It is not just laziness that this blog has been inactive – I
have actually been busy (by my standards). Quite a change from the first months here. To
summarize the happenings of the last few months:
February: Training of Trainers (TOT). I was a trainer for
the new group of volunteers who came in March (for the Environment group), and
if you want to be a trainer, you have to be trained yourself, so you go to TOT.
This is to learn the bureaucratic parts of being officially a trainer for PC,
and also to make lesson plans and design the content of PST (Pre-Service
Training, when you live at the training center for two months and learn
Malagasy etc.).
March: PST. The new group arrived early March, and I was at
the training center for two weeks in mid-March. The PCV tech trainers are
supposed to be just that, trainers for technical skills, but an equally
important role is just being there to talk about daily life in Madagascar, and
to show them that after a year in-country, we are still alive and well. The
technical aspects I helped to train about were SRI (a rice farming technique)
and bio-intensive gardening. It was a fun, if busy, two weeks, and good to get
to know the new group of volunteers joining us in-country. After training, I
went home to prepare for the Tech Trip that happened in April.
April: Tech Trip. During PST, budget gods willing, there is
what they call a Technical Trip, where the new group goes to different
volunteer sites to see in person the things they have been learning about. This
year’s Tech Trip started out at my site and Andasibe for a few days, then
continued on to the coast. They were primarily coming to my site to see the SRI
fields.
Sounds simple and free of preparation, yet I realized when
thinking about the details of the day’s plans that it would be 20 giant
(relatively speaking) vazaha who are not used to rice fields tramping around on
our tiny little muddy paths. I mentioned this to my neighbors, and asked them
to find suitable paths to the fields for these clumsy vazaha, reminding them
that in the US I’m not the biggest person in the whole world, and that when I
first arrived narrow muddy path walking was not amongst my skill sets. So
imagine 20 of me in your fields. When the group arrived, there were nicely
cleared wide paths, branches laid over particularly muddy spots, and still tons
of falling in the mud. It was great.
I went with them on the rest of the trip (along with 2 other
PCV trainers), to help them navigate new cities and translate etc. All in all,
a really good trip.
May. Vacation and training. The first of May, Lange arrived!
She was the first of the overlapping string of visitors from home that lasted
until mid-June. We went directly to Diego in the North, spent some time on
beaches and at a national park, then started our brousse trip back down to
Tana. We went to the Tsingy in Ankarana, an amazing place to see. Jagged
limestone rocks that stretch forever. Eventually we made it back to Tana, then
home to Andasibe and my site for a few days before going back to Tana to meet
Marieke, Kerri, and Jessie! Straight off the plane we went to the brousse
station and on to Moramanga, since I was in a hurry to get home for a meeting
the next day. With much rushing, we made it in time for the meeting. But no one
came; a good preview of my life here. It was awesome to have them in my
village, and I think I will hear about the vazaha with Malagasy ancestors
(Kerri) until I leave.
I then ditched them to go to our Mid-Service Conference
(MSC), held for my training group at the PC training center. They went to the
coast on an adventure by themselves for a few days, and we met back up in Tana
after.
Lange and Kerri flew out at the end of the month, leaving
Jessie, Marieke, and I to travel south on our own.
June: Jessie, Marieke and I traveled south to Ranomafana and
Andringitra National Parks, stopping briefly at Anja reserve. From the humid,
warm tropical rainforest of Ranomafana to the dry rocky (freezing!) grasslands
in Andringitra, it’s an amazing and incredibly diverse country. We came back to
Tana to drop Jessie off at the airport, and then Marieke and I continued on to
Andasibe, where we invited ourselves to follow the BBC film crew as the filmed
for a new documentary they are producing on evolution. We then spent some cold,
rainy days hanging at my village planting a garden and drinking hot tea. Then back
to Tana for her flight home.
I have since been at my site and in Andasibe, where people
tell me they are surprised to see that I didn’t just follow my friends home
like they thought I would.
This week, on the 26th, was the national holiday,
so that meant two days of celebration and a week of craziness leading up to it,
all in all quite fun. If there was anyone left in Andasibe who didn’t recognize
me, I think that has now been remedied. I was in the parade with Mitsinjo in
the morning, then played soccer with my women’s team in the afternoon (way too
many spectators for my liking – it would be different if I was showing off an
actual skill, and not just making a fool of myself), then attended the dance in
the evening. So now when I walk down the street, in order to get my attention
or engage in conversation, there are three topics – anyone involved in Mitsinjo
already had an easy topic, but now kids like to mention that our team won, or just
“hey defense! How are you?”. And – my favorite addition to conversations – all
the drunks in town would like to know if I am hung over from all the dancing
they – miraculously – remember me doing.
Life is good.
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