My town

The high school where we had practicum

Manohana!

Hello everyone from Madagascar! I have now been here 2 weeks and I am still in shock that I am halfway around the world from the West Coast. And Madagascar is literally halfway around the world. Sorry that i haven't posted sooner, but this is the first chance that I have had to use the internet. In the interest of time (mainly mine since I don't have that long) I am goingto copy and paste my last 2 weeks from my friend James email to his friends and family. Don't you worry, I will add little Megan-isms as I go, which I will put in parentheses so you kow it's me. First though, I am doing fine. I did get a cold, which I partly blame no the typhoid vaccine I got the day before and partly on the five other people around me, including my host mom, who were sick. I am better now and have just a few last sniffles to get out. Speaking of my host mom, my whole host family is great. There are six people in my family; a mom, a dad, a 19-year-old brother and three sisters, age 16, 10 and 7. They have been super nice and accomodating with me, which I definitely need. They only speak Malagasy with me, which means I have had to learn at least a little bit of Malagasy fast! I know my brother can speak a little English and a little French, but it's a no-go when I am around. In terms of food, I have been eating a ton of rice. Like ridiculous amounts of rice. There is rice at every meal and sometimes there are also noodles. I am in a carb overload place. I do get some veggies, some meat and great pineapple, but it will be nice to eventually cook on my own and cut down on the rice. Peace Corps diet my ass. That is not hapening for at least the next 8 weeks I am with my host family. Those are the basics, so on to my journey here.
My Host Family

Yay! Let's begin the day I left the US of A. the next part will be all me BTW. Leaving the USA was one of the hardest things to do. Brian was able to be at the hotel to say goodbye to me and leaving his arms took every ounce of strength I had. I couldn't look back at him or else I would have cracked and never made it back to the hotel. I am so thankful that my staging miraculously happened to be in DC. I needed those two extra days with Brian in order to say goodbye for a year. After Brian left, I went back in and started talking to the other people in my group. There are 42 of us, 21 education volunteers and 21 health volunteers. It was crazy trying to get us all to the airport, checked in and through security. I was gradually making friends and figuring out what the hell was going on. Then we got to the actual flight. Oi vey that was a long flight! It was something like 20 hours. Around hour 12, I lost track. I just know we were delayed an extra tw

o hours in DC and then an extra hour in Dakar so we pulled into Jo'burg behind schedule. Now I will start copying and pasting from James' email, so unless it is in (), it is all him. We had a one night layover in South Africa which was also slightly a debacle because they had told us that the hotel was part of the airport and we wuoldn't have to go through customs, which we most certainly did have to do. Whatever, if you had to let 40 people into a country, I guess the best people to let in would be us. The hotel bar was fun, though. More hanging out and getting to know the other volunteers (I dropped $30 on a buffet at our hotel in South Africa and it was so worth it. One last night of American-ish food--it was heavenly.)

We spent the first night in madagascar in Antananarivo (abbreviated Tana), going through some basic language training and pre-oreintation things like vaccines, basic health requirements, etc. (I had to get shots in both arms and they gave us this comprehensive medical kit, which I am hoping I only use a fourth of. Also that night, 16 of us had to stay in a hotel in Tana, which I volunteered for, since I wanted to see more of the city). the next day, we left for Mantasoa, where the Peace Corps training center is located. It's probably not more than 40 miles or so from the capital, but the roads here are not the best, so it took us about 2.5 hours.

A few notes on the roads in Madagascar: First, there are no stop signs, street signs, street lights or any other type of traffic control (there is no way I would want to drive anywhere, at least not any time soon, so I'm glad I'm not allowed to. Makes it easy for me). Most roads are also dirt (and since it is now the winter here, mud) and cars get stuck frequently. The main type of transportation is something called a taxi-brousse, which is basicaly a bigvan that fits 14-17 people, depending on how big the people are, and goes from city-to-city or to different parts of a city. The main road in Mantasoa is dirt and has holes and dips. Because there is no way for drivers to tell how deep the holes are, most of the time spent in the taxi-brousse is spent weaving back and forth and from one side of the road to the other. So far, only three of the volunteers have puked in the vans, and I've managed to avoid all of those cars, luckily (so far James and I have managed to be in the same cars, so I have also avoided the puking people. Even for someone who has a strong stomach, it is rough. I'd like to think my stomach is fairly tough and I am getting sick on these roads).

Anyway, after the 2.5 hour trek to Mantasoa, we finally arrived, tired and car-sick. Of course it was pouring (I'll get back to the weather later. Just an FYI, right now it's cold and rainy), and of course all of our host families had been waiting there for an hour or so. they were good sports about it though, and welcomed us warmly. We wanted a few minutes to collect ourselves before going inside the local elementary school for the host family ceremony, but it was not to be. Normally I'm a pretty confident person when it comes to awkward situations, but when they asked for a volunteer to go first for their host family to claim them, I didn't budge from my seat (I will forever be impressed with the girl who went first. No way oculd I have done that). Standing up and meeting my host mom for the next three months was definitely one of the most nerve-racking experiences of my life. (Just a quick side note to me for a paragraph while I tell you about my house, since my situation is completely different from James's. My family, and now myself, lives in a two-story house that has no electricity or running water. I get my room, PC requirement, which is nice, but I do feel bad, since the other four kids share a loft area, and my host parents' bedroom is connected to both the kitchen and the dining room, so I walk through it about 20 times a day. My room is also the one with a door, besides the outside doors. My bathroom and shower area are both located outside, and let me tell you, taking a shower has not been my top priority since it is so cold here. Don't worry, I have showered, but only when my host family has heated up water for me and it's waitig for me when I get home from school. Or I'm at the PC training center, which I will get to later. The toilet is a squat one, so the hope is that I will have good aim and strong thighs when I return. This type of environment was what I was expecting and I do have electricity at my site, so I only have to rely on candlelight for eight more weeks. Also, since my family doesn't have running water, they have to get it from a well, which is really a rice paddy 200m away. I only have been once to get water and I would rather not make the journey again, but I will if I have to. It's over the river and through the woods to grandmother's house we go. I do help my host family out with chores, like washing the dishes and sweeping the floors though. We are supposed to be treated like family members, not guests, so we have to pull our weight. Also, my family has two pigs, some chickens who like to wander in and out of the house, whose name is not Fritz, but that's what I call him. he's really cute and small, but I don't pet him too much because he's def not vaccinated and I'm not trying to get worms).

My Family's house

My Room at my host family's

(on to the weather) The weather here is terrible. Mantasoa is right at the beginning of the high plateau of Madagascar, which basically comprises the entore middle part of the island. As a result, a ton of clouds roll in every day from the Indian Ocean and make it just over this city and then get stopped by all the higher mountains a little farther inland. It may rain here four or five completely separate times every day, with completely clear weather for 20 min intervals. This means that (1) our clothes take about three days to dry and (2) we're always cold and wet, since heating hasn't quite made it here yet. I've been assured that this is the worst weather all year, so I'm looking forward to a nice, long hot tropical summer.

My typical day begins around 6:30am, getting ready for the 7am breakfast of.....guess what? Rice. (My family loves coffee, so we usually have that every morning, which I love). We clean every day because a ton of mud ends up getting trekked into the house, and after that, I leave for elementary schoo for four hours of Malagasy language lessons. I'm learning quickly and it's a pretty easy language other than the fact that all of the verbs start with the letter 'm,' which makes them very hard to keep straight, and that the subject goes at the end of the sentence. There's a two-hour siesta for lunch and relaxation, followed by another three hours of technical training, which for me is learning abou the Malagasy education system and the English curriculum they use in the schools here. Afterwards, I usually hang out with a couple of friends and then head home for dinner and then bed. There is absolutely no night life here to speak of (and I am home by 6pm, in bed no later than 7:30pm. I go to sleep between 8 and 9. I am rockin out I know).

Last Thursday was exciting, though, because we found out already where we're going to be stationed for the next two years. (I'll be in Faratshio, which is a town in the middle of Madagascar, southwest of Tana. I'll be living in the district minister of education's compound, right behind the middle school I will most likely be teahcing at. Yay!!). I visit my site in two weeks, so I'll have more details about where I'm living pretty soon.

By the way, I have a cell phone here. It's pretty expensive for me to call home, but it is possible for people back home to get an international calling card. skype or google voice and use it to call me if anyone's interested....it doesn't cost anything for me if someone calls my phone. My phone number is 261346059184. Just remember there's a 7-hour time difference from the east coast (and 10 hours from the west coast. And yes, that's my phone number. I changed it from James's).

One more funny thing, the Malagasy people are all incredibly short (My host brother is my height, which is on the tall end). I literally hit my head two or three times a day on a door frame or something else. One of the volunteers is 6'4 and can't stand up anywhere indoors. That, coupled with the fact that these people don't see many white people, means that when we walk around town, people stare at us and say hi literally non-stop...There's also some differences in culture when it comes to interactions between boys and girls, so when I'm walking with a friend hwo happens to be (male), we tend to get a lot of cat calls or "knowing" looks even though we're just walking to class.

So that's the ends of James' email, so from here on out, it's me. A few things to add on. Please please send me letters. I so far haven't gotten any (and I know there are two in the mail. Thank you Brian and Mom and Dad) and other people have and I have gotten jealous of their letters, not going to lie. Please write to me, even if it's short and sweet, just so I feel loved. I know that sounds ridiculous and petty, but I want mail! Also, anytime you write, say one thing that's going on inthe world in one category. I have been very news deprived, and if anyone wants to send me some old Times (dad....), I would really appreciate it. I miss everyone like crazy and wish you all could be here with me in Madagascar. The dollar is strong and we could eat $.25 pineapple 'til the cows come home. I love you all and I have no idea when I can write again, so be on the lookout.

Hugs and Kisses,

Megan

PS: I have made friends, so no worries about me being lonely. We have already made xmas plans so we do not have to be alone. And since I get off all the holidays that Malagasy teachers have off, I can travel to see everyone. Yay!!! First stop, the west coast to see the avenue of baoboails (that's not how you spell them, but I have no idea how) and some lemurs.

PPS: I haven't seen one lemur yet. I've seen spiders, cows, stick bugs and pigs, but no lemurs. Boo!