Beach Life

9/18 The kids on this trip and I have been referring to the USA as “real life” and the trip to Vatomandry confirmed that this was not real life. We stayed in bungalows literally ON the beach. It was unreal that our classroom had been replaced by a huge wall-less pavilion with banana leaf roof that gave us a view of the Indian Ocean and kept us cool when it got hot during the day. In the morning, we would have class for a couple hours to keep up on our French and Malagasy studies (with a break to lay in the sun for a bit) and we would then just explore the town of Vatomandry each afternoon. It was so nice to leave the pollution of Tana and finally get some fresh air!

SIT organized a visit to a government building there where we got to learn a little bit about local politics but the coolest part was that the people were so nice there. Always friendly and smiling and willing to “talk” (talk is in quotes because the language barrier usually mad it tough for both sides to truly understand). We got to go swimming in the Indian Ocean every day although the waves were always huge and the water was very strong; it was still fun to jump around for a bit until we became exhausted.

It wasn’t cyclone season but they are very common in the Vatomandry area later in the year and you could definitely see the effects on the community. Most of the buildings were made of just wood and sometimes cinderblocks with banana leaf ceilings, these structures are weaker but easier to repair than the cement counterparts that were sometimes used. My friends and I found a public school that was made of about 10 buildings until a cyclone 3 years ago destroyed 7-8 of them. Now they still use the 2-3 that are okay but the remains of 8 destroyed buildings still stand next to the school, mostly being used for extremely vulgar and graphic graffiti.

Yesterday, we drove back to Tana, but first, a couple of my friends and I woke up early to watch the sunrise since we were on the East Coast and got to watch it over the water. The drive usually takes about 8-ish hours but we stopped for lunch on the way as well. Plus, it was along a curvy road, similar to Highway 1 north of San Francisco for those who have that point of reference, and 3 of the students ended up getting sick on that drive back. Overall though, it was a really nice week, one that I am still kind of in disbelief that I experienced. Did I really spend the last week walking through rainforests, seeing wild lemurs, and living on the beach??

When I chose to study Madagascar, I did not put much though into the fact that it is a tropical island but I am learning that is more like that than it is like Africa. Not saying that is bad or good, just something I hadn’t really though about.

I am writing this on 9/18 as it says on the top and plan on posting it on 9/19, so I will say, GO NINERS!!!