Erin in Madagascar - erininmadagascar

Wow!  It has been a fabulous past two weeks to finish of my time in Madagascar.  Our group left Fort Dauphin  and flew to Tana, the capital city.  It was neat to look out the airplane and be able to see the area where I did my Independent STudy project from the air and see the mountains I climbed and the bay where we camped.  We spent a little time sightseeing in Tana, visiting a sacred mountain with an old palace on top and a neat orphanage.  We then flew to th e very north to a town called Diego.  It's busier than Fort DAuphin, and there is definitely more of a presence of tourists.  We spent one day hanging out on one of the most beautiful beaches I've ever seen with crystal clear blue water and sail boats and green islands.  I also acquired quite a sunburn on the back of my legs which was much fun for the following days.  The next day we took a sail boat ride into the Emerald Sea, which was truly emerald colored.  We ended up at this sandy island that had nothing but little huts to picnic in, and had AMAZING seafood.  And I don't even really like seafood, so that's saying something.  Seriously, the best grilled fish (i think it was parrotfish) with lime and crab and coconut rice, and bananas flambe.  It was so perfect.  Then we went "snorkeling" in the middle of the ocean.  There were huge waves and they just kind of told us to jump in.  There were some neat fish, I was more concentrating on not getting swept away by the waves though.  The whole day was absolutley gorgeous and so much fun. Diego was a lot of fun too, we did a ton of shopping, ate a lot of good food, may have visited a casino, which was bizarre, and enjoyed the warm showers at a our hotel.  Other highlights of the north were seeing the worlds smallest type of chameleon which was extremely cute, and also the largest lemur in Madagascar, called the indiri, which make extremely loud calls and were very entertaining.  One other highlight was an intense dance party that took place on our bus initiated by our two Malagasy Most of the group took off last night for the return home, and I leave in a few hours for Paris, where I'm spending a week with my mom. My disease list is final at one stomach infection, one case of intestinal distention, strange leg infection, strange arm infection, one headcold/fever, various upset stomachs, and 8 infected blisters, three of which seem to be continuous and don't want to go away.  But I've heard as soon as you leave the country, they dry up pretty fast, so I'm counting on that.  Looking back at the semester, it has been SUCH a fabulous experience.  It's been hard at times, and I actually am very ready to go, but there are many foods, places, people, and crazy situations I will miss.  But there are a lot of adventures still coming this year, and I'm looking forward to everything.  I will have my computer in Paris, and hope to get my pictures up on the blog, finally!  So I will send out an email when that happens.  Hope you are all doing well!!  

Hi friends, i'm back in civilization for a while, it's been an interesting 3 weeks, but it's so nice to sleep in a bed again and have some running water.  I left Fort Dauphin approx. 3 weeks ago and was driven in a 4WD truck (it's really the only way you can navigate most of the roads off the major highway) to Sarisambo, a little village about an hour and a half away.  We basically showed up at the mayor's office, it was market day which means there were hordes of people around, and we were immediately surrounded by about 100 children all yelling "vahaza" (foreigner) and a crazy grandma who was dancing like a madwoman right in front of our faces.  We ended up setting up our tents behind the CSB, the local clinic.  It was a great situation because it was semi-fenced in so there was some privacy, there was a bathroom and shower situation, even if it was an outhouse and a room with a bucket, a running water pump that the whole community used, and one house where a man that was the guardian of the clinic and his family lived.  His wife cooked for us every meal, we just gave her waht we wanted to eat, which we had brought from town.  Everymorning we had rice with a little of the water left with it, and you mix it with sweetened condensed milk.  It's basically like hot cereal, and was actually my favorite meal of the day. Lunch and dinner were always rice with either fish we bought on the path, beans, manioc leaves, or ramen noodles.  We were truly isolated, there were no shops or ways to buy food except for the fish.  I spent the beginning of my time visiting the three mountains that have some pretty awesome rainforest.  We were able to camp at teh base of each forest, it was a challenge to walk to we were on tiny paths through rice fields and it rained a ton the first week.  The mountains were really cool, but the paths do not really exist.  We paid a guide to show us the way, and there were times we were almost on all fours.  It was wet, muddy, slippery, rough, and my feet were torn up by my chacos, one of which is broken, by the end.  I have a variety of infected blisters now healing on my feet.  Saw a few lemurs, some crazy things that looked like earthworms except kind of a white translucent color, slightly fatter, and about 3 feet long.  They were pretty crazy.  I also got to see some dung beetles which was quite exciting.  Herman, my translator/only person i could speak to for 3 weeks, was great.  We got a long really well, he was positive the whole time, we played more cards than i have ever played, and he did a great job translating/coordinating meals and guides and payments/playing doctor for blisters and fever/headcolds/ and just being a great friend.  We came back to Fort Dauphin for Easter and stayed with his family, which was fun as his mom runs a little shop and there were just constatnly people coming in and out.  Easter here is mostly celebrated on Monday and everyone gets together with family and goes to teh beach to have a picnic.  We went to a really fun beach with huge white sand dunes we could slide down and played with his little sisters and their friends.  It was really fun.  We headed back to Sarisambo after the weekend to continue our work.  One new experience I had involved buying a chicken for our last dinner with our family, and I decided I was going to kill it.  My dad had told me once that he killed a chicken when he was my age because he felt like in order to eat meat, you should have the knowledge/connection of the animal dying.  Especially in the states where the meat is already processed/packaged/ready to eat, I don't often even feel like I'm eating an animal.  So I decided I was going to kill my dinner.  I won't go into gory details for those of you that have no desire to hear them, but it was quite an experience.  There was a crowd gathered watching me because I was minorly freaking out about it as I did it, and there was a lot of laughing at me.  All I'll say is that I was not prepared for it to continue to try to fly even when the head was gone.  My legs took a while to stop shaking, but I did it, and there are pictures if you are interested.  Another highlight was visiting a gorgeous beach called Baie d'Italy and camping under gorgeous stars.  Besides the major blister action, I had one bad head cold that made climbing a mountain difficult and I felt pretty awful the next day, but Herman gave me some kind of drugs and it cured me pretty quickly.  On our way back to Fort Dauphin, we ended up hiking about 5 hours to visit a protected forest where they do medicinal plant research and then onto a town called Manambaro where we had a cold Coke for the first time in so long, and then caught what is called a taxibrousse back to Fort Dauphin.  That was quite an experience.  There was a station wagon that I was told was a taxi and it would only cost 2,000 Ariary ( a little over a dollar) to get a ride the 30KM back to town.  Then I was told we were going to wait until we got 12 other passengers.  In total there were 14 people plus baggage in this normal sized station wagon.  One guy was in the trunk holding the back hatch closed, and then 3 of us in the back seat, somehow two rows of people in the next row of seats, and then across the front, four more people.  My favorite moment was when the guy I thought was driving turned out to be a passenger, and I realized the driver was basically sitting with his head out the window because it was so crowded.  It was also the most rundown car I've ever seen, the doors didn't really have interior paneling, the car had to be moving in order for the engine to turn on, and there were chickens tied across the back.  Whenever we stopped by the police stations that are on all roads, some money changed hands through a handshake, and we weren't counted or our car wasn't searched.  It's just the system here.  Now I'm staying at Mahavoky, the loud and crazy hotel we love so dearly with two other students, and am going to spend this week writing my report.  In a really basic summary, there is a lot of potential for camping and hiking in the area, but there is just no infrastructure whatsoever at this point.  If they could clear paths on the mountian, and make some really basic campsites and charge some money for tourists to come, it could be a great destination.  But there needs to be a lot of work done, right now the president of the community organization (there are 2 people in this organization and they are members because teh mayor decided they should be) that runs the forest management doesn't even know how to read.  When he came to talk to us and to tell us the entry fee for visiting the forest, he just handed his big handbook to Herman and Herman had to find the page and look up the prices because this man didn't know how to read and apparently wasn't exactly aware of the prices.  So anyway, I will center my report on what is there now, and what needs to be done before it is a worthwile tourist destination.  Now I have to remember how to do actual homework :)  I'm back in the land of internet and phone service, so feel free to email or if you have more questions, feel free to ask.  It's hard to summarize 3 weeks in one blog entry, so if you want more stories/info on something, I'd be happy to share.  I hope all is well, while I'm still enjoying my time here, I'm really looking forward to coming home at the same time.  Much love to all!!
p.s. there was an article in our school newspaper about my time here, you can check it out here if you want : http://chips.luther.edu/2009/04/23/green-%E2%80%9810-encounters-trouble-paradise.html

It's been a nice week back in Fort Dauphin, it's fun to be back in a town that is familiar.  The majority of the students are staying in a hotel of sorts that we stayed in the first time we were here in February and it's nice to kind of be independent, as fun as it was staying with host families before. I went to visit my family and had dinner over there the other night so that was fun, plus the cat had kittens that are only two weeks old, so that's always fun.  BAsically we have just spent the week getting ready for our Independent STudy Projects (ISP) that start this weekend for the month.  As of 2 days ago, we were suddenly informed that due to SIT's Vermont office's decisions, we could only do projects within 2 hours of Fort Dauphin or Nosy Be where the other SIT group is located, which eliminated my project that I have been planning, along with several others.  Luckily Barry, our academic director, is a miracle with potential projects and set me up with a new project closer, basically looking at potential ecotourism sights again.  I am bringing one of the Malagasy students from the ecology center where our classroom is with me, he's 22, and his name is Herman.  Actually, he has 3 names, Herman is his English name, I don't remember the French and Malagasy names.  He's really easy to talk to and outgoing and actually speaks English pretty well, as well as French so it should be a good situation.  Basically we will leave sometime soon, Saturday morning at the earliest, show up in this tiny village, find the mayor or village head, explain to him what we're doing, find a family that will let us set up two tents in their yard, find a family that will be willing to cook food for us, and start exploring.  Hopefully that will all work out as planned.  There's three areas of protected forest on a mountain nearby, so we'll research that, and find potential campsites, and the best way to visit and walk that hike, and other things like that.  We'll be near the ocean, so that will be good, but will have no electricity, phone service, running water, cold beverages, internet, etc. for 3 weeks so that will be interesting.  We've been eating in a lot of restaurants in town lately because we were given money by the program to budget our own food (and restaurants are pretty cheap) which means there has been an absence of rice lately.  I'm not a huge seafood person, but you can get grilled tuna steaks here for dirt cheap and they are sooooooooooooo good.  We have been working on a paper assignment and I've basically forgotten how to do homework.  Life is so relaxed around here in all aspects.  I quite honestly have not been stressed once since I've been here, academically or emotionally or anything, even when attempting to push a bus out of a seemingly never ending mud pit :)  Well, I'm off to get a cold Coke, which are so much better here by the way.  Absence of corn syrup/presence of real sugar in pop is a great thing.  Hope everyone is doing well!

Once again, a very difficult week to try and describe in words. We have been travelling on our beloved Tata bus with our driver Claude and driver assistant Ninah who has a consistent smile on his face. Our luggage is tied on top, and we have been fortunate to be travelling on the best road in Madagascar which means pavement with no holes. Our first destination was Isalo National Park which was pretty awesome. There were a ton of rock peaks and pillars that were pushed up when the island was moving around. We also got to hike to a natural pool and swim. The hik was pretty awesome through a rock canyon that was very rainforest-esque. We were basically hopping rocks up a stream through the valley, and we saw a large boa constricter. We spent the night in a little hotel in town and the next morning stopped at Anja Forest Reserve, which was cool because it was an entirely community based protected area, which is pretty rare here. We went for a hike with some awesome guides and saw a ton of lemurs super close which was really fun. We also saw some caves and climbed up an extremely steep rock that my friend pretended to fall off of and gave me a heart attack. Then we were back on the road to a town with a hotel. I don't remember the name of the town but the only important thing is that it had running hot water. Another highlight was watching a pirache dug out of a friends foot, which is a little bug that burrows in and lays an egg sack that you pry out. It was pretty gross, but also intriguing. The next day we drove to the base of Peak Boby, the second highest peak in Madagascar, located in Angrigitra National Park (p.s. there is no way i spelled that right, in case you wanted to look it up). Porters were hired to carry our large bags, and we began our trek upwards and onwards. It was pretty tiring, and then about half way through it started pouring rain. It causerd me to lose faith in Perry, my trusty raincoat, as I was soon soaked through, and it was cold too, which was actually a nice change. We finally reached our campsite, which luckily had two small shelters for cooking and hanging out and attempting to get dry which never happened. It was really cold, but it was nice, and it gave me a chance to wear my huge grey fleece I've been lugging around and not wearing. And we had S'MORES for dessert. by s'mores i mean disgusting pink marshmallows that tasted like perfume, little biscuits, and madagascar chocolate, which is not exactly high class. but all the same. it was a s'more. In the morning we got up to climb to the summit, which reaches around 8,000 feet. It was an awesome awesome view, this part of Madagascar has tons of mountains, and we could see all around us. Then we went all the way down back to the base. All in all, we hiked about 8 hours, and my knees decided they hated me by the end. L:ittle did we know the drive back to our previous hotel was going to be one of the biggest adventures of all. The road up to the base was awful, just red dirt with huge holes all over and was very up and down. So when it started pouring rain, basically the road turned into a large red sticky river. We got stuck multiple time and were pushed out by our assistant and leaders in the other car. Then we got majorly stuck. There were half of us outside, half a village of children and men, and all our drivers, assistants, and program leaders trying to push/dig out/ load rocks under the wheels, etc. And of course we were on the edge of a large drop-off with a 3 ton bus. We ended up being in the same spot for 2 hours, and it got pitch black very quickly also. I was up to my ankles in mud and extremely wet. In the end, it took tying a tree that was hacked down in the forest with a machete tied between the four wheel drive car and the bus, and a makeshift road built under the bus with pieces of concrete that broke off the "gutter" when our bus slid out. We got back to our hotel around 11PM, ate dinner at 11:45PM. It was the best plain noodles and french fries and cooked carrots I've ever eaten. I still have mud stains on my legs. The next day the journey continued to Ranomafana Nat'l Park, which means hot water. There are hot springs but they were being cleaned so we didn't get to go in. But we did hike and see golden bamboo lemurs which are extremely rare and only found in this park. ANd they're super cute. This was truly rain forest and it rained about every 20 minutes, but we were lucky enough to put our tents under little roofs so we didn't get soaked. In the morning we visited a medicinal plants center, of which the highlight was our ancient toothless guide that was the cutest old man I have ever seen. Then just some long, long hours in the bus heading back to Tulear where we started. But the scenery was absolutley beautiful, and it was raining, so there were some great colors and rainbows as well. Today we arrived back in Tulear and went straight to a huge, amazing lunch that once again included pesto. Tomorrow we fly back to Fort Dauphin where we have spent most of our time here. The political situation seems calm from what I can tell, so that's good, although I just recieved an email from the US Embassy saying that there is a cyclone warning and that it will hit the town we are in now, which is probably not serious, but could maybe change our flight situation. Anyway, that's about it. I'm doing well, except for a possible eye infection, but that's pretty normal by now. We are having a little party to say goodbye to our drivers and one of our program director's tonight which will be fun/sad, although I'm not sure how I"m going to eat dinner considering how much pesto gnocci i just ate at lunch. Gosh, life is hard sometimes :) miss you all, much love!

We have definitely been spoiling ourselves during out time in Tulear. Sunday night we stayed north of town in a little hotel directly on the beach. It was beautiful and the town was super laid back in general. Except for several cockaroach escapades which ended with me using a broom quite vigorously, it was a nice evening, and in the morning we got to go snorkelling. We sat in little wooden pirogues which are very narrow dugout canoes with a side rudder and a sail that didn't really do anything. The snorkelling was pretty good, I've been lucky enough to see some awesome coral and fish in Malaysia and other travels, and this wasn't quite as nice as that, but it had been a while, and it was fun. And I saw rainbow fish like the kids book which made me happy. Then we came into town and were set up at a little hotel. AT first all we could see was a concerte building very much under construction that looked like it had been looted and we were very unhappy. But it turns out once you walk through the courtyard, you see one wall of the building has very nice hotel rooms on it. including AIR CONDITIONING, FLUSHING TOILETS WITH SEATS, AND HOT WATER IN SHOWERS THAT ACTUALLY COMES OUT OF A SHOWER HEAD. it was the best night of sleep i'd had in a while, and we have 3 nights here. plus we had dinner at a chinese restaurant, and in the end there were 6 kinds of meet on our table. one of which i ate thinking "what a bizarre shaped chicken leg". to find out 5 minutes later i had just eaten a frog leg. first time for everything i guess, and it is very true taht it does indeed taste like chicken. yesterday a few of us spent the morning talking to people that work for the city trash collection department for an environmental issues paper we're writing which was pretty interesting. Basically they have 25 dumpsters around the city that they collect a few times a week and dump outside of town, and that is the extent of trash management. WE had lunch at a place that served actualy pizza and it was sooooo good. so good. Then an afternoon of playing cards, napping, washing underwear in the sink, applying fake tattoos, and pretending to start our actual work, followed by dinner at a nother chinese restaurant and a little st. patricks day celebration. today we woke up and had a meeting about the political situation which is actually stabilizing, we think. the president stepped down and TGV(the opposition leaders nickname) has taken control of the transitional committee. Apparently they have decided not to have elections for 2 years so they can rewrite the constitution. So no president for 2 years? Things are kind of strange here, but i think it's good news for now at least, and everything has stayed calm. I know that a lot of newspapers were coming out with headlines like "Madagascar on verge of Civil War" and "Tanks moved to center of town" and things like that, which seems crazy because everything is soo calm. Today is homework day for Erin after we just had cake for breakfast :) We are headed bright and early to Isalo national park tomorrow which is supposedly the most beautiful place in Madagascar so I'm pretty excited about it. Internet will probably only happen once in the next 2 weeks, so if you don't hear from me for a while, it's probably because i'm swimming in turquoise pools in the rainforest, dont' worry. Hope everything is going well!

It's been an interesting few days.  We left Fort Dauphin on Wednesday and flew 45 minutes to Tulear on the west coast for marine studies.  We are camping in the yard of a beautiful house our academic director is building about 20 minutes outside of town.  There is rows of mangrove trees all along the beach which are the only plants that can live in salt water.  The tides are ridiculous, we are right next to the water for a while, and then a few hours later it's 2 miles out to the water.  i've never seen anything like it.  We've just been having regular classes, as in lectures in the morning and visiting various places in the afternoon.  Yesterday we went to a sea cucumber farm and swam in a really cool turquoise pool that was halfway covered by a cave.  If there ever were mermaids in this world, this is where they would be.  We eat breakfast and dinner at a little restaurant 5 minutes walk from our camp.  We eat rice and rice and beans and sometimes meat.  And a miraculous sight of vegetables the other day.  That rarely happens.  Last night there was a full moon and our academic directors and bus drivers and cooks and other assorted people had this huge party outside dancing and playing music on drums and guitar type things under the moon.  I think they do it each full moon, it as pretty fun.  The politics here have continued to be iffy, and the American Embassy put out a Level 1 travel warning.  This means that the peace corps has decided to take out all of their volunteers which usually SIT uses as a barometer for us as well.  There was actually a lot of talk of evacuation which was making a lot of us nervous.  Things are peaceful for the most part but the army has divided which is never a good thing.  Chances are the president will step down this week.  It's all a big mess, but we were informed today that we are going to continue the program unless things get worse.  However, two members of our group taht go to state schools have been told that based on policies they have to leave the country, which is sad.  They are hoping that they are going to be able to be switched to the Botswana SIT program and not have to go home, but it's really hard for them to know that we're all here and they have to go.  So hopeflly things will stabilize soon, because it's really hard to be at a point of such uncertainty.  But anyway, we just had the most fabulous lunch i have ever had at a really, really cool looking restaurant.  Think Loring pasta bar for those of you who know what i mean except really small and tropical themed.  And they had pesto on bread.  which ironically we had been talking about for like 20 minutes on the bus ride there.  it was one of the best moments of my life.  the dessert was different baby bottles filled with rum infused with different spices or fruits.  it was pretty bizarre.  anyway, a little internet and then we're heading back to camp.  love to all of you!  

I have just experienced one of the strangest/ most unique!exhausting weeks that I will quite possibly ever experience.  We spent a week staying in ruaral villages on the south coast.  It is going to be really hard to explain this on a blog entry without writing a novel that noone has time to read, so i will maybe just list a few of the experiences we had. 
1.  There were two students staying in each village, and I was paired with Matt from Colorado.  We were picked up in an rickety cart pulled by two zebu, the Malagasy eauivalent of cows.  We then rode two hours to go the 7 kilometers to our little village.  Periodically our 12 year old chaffeur would jump of the cart and dissappear for a few minutes before jumping back on.
2.  We spent every morning wandering in th e fields that our father owned eating raketa, which is cactus fruit which the people eat an enormous amount of becfause there is a drought and not a regular water supply and these fruits have a lot of water in them.  We also picked coconuts and watermelon and ate them out in the field.
3.  Our family spoke no French and we speak approximately 10 words in Malagache so communicating was truly interesting.  We were constantly being yelled at with Malagache phrases to leazrn bgy our extremly bossy sisters, who were one of 13 children in the family, the youngest  of which were scared of us because we had white skin. 
4.  When we left we were both given live chickens and told through rough communication that we were to bring them back to our families in America.  In reality, they were thrown on top of our huge bus for an 8 hour bumpy ride in the African sun, and then I walked through town back to my homestay familycarrying my tent in one hand and a tied up live chicken in the other.  And I believe we are eating it for dinner tomorrow.It is actually a huge honor because chickens are expensive for the villagers.  Our father was very sentimental and wasz very sad to see us go.
5. We had a troupe of dance teachers that would come everyday for 3 hour sessions of learning the traditional dances.  We paid a small fee of probably 4 dollars to provide enough of the sweet sugar cane alcohol to get them sufficiently drunk everyday.  The practices were preperation for Friday when we danced to the main village, and by danced I mean jogged about 5 miles in the African heat with no water while people played guitar things with one string and drums.  It was so so so bizarre, but we met up with the other 5 villages in Faux Cap for a huge celebration and there was so much excitement.  Each village and their two students did their dances and songs.  It was absolutezly backed.  It was one of the most exhausting experiences ever, but so so so cool.  We looked strange with the traditional hair styles, and hopefully i can get pictures up sometime soon. 

This is all i can write at the moment, but it was a truly amazing week, i felt like i was living in National Geographic.  Seriously.  I have so many more stories to share, but they will have to wait.  We only have 5 more days here in Fort Dauphin which has been our home for the month and then we start travelling.  Hope all is well!! 

Seeing lemurs was quite the trip....  it started off with a car ride that was extremely bumpy so I decided to take some Dramamine just in case.  In case you aren't aware, as I wasn't, Dramamine knocks you out.  So when we stopped to do a little hike two hours later, I realized that I was half asleep and could barely function so that was an interesting experience.  It was a really long, hot car ride, and our truck would repeatedly start working and we would have to get out and push for a while to get it started again.  Then after our tire had been making strange noises for about 20 minutes, which the driver ignored, there was a large jolt and we all got out to see our tire was basically fallen off, as in all the lugnuts were gone.  We were honestly in the middle of nowhere in a desert, so we sat for a while in the little shade we could find so they could take screws off the other tires to hold on the first one.  We also stalled on a one lane bridge holding up a large line of ox-drawn carts for a while, and people just stood outside our windows and pointed.  It was a pretty strange experience.  After 3 more hours, we arrived in the little village of Ifotaka.  We set up our tents and walked around before a little orientation talk.  At that point I was feeling kind of sick, and realized that my skin was burning up, but I didn't have a temperature.  I went to bed pretty early, and ended up throwing up at around 4AM.  It was not the best night I've had.  The next day I felt semi-normal again, and we drove 7KM to the tiny, tiny village (by which I mean a little collection of aroun 20 wooden houses) where we were camping for the two other nights.  WE spent teh afternoons and morning out doing different lemur studies, basically to practice scientific methods, and got to see some pretty sweet lemurs.  They were sifakas, and when they hop on the ground they look like they're dancing.  It was really cool.  The main problem was the heat tehre.  We were drinking bottled water we brought, and it was extremely hot the whole trip.  The dry heat there was super intense, in the middle hours of the afternoon, everyone would just sit and do nothing because there is nothing else you can do.  The spiny forest habitat where we were is interesting to walk thorugh also, because approximately 50 percent of the plant speicies have sky things.  We all had cut up legs and lost some hair because of it, while following our guides who were ancient village men who somehow managed to be extremely graceful, and see lemurs that none of us managed to notice, even while trying to be observant.  We would try to get clean and cool off in the late afternoon by bathing in the river, which was basically brown, but the fact that it was a little cooler than the air made it worth the non-cleanliness.  We also got to do a short night hike to see the nocturnal mouse lemeurs, which are tiny and really cute.  A few scorpions here and there, a ton of cows, and massive numbers of balck flies, which fortunately didn't bite, or life might have been unbearable.  I also having some digestion problems, which was not fun.  The morning we left, we got to go to Berenty, which we had read a book about, which is a nature reserve where the lemurs are all over.  It was fun to visit, and we saw some HUGE bats which was really cool.  To be honest, I almost liked them more than the lemurs.  Then we had the best treat of all.  Cold drinks.  A cold glass of water, followed by cold Cokes was the best thing we had ever tasted, along with a huge very nice French style lunch.  Unfortunately my stomach was not very happy about eating, so I didn't enjoy it as much as I could have, but it was still pretty good.  Then a long drive home, some presentation prepration, and back to class today.  I started taking Sippro, which if you know about travel medicine, is pretty strong stuff, and I feel so much better.  I kind of hit my height of homesickness so far, which i think was from being sick, because all I wanted was to go home to the comforts of my house with airconditioning, a comfy bed, a normal bathroom and shower, and normal food that wasn't rice.  But I'm feeling better now, so things seem a lot better as well.  We only have a few days before our village stay which is going to be very interesting, so we're enjoying the "comforts" of our homestays here for a while.

So I just posted two days ago, but I thought I'd write one more before we take off tomorrow for 4 days to study lemur ecology.  I'm pretty excited about it, lemurs are one of the main reasons people come to Madagascar because they are nowhere else, and they are pretty funny looking.  So my apoctolyptical church experience was quite unique.  We arrived and all the women were wearing head coverings, but I was assured I didn't need to wear one.  The men and women sat on the floor in sepearate halves of the small church.  My mom and I came in a little late, swo everyone was singing, but we of course had to go right to the very front, and kneel down and put our heads on the floor for a few minutes, then stood up and sang and danced.  Or in my case, listened and awkwardly waved my hands around like everyone else.  Then the preacher read a bible passage in Malagache.  I expected just to not understand liuke my last church experience, but then another man stood up and asked me if I preferred english or French.  I said English, and he proceeded to read the bible passage in English, obviously just for me as I was the only vahaza (white person) in the church.  Thedn for the sermon, and everything esle taht was said, he would translate every sentence yelling it out in English quite energetically in front of everyone.  People went up and told stories of how God has been present in their lives, for example a woman went up and said that her baby had not been sick since she started going to this church, except when she had a fever, which was obviously God in her baby.  There was a lot of clapping and amens and alleluias.  Then the translator told me everyone wanted to hear my voice.  So I "got" to go up in front of everyone and he translated my message which basically was a thank you for being so welcoming and other cheesy things like that.  It was quite the experience, to say the least, but they were obviously very excited to have me there.  We also had a party yesterday afternoon with the Malagasy students we did research with that was kind of bizarre.  WE went toa  place called Freedom Bar which was a little place basically hanging over the ocean and was really pretty.  But we also ended up standing up and introducing ourselves as if in class, and the language barrier/the fact no one knew each other strained the socialization slightly.  But it was okay by the end after some drinks had been ordered :)  Then I went home for dinner, during which i spent 10 minutes for each bite of fish getting tiny bones out of my mouth, and my dessert was an avocado that i was supposed to mash up and eat with sugar mixed in.  The texture was a little strange, but it wasn't too bad.  WE didn't have class this afternoon which was nice so we went out for lunch for spaghetti which does not involve rice, therefore it is appealing.  Then we attempted to buy some silver bracelets from a woman right outside the restaurant, which was fine until there was all of a sudden 10 women putting bracelets on us and shouting and I coudn't even figure out who the original woman was that I was attempting to pay.  There were some in my hand that I tried to give back to one woman and she wouldn't not take them.  I literally ended up putting them in the dirt because she wouldn't take them and I didn't want to buy them.  They all kind of came from nowhere, it was pretty crazy.  I'm going to go home and pack now for our little excursion for the lemurs, hope all is well (and not too cold!) 

 

Hi everyone!
  It's been a pretty good week!  Last Wednesday we had the chance to travel to a little fishing village with our Malagasy/French teachers as interpreters and conduct interviews with the fishermen about their lives.  The drive there was quite the experience.  The roads here can be pretty terrible, and this was out in the country so we were basically driving on dirt with huge potholes, and also included some driving through small rivers, feeling like our entire car was going to tip over sideways, times where I could put my hand a foot out the window and touch the dirt of the hill next to us, and a stretch of racing along the white sand beach and basically doing a doughnut in the sand, and then backing into the ocean to turn around.  I always ride in Mamy's car, one of the program assisants, and by now, I completey trust that man with my life.  I could never, ever drive on these roads, even if there did seem to be traffic laws to obey, but he has got it down.  The fishermen were fun to talk to, their lives really revolve around going out in their little pirogues to fish every morning at 4 AM.  There are all kinds of traditions and taboos, for example, no singing in the boats, no fighting with anyone before heading out for the day, the women at home can't really leave the house while the men are out fishing, and once a year they kill a cow as a sacrifice to the sea.  Those are just a few of the interesting facts we learned while we were there.  Then we went to a beach for a picnic and Malagasy lesson.  It was a very strange lesson that basically involved singing and dancing to every song we have learned, and then learning the names of body parts and Sosony, one of our professors, lifting up his shirt to teach us the word for nipple hair.  Teaching formats are slightly unorthodox here :)  We have quite a bit of time in the classroom the rest of the week doing a lot of plant and biodiversity training, along with French and Malagasy.  The weekend was pretty laidback as usual.  Saturday morning we got to hike Mt. St. Louis which is very close to the city.  It was an awesome view of the coastline all around us.  Also spent some time on the beach and managed not to get sunburned which is quite an accomplishment.  Du Nord folks, I'm by far going to win the chaco/watch tan line contest this summer.  It's only February, and I have an intense tan already.  Yesterday we went to Andohahela National Park which is about 3 hours inland from Fort Dauphin.  There were a lot of really neat plants we saw, and we spent the evening trying to do a plant species survey in a small roped off area for each group of students.  It was kind of unorganized and actually pretty frustrating.  We had Malagasy students with us as well, and the language barrier was a little difficult, even if both sets spoke French, at least to some degree...  But either way, we got to see a lot of cool stuff, and everytime you walked little lizards scattered everywhere.  The night was pretty hot as we were sleeping in tents and it was around 80 degrees.  but it cooled off in the early hours of the morning.  This morning we hiked, and got to swim in a waterfall and natural pool, and it felt soo good.  Now I'm sitting in an internet cafe basically dripping sweat, and am going to go home and take a cold shower.  I'm also going to an Apoctolyptical chruch service tonight with my host mom and some 25 year old guy named Jost/Just/Jest??  that really wanted me to come.  So that should be an interesting experience.  And dinner is an experience as always. The other night we had chicken and I'm not exacly sure what I ate but it may have been the gizzard.  I actually don't really want to know, I kind of swallowed it whole.  It's interesting to eat and watch your aunt eat the meat off the feet of the chicken.  (I wasn't aware there was any, but apparently I'm wrong).  Well, I have a long hot walk home ahead of me, so I'm going to sign off, but will hopefully have a chance to try to get pictures up sometime soon!!  Peace!

I decided that I would write what my average day looks like here, not that there's really an average day, but I'm going to try...
6:30 AM:  I get woken up by my aunt yelling "Erin!  C'est l'heure!"  I get out of bed and walk across the courtyard to take a "shower".  By shower I mean splashing some cold water on my legs because I can't handle cold water in the morning but my aunt informed quite firmly that everone showers in the morning. 
6:45 AM:  I eat breakfast of half a baguette and nutella or jam and tea, and sometimes some really good eggs if I'm lucky.
7:00 AM:  I leave with my sister to walk to school.  There's like a huge migration of schoolchildren of all ages walking, and you can tell what school they go to based on the color of the shirts.  I follow all the purple Lutherans for a while, and then climb down a steep path, walk down the beach for 10 minutes, climb up a steep path and arrive at school.  Which is a class room with houses and a library around it.
8-12:30:  A variety of classes, usually either some French or Malagasy, or a lecture from people like NGO's in the area, or experts on marine biology or fishing methods, etc.   The Malagasy classes tend to end in hysteria as we usually start with a random song.  The one we learned today has a first line that translates to something like "Corn-corn man".  The language makes sense in general, except figureing out the sentence order, and also figuring out the method they are using to teach us which tend to be slightly confusing and ridiculous sometimes. 
12:30PM:  Eat a lunch that is prepared for us that is rice and something else.  Always rice.  Always.  3 meals a day.
1:30-4PM:  Other classes, lectures, etc.
4:00 Walk back from school and hit up a cyber cafe or the local supermarket that sells Snickers ice cream bars (those were discovered yesterday and there were some very happy Americans) or a little restaurant for a drink.
5:00PM:  Arrive home, say hi to whatever random family members are around, go into my room, sweep all the sand out of my room, do some reading/journaling, etc.  Maybe watch some TV with the host sister, for example a viewing of High School Musical 2 with French dubbed in except for the songs in English with karoke underneath.  My sister definitely knew every word.
8:30:  Eat dinner, which is always rice, and something else.  Yesterday we had chicken, and I just wanted a little piece so I took two little pieces of white-looking meat.  The my mom says "Oh, you like the head."  I looked down and there was definitey an eye socket looking back at me.  I didn't hid my shock/surprise very well and she laughed and took it off my plate and ate it.  They think I eat nothing and constantly try to put more food on my plate even though I'm extremely stuffed.  The food is pretty good in general, but my stomach is kind of constantly upset, which isn't that fun.  I'm not really sick, but just uncomfortable pretty often and I've lost all faith in Pepto Bismol because it basically doesn't do anything. 
9:30:  We honestly go to bed right after dinner.  I usually get in bed and fall alseep to the sounds of people dying in the horror films my cousin watches in the room next to mine, and wake up in the middle of the night to the dog barking like crazy about something.  Needless to say, earplugs have become a good friend of mine. 

Well that's  apretty average day, except school we go on a lot of field trips and stuff. Tomorrow we are driving an hour up the coast and interviewing fishermen, then having a picnic and swimming on the beach all day.  The political situation here is still not good.  We're actually slighly worried because Peace Corps is considering pulling people out, and Peace Corps is kind of what SIT bases their decisions off of. It's very calm where we are, but a lot of people have been killed in Tana, the capital.  People are not happy with their president, and the mayor of Tana is trying to kind of start a new government, and it's pretty complicated.  But none of it is aimed towards foreigners, so I don't feel worried.  It's pretty safe here, although people constantly stare, point and yell things at you on the street because you are 'vahaza' or white/rich.  Anyway, not a whole lot else going on, hope all is well with you! 

Hi Everyone!
  I just wanted to write an update.  I moved in with my host family last night, and am so happy about the situation.  We met all of our families at a kind of dinner/dance/music party.  It was pretty awesome, everyone was dancing, and it was like 100 degress, and I don't know if I've ever sweated so much.  But everyone was having a blast and dancing, and there was definitely no self-conciousness in the room.  I live approximately one minute walk from the beach, which is pretty awesome.  My family consists of my mom, Jorline, and my 16 year old sister, Giana.  WE also live with Jorline's brother, Jean Claude, and her sister, Henriette.  Henriette has a daughter, Sophie who is 24, and an adopted son who is technically her nephew, Eric, who is 33.  Jean Claude is married (he's about 60, and I believe his wife is 16, which is pretty nuts, and I might need to clarify that, but it's not too bizarre for this culture) and they have 2 little children.  The house is  bascially a collection of little buildings in a little courtyard which palm and pine trees, and there is an awesome view of the ocean, Pic St. Louis, a mountain nearby, and a residential area of Fort Dauphin.  I actually have my own room with a full bed.  It is connected to two other bedrooms also.  There is a another little building with a kitchen, dining room, living room, bathroom, cold shower, and a bedroom for my mom and sister.  Jean Claude and his little family live in another little building.  Hopefully I can send pictures soon, it is beautiful, and super super windy, which I absolutely love.  The only bad part was the two dogs that spent hours barking extremely loudly in the middle of the night right outside.  The family is so nice, and super hospitable, and all speak French pretty clearly. Last night for dinner we had rice (the Malagasy eat rice three times a day.  Always.  No exceptions.) and fish in some kind of sauce.  I've tried to put aside my picky eating habits as much as possible, and I succeeded in eating a whole fish, right off the bone.  They think I eat basically nothing and constantly say "C'est tout??"  (That's all??)   There's only so much rice I can handle eating in one sitting and it's about half as much as my 16 year old sister eats.  It takes me about 40 minutes to walk to school, which seems long, but it's always interesting and absolutely beautiful.  My family is mostly Catholic, and was quickly informed that we go to mass on Sunday at 6 AM before it gets too hot.  So much for sleeping in :)  I learned a little about the history of Fort Dauphin today, and found out there quite a few Lutherans from Minneapolis that came here in the mid 1900's as missionaries and built quite a few of the schools and a hospital here.  I've learned that the school kids walking around wearing purple shirts go to the LUtheran school.  WE also visited the military base of Fort Dauphin today, and there was a great lookout of the bay.  There are about 5 wrecked ships in the bay, and they still poke out of the water, and it's pretty cool to see them.  Apparently it's a dangeous place for ships.  It is cloudy and very windy today, and theer has been some rain, apparently there is  cyclone coming, but it should hit north of here.  Hopefully that's the case because I live pretty darn close to taht water :)  Tomorrow is the weekend and a day off.  We are going to go to Libanona Beach which is directly under the hill our school is on, and hang out and do some of the reading assigned for Monday when we talk about the mine that is here.  The company is called QMM, and it is a part of Rio Tinto, a large mining corporation that I think is based in Canada.  There are a lot of immigrants from all over that work for the mine that are based here in Fort Dauphin.  It should be an interesting talk.  I have bought a cell phone here, and thought I would post the number, as it is free for me to receive calls on it, but very expensive to call outside the country.  If you happen to have access to a phone card, and want to give me a try, the country code is 261 and my number is 33-21-236-87.  WE are 9 hours ahead of central time, and the best time to call would be around 7-10 AM central time.  Well, I"m going to take off, I'm currently at a cyber cafe, and actually have no idea how to get back to my house, so I'm probably going to be wandering around for a while.  Best wishes, and I'll talk to you soon provided my house is not leveled by a cyclone tomorrow :)

Salama e!  There are 16 students in our group, basically all traditional college students except for one 28 year old woman finishing her degree.  Everyone is really nice and easy to get along with.  We went straight from the airport to a little camp type thing where we started our orientation.  First impressions of the area are hot, hot, hot, humid weather.  We were all pretty miserable for the first day or two, and I defintely have not sweat this much in a long time.  Jim is our program director, and there are four Malagasy assistants, Nina, Sosony, Hussein, and Mamy.  We are already learning quite a bit of Malagasy language.  Overall, it is an extremely simple language, although the numbers are pretty ridiculous.  We were sent to the market yesterday to barter for fruit, which was an interesting experience.  I find so many things here to be similar to our family's time in southeast Asia.  The people are very econmically disadvantaged, but seem very happy, and children follow you around everywhere, wanting you to take their picture so they can see it on the screen.  We hqve visited an orchard, and got to sample some awesome fruit, including a mango that fell out of a tree right behind a students head that they washed off and we ate.  Also the best lime I have ever tasted.  We have rice with every meal, and usually some kind of meat and beans and veggie.  One thing I have not gotten used to is the hot rice water served at every meal.  The taste is not too awful, but I do not quite understand why hot drinks are appealing at all in this heat.  The landscape here is absolutley amazing!!!  We are on a bay of blue water from the Indian Ocean, but there are also rainforested mountains all around us.  Every kind of palm tree possible, and even pines that were brought in by the French during colonization.  I feel like I a, in a different country depending on where I look.  The lifestyle is extremely laid back.  They use the term mora mora here which means laid back, take it easy, slowly.  It definitely describes the culture also.  We are now staying at a hotel in town that was built by American Lutheran missionaries once upon a time.  Apparently I can not escape those Norwegians no matter where I go :)  Today is our first day to wander around town, so we finally got some internet access and we are going to go buy phones also.  Everyone in town seems to have cell phones, they are really cheap.  French is not used as much as I had thought, only some buisness owners or older people.  the Malagasy will be important to pick up.  Our task now is to find Libanona, our class room, without any prior directions, just asking around while in pairs.  I am having a great time, am quite sunburnt, put my feet in the ocean yesterday, did laundry by hand in the hotel bathroom, have taken many cold bucket showers as we did not have running water, and woke up this morning to extremely loud American pop music outside our window at 5 AM after a long hot night on a bed that feels like boards and a pillow apparently filled with many compacted cotton balls.  This is the life, right?  But we are having a great time and get to meet our host families soon.  I hope you are all doing well, especially those of you in cold snowy Iowa, I will say hi to the beach for you:)  Much love to all!  Velomae!!  

I made it here!  The trip was smooth for the most part: I hung out in the Amsterdam airport for a while, got on my plane, and weird event number one occured.  As we were heqded towards the runway, this guy was tqlking very loudly in Dutch, obviously very angry about something.  Several ti,es he said in English 'They send me to Kenya, I don't know why!!'  The flight attendant came out and asked him to calm down, and then he got really mad and started hitting things around him.  Guys were holding him down, and then the weird part was that this guy sitting in front of him reached up into his carryon luggage and whipped out handcuffs.  I thought maybe we would drop him off, but nope, we took off for Nairobi.  He calmed down evantually, but I still have no clue what happened.  Flying over Africa was absolutely amazing!!  Endless desert for a while, then mountains, and I swear I saw lava, but I could have been wrong :)  Then I arrived at Nairobi for my 12 hour layover.  My lesson from Nairobi is ask your question to at least 5 people because you get a different answer every time.  Evantually, I found out I did not need to do any paperwork, and found my way to the sleeping rooms.  I was not that tired, but it did not seem like a good airport to hang out in on my own.  The sleeping room was just what I needed, a tiny room with a lock, and an uncomfortable bed.  I hung out in there trying to sleep for 8 hours, then headed up to find my flight to Madagascar.  I was told it might be delayed because of political problems.  So I sat down to wait for a while.  I stqrted talking to a guy from North Carolina, and when I mentioned Madagascar, he said, "Oh, I would not go there right now.  People are being killed in riots."  So the  political problems were slightly more serious than I had thought, and I had no clue what was going on.  But I got ahold of my parents, who of course knew all about everything.  The problems were antigovernment, and were only in the center of Tana, and my hotel was not downtown.  Once I arrived, everything went well.  I stayed in a beautiful little place 5 minutes from the airport, and my academic director came to meet me as well.  Overall, the traveling alone went well.  I knew I was going to be able to handle all the airport stuff, but I did not realize how lonely I would be.  I had no seatmates on any flights so my only social interaction was with flight attendents for 2 days straight.  I a, sure traveling alone can be a very freeing experience, but it is definitely a little emotionally trying for me.  It was great to meet up with the rest of the group the next morning to finish our travel to Fort Dauphin, where we will be for quite a while. 

 

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One week left at Luther, and then I'm home for a few crazy days of packing and last minute shopping before I take off on Tuesday, the 27th.  J-term has been flying by, and it's been a lot of fun.  Now basically just a large final paper to write a French and I'm out!  People always ask if I'm excited, and of course I'm excited, I don't know how I could not be, there's so much to look forward to.  But I just thought I'd list a few things I'm nervous about:

4/23/2009 7:49:47 PM - 002060601720
Salama Erin!
You were on a front page article in Chips about your study abroad experience during a time of political tension. They had a picture of you dancing during the celebration after the village stay (I'm at least assuming that's what it was). I have really missed updates from you, but I do understand because I know what the ISP is all about. I can't wait to hear from you again and find out what went on during your project. I hope you're staying safe! Good luck with your remaining time in the country.

3/12/2009 1:26:03 AM - 002020569476
Hey Erin Green!!!
It looks like you are having lots of cool, kinda intersting experiences and that the time is flying! We miss you like crazy! I can't wait to hear stories firsthand and see pictures!!! ~Lizzie

2/24/2009 1:50:46 AM - 002053483618
In a cool global flip:  the day after you were listening to "I Believe I Can Fly" (or kinda sorta) in Africa, the (African American ) Harlem Gospel Choir was in Decorah, singing "I Believe I Can Fly."  We were there.  Your spirit was really there, even though your body was across the globe!  

2/19/2009 1:36:59 AM - 000081714159

That's amazing Erin - I am pretty sure that I was never taught nipple hair as a body part, you are learning SO much!

Your stories are great  - I can't wait to hear about the church service with Jost/Just/ Jest.

I'm sure it isn't easy to get to the cafe - so thanks for keeping up with your blog and letting us experience some of your new life with you.

Love you,

Diane

2/12/2009 3:23:40 AM - 000044818055

So what I'm picking up is that you would like me to send you a care package of rice.  I'm just guessing that's what you want?  Oh... and I love you and your great.

2/3/2009 1:45:46 PM - 002056415507
Hey girl - it's nice to be able to keep up with you. glad you're there ok and i hope everything continues to go well! love from the cold :) LVD

2/1/2009 8:23:22 PM - 000081714159
So glad that you have arrived safely (I talked to your Dad and got all of the details!).  Can I be on your list to receive an email when you update your blog?  I am looking forward to good stories and pictures.

1/27/2009 8:08:15 AM - 002055719792
Hey there - You'll be amazing.  Relax, enjoy the trip, don't psych yourself out - there really isn't too much anyone can do to prepare for a plunge like this.  I'm thinking of you and praying for you!  Look for care packages being sent your way soon!  <3

1/17/2009 10:13:44 PM - 002053483618
put us on auto update, egg from ggg

1/17/2009 9:31:50 PM - 002053783110
You can crush up the pills and snort them.