Random tips for new volunteers

Note: this is third in a series of posts specifically for incoming volunteers.

Back when I first began navigating life as a Peace Corps volunteer in Madagascar, I started thinking about things that I was glad that I had done, or things that I wish I had done differently. I started writing these down with the intention of publishing them as a blog post at some point. So now, with about 4 months left in my service, and about 3 months until the next new stage of volunteers arrive, I figured that it’s time to finally write this up. So herewith follows a list of random tips and suggestions that have popped up into my head during my 20 months in this country. These are ordered chronologically from pre-staging, to staging, the PST, to service. Some of them may not make sense now if you’re still in America awaiting your departure, but just trust me!

• If you wear contacts and hate wearing glasses, I highly recommend getting LASIK surgery before you go, if at all possible. Peace Corps doesn’t want you wearing contacts due to the possibility of getting something nasty in your eye, so you’re supposed to wear glasses all the time. But because I absolutely hate wearing glasses when it’s hot out, I am really glad I got the surgery and so I don’t have to worry about glasses/contacts at all over here. (If you’re already been medically cleared then you would need to get this OKed by Peace Corps, though.)
• When you get your invitation and start preparing for Peace Corps service, start collecting photos, cool pages from magazines, postcards from your favorite bars/restaurants, inspirational sayings, etc. to decorate the walls of your house. Having these will go a long way towards helping you feel at home, especially in the beginning.
• If you’re a girl, you may think it’ll make things really easy to cut your hair really short before coming here. However, 9 times out of 10, girls who do this end up really frustrated by having short hair when they’re here, and they almost always grow it out. My recommendation is to cut your hair before you come, but keep it long enough so that you can still pull it back in a ponytail. Otherwise, it will just drive you crazy!
• If possible, try to arrive in DC (or Philly, or wherever you’ll be flying out of) the night before staging. This will prevent you from having to wake up at dawn to get your flight, and therefore being exhausted during staging—it’s a long day. Peace Corps’s travel agency may not give you the option if you live on the east coast, but see if you can finagle it. I was living in Vermont right before I left, and I was able to get a night-before flight because I was worried about possible weather delays if I left the day that staging started.
• Download some of President Kennedy’s speeches about the Peace Corps—the University of Michigan 2AM speech, the announcement of the executive order that created the Peace Corps, and the “ask not what your country can do…” speech. It will really help remind you why you’re doing what you’re doing when times are tough, and it’s reassuring to hear his words about why he started the Peace Corps.
• During training, save as much of your walk-around money as possible. It will be tempting to buy snacks, beer, chocolate, etc. when you have that cash in your hand—but seriously, when you get to site and are actually fending for yourself, you will wish like crazy that you still had that money. Most people end up spending a lot of money on stuff for their house—often more than we get as our settling-in allowance—so it will really come in handy if you have savings from training. Try to save at least 100,000 Ariary from your PST walk-around money. Honestly, Peace Corps feeds you so well when you’re living at the PCTC and there is really no need to be buying snacks on top of what they give you! (Something I wish I had remembered myself…)
• Take advantage of the homestay experience, and spend time sitting and talking with your host family. Don’t just treat them as a hotel/restaurant -- they’re an invaluable language learning tool. While it’s undoubtedly easier to just go to your room and close the door at night, it’s worth pushing yourself to be a little bit uncomfortable in order to gain language experience. In my stage, I noticed that the people who scored highest in the language exams were the ones who spent the most time talking with, and were the most integrated with, their host families. I wish that I had pushed myself to socialize and talk with my host family more, instead of just going to my room to study after dinner.
• Bring a set of inexpensive colored pencils (and a sharpener!) that you don’t mind letting neighborhood kids use. One of the best things I’ve done is invite the local kids over to draw pictures. They love it, and I like giving them a bit of time for creative expression, which they wouldn’t get otherwise. And I’ve gotten to learn all their names by having them sign their pictures. I put them on my wall and they love to see their artwork hanging up in my house.
• Although most members of your community will be good, decent people, they are also all human (and therefore imperfect). And with poverty as acute as it is here in Madagascar, some people will be desperate enough to see stealing from you as a way to alleviate some of their daily struggle. My recommendation regarding this is: don’t give people the opportunity to disappoint you. This is not to say that you shouldn’t trust your friends and neighbors, but it means being cautious enough to remove any temptation. It means locking your doors every time you leave your house, even if it’s just to use the outhouse or fetch water. It means not leaving anything outside your house that could be of interest. I had my Chacos stolen from leaving them outside my door to dry overnight. I’ve had a hammer stolen that I left right outside my ladosy while I took a 15-minute bucket bath. I'm 100% certain that no one would have broken into my house to steal these things, but because they were outside sitting there, it made it easy. Most crimes here are crimes of opportunity, so removing as much of that opportunity as possible will protect your belongings but also protect your relationship with your community. Never having to confront someone about theft will just make your life at site a lot easier. And another note: if there is a guard at your house or hotel, do not rely on them to take the place of secure locks and proper precaution. Frankly speaking, the guards in this country are not paid enough to give a shit, and I’ve heard many a story of volunteers who’ve had break-ins while the guard, oh so conveniently, just happened to be on their dinner break.
• You’ve probably heard about the Peace Corps rollercoaster, where the highs are incredibly high, but the lows are often unbearably low. You will inevitably have these bottom-of-the-rollercoaster days, when you just want to quit and feel like it’s pointless, and all you want to do is be alone and shut the door to the world. However, I’ve found that when I push myself to get outside and talk to people or play with the local kids, even just for a few minutes, it always helps me feel better. And if you’re naturally independent and introverted like me, try to resist the urge to be a shut-in and a recluse, even though it’s easier. I wish I had pushed myself out of my comfort zone more to socialize and interact with my neighbors, even when I just wanted to be in my house and read a book or watch TV. When you look back on your service, it’s those personal interactions that will be your best and most priceless memories.
•  My personal recommendation (and other volunteers may disagree) is that unless you absolutely have to go home to America for a family wedding/bar mitzvah/funeral/other important event, try not to take a vacation in America during your service, as tempting as it may be. Why? Although many people have a great time going home and seeing their friends and family, almost everyone I’ve talked to who has done this has reported having a very difficult time re-adjusting when they returned to their country of service. They all say that the culture shock is harder the second time around, probably because they’ve just come from a week or two of American luxuries and comforts of home, and then they get back to country and realize “ugh, I still have 18 months/1 year/whatever amount of time left…” That said, I DO highly recommend taking a vacation out of country at around your one-year mark, if you can afford it. It’s a good time to take a break from your country of service and reward yourself for a year’s worth of hard work and hardships, and you can plan a trip to meet up in another country with friends or family. I did this and went to India for a friend’s wedding, and was able to spend time traveling around the country with another friend. It was great to be able to see my friends from home without actually going home, and going to a non-westernized country (although one that’s still much richer than Madagascar) made it pretty easy for me to adapt when I was there (squat toilet? no problem!) and then when I got back to Madagascar. In short, there’s something to be said for taking a vacation somewhere that makes your country of service seem like “home”—whereas if you go back to America for vacation, you may find yourself feeling like that is actually your home. After a chaotic and busy 10 days in India, I was excited to get back home to Madagascar, and I arrived back at site recharged and ready to tackle my final year of service. Also, giving my language skills a year to sink in meant that when I came back to Madagascar, I didn't feel like I had lost any of my Malagasy ability.
• This final piece of advice actually comes from my fellow volunteer Amy, who was counseling me on the phone this weekend when I started freaking out about how we only have 4 months left and OMG, what am I going to do with myself after we COS? She reminded me that even though our remaining time is rapidly ticking away, we still need to take it day by day, just as we did in the beginning when everything was new and different and we were still learning how to live here.  At this point, with so many of our months of service behind us, it’s easy for our minds to leap ahead to the future. But we still have to live in the present and remember where we are and what we’re doing. So that’s the piece of advice that I’m personally trying to follow right now.

En Tana, avec le jacaranda

It should be said that I really, really dislike Tana (short for Antananarivo), the capital of Madagascar. It's inexplicably in the middle of the country (on an island-- really?), dirty, expensive, crowded, and full of sneaky pickpockets, crazy traffic, and terrible pollution. There are literally no working stoplights in this massive city, and it's impossible to navigate on foot because every inch of the sidewalks are covered in street vendors. When I think of Madagascar, I think of the beautiful coastal region where I live, and so whenever I come to Tana it always screws with my head a little bit as I try to reconcile being here with the idyllic, tropical reality of life at my site.

However, the more time I spend in Tana, the more layers of the city have been peeled back for me, and I've begun to find some interesting things. It's also made me realize that despite its flaws, Tana does have some qualities that should be appreciated. I've recently had to make several unexpected trips to the city to handle some business and medical issues, and so I've tried to make the most of it by exploring, walking around, and actually taking some pictures. The best part of being here when I have been lately (September/October/November) is that it's when the gorgeous purple jacaranda trees are in bloom all over the city.

Jacaranda trees ringing Lac Anosy, in the middle of Tana. Unfortunately it wasn't a great day for photos so you can't really see just how vibrantly purple the blooms are.

The blossoms litter the ground almost everywhere you walk (or stand, in my case here.)

I'm also really enamored by the beautiful old train station at the end of L'Avenue de l'Independence. I've always been drawn to beautiful old train stations, and while I wish this was still a working station, I'm glad that it's at least been restored and has a new life. Right now it's home to a few expensive shops and boutiques, plus one of my favorite restaurants in town, Cafe de la Gare.

A relic of the colonial era, the station is emblazoned with the French name for the city, "Tananarive".

My other favorite piece of architecture is this Telma building which I randomly stumbled across while walking around one day. Telma is the name of the main cell phone/land line provider in the country, and before it was privatized it was the national phone provider, Telecom Malagasy, so I'm assuming this building dates back to when it was still government-run.

The Telma colors are yellow and green, hence the paint job on this building.

An old sign for a Telecom Malagasy payphone.

Here are some other miscellaneous photos of things I found interesting in Tana:

The fancy Hotel du Louvre and its beautiful jacaranda tree.

I'm kind of obsessed with all the post offices in this country because all the lettering is done in this fantastic mid-century modern font. I hope they never modernize! This post office in Tana is my favorite.

Here's a sign for the office of a dental surgeon with some fairly impressive credentials.

"Buvez Coca-Cola!"

Street corner scene.

What the Malagasy call "le propagande"-- election posters for one of the presidential candidates. NB: "fidio" means "choose", and "filoham-pirenena" literally translates to "leader of the country". Hajo is the first name of this candidate.

Tana is a very hilly city. Here's a view looking towards Lac Anosy.

Zaza kely

If there's one commonality among all Peace Corps volunteers around the world, it's the frequency of our interactions with kids. Children, in their natural openness and curiosity, tend to glom on to Peace Corps volunteers in any town-- visiting our houses, saying emphatic hellos, and wanting to help us with daily tasks. I often find myself acting as a sort of combination Pied Piper/court jester for the under-10 set in my neighborhood of Vangaindrano. On days when I am feeling just "over it" and sick of my town and Peace Corps life, I can always count on my little kid (zaza kely, in Malagasy) crew to cheer me up. Here are some photos of some of my favorite little ones:

These are 4 of my favorite girls, and I just love this photo of them. From left to right it's Prisca, Marinah, Rojo (pronounced "rood-zoo"), and Lanisa. I just love Lanisa's little hand-on-hip pose, and the fact that my cat Harry wandered into the picture. Sadly, Rojo and the rest of her family (including her little sister Fenitra who was my absolute favorite) moved to Tana back in October, so I will probably never see her again.

One thing that irks me about this country is that it's bad luck to say that a kid is cute, because there is a superstition that cute kids will be snatched away by some evil spirit. So to 'protect' a kid, you're not ever supposed to comment on his or her adorableness. And since there is also a widely-circulated myth that vazahas (white foreigners) steal babies, I REALLY can't ever say a kid is cute. The problem with this is that there are so many absolutely adorable children, and not being able to say something kills me! So to get around it I say that they are really good at smiling, or something similar.

This little girl, Sarobidy ("precious" in Malagasy) was one of the best parts of my homestay experience during my training in Mantasoa. She came to stay with my host family about a week after I arrived-- I think she was a cousin-- and she just brightened my life whenever I saw her. She loved posing like this for photos and she always had a smile on her face when she saw me and would exclaim "AIM-LEEEEE!" My favorite memory of her is when I was going to fetch water with her and my host sisters Eva and Tanya, and I was wearing my sunglasses (as I always have to in this intense sunlight). Suddnely Sarobidy decided that she absolutely had to wear sunglasses too, and refused to go with us unless she had a pair on like me. So after a mini (comical) tantrum, Eva lent her a pair of hers. Watching this little toddler wearing oversize sunglasses while walking to the water pump was one of the cutest things I have ever seen.

This photo captures one of my favorite Peace Corps memories, one which really epitomized the barrier-breaking cultural interactions you can have when you embrace openness and spontaneity. I took this on the beach in Manakara back in August 2012, when I was hanging out with my friends Matt, Emily, and Nick. We were just chilling on the beach when a bunch of kids came over and started flying their homemade kite next to us. We asked them if we could help/play along, and then Matt asked them if they wanted us to bury them in the sand. Naturally, to a kid, this sounds awesome-- why NOT get buried in the sand? So we got to work, and the kids screamed and laughed and generally had a silly, fun time. I love the combined look of joy and terror on their faces in this picture.

This little ham--  he of the funny faces-- is Fanomeja ("gift" in Malagasy). He's really become one of my favorites, and unlike some of the other kids who decided it was no longer cool to hang out with me after a while, has stuck by my side. He loves to come over and color and has also been helping me in my garden lately. He is definitely one of the poorest kids in my neighborhood, and usually only has one threadbare set of clothes that he wears. So I decided that for Vingt-Six (Malagasy independence day), I would buy him a shirt and pair of pants at a frip (used clothing) seller so that he would have a nice outfit to wear on the holiday like all of the other kids. I told him to come over to my house (so that I could give it to him without all the other kids knowing), and he was so excited to have a nice set of clothes that he changed into them right then and there. Usually I'm kind of against just buying stuff for people, but he is such a genuinely sweet kid that I wanted to do something nice for him.

Here I am (looking extremely unglamorous) with my little neighbor friend, who is also named Sarobidy. I've watched him grow up into a toddler who knows how to say my name, and without fail, he'll squeak out "'kor ab' Ay-ee" (his best attempt at saying "Akory aby Emily") every time I pass by his house. Woe to me if I forget to say hi to him back! Lately I've been indulging him by giving him little rides on the back of my bike (while I walk my bike and hold on to him), and much to his constant delight, giving him piggyback rides as well.

Finally, no blog post about kids would be complete without a picture of them coloring at my house. One of the best things I did was get a set of colored pencils from a volunteer who COSed (finished his service) and invite the neighborhood kids to come over and draw pictures or color in coloring books (which my mom has been sending in care packages). In the beginning, I had them sign all of their pictures, which really helped me learn all of their names. Now they're all extremely zatra (accustomed to) coming over and using the pencils, paper, and books. In the process, they get to practice sharing and picking up after themselves. And, I love that they get to have an outlet for creative expression, which is something these kids rarely have a chance to do.