9

A summary of my weekend because it was funny:

Friday:

First experience going out in Tana to experience le night life. Not gonna lie, this was not so much a casual ‘girls night out’ as it was a full scale boite operation intensely orchestrated and planned by, yours truly,  monsieur they-see-me-Roland.

However, was grateful. Because. Being white in Tana freaks me out sometimes during the day and I had yet to be out past 7pm. SO yeah the boite experience was great and was a reminder of the realities of alcohol tolerance – lets just say I bought one drink and ca suffit. Side note: there were many geckos in places where they should not have been (context: this is the nicest night club in Tana)

Saturday:

Slept in (till 9 *gasp*) and helped my dad make the fried eggs because my mom was doing the laundry. This was about 5 minutes after him being all progressive and saying that household chores should really be shared, that the man is called the chef of the famille but that is not really the way it should be.  Ironic but hes the cutest so idc.

We went to visit my other sister and her perpetually confused looking tiny adorable 9 month old bebe Leonardo. We were all going to go to the zoo but the garage door was broken so instead just me and my mom went (?) mora mora. She spent many tense minutes speaking with the zoo officials so that I could get in with the Malagasy price (because the price for foreigners was “lafo be “ = way too expensive = less than 5$). Wabam I was now her daughter-in-law obvs. I saw lemurs lemurs and 4 giant tortoises (!!!!!! GIANT) a lot of birds and 5 camels (?). also regressed to about 6 years of age. My mom tried to buy me cotton candy, held my hand while crossing the street, and continually referred to me as a “zaza lehibe” = big child. did not contest. It was the best ever.

After we went into town and she bought a cooking pot and also a mat for the bathroom with giant feets on it because I thought it was funny. We met up with dada and they deliberated for several minutes over which pastry to buy and then we ate it on the car on the way home. !!!!!!!!!!!! BEST DAY EVER.

Sunday:

Did not go to church because I was writing a paper (heathen). IT’s fine though neny and dada are super chill about me skipping out on jesosy. After we went to a family reunion (happens once a month). We got there early and within 5 minutes I was handed a karaoke microphone and instructed to sing. Uhhh. 

When everyone got there there was much quoting of the baiboly and talking in Malagasy and then there was food on food on food on food . can’t explain. Let’s just say the self-service with the meat would have been preferred but I ended up with about half a cow and 3 chickens on my plate. Not even going to mention the pasta couscous  crackers or RICEEEEEEEEEEEE. and cake. Vary betsaka MISAKAFO BETSAKA. It got to the point where I was earnestly chugging the dreaded “jus naturel” in hopes that I would have a nice vom sesh later. Malheureusement this has not come to pass. After rejecting several offers to MIHINANA BEBE KOKOA (eat more) everyone realized there was a Britney Spears song on the karaoke machine (going continuously during dinner) that I , obviously, knew and wanted to sing for everyone. Did not know the song at all but do not worry because I ROCKED it  and then I sang Hotel California, I turn to you by xtina Aguilera and my heart will go on, with help from my 12 yr old cousin. I also did a solo version of the previously mentioned song about “the white people are washing their hands” but no one cared/noticed.

There was a pretty sunset on the way home as I was squished into the back corner of a hollowed out frame of a van, with a single red plastic rosary hanging from the place where a rearview mirror should have been. Gotta love mads. Taxi be times with the fam. It is now almost 10 so way way past my bedtime. Love you all !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! /also in love with the world probably due to the half cow in my belly. Gnight = TAFANDRIA MANDRY  

7

My host parents responses whenever I tell them I am marary kibo (sick to my stomach) (doesn’t happen all the time but. happens):

“ah. It is in the air”

“mm yes it is the cold shower you took last night”

“eat more”

“you eat so little”

“you must get in your bed and wrap yourself in your blankets”

“you must drink hot water to get rid of the mud in your stomach”

“ahh. Yes. the wind”

“eat this bread”

“you are hungry”

They really are nice people. I love them. 

6

Just got back from a petit excursion wif the neuf meufs. They are great. We visit:

Moramanga (literally means cheap mango. I got really excited because I love mangoes but then realized that mango is actually an old slang term for slave. Sad.)

-          Chinese food restaurant and Melissa gets the chicken head! Lucky. Now you must eat it.

-          Gendarmerie museum – probably the best museum in Madagascar and half of it was destroyed by the cyclone. Last year. Yet to be repaired. We are the only people there and our guide, among other things, tells us how to correctly pack a spliff in a cigarette, load a homemade semi-automatic weapon, and warns us to watch out for love potions, all in a maroon and navy sweatsuit. He was le shit.

-          We get told several more times to watch out for love potions. They will give you taraiki – originally meaning “to be late” but for young people it means “to love too much”. We will s’en fou de our vie in the etats unis, we will forget our families, we will stay until we die. Il faut en croire eh!

Vatomandry

-          Beach. Sunburn. Indian ocean. The waves are too big for swimming but we are contented to stand knee deep and still end up with 5 pounds of sand in our bathing suits, w/e

-          Cutest bungalows ever owned by the cutest woman ever Odetta who tells us to eat a lot so we can have “des gros titties”. Love her.

-          Had French/Malagasy class once which consisted of playing musical chairs, counting to ten, and singing a song which roughly translates to “the white people are washing their hands, the white people are washing their hands now the hands are clean!” Real life ? Yes.

-          Sat in a sketchy printing/scanning shop and had a kid burn me 16 tracks of Malagasy music off his laptop. “t’aime ca?” “oui je le veux”. It cost around 75 cents. “tu fais ca souvent pour les touristes?” “non” He tells me this is what he went to grad school for. His favorite artiste is black nadia

-          Jumped in a pousse-pousse in the pouring rain (3 of us) and had a skinny teenager bike all our fatasses down the main road. We splurged and gave him 2000 ariary which was supposedly “a lot” (less than a dollar)

-          Bioluminescence on Valentine’s day. Words don’t explain. Google it. Slept maybe 3 hours and got up to see the sunrise on the mer indien. A lil anticlimactic but fun nonetheless.

Andasibe

-          LEMURS

-          Chameleons

-          MOUSE LEMURS. Literally died of cute overdose.

-          Yummy soup

-          Indry lemurs only sing for 4-5 minutes a day and I saw two singing their hearts out right in front of me I almost cried. Overwhelming even though I am surrounded by stupid Polish vazahas with giant cameras. Will try to load a video. Want to remix it into something bamf.

o   Side note: Malagasy view indry lemurs (biggest ones) as ancestral. Other lemurs, people in la brousse (aka middle of fucking nowhere) eat because they are starving. Pauvrete is a sad thing

-          Giant land snail

The whole thing was grand. Semi got a tan. Checked chillin with lemurs off the bucket list. Pas mal. 

4

quelques images de my room:

cute huh!

3

Fun Facts about Moodogooscoo/Mads/Madagasikara/Gaskahhhhhh

-the language here has no word for "to be"
-3/4 of Mad's govt budget comes from foregn aid
-the music video channel is hilarious
-the Malagasy dont think of themselves as African or even black
-you eat rice with a giant spoon
-sometimes people eat baguettes for breakfast
-there's .164 of a doctor per 1000 habitants
-also 1 shower/toilette per 1000 habitants
-famadihana= digging up and reburying your dead family members. Yep. Happens errday.
-80% of popn rely on food they grow in order to eat
-my host mom thinks im anorexic
-the first book translated into Malagasy was The Bible (baiboly)
-how high your house is on the hill = how high your social status is
-the malgache word for dad is dada
-tana is technically in a region that is 'cold' - im fucked for whenwe go to mahajanga
--i saw a 2 year old in a snowsuit
--winter hats are not uncommon
-im a 5 min walk from a Pandora store (wut?)
-dirt is red. Water is brown.
-my host mom has 6 brothers and 7 sisters
-in Mads, children = wealth. regardless of whether you are capable of feeding them
-fihavana= malache for 'youre a stranger but youre my brother so lets get along /social harmony, egalite, fraternite'
-all the taxis ar from the 50s not a joke



I could go on but i wont bc we are going to a dancing spectacle

2

Sooo la vie est commencé. The last five days have been a dream blur. I’ve been at three different beauteous hotels with flush toilets and the nine girls are awesome. We are all insane in a good way and have already come up with a code word for diarrhea (kiss kiss karaoke) so I would say we tore down all boundaries pretty toute de suite.

I am sitting at my desk Lot II J 82 WE, Ivandry, Antananrivo. My mosquito net next to me makes me feel like a princess.

Anyways will attempt to be chronological here:

Orientation was lot of us sitting around watching Roland talk (approx rate of 2 words per min), having snack time and going to bed at 9 every night. We also took van rides into the paysage to visit some palaces (palace is used loosely here – the precolonial palace was literally a one room with a very tall roof and a bunk bed. Lots of wooden bowls and spears on the walls. Post colonial palace looked like a special bird flew in a giant size dollhouse from Angleterre and plopped it next to a huge rock where they used to slay zebu (special cow with giant hump) back when Europeans were still just vazahas (white people)in weird pants that bought your spices. This is a weird weird place). We also went to three tombs which are basically located in this awesome village where, as far as I can see, there is always someone playing an accordion and no one wears shoes. People drop honey, candy, and sugar on rocks near the tombs as offering to the gods because – I am not kidding here – “Life is sweet”.

This is a place where you literally give gummy bears to a God called Neny Be (Grandma) if you want your children to be blessed.  These people are the chilliest ever.

We also went to a market and I bartered for flipflops and a pair of earrings all of which cost me less than an American dollar combined (it was 2100 ari ari). I almost got smacked in the face by 3 live goose that a man was swinging around from a rope tied to his wrist. That was cool. It was also enlightening to see that many goat chicken zebu livers all on one table under one roof.  There was a lot of mud and a lot of people staring at me. It was fun!

The staff are:

Roland (director man) is a white white gentle giant from Kansas who came here for Peace Corps and ended up staying for 20 years. He speaks Malagasy, French and English, all very slowwwllly. This is the Malgache way. Mora mora [moo-ra moor] = easy easy. There is no rush here ever. He is big. He has no hair. He is awesome.

Hanta is assistant director and is Malgache woman that I am having trouble describing because she is literally too nice that no words suffice. Her laugh makes me feel like my brain has turned into a baby panda. She speaks French even slower than Roland and when she went to Texas one time everyone thought she was Mexican. I want her to adopt me.

I could go on with the other staff members but you basically get the gist that I am landed in a soft smiling paradise. People were not lying to me when they told me Malgache are the nicest ever. Even when people are yelling vazah to me on the street I feel like they are my bffls. We got in a cab (cab literally from the 1950s there was no dashboard, shocks or seatbelts) and us and the cab driver literally laughed the entire way to the restaurant for no apparent reason other than we were vazaha (white people). We would say one word in Malgache and he would crack up into his steering wheel dying of laughter I felt like I was on some kind of weird happy drug. It’s on my list as the top 8 minutes of my life.

Meanwhile, every hotel owner of every hotel we’ve been to has told us to come back soon! No but just like, to hang out. The second one asked what an American hotel owner would be doing in this situation and was surprised to learn he/she would probably be in a random office building somewhere behind a swank desk instead of sitting around drinking beer with the guests. Maisssss ca fait pas du sens quoi…

So… you get the picture. The hospitality is a real thing. I have been with my host family 0 nights. This is the first night. They are:

Pere: Andriatahina Rakotonirainy

Mere: Jeanette Ravaoarisoa

Frere: Sitraka Andriatahina

(oh yeah forgot to mention all the names have like 34 letters in them) fml.

The dad (nickname Tahina) is a retired IR professor and is a skinny tiny man with a strangely abrupt enormous laugh. The mom is a librarian and is quite possibly the most timide malgache I have ever met here. The son is 23 and does something with computers and French people he also likes photography. They also have 3 older daughters that I will probably meet. They all speak French except for the mom. She is half Chinese. Their house is really cute in a neighborhood not far from Tana (theres a flush toilet (!) and a shower (!). And a tv). They keep telling me not to worry about noises on the roof it’s just cats running around. T’inquietes, c’est les chats. This will be awesome for my French. We are probably the same level language wise, except for Jeanette. I feel like they were a little insulted I didn’t eat more rice but they are grateful I actually speak French because I guess their last student didn’t. Also, they were surprised to learn there were black people in New England. Ah bon? They like chilli sauce which comes in this plastic bottle and is kind of a fluorescent red color but I ate it anyway hopefully it won’t give me the kiss kiss karaoke.

In other news, there is a pretty nice Jesus poster above my bed. It is of Psalm 54. They are excited to take me to church. I told them I wasn’t raised with religion and they seemed fine with that, besides the fact that technically that makes me one of the “men without regard for God” mentioned in aforementioned Psalm 54. The ones that Jesus describes as “strangers attacking me” and “ruthless men seeking my life”.

Oh well. Tsara be ! [sara-bay] = very good. I don’t think they take it too seriously because the son described church as “boring” and put his head in his hands right in front of them at dinner, alors.

My princess mosquito net is calling me.  

I don’t know the word for sleep in Malgache yet but if I did I would insert it here. Instead I will say Faly mahalala anao [fah-ly mah-la-la-la now] = nice to meetcha!