s wedding, so this reunion was long overdue
• ·         Holiday party-delicious food, friends and family, big xmas tree, lights, Christmas carols!
• ·         Xmas eve party at Sara’s-a tradition with amazing food, although still feeling the effects of jet lag, I fell asleep in a chair…
• ·         Movie on Christmas-the HOBBIT 3D IMAX…sensory overload. I’m used to watching movies on the tiny screen of my netbook.
• ·         Birthday festivities-amazing sushi dinner at Sansu, Harpers with lots of highschool pals and a late night Taco Bell trip, what could be better?
• ·         Columbus-DU reunion with all my favorite people, live music, good food and conversations about food (Noodles & Co. anyone?), cuddling, visiting campus (Aww P1) and Brews for old times sake.
• ·         Boston-so many good restaurants/bars, meeting all of Alyssa’s friends which includes pretty much the entire city of Boston, hanging out in her loft and walking the entire city in a weekend!
• ·         ….and everything was so clean. Even the gas station bathrooms....AMAZING!

It was such a great trip home, and thanks to everyone who made it possible! And now that its 2013 I can say….See you later this year! 

Kabones for all!

A few weeks ago, I tagged along with my NGO worker friends to go on a "Community Led Total Sanitation" certification day. My friends work for a project called RANOHP which works on issues relating to hygiene and sanitation, latrines, hand washing, and clean water. A group of 7 of us (health workers, the head of the district, the adjoint mayor, myself and some other people who I don't know who or why they were there) hiked out to two villages. 

We went out to a small village, where supposedly, everyone uses latrines. We had a few items on the agenda. First, we visited the area where the village used to go to the bathroom before they built latrines. The group of 7 used their high tech investigative skills to look for evidence of human shit....It was pretty funny seeing the head of the district turning over rocks and leaves looking and smelling around for human shit....but they didn't find any! Then we went to look at all the new latrines they built, and then the head of the district held "court." Or at least that's what it seemed like to me. The head of the district called people up, one by one, and asked them about their bathroom habits, where they went to the bathroom, which latrine their family used, etc. etc. etc.

Showing off her new latrine.

A super clean village!

Finally after being somewhat convinced that everyone used latrines, we awarded a certificate and plaque to the village. We hiked to a few other villages and did the same thing. And while its great that these villages all use latrines, there are still many (mine included) where people go to the bathroom wherever they feel like it....including outside my door. Little by little...

Looking for human waste....

These people use latrines. Yay

The Campaign comes to Mada

pre-election fun

Yay for MI!

In 2008 I was in Ohio, volunteering on election-day, knocking on doors and making lots and lots of phone calls. Four years later, I was sitting in a hotel room in Madagascar constantly pressing refresh on my laptop.. Completely different experiences, but both will always be memorable nights. This year, since the need for Obama campaign volunteers in Madagascar was so low, my two friends and I got a hotel room with wifi instead. We decided to wake up at 3am (7pm in the US) to start watching polls come in. As this plan developed, I thought it would be a good idea to make an hour by hour guide, an electoral map and a tally sheet…all on poster paper to be hung in our hotel room! (And they turned out pretty well, even though I had to draw the map with just a headlamp as the power in the hotel went out…)

Half our states were filled in...

By the time 3am rolled around, we had our own Obama HQ, and it seemed like a great idea since this was going to be an election night without TV coverage! Can you imagine? Anyway, our alarms woke us up at 3am and the fun began. We watched polls come in by constantly refreshing our computers. We took occasional naps and colored in our electoral map as states closed. We skyped with friends and family in the US to fill us in on what we missed and we texted all our other volunteer friends with electoral vote updates. I’m pretty sure it was exactly what the Obama campaign’s US headquarters looked like as well. A 12 ft² room with a mosquito net and a shower curtain for a bathroom door. Anyway…when Ohio was finally called for Obama, all my news website tabs had frozen, and so I relied on the 400 facebook statuses all including the key words “Ohio, re-elected, four more years, OBAMA!” to persuade me that he had won! 

OHIO....and Obama is declared the WINNER

Completed masterpiece....I should probably send this over to CNN

It was a crazy feeling…but, like any campaign HQ, we were extremely ecstatic and watched as the confetti came out of the ceiling…(I wish). We did a little victory dance and then left our hotel to find breakfast (it was 8am afterall…). We went to our favorite restaurant which has a tv that usually plays the French news and with a little persuasion, we convinced the owner to put on BBC in ENGLISH so we could listen to Obama’s victory speech. I’m pretty sure we had more people watching our reactions than people watching the TV, but the speech was so good that Brynna and I couldn’t help but get really excited and clap out loud. There also may have been tears…but that doesn’t surprise anyone who knows me. When customers realized we were Americans, a few of them came over to congratulate us and use their limited English to say YEAH OBAMA!

While experiencing election day in Madagascar is a little different than what I was doing four years ago, I know I’ll always remember coloring in Ohio blue on my hand drawn map of the US! Congrats Obama! Four more years!

GLOW Camp

Feeling good! This past Friday 4 other PCVs and I finished up a GLOW camp (Girls Leading Our World) that we had been planning for the past 6 months. My friend, Brynna, and I did most of the planning, but there were three other PCVs involved too. We each brought four girls from our sites and one Malagasy woman to chaperone and help lead sessions throughout the week.

Girls' room at Rovan'ny Tovovavy

Last Sunday, the first day of the camp, I planned to leave my site around 8:30 with my girls and chaperone. Contrary to the normal “fotoana gasy” (Malagasy time, which means being late), my girls showed up at my house two hours early. I didn’t need to worry about missing our ride! None of my girls had ever been to Tana, the capital, so this was a big adventure! Aside from most of the girls getting carsick and puking out the window, the ride went pretty fast and arrived in Tana around 3. 

Each girl had to bring 12 kapoaka of rice...it adds up quick!

We settled into the Rovan’ny Tovovavy, a church dormitory, with all 25 campers and chaperones in one room, and the PCVs in another. Twenty-five girls in one room…it’s like a sleepover parents would never allow! But they loved it! The first night we had ice breakers, introductions, explained the schedule for the week, introduced journaling, and set out some ground rules. Of course, the power went out during our session, and we had to finish deciding on ground rules with multiple headlamps providing our light.

Monday, our first day, focused on goal setting. The group went to the US Embassy to talk to three panels of women employees. They talked about their education, their jobs, and gave advice for staying in school and finding a job they like. During a break, the girls played with ipads, got to look at the embassy library, and marveled at the automatic soap dispensers and hand driers in the bathrooms. We ate lunch at the Embassy café in a beautiful atrium with table cloths, meals delivered by rolling cart,  and a TV playing CNN coverage of Hurricane Sandy. Everyone was in awe, including the PCVs! In the afternoon we met with another panel of women before heading off to the Federation Malagasy de Football. On our second visit, the girls got to learn about the national soccer team, meet two women working for FIFA and visit the national stadium. By the time we got back to the Rovan’ny Tovovavy the PCVs were exhausted and the girls wanted to go out exploring. It was a really great first day though. 

The girls from Tsarasambo and my chaperone at the National Football Stadium, Mahamasina

Tuesday morning we had a later start, although the girls woke up around 4:30 and therefore it was impossible to sleep past 5. We had breakfast and played games outside while we waited for our visitors. Tuesday’s theme was health, and we worked with peer educators from the NGO Population Services International. We had three sessions led by Malagasy University students, the first about STIs, the second about HIV/AIDS and the third about family planning. The peer educators were amazing and the sessions were fun, interactive, and informative. By the end, the girls were laughing and asking tons of questions, which was great to see. The girls all learned and practiced how to use condoms, learned about different kinds of birth control, and talked about the consequences of early pregnancy. The girls even did condom demos with their eyes closed (since the majority of the girls don’t have electricity). While this is all information that should be covered in schools, most of the girls were hearing some of this information for the first time. Even our adult chaperones were learning new things…

Health day with peer educators from PSI

Wednesday was education day. We took our girls to the EducationUSA Advising Center, an office run by the US Embassy. They learned about resources available to girls wanting to go to University in the United States, and they got to look at books about applying to college, taking the SAT, and finding scholarships. We spent over an hour looking at the books, and when it was time to go, the girls asked if they could stay longer! Unfortunately, we had another meeting to get to. So we went back to the Rovan’ny Tovovavy where we were going to talk to University students studying in Tana. Eleven students came to talk to us, and they started out by showing some videos to the group. We quickly found out that they were religious propaganda, and had to abruptly end that presentation since we can’t (nor do we want to) promote any religion. We eventually got the University students talking about student life and their experiences at the University, and were back on track!

Girls at EducationUSA Advising Center

In the afternoon we were supposed to visit the University of Tana, but midway through the student session we received a message that there were strikes at the University, students throwing rocks at cars, and the police using tear gas. So, we had to cancel that visit and come up with plan B...the ZOO! It was so much fun and I finally understand what parents mean when they say that a perk to having kids is being able to experience childhood again. Seeing our girls run around the zoo and look at animals they’ve never seen before was pretty cool. I even found someone selling cotton candy, so I got to watch my girls eat that weird fluffy stuff on the end of a piece of bamboo.  

Tsarasambo group at Tsimbazaza (the zoo)

That evening, we decided to have a Halloween “party” to teach the girls a little about American holidays! Brynna’s parents sent us a box full of Halloween decorations and candy (THANKS!) so we were able to set up trick or treating in the dorms. The volunteers wore fake vampire teeth, which I thought would be really funny for everyone. However, once all the PCVs were running around in vampire teeth, some of the girls got really scared and hid behind a door. One girl even fell down. Woops. This might have to do with the myth that white people take Malagasy children and steal their organs….Anyway, the trick or treating went well and the girls (and adults) got really into it. Although there were no pumpkins or costumes, it was still a successful Halloween.  

Halloween at Girls Camp!

Thursday was our final day! All our girls came to breakfast in their matching camp shirts, which was perfect since we spent the morning on a city tour of Tana. It’s hard to lose a girl in Tana when you’re in a group of 30 people wearing violet shirts. We drove around Tana, visited the Queen’s Palace that burned down, and got to visit some markets for the girls to buy souvenirs, and drove through a tunnel (which was a terrifying first for some of our girls!).  By the time we got back from our city tour, it was time for lunch and final activities. We had our Malagasy chaperones lead two sessions with the girls, the first about their life goals, and the second about responding to peer pressure. Seeing the girls present their goals of going to the University, working at the US Embassy, and even becoming the chef de region (equivalent of a governor) or a doctor, was a rewarding end to the camp! 

Campers on a Tana city tour.

Tsarasambo group at the Queen's Palace.

East Coast Girls Camp 2012.

Certificate Ceremony!

The camp was exhausting, but definitely worth all the work we put in. We’re hoping to do more camps like these in the future, so we will see…