Premiere Semaine!

After arriving at the Antananarivo airport after midnight, five of us girls were greeted by a few men who did not speak English grabbing our bags and asking for money. I hadn’t exchanged anything yet, and all I had were $20 American bills… awkward. First culture shock of the trip. We were then taken in a mini-bus to our hotel where we were told to split between two rooms. I roomed with Alli! We repacked our bags, brushed our teeth with bottled water and talked about how excited and concerned we are about the different parts of the program through our mosquito nets.

Every day is so long because we do SO much! We wake up for breakfast every day around 6:30, and there is luckily always coffee. The first day in Tana (Antananarivo), we went to the zoo. It was much like our zoos in America but more like a recreational park with some cages containing native and non-native animals and plants. This was just a tour to give some background on what is endemic or not to the island. We’ll be seeing this biodiversity for real in “the wild” later. Did I mention that almost everything we do is in spoken French?? I’m honestly surprised at my ability to keep up.
Driving through the city was quite a culture shock. As we drove by people in dirty clothes manning their tiny market booths with hanging meat and produce surrounded by bugs, the people would stare and wave and shout at the bus full of Americans driving by. I saw a couple men sleeping on the street and actually stared for a few minutes to check for breathing. More out of the urban areas, we passed small lakes (or probably more like very large puddles) where people were washing their clothes and laying them out on bushes to dry. And this is in the suburbs! I wanted to take more pictures of the people but refrained to avoid offending them.


Then to Fort Dauphin… well, not immediately. The weekend was spent in an area called Manatantely or “the land where there is honey” in Malagasy. We played a game to get to know eachother with the program teachers, played with some of the local children and ate dinner. They served us “jus de riz”, rice water, which is served hot. The way its made has something to do with burning rice, and the smell gives that away. The taste is actually similar to plain green tea. Still, I am not a fan, primarily because I focus on the burnt rice aspect, but also because it is just too hot most of the time to really enjoy a hot beverage.
We stayed in a building with minimal electricity, and by that I mean there is a small light in every room and that’s it. My first shower of this trip consisted of me pouring buckets of cold river water over myself in a stall with a curtain that did not close all the way. Also, we have been going to the bathroom in stalls with holes in the floor instead of toilets. At first, to no surprise of people who know me, I was very overwhelmed. I spoke to the other students very little that day because I kept thinking about how difficult this was and how I wanted to go home, trying not to cry. But I got over it. I realized that this is not how it’s going to be the entire time, since Fort Dauphin and our homestay houses will have at least slightly more favorable conditions.
We’ve been learning Malagasy every day. Every day phrases like: “Salama!” = Hello and “Misaotra” (Mee-show-cha) = Thank you, and “Aza Fady” = excuse me. We went to a small farm where we learned about many plants and fruit trees and played with sensitive plants, “plantes timides”. It was ridiculously hot, as it is most of the time here, with the exception of our first day in Tana. After that, we went to the market to practice the Malagasy we had learned that morning to barter with the merchants for bananas and pineapples. People are very friendly and patient with us. It seems like everyone, even the poor people, know at least a little of all three languages; Malagasy, French, and English.
As stressful as it is to have such a change in lifestyle, feeling dirty all the time, living out of a suitcase in a less than developed “hotel” and not knowing anyone around, it is not something we can’t deal with or eventually get used to. I’m very excited to meet my homestay family and see what kind of home I will have for the next three months or so. Ofcourse, this time will be interrupted many times with camping trips and other trips to various parts of the island. It’s definitely going to be an overwhelming experience.

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We went on a hike through the forest up a local mountain and learned about the local deforestation around Manatantely. I held a millipede!! It felt like plastic. People weren’t sure about it, but the teachers said it was harmless so I took the initiative and pulled it off the rock. After that, everyone wanted to hold it.

After the hike, we went to a natural spring to swim. It was the cleanest I had felt in days. A few of us kept climbing up the rocks through the little falls and went pretty far up. At the top we saw a beautiful red chameleon climbing around a tree branch. It was one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen out in the wild. I was so mad that I didn’t have my camera, but there is no way I could have safely carried it up the watery falls. I could barely safely carry myself… That night we learned a few local dances and the children joined us before dinner. The dances aren’t exactly what I had expected but they are different for every village. They had a TV playing during dinner with various hip hop music videos and it got me dancing in my seat. I started feeling like myself around everyone and we left the dinner room singing and dancing to Vamos a la Playa.
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Finally we have arrived in Fort Dauphin and were thrown into the market on our own to purchase different groceries by speaking Malagasy. My team was assigned to “épices” so we went around and asked the merchants “how much for this many garlics?” in Malagasy. It was overwhelming. We ended up buying some ginger, some garlic, salt, and green onions. The meat group even brought back a live chicken that had to be held by the feet! The first two nights in Fort Dauphin are spent in a hotel, finally with some electricity and plumbing, before we meet and move in with our homestay families.

I was going to put pictures in here but the internet is not the best so they won't load. Maybe another time.