the end (vita)

ok so.

nope not ready to write this bye

18

All efforts to avoid congestive heart failure disappear when i discover that i can buy deep fried bananas off the street for 5 cents a pop. Help me jesus

17

 dunno if this will work but this is Surgi playing the lukanga!

16

Blog post 4

I sink back into my life here in Tana. It is not hard. Here, where my family is small and quiet. My dad is not shirtless and booming here, he is little and scared of oranges that are too sour, flash floods, and also the neighbors dogs. His moustache is turning white. Here, soap operas are religiously watched and murmured about quietly. Here, If you want to be silent at dinner, its okay. If you want to go to bed at 8:45, so does the rest of the family. 

Meanwhile, tomorrow I begin my non-school days. I am no longer sitting in class. For one month, the loud cluttered streets dirty gutters and falling apart buildings of Tana make up the walls of my classroom. Children are playing around in the watery trash soup next to me and I am sitting staring at a rare functioning fountain, waiting for my interview with a random gasy rapper, learning. I have coaxed my taxi driver into explaining to me why he likes to listen to hira vavaka (hymnals) on the job, learning FOANA. I am not a real human being, I am an investigatrice. I have transformed into a detective girl in plainclothes. I am on CSI Miami. i am a jungle explorateur. My prerogative is to attend every concert within earshot, talk to everyone who will talk to me and at the end write 50 ish pages. It is also on my wishlist to attend a famadihana (dance a lot, sing songs and dig up the bones of your andestors) and a tromba ceremony (drink a lot of rum, play the accordian and become possessed by your ancestors).

Needless to say IM A LITTLE EXCITED. 

( My dad also suggests I should attend a circumcision. We shall see. it would most likely mean i would have to see a grown man eat a foreskin on a banana. but Im not entirely opposed. )

and also spazzing out with the amount of free time i have (which is all day every day). 

Knowing me, this will soon become not enough time at all. Mamy be ny aina.Tsy andriko 

15

Yesterday i ate a fish eye ball on the beach. Dont worry it  was cooked. It pretty much tasted like a fish (surprise!?)

I also had the experience of going out for drinks in what was essentially a prostitution ring. Sex tourism is really big here on NOSY BE (island off the NW coast)  so we were the only young women in the place who weren't , a. Malagasy and b. Hanging off a creepy ancient french man reminiscent of of a Gringotts elf. Its legal here if youre over 18.

It was weird. However tried to remain open minded. Both parties are technically profiting , and it provides a level of financial independence for these females whose country's education/economic systems have failed them. But, still makes my stomach whirl whenever i see a white haired geezer  fingering the hemline of a 19 year old with hair extensions. On the bright side, the live music in the place tended towards the over-50 crowd, so we got to rock out to frankie vallie and stevie wonder.

Also, i bought an avacado off a woman's head for 50 cents and it was masiro be (= real yummy). Also went skinny dipping in the indian ocean. Dont worry there were no geezers  present.

15

Mahajanga. Maahhhhajanga. Haven't been able to write much bc im stressed. 'stressed' being relative - i spent all day sunday on the beach and right now im sitting under a fan drinking a frappacino. BUT! There is actually lots of school-related things to be doing. And it is harder to do them when i am sweating out my eyeballs. 

Highlights:

-My fam here is insane. There is a mom a dad and approximately 800 children/newphews/nieces/kids of friends/ random ppl who swing by on the weekend/unknowns. Dinner is minimum 8 people. I love them they find me hilarious.

-My dad likes to not wear a shirt on talk nonsense in a booming voice.

-My mom likes to sit outside under the mango tree, yell at her kids to cook more rice, and refer to me as vazaha "efa voki vazaha?" already full vazaha? Vazaha knows lots of words. Vazaha will kill the chicken.

-Oh yeah i killed a chicken. With a knife. My 13 year old brother/newphew taught me. He told me I gave it a slow death, thats why it was twitching so much. Noted.

-My family likes to make me dance and then tell me im a good dancer while simultaneously dying of laughter. Confusing. 

-Doesn't help that my 800 siblings/cousins are all accomplished ballroom dancers. I went to class with them (they go 3x a week) and ended up getting almost molested in a corner by a rando during the Meringue. Afterwards the instructor aggressively held my shoulders and yelled french numbers in my ear bc my foxtrot was 'ratsy be' i.e. terrible. 

-I was on the 7 o clock news (not just me, all the vazahas of SIT) bc we visited the local tv station and because we are news. I had an interview where i talked gasy too fast and confused the word 'sad' with a random music group ive been learning about. example: "i am Rolling Stones to be leaving mahajanga in a week!"

-Consequently, i learned the gasy word for 'famous'

-I cooked fajitas for my fam with guacamole. My 10 yr old brother said it was the only vazaha food he has liked. Win. mahay mahandro ny vazaha - vazaha knows how to cook. But does not know how to foxtrot.

13

Things that are different:

The oranges are green

you eat the avocado with sugar

tortillas have disappeared from the earth

On the way to school I see a man sitting in a dumpster, I see a cow leg hanging from a hook, there is a boy looking at me over his shoulder, smiling over his blood-streaked pousse-pousse “vazaha?!”

I come home and my dad picking guavas off the porch tree. Guava jus at dinner isan hariva

Taxi rides are max 5 dollars

I am telling the big-eyed dirty city ankizy tsy manana vola! but they are reaching into my pockets anyways

My race is instinctively yelled to me several times a day “vazaha!?” “vazaha?!” in case I didn’t know

I hear myself parting ways on a Friday night, saying bizarre things such as 5:30 tomorrow? Because we want to go running under a sunrise.

When I sleep until 7:30 it is “sleeping in”

When I stay up past 10 it is “late”

I am a celebrity to my neighbors

My neighbors are asking me for 500 ariary please he wants cigarettes

When I see a white person I notice

When I see a person washing a pig intestine on the street, I don’t

Things that are the same

The oranges are still orange on the inside

Sometimes I eat crackers

Coffee at breakfast

There are nephews who come to visit

There are tv commercials telling you which type of noodles to eat

There are silly soap operas

There are piano lessons

There are grandpas forgetting their glasses upstairs ah les lunettes encore!

There are grandchildren squirming at the dinner table je peux m’excuse s’il te plait

But no you must first finish your rice

I need to buy toothpaste

I need to buy sunscreen

I have written an essay in a coffee shop. The wifi code is Cheesecake

I have had iced coffee with whip cream

I have a mom who is worried about my bug bites, a dad who is telling me to set my alarm maraina be!

I am TAMANA BE