Things I love (and don't love) about Madagascar

Things I love about Madagascar

1. Little kids piled on a pousse-pousse going home after school, especially when there are a bunch of cute little backpacks hanging off the back.

2. The fact that women breastfeed anywhere, openly, and nobody gives a shit, because duh, when a baby is hungry, that’s what the mother’s breast is there for. There are some anti-breastfeeding-in-public morons in the US who would do well remember this.

3. The drive from Farafangana (my banking town) to Vangaindrano (where I lived), with its stunning view of the Indian Ocean past the valleys.

4. THE FRUIT!

5. When I did a lesson in a local English class asking kids what their favorite foods were, 99% of them named a type of fruit—mangoes, bananas, lychees, etc. What a far cry from the typical American kid’s response, which more likely than not would be “McDonald’s”, “Doritos”, or something else equally depressing. With the exception of the occasional small package of cookies or crackers (a treat), most kids here simply do not eat processed food. In fact, they eat exactly what the adults eat, which further emphasizes my inability to ascribe to the American notion that kids need special (unhealthy) food because they won’t eat adult food. I’ve never seen any kids here eating chicken nuggets or mac and cheese, and what a welcome relief that is.

6. Riding my bike everywhere (especially to beautiful places like this beach), and feeling like a kid every time I do.

7. Opening my front door at night and seeing the Milky Way above the trees, displayed like a bright banner in the night sky.

8. The fact that talented local artisans can pretty much custom-make you anything to order: jewelry, shoes, handbags, furniture, you name it.

9. When a stone-faced kid is staring at me, and just by saying hello to them in Malagasy, I can get them to erupt into a toothy, joyous grin.

10. Little babies wearing tiny, adorable straw hats to protect them from the strong Madagascar sun. It kills me that I don't have a photo of this, because it's the cutest thing in the world, but I always felt too intrusive and rude to ask a stranger to take a picture of their baby.

11. The unspoiled, undeveloped beaches. In America, people look at a beach and wonder how many million-dollar condos they can build on it, but here, it is just part of nature.

12. Malagasy kids and their inventive play—you will never hear one of them say “I’m bored”. Kids make their own toys out of sticks, mud, sardine cans, old CD's... whatever they can find. My favorite is when some local kids made their own stilts and were walking around on them!

13. Here, people repair and reuse broken things—umbrellas, shoes, buckets, extension cords, even lighters. There isn’t the same idea we have in America of “oh just buy a new one”, because most people can’t afford to.

14. You see male friends holding hands and generally showing affection to one another. Of course, it's a bit different here because homosexuality is essentially an unknown (especially outside the cities), so they would never even think that it meant anything other than “we’re friends", but I always like seeing it.
15. This is probably a legacy of the French colonial education system, but children learn how to write in cursive, and so as a result, everyone – even teenage boys—has really beautiful handwriting. I particularly love the writing on this sign outside my local carpentry shop.

16. The way kids in my town greeted me every day like a local celebrity, with shouts of "Emilieeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!" I will forever miss riding my bike up the road to my house, and the throngs of kids who would run up to me shouting my name as I arrived. I also loved the fact that little kids who weren't yet speaking when I arrived learned to say my name as one of their first words. It was so flattering and heart-warming.

17. The strong culture of working together, through the formation of cooperatives or fikambananas. These exist for every kind of profession: seamstresses, farmers, epicerie owners, fishermen, fruit dryers, etc. They're a helpful support system, a mechanism for motivating others, and a way for people to secure credit and financing for their businesses.

18. The very un-American diet centered on whole, unprocessed foods like rice, vegetables, fruit, legumes, and locally-produced meat. People generally don't eat enough vegetables and protein, but still, the diet here is plant-based and low in processed food and sugar, and therefore healthier than the Standard American Diet (SAD).

19. Little kids riding on the front of bikes. I know it’s not safe, but it’s just so darn cute!

20. The ability to buy ridiculous made-in-China things like Facebook and You Tube flip-flops.

Things I don’t love about Madagascar

1. That from a young age, most girls work so hard at housework, taking care of siblings, cooking, and laundry, and aren't afforded the time to just be kids as much as boys are. And I hate that this often means that the boys are allowed to go to school, but the girls are forced to stay at home.

2. The culture of infidelity and having a sipa (girlfriend on the side). I know that infidelity exists in every culture, but it's particularly saddening to me how many Malagasy men think it's ok to cheat on their wives and father children with other women (or even school-age girls). This just compounds the problem of poverty, because it creates single mothers who can't support their children, girls who drop out of school because they get pregnant, and families that don't get financial or emotional support from the father because he's off with his girlfriend.

3. Extrapolating from that, I hate the way that women are undervalued and told they can’t do things, can't succeed in school or business, have to stay home and be housewives, and are just generally subservient to men. Coming from a relatively progressive country like America, it was a huge shock to be thrown into a world of pre-women's movement gender relations, and it has definitely made me appreciate how women are treated in the US, even though it's still flawed.

4. The heartbreaking poverty— at this point, almost 90% of people here live under $2/day. So many people can’t afford school fees, can’t afford good food, can't afford medicine, can't afford a decent house, and frequently can't even afford clothing. I often see people checking the fruit trees behind my house to see if anything is edible, and you can tell it’s because they don’t have anything else to eat. It makes me want to cry every time.

5. The overuse of tavy (slash and burn agriculture) and clearcutting to turn more and more swaths of forest into rice fields, and the generally short-sighted view of the environment. (But by the same token, people are hungry, so can you blame them for wanting to grow food?)

6. The fact that many people think a bowl of just rice constitutes a meal, and don't understand that in order for their children to grow up healthy, they also need protein, vegetables, fruit, and other food groups.

7. The constant shouts and taunts of vazaha ("white person/foreigner"). I hate it because I hate when anyone is objectified as nothing more than their skin tone, whether it's black, white, brown, yellow, purple, whatever. All it does is just emphasize our differences, when instead we should be focusing on how we're all pretty similar. I especially hate it when women point at me and say “look at the vazaha” to distract their crying baby, much as Americans would point out a dog or a cat. I'm not a zoo animal, for pete's sake.

8. The disgusting trash that's absolutely everywhere, littering some of the most beautiful places in the world. There is a gorgeous, serene grove of trees right near my house, and what do people use it as? A trash dump and a toilet.

9. The atrocious roads and terrible infrastructure. Even most of the "paved" roads, like the main central artery of the RN7, are in terrible shape.

10. The disgusting smog of Tana, the capital. This is both because of the 1960s-era taxis (no catalytic converters) as well as simply the massive urban sprawl and unsustainable growth of the city which was resulted in way too many cars, trucks, and buses.

11. The rampant sex tourism. It makes my skin crawl whenever I stay in a hotel and see a white man being accompanied by a much-younger Malagasy girl. I also have a hard time with the cultural notion that if you’re a Malagasy girl and marry a white guy—no matter how old and disgusting he is—you’re getting ahead in life. My neighbor recently asked me to find her a white man—and one for her 8-year-old granddaughter (later in life, I certainly hope.) There is a huge "sexpat" culture here of French men who move to Madagascar after retirement.

12. That people assume that if you’re white, you must be French—and that children assume to ask you for money. Somehow they have all learned to say “Donne-moi de l’argent”, even though they often don't exactly know what it means. I mean really, has that ever actually worked for them? Does anyone actually say "oh sure, here's money!" And c'mon kids, if you’re going to demand money from someone, at least use the polite ‘vous’ form and say “Donnez-moi de l’argent”.

13. The fact that it costs over $1,000 to fly to South Africa roundtrip…. Which is almost the same as flying roundtrip to NYC, a mere 8,000 miles further away.

14. The mistreatment of dogs/other animals, especially in the Sud Est where dogs are seen as the lowest life form, and it's taboo to care for them or give them food. Yet dogs still exist, and are not only starved but are also kicked, beaten, and abused. One of my favorite things of traveling to India was seeing how even the stray dogs in Goa were fed and taken care of out of karmic responsibility.

15. The tradition of blasting music before, after, and during cultural events and parties, to the point where it's as loud as possible and talking to another person is both infuriating and pointless. WHAT? SORRY, CAN YOU REPEAT THAT? I CAN’T HEAR YOU. I DON’T UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU ARE SAYING. NO, BLASTING THE MUSIC DOES NOT MAKE IT ANY EASIER FOR ME TO UNDERSTAND MALAGASY.

16. In the Sud Est, there seems to be somewhat of a culture of dependency and an attitude of “give me things because you're a vazaha". A lot of times people only saw me as a potential source of free stuff, just because I am a foreigner. When I moved out of Vangaindrano it was frustrating to see all the people come crawling out of the woodwork to demand stuff from my house, even if I had never even seen them or talked to them before.

17. The fact that it’s considered perfectly appropriate to try and get a woman’s attention by hissing at her. It makes my skin crawl whenever I hear it, and I refuse to respond to any guy that hisses at me.

18. Market day in my town, which results in an overabundance of chicken sellers that snarl up traffic (foot/bicycle/pousse-pousse) and causes a massive, infuriating bottleneck on the main road in the center of town.

19. When people fetch water at the pump and overfill their buckets up to the brim, and stand there and pour out some of the water before walking home. Or they waste the water otherwise because it ends up sloshing out as they walk home. Yet people always chide me for not filling up my buckets "enough" when I fill them exactly to the line. My response? “I don’t like wet feet.”

20. People who don’t look when they cross the street, and just start blindly walking diagonally across the road without a care or a thought for anything that might be behind them. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve nearly collided with someone on my bike because of this.

Armchair linguist

One of the most unique—and challenging—componenents of Peace Corps service is that volunteers must learn and speak the local language of where they work. This often means forgoing a country’s colonial language (often French or Spanish) and instead learning the indigenous language, which allows volunteers to work closely with people who need the most help. In Madagascar, French is the language of business and government because it was a French colony until 1960. But the majority of people here speak Malagasy on a daily basis, not French. And getting outside of larger towns and into the countryside, where fewer people have gone to lycee and almost no one has gone to university, French is rarely spoken at all. So when Peace Corps trainees arrive in Madagascar, they are given 2 months of intense Malagasy training before setting off to their sites: 1 month of learning Malagasy officiel, the standard dialect and the one that’s spoken in the highlands (the capital region), and after they learn where their site location will be, another month of either continued study of officiel, or of one of the 17 other Malgasy dialects. Each of the dialects corresponds with the tribe that has settled in a particular region of the country. In my area (Vangaindrano), most of the people are of the Antesaka tribe, so I learned the Antesaka dialect. But if you go up the road 80km north to Farafangana, you’ll be in Antefasy land, so the dialect spoken there is Antefasy. However, unlike many other African countries, the dialects are fairly similar, and most Malagasy people can understand one another, even if one person is from up north near Diego Suarez, and another person is from down south near Ft. Dauphin. My dialect (along with the other Sud Est dialects of Antefasy and Antemoro) are notable for turning all “s” sounds into “sh” sounds, a fact that some of my more northernly peers like to laugh at. (So for example, the word misy, which means “there is/there are” is pronounced “meesy” in other areas, but “meeshy” in mine.) My dialect also has a fun habit of shortening words by dropping the final syllable, especially if the word end in –na, and also boasts lots of local colloquialisms like Da ta andra? Ao ka!, which basically means “what’s up? Not much!” but would never be said anywhere outside the Vangaindrano region.

The famed naturalist Gerald Durrell writes in his book The Aye-Aye and I that “Malagasy is a fine, rackity-clackity, ringing language which sounds not unlike someone carelessly emptying a barrel of glass marbles down a stone staircase.” I don’t know if I would make that exact same colorful comparison (although Durrell certainly does have a flair for language), but I have many days when I truly do think people are rolling rocks around in their mouth. My language challenge has always been more with understanding than with speaking, and that hasn’t changed in my experience here. I’ve struggled (and continue to struggle) greatly with understanding what people are saying, and find myself frustrated on a daily basis that I can’t express myself the way that I want to.  I do have to remember, though, that I have more of an uphill battle than other volunteers, because it’s commonly remarked that language gets more difficult the further south you go, and I live in one of the most southernly towns of all the volunteers here. In the countryside towns that surround Vangaindrano, people’s accents become even thicker and their speech more rapid, which makes it incredibly difficult to understand them. Unfortunately, this is also a country that isn’t known for its dental care, so there are many people with missing or no teeth, which makes comprehension even more mind-boggling.

The Malagasy language itself is a bit of a mystery that is both a linguist’s and anthropologist’s dream: its closest relative is an Indonesian dialect spoken by one particular tribe on the island of Borneo. This gives credence to the theory that Madagascar was first settled by migrants from Indonesia, who traversed the precarious Indian Ocean on a raft for months on end. Malagasy also contains elements borrowed from Arabic, such as the days of the week and the greeting salama; this is due to the presence of Islamic traders who settled in Madagascar several hundred years ago.  And owing to the French colonial influence It also has a large number of Malagasy-fied French words. Malagasy uses no article, so words borrowed from French simply take the “le/la” and string it together with the actual word. So for example, the French for key, la clé, became lakile in Malagasy. (The alphabet does not contain the letters C, Q, U, W, and X.) La biére (beer) became labiera; la bougie (candle) became labozia. Other words are changed only slightly, such as legume, which became legioma. And a large number of French words were simply adopted wholesale, such as verre (glass), restaurant (no translation needed), and epicerie (small grocery store).

Malagasy is a comparatively easy language to learn because there are simply not that many words—one word could have 3 meanings. But this is at once both simplifying and maddening. For example, the word sahirana means “busy”, but it also means “stressed” or “worried”. So if I want to ask my counterpart if she is busy (a fairly common thing for Americans to ask in the workplace), there really isn’t a great way to do it. The all-encompassing phrase tsy mety literally means “not good”, but is also really the only way to say that someone is being rude. If I want to explain to a kid why he shouldn’t yell “vazaha!” at me, I want to be clear that it’s more than just “not ok”, it’s rude, but there literally isn’t a word for that. And the often-used word mazotoa means “good luck” or “have fun/enjoy”. But if my neighbor is on his way to take the baccalaureate exam, I don’t really want to say “enjoy the test!”—I want to wish him luck. This prevention from being specific is one of the language’s most frustrating aspects. However, my least favorite part of the language is that there is no verb “to be”. Think about how often you use some form of this verb, either in English or French, and you’ll realize how exasperating this is.

However, despite the annoyances, Malagasy does have some amusing quirks and features. I’ve written before that perhaps my favorite word in the language is mitsangatsangana, which means to take a walk for pleasure. It wasn’t until I’d spent a couple months studying Malagasy that I learned the utility behind this word, which is fairly fun. Malagasy employs a pattern whereby if you repeat the second half of a verb, it weakens it. So in the case of mitsangatsangana, it means “to sort of amble around”, whereas its parent, so to speak, is simply mitsangana, "to stand" (I guess if you're not really standing, that means walking around.) Same for the verb “to go”, mandeha, which becomes mandehadeha when you’re talking about just kind of meandering along. And one of my most frequent jokes is when people remark with surprise that I can speak Malagasy, by saying mahay miteny ‘Gasy enao!, I self-deprecatingly respond with ehhhh…. mahayhay fotsiny iaho (I can only sort of speak it), and this unfailingly causes a round of chuckles. This repetition/weaking utility is also employed with some nouns, most notably colors: the word manga mean “blue”, but mangamanga means “light blue”.

In all my struggles with the language, I try to remind myself that I’m lucky that I didn’t have to learn a new alphabet, or one of those notorious African languages with clicks and other unwritable sounds. And when I get depressed about my lack of language skills, it’s important to remember that I’ve only been studying and speaking Malagasy for a year—I spent 10 years becoming fluent in French. But above all, I’m proud to be able to (sort of) speak Malagasy because it sets me (and other PCVs) apart from your average French-speaking foreign aid worker or European tourist. It allows us to gain the trust and respect of the people of Madagascar, and well, let’s be honest: being able to blow someone’s mind by being a white person who speaks Malagasy will never get old.

Mariazy

During my first 7 months of being at site, I made great strides in my language skills as well as my level of integration within the community, but I still felt like I something was missing-- that my neighbors still didn't consider me to really be living there. Other volunteers from my stage had regaled me with stories of being invited to weddings, circumcision parties, and famadihanas (the "turning of the bones" ceremony that honors a family's dead ancestors), and I felt envious of their invitations, because I hadn't received an invitation to anything. It was beginning to weigh heavily on my conception of how well I was truly integrated.

In early December I had a language learning session with my neighbor and Malagasy tutor, Madame Titine, and she mentioned that another one of our neighbors, Madame Priscaline, was getting married in town in a few weeks. I'm close with many members of Priscaline's family and talk with them on a daily basis, but none of them had mentioned the wedding. Later that day I stopped by the epicerie that Priscaline's mother, Madame Marcelline, runs, and I mentioned hearing about her daughter's upcoming mariazy (wedding). She clapped her hands with delight as a smile lit up her face, and invited me to come. And just like that, I finally had an invitation to my first Malagasy cultural event!

The wedding was a big deal for the people of Ampasy, my neighborhood in Vaingaindrano, and on the morning of Saturday December 15th, people were up and about getting ready. My teenage neighbor Sonia wanted to braid my hair for the event, so she came over at lunchtime and gave me a beautiful set of braids that, if I wasn't quite so white, would have made me fit right in with the other women in my town. My 8-year-old friend Marinah, sister of the bride, came over afterwards and we did our nails together. And then I put on a nice dress that I rarely wear and headed out to the main road to meet the rest of my community before walking to the church. The sense of joy and excitement was palpable, with little girls giddily dressed up in their finest dresses just for the occasion, wearing swipes of lipstick courtesy of Sonia, our glamour goddess. I brought my camera out and took lots of pictures of everyone dressed in their best, which made it truly feel like a special occasion. About a half-hour later, we all walked to the FLM (Lutheran) Betesda church and stood outside while we awaited the arrival of the bride and groom. I passed the time by taking more pictures of everyone-- an activity that never fails to entertain, and about a half-hour later a silver Peugeot decorated with flowers pulled up in front of the church. Here comes the bride!

I shouldn't have been surprised at this, but my eyes began to water just like they normally would at a wedding back home. I am a serial wedding-crier, and I can't help it. This was at the same time both a regular wedding like you'd see in a America, but also not normal at all, because an occasion like this is truly special. These are people who hard incredibly hard and don't often have the chance to dress up in nice clothes and celebrate a special occasion. So when I saw beautiful Priscaline step out of the car, resplendent in a gorgeous white dress and veil, tears began to stream down my cheek because not only was this a wedding, but it was her wedding, her special day, and I was so happy that she got to experience a day of joyfulness of her own.

Her fiance, Ralahady, followed next, walking arm-in-arm with his regal-looking mother. At first I wondered to myself who this young man in a white suit was, but then it hit me that it was, in fact, the grooom. (Is this a sign of my advancing age?) And then the cute little groomsmen/ring bearers tromped in behind them-- little 5-year-old Totona, my neighbor, as well as another boy who I presume was Ralahady's relative. After the rest of the family entered the church the guests streamed in and took our seats. I sat with some of the children from my neighborhood and kept us cool in the sweltering church by using my paper fan. The wedding ceremony processed pretty much as it would in America, albeit in Malagasy instead of English, with one exception: the FLM Betesda church choir sang two beautiful hymns, which is something I've never seen before in a wedding. It was lovely and so fitting to this wedding, where it truly felt like the entire community was there to bless the union of Priscaline and Ralahady.

After the vows were taken and kisses were exchanged, the bride and groom walked out of the church, followed by their families, and formed a receiving line outside the exit. The main difference between an American and Malagasy receiving line is that here you do the customary one-two-three cheek kiss on every person on the line, so it takes a while to go through. Afterwards I met up with Madame Titine and we walked to the nearby Tropic Hotel for the reception.

I wasn't expecting much for the reception because these are not wealthy people, but I was duly impressed by the care that the hotel proprietor had taken to make this a special event. A large white tarp was draped over the open area south of the hotel building, forming a sort of tent, and underneath it were about 20 tables (borrowed from the middle school across the road), each bestowed with a tablecloth, bottles of soft drinks, and bowls of snacks. It took about an hour for the wedding party to finally arrive at the reception, at which point an emcee took to the microphone to make some speeches about the couple that I couldn't understand. Titine, our tablemates, and I all ate sambos and kaka pigeon while the speeches were being made, and then lined up to give our gifts to the couple and receive a piece of wedding cake. Malagasy tradition dictates that you give an envelope of cash as a wedding gift, and I silently worried that I hoped I'd included the right amount of money-- I didn't want to give too much and look ostentatious or wealthy, but I didn't want to give too little and look like a miser.

After giving our gifts and receiving cake, Titine and I walked home because it was getting late. It had been a 5-hour event and the sky was darkening. I was happy to be getting home, but I was also curious if there were other wedding events. There was no dancing and no alcohol served (probably the biggest difference from American weddings), though I'm not sure if that was indicative of all Malagasy weddings or just this particular family. But I walked home with a big smile on my face because I was so thrilled and so honored to be included in Priscaline and Ralahady's special day. Unlike American weddings where people gather from all over the country (or the globe), this felt more like the coming together of an entire community than a collection of various friends and relatives who don't know each other. Indeed, it really felt like everyone from Ampasy was there, and my inclusion was a watershed moment for me in terms of feeling like a true member of the community. I wasn't there as a special guest or token white person; rather I was included because I'm just a friendly person living in the neighborhood. And one of the main things I strive for in my Peace Corps service is to be seen as just that.

Thoughts on Christmas

Note: I struggled with whether or not to write about this, but in the spirit of wanting to be as open and honest as possible about what my life is like here-- describing both hardships and triumphs-- I decided to go ahead and share this with you. Please do not interpret anything written as a personal attack or judgment on anyone.

Can it still be Christmas when it's 90 degrees out and you're sitting next to a palm tree instead of a pine tree? That's a question I had to ask myself as I prepared for my first Christmas away from family. I'd already experienced Christmas abroad before (Buenos Aires in 2010), but that was a trip with my family, so this year was still going to be an entirely new experience.

Because I was worried about being lonely if I stayed in Vangaindrano for Christmas, I decided to take a vacation and head north to Diego Suarez, a beautiful beach town on the very northern tip of the island. About 17 other volunteers also came up to Diego, and it was an epic 3-day journey to get here, including a day-long brousse in which they had decided to squish 5 people into each row, but all the travel difficulty was worth it as we spent a magical Christmas Eve boating in the Mer d'Emeraude and snorkeling in the cerulean waters, and a luxurious Christmas Day splashing around a fancy hotel pool, splurging on a decadent lunch, and drinking vacation-worthy tropical drinks. I was pleasantly surprised to find that as much I wished I could be with my family back in Vermont, eating our traditional Christmas brunch of french toast, bacon and mimosas, I wasn't actually very homesick. Spending the holiday with my Peace Corps family was exactly what I wanted and needed, and even though we're all many thousands of miles away from home, we became each others' family. After our day at the pool we all went back to our hotels to shower and put on nice clothes, then went out to a local bar where we danced to a fantastic band was playing a set of both American pop songs and Malagasy music. The highlight of the night was when we all got up to sing along and cheer as one of my fellow Peace Corps volunteers belted out an amazing rendition of Adele's "Someone Like You". That moment cemented for me the epiphany I'd had earlier that day: that Christmas and Hanukkah are not about the gifts you give or receive; rather, they are about the people you spend them with. There is no way I could have been happier than I was that night, jubilantly dancing with my friends in a random bar on the tip of a tropical island. And even prior to Peace Corps, every passing holiday season that saw me another year older also saw me less and less interested in gifts being a part of the Christmas experience. I found myself thrilled to just be able to spend a day with my family eating good food, going for snowy hikes up a local mountain, and just being able to enjoy relaxing together. If anything, my feeling of contentment and happiness during this year's gift-less holiday was simply a natural progression of how my enjoyment of the holiday season has evolved. So after that wonderful moment of dancing and singing, when some people went back to the bar for another round, I decided to end the day on a high note and headed back to our hotel in a touk-touk (a motorized rickshaw cab).

But as happy as I was all Christmas day and night, I couldn't ignore a feeling of something bothering me deep down inside. It wasn't until I got back to an empty hotel room and began to process it that I fully understood what it was. One part of it is that Diego is one of cities here with the highest prevalence of sex tourism, and it's hard not to feel disgusted when you see lecherous old French men sitting with underage Malagasy prostitutes at the next table over. (Because really, is there anything sadder than being alone on Christmas and feeling the need to pay someone for companionship?) But it was something more than that that really got to me. While I was at the pool and the bar, I was using my phone to check Facebook and post holiday updates and greetings. Doing so allowed me to see many, many photos of people's Christmas trees overflowing with brightly wrapped gifts, and pictures of their children gleefully tearing open new toys, dolls, video games, iPads, and other symbols of a privileged Western existence. I was overwhelmed by the contrast to life here; floored by the sudden appearance of so much excess, so much unnecessary spending and consumerism. And, I was horrified to think of myself as a child who had been a part of this system, begging my parents for gifts that they very often indulged me in. And then I thought of the reverse side of the coin, how childhood is in Madagascar and other places with poverty so extreme that it's unfathomable. I thought of the kids in my neighborhood, who I can now affectionately call "my" kids because they stop by my house every day to play, and because they call out "Ay-mee-leeeeeee!" as I go to fetch water. I thought about sweet little Marinah, my new tag-along 8-year-old best friend, who delights in following me around and loves to use my colored pencils to draw pictures on scrap paper-- a common activity for American children, but an exciting luxury for kids here. I thought about little Liba with his bright smile, who loves to come over and flip through the picture books I have in my house for the kids; he can't read, but he happily looks at the pictures over and over, describing what he sees. I am fairly certain this is his first time ever seeing a book. And I thought about the countless other children who live near me, who maybe own one or two sets of threadbare clothes, and perhaps not even a pair of plastic flip-flops, but smile and play and run around joyfully just like kids are supposed to, even though they're probably always a little hungry and spend every night sleeping on a threadbare mattress that they share with the rest of their family. I can't give these kids money, but I give them fruit when I have it, a banana or mango here and there, and maybe some peanuts to try and make up for the some of the protein their diet is missing every day. They are ever grateful and gracious at any act of generosity. No parent ever has to remind these children to say thank you.

And so when I thought of "my" kids back in Vangaindrano, along with the majority of all the children in Madagascar, who want for so many basic things yet ask for so little, and then thought of the pictures I saw of waste, excess, consumerism, overconsumption-- all brought about in the name of a holiday that is supposed to celebrate peace and goodwill towards others, I broke down into uncontrollable sobs. I called my mom, tears streaming down my face as I tried to explain why I was so upset. No, I wasn't homesick, I said; this was something far different. Such a complex mix of feelings brews a storm of emotion that is hard to dissect and explain. I felt angry, guilty, helpless, heartbroken. For some reason little Liba stuck out in my mind, as I sobbed to my mother, he doesn't even own any shoes! Almost all of them are malnourished and can't afford to go to school-- how can I look at these pictures of wasted money spent on ridiculous things and not feel angry? But I can't solve the problem-- it's a broken system. Me buying things for the kids in my community won't fundamentally change anything, just as Americans not buying Christmas gifts for their kids won't change anything either. And who can fault them for wanting to shower their children with love and affection in the form of things that make them happy? Who doesn't respond to the glee in a child's face when they open up a gift? I am a generous person by nature and absolutely love to give gifts, although mostly of the homemade variety. So how can I change anything? All I know is that this Christmas, something changed in me, and I will never be able to look at the holiday the same way again. On a larger scale, I also hope this helps me become less of a materialistic person when I return to the US. And when I have kids, I hope to do something different with Christmas and Hanukkah, something that isn't centered around buying things. An idea came into my head yesterday as I was hiking through the beautiful natural rock formations of Tsingy Rouge, a park near Diego Suarez: I thought about how wonderful it would be to use the holiday season to travel every year and explore another corner of the world. There is so much beauty to be seen in the world, and if I am fortunate enough to have the money to explore it with people whom I love, I can think of no better way to honor the spirit of the holiday season.

I hope all of you back home have a joyous new year and are able to drink a toast to a happy and healthy 2013 with your friends and family. Love to you all, and Bon Année from Madagascar.

Thankful

This year I am celebrating Thanksgiving in Madagascar, the first time I've been away from my family and outside of America for the holiday. It's also only the second time I have missed the traditional family reunion Thanksgiving that my dad's family has been doing for over 50 years. So, I asked my cousin to say a few words on my behalf to all the family members that I won't get to see. Here's what I wrote:

This year marks my first Thanksgiving away from America, and only my
second time missing the big family gathering. It's rather interesting
to look at the holiday and its meaning in a completely different
context-- both geographically as well as mentally. Here in Madagascar
I find myself living in a land of indescribable beauty, but also among
heartbreaking poverty. I see school-age children running around or
working in the market, instead of sitting in a classroom, because
their family can't afford to pay the school fees. I see people with
distended abdomens and lack of pigment in their hair because they
don't eat enough protein. I see families looking longingly at the
fruit trees behind my house to see if there is any food to be gleaned.
And yet, even with all of this despair and need, there is still
beauty, and friendship, and happiness. Families spend time together
just sitting and enjoying each other's company. Kids find creative
ways to turn found objects into toys. Men get together in the evenings
to sing traditional songs. And Malagasy people show a touching
generosity to myself and one another, even if they can ill afford it.
Living this way for the past 9 months has taught me many things, but
one of the most important is an appreciation for the simplest things
in life. I find myself thankful not for a computer, a cell phone,
clothes, an iPod, or any other material things. Rather, I am grateful
for the fact that the water pump by my house is no longer broken, and
I and my neighbors can access clean water. I am grateful for my good
health, and the fact that I have the resources to deal with any health
problem that I may encounter. I am grateful for the fact that I have
just enough money to buy vegetables and fruit and the right kind of
food to keep me healthy. I am grateful for my friends back home, who
have not only not forgotten me, but have in fact shown such
thoughtfulness by sending me care packages and letters. And finally, I
am grateful for you, my family, because no matter where I am in the
world, and no matter how small my salary is, I know that you are
always a presence in my life-- and that is one of the most precious
things we can ask for.


Happy Thanksgiving to all of you, wherever you are, and may you have a wonderful holiday filled with family, friends, and a bounty of delicious food.

Peace Corps Passover

            When I joined the Peace Corps, I knew I’d have to make some sacrifices and adjustments to the lifestyle that I’d been accustomed to— chief among these was how I practice Judaism and observe holidays. From conversations with my Peace Corps placement officer I knew I would have to tread carefully since I’d be living in a country where most people probably don’t know what Judaism is. And, let’s be honest, I wasn’t really expecting to be able to find matzoh anywhere in a country like Madagascar. One thing I did know for certain, however, is that I didn’t want to lose the Jewishness from my identity, because among other things, I credit its influence with helping me be the person I want to be—someone who serves as a Peace Corps volunteer, quite honestly. In fact, my short answer to the oft-asked question of “why did you want to join the Peace Corps?” could probably be two words: tikkun olam, which is the Hebrew phrase for the Jewish ideal that translates to “repairing the world”.

            So when I realized at the end of March that Passover was coming right around the corner, I knew that I wanted to do at least something to observe it.  Obviously it wasn’t going to be feasible to observe the dietary laws when I still have to eat whatever they serve us at the training center, so that part was out of the question. But as fortune would have it, I discovered during our tech trip that one of my fellow volunteers, Emma, is also Jewish and was hoping to do something for Passover as well. So, on the second night, we held a very modified seder at the training center. One of our non-Jewish friends also joined in, and we had a fun time making the best of it given our limited resources. I made a Peace Corps-version seder plate using, among other things, cooked potatoes in place of matzoh, and sakay (hot pepper relish that’s popular in Madagascar) in place of horseradish.  My crowning achievement, however, was my Macgyver-ed “wine” for the 4 cups, which I made using vodka and water mixed with Cran-Grape drink mix packets. Hey, you have to work with what you’ve got.

Cups of "wine"

            After the seder, a few more friends joined us at the table and Emma and I ended up talking about Judaism and Jewish holidays with them—trying and failing to remember any Passover songs, and making plans for celebrating Rosh Hashanah together, somewhere in Madagascar.  The night ended up being perfect, and just what I needed to help me keep some bit of connection to my Jewish identity and my life back home. I haven’t had that many moments of homesickness since being here, but when I got to thinking about not being able to celebrate Passover (or any other holidays) in New York with my close friends, it all hit me at once. Realizing that I could keep up some sort of observance during my time here was a balm that smoothed some of the rough edges of that little bit of homesickness.

            At the end of the seder, after we said “next year in Jerusalem” (but let’s be honest, it’s more likely to be “next year in Antananarivo”), we went around the table and talked about what Passover meant to us being here. For me, I have a very distinct connection between Peace Corps and Passover, because it was while I was at my friend Jesse’s parents’ house for a seder last year that I got the phone call from Peace Corps saying that I was finally medically cleared for service.  So it was a great moment to be here in Madagascar, exactly one year later, celebrating the holiday with new friends yet remembering everyone back home, and reflecting on my good fortune to exactly where I am right now.