I figured I would make a post with a few specific stories that I found interesting or funny or something… They may have been referenced n my last post or may be new.
1.When I first arrived in my village, the mayor was working and so after being introduced me to my mother, she dropped me off in my brother-in-law’s shop where I spent the morning sitting around. There were a few other guys in the shop sitting on rice sacks and drinking rum. I immediately knew that these were the town drunks because it was 9:45 am… Still, in the spirit of Malagasy hospitality, they offered me a few drinks and knowing me, I obliged. My introduction to Tsinjoarivo was drinking Sambo rum with the town drunks!
2.One of the men I met in the village was named Mr. Rasolo; he was incredibly nice, spoke French and had a large farm where he gave me a tour of his chickens, pigs and farm land. One day after walking around the village he invited me to his house where we talked about a lot of things ranging from Malagasy culture to US politics. He was pretty well learned (he knew US history like Benjamin Franklin, so I took that to be learned…) and part of the conversation really struck me. We were talking about the war in the Middle East and the US’ war on terror. His point of view was surprising, he was all for it. I mentioned that we had been there 10 years (Afghanistan) and 8 years (Iraq), that it had costs the US a lot of lives and the occupied countries even more and that none of the countries involved’s citizens really wanted us there. He said, and I quote in English for everyone’s comprehension, “No, it is good that the USA goes out and protects democracy. When countries need help, it is the USA who steps in and helps them out.” I was shocked seeing that the USA has pulled all non-humanitarian aid from Madagascar and refuses to acknowledge the people in power as a real government. It was so contrary to the normal view of America that I receive when I am traveling. Curious as to how much Barrack Obama has to do with this shift – since I haven’t been out of the US since he was elected – or if it is a Malagasy view or just that of Mr. Rasolo.
3.While I was there, my sister had appendicitis and was driving to the first town we stayed in where they had a better equipped hospital. Everything went well but it was crazy that for an appendectomy, she had a cut across the bottom of her entire stomach. She was in the hospital for 5 days and who knows what her recovery time will end up being. Just thankful that in America it is quite a “small” procedure, you can go home same day, maybe next if you want.
4.I saved a puppy! The mayor had a dog that had given birth to 4 puppies about 5 weeks before I got there. They were adorable but covered in fleas so I could mostly only enjoy them from a distance. One day I went to our outhouse and I could hear one of them crying, I searched around and realized he had fallen into one of the old outhouses that hadn’t been used (and had nothing bad inside) but obviously, the puppy couldn’t get out. I went and found the house helper, who was the only one around, and told him in Malagasy that a puppy had fallen in an old toilet. We then tied a sack to a stick and stuck it in the hole where the puppy had fallen. We used another stick to help push the puppy into the sack and lifted it out! YAY US!
5.Tsinjoarivo had a market place on Tuesdays and a few students families had came to town to shop a little bit. I ran into my friend Chris with his host family and invited them over to have a beer and talk. We all had a glass of beer and were talking and his mom began sharing hers with her 9-month-old baby. Well, I thought it was worth noting…
Posting some pictures to accompany these stories as well.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Monday, October 10, 2011
The Mayor
I thought I would dedicate a full post to my father during my rural homestay, Gérard Rasoloson, Monsignor Le Maire. He was a very interesting guy and hopefully this post just gives most insight into what I did the last week and a half.
Living with the mayor of a large district in Madagascar was surprisingly similar to what you may expect. He wasn’t around to often but our time together was always awesome. He was a very arrogant, proud, sweet family man who enjoyed his job. He was the only one who spoke French in my family and so it is no surprise that he is the one I connected with the most. When I first arrived in Tsinjoarivo, he was off in some other town because he was in the process of opening a new government building in town and needed to go through the proper bureaucratic process. When he finally arrived at home, we spent about 4 hours talking up on his third story balcony about a wide array of topics while watching bocce ball players, zebu herders and the sunset over the mountains. Part way through our discussion, he went a got his bottle of J&B scotch that was a gift brought to him from France that he only drank when he had guests over. Shortly after he pulled out the scotch, a plate of sausage and manioc was brought to accompany. We discussed his family, Malagasy culture and politics, the US and much more.
Gérard was an extremely proud guy, of himself and his accomplishments, of his family, his town, and extending out to Madagascar. He loved it whenever I complemented anything Malagasy. It probably made him feel great to think that anything from Madagascar was good enough for an American, who as far as he knew had every single thing possible. This included anything I saw, ate, did etc… Eventually though, his pride encompassed me as I truly felt welcomed into his household and family in an extremely short period of time. He would do things like tell me to invite my friends over to the house to express to me that the house was mine.
When we would visit my sister in the hospital (you will hear about this later, she’s okay though) he and I would go run errands after an hour or so while the rest of the family stayed with her. It was during these errands/tour of the town that we passed the rooster-fighting stadium and he stopped so that I could watch my first fight. Afterwards, he bought us a couple beers and some meat skewers for a snack. As with the house, he was evidently well off, but it was clearly “rural well off”. He loved to flash any chance he could and so buying things like beer and snacks was a big source of pride for him. He did have quite a bit to be proud of. When he first became the head of his village, there were about 1000 people living there and it was not too developed. Now, part way through his 2nd term as mayor of the district (that includes many villages), the population has risen to between 3,000-4,000. He started two schools in the district, added classrooms in almost every village in his district, started the Tuesday market that has continues to grow in Tsinjoarivo, multiple public water sources throughout and most recently built new government offices which he actually designed the blueprints for. All of this without a college education.
One of our homework assignments while in our home stays was to interview someone for their “life story” for which I, of course, chose Gérard. He was a self made man who started as a cattle herder and then began farming until he raised enough money to buy a car. At 23 he was elected head of his village and began his political career. Afterwards, he used his car to drive crops from his village into Tana and later to bus people from one place to the other. He then served a term as mayor of the district where he began some of the accomplishments listed above. Then in between stints as mayor, he served as president in his district and simultaneously the vice-president for the entire region of the micro-finance institution in Madagascar. Even today, while serving as the mayor, he takes days out of the week to continue his work as a taxi-bus driver and shuttle people around. For all his arrogance, he is very big on his community and while he would drive his family to see his daughter, he still picked people up and dropped them off along the way; although they may have paid him, I never saw any money transferred during those rides.
I don't want to take up more room on my homepage with pics, so click the link below to see pics of him and his family!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/benjacohn/sets/72157627735651351/
Village Recap
10/7 How can I even begin to blog about the past 10 days??? I spent a couple days in a town where our director served as a Peace Corp volunteer back in 1993, then 6 days in a rural village living in the Mayor of the district’s house and then a few days in a hotel to relax before arriving back in Tana. First off, I cannot believe it is October 7th already. And I guess 2nd, I will list some of the things, outside the obvious, that I did for the first time in my life, since I last posted here.
• Took a bucket shower
• Watched a coq-fight (rooster) with 300+ Malagasy people
• Had 21+ straight meals involving rice
• Ate pig stomach, intestines, heart, chicken neck, intestines, liver, beef tongue (okay, I’ve eaten the last two before, but I added them for dramatic effect and they were at least prepared differently) and manioc
• Saw 200+ cockroaches in one confined space (our outhouse)
• Drank beer with a 9 month old baby
• Saved a puppy
As I mentioned, I lived with the mayor and his wife. They have 3 kids, one of whom lives in the capitol with her husband and daughter. Their son’s house is on one side ours with his wife, 2 year old daughter and 8 month old daughter. The mayor’s last daughter lives on the other side of our house with her husband, 8 year old daughter and 3 year old son. It was a big family but only 3 of us plus any grand children spending the night stayed in our house. No student stayed with any of the people who were extremely poor – if they weren’t eating 3 meals a day or didn’t know when their next meal was coming, they probably weren’t going to volunteer and be accepted to host a student – but it was quite a different life in the Bongolava region. My dad spoke French and my brother in law spoke a little bit as well (around my level, maybe less) but the rest of the family only spoke Malagasy. That meant, I did a lot of talking with my hands.
I knew staying in the mayor’s house would be on the upper end of the possibilities but it was quite a strange combination of poverty and riches. We had a big 3 story house and I had a room to myself but we used a bucket shower that was only enclosed on 3 sides and who’s walls covered up to my belly button or so. We also used an outhouse 20 meters away from the house, which is where I saw 200+ cockroaches. The first night, I went there before I went to sleep wearing only my headlamp and opened the door to see cockroaches crawling around every inch of the walls and ceiling. Because I was wearing a headlamp, I could only see about 30-40 at a time but I could certainly hear all of them crawling around. YUCK! But it was what we had. The mayor had a TV in his room but we used candlelight after the sunset, including for meals. We had a separate building that functioned as the kitchen but still all cooking was done over an open flame and by candlelight after dark. I am going to write a separate post just about the mayor himself but I hope you can get my point.
The Malagasy have a term “moramora” which translates as “slowly slowly”. Meaning a laidback, slower paced life, and the village was definitely moramora.. I spent a good majority of my time just sitting around: reading or talking to my family. I also went for a lot of long walks just checking out the village, interacting with people, and taking in the beautiful landscape that surrounded me. Every meal (3x per day) I had rice, which was usually accompanied by eggs or meat or a vegetable. When we had meat, it was all parts of the animal and the mayor would usually tell me which piece to eat so I got the delicacy of intestines and heart a couple times. I visited a couple farms where they grew rice, onions, tomatoes, manioc, bananas and much more. One of them even had a type of fish farm. Sustenance farming was by far the most common work anyone did in the village, most of the people I met and saw were living on less than $1 a day.
The poverty was incredibly evident but it was also interesting that pretty much every single Malagasy person I spoke to mentioned, “this is where poor people live” or something along those lines. I may have been the first American any of them had spoken to and there was a clear inferiority complex amongst the Malagasy to feel as if they had to apologize to me for the village and explain that it was a poor place. As if I hadn’t chosen to come live there with them and experience it, although many people seemed very grateful for that fact and thanked me personally. Multiple students seem to have had similar experiences. Often I would be referred to as rich and each time I wanted to explain otherwise. That the cost of living in the US was high, that I was going to have debt from going to school, that I knew a lot of people who were much wealthier than I but each time, I couldn’t rationalize telling someone without running water or electricity that I wasn’t rich. I mean I had just flown halfway around the world to Madagascar and even that was incomprehensible to these people.
No matter whose house we stayed in, or our living conditions, this was certainly a once in a lifetime experience and I am extremely lucky to have lived it. I have a few more posts that I plan on writing related to the village stay but it is quite difficult to convey what I just did. Hopefully this gets it started!
• Took a bucket shower
• Watched a coq-fight (rooster) with 300+ Malagasy people
• Had 21+ straight meals involving rice
• Ate pig stomach, intestines, heart, chicken neck, intestines, liver, beef tongue (okay, I’ve eaten the last two before, but I added them for dramatic effect and they were at least prepared differently) and manioc
• Saw 200+ cockroaches in one confined space (our outhouse)
• Drank beer with a 9 month old baby
• Saved a puppy
As I mentioned, I lived with the mayor and his wife. They have 3 kids, one of whom lives in the capitol with her husband and daughter. Their son’s house is on one side ours with his wife, 2 year old daughter and 8 month old daughter. The mayor’s last daughter lives on the other side of our house with her husband, 8 year old daughter and 3 year old son. It was a big family but only 3 of us plus any grand children spending the night stayed in our house. No student stayed with any of the people who were extremely poor – if they weren’t eating 3 meals a day or didn’t know when their next meal was coming, they probably weren’t going to volunteer and be accepted to host a student – but it was quite a different life in the Bongolava region. My dad spoke French and my brother in law spoke a little bit as well (around my level, maybe less) but the rest of the family only spoke Malagasy. That meant, I did a lot of talking with my hands.
I knew staying in the mayor’s house would be on the upper end of the possibilities but it was quite a strange combination of poverty and riches. We had a big 3 story house and I had a room to myself but we used a bucket shower that was only enclosed on 3 sides and who’s walls covered up to my belly button or so. We also used an outhouse 20 meters away from the house, which is where I saw 200+ cockroaches. The first night, I went there before I went to sleep wearing only my headlamp and opened the door to see cockroaches crawling around every inch of the walls and ceiling. Because I was wearing a headlamp, I could only see about 30-40 at a time but I could certainly hear all of them crawling around. YUCK! But it was what we had. The mayor had a TV in his room but we used candlelight after the sunset, including for meals. We had a separate building that functioned as the kitchen but still all cooking was done over an open flame and by candlelight after dark. I am going to write a separate post just about the mayor himself but I hope you can get my point.
The Malagasy have a term “moramora” which translates as “slowly slowly”. Meaning a laidback, slower paced life, and the village was definitely moramora.. I spent a good majority of my time just sitting around: reading or talking to my family. I also went for a lot of long walks just checking out the village, interacting with people, and taking in the beautiful landscape that surrounded me. Every meal (3x per day) I had rice, which was usually accompanied by eggs or meat or a vegetable. When we had meat, it was all parts of the animal and the mayor would usually tell me which piece to eat so I got the delicacy of intestines and heart a couple times. I visited a couple farms where they grew rice, onions, tomatoes, manioc, bananas and much more. One of them even had a type of fish farm. Sustenance farming was by far the most common work anyone did in the village, most of the people I met and saw were living on less than $1 a day.
The poverty was incredibly evident but it was also interesting that pretty much every single Malagasy person I spoke to mentioned, “this is where poor people live” or something along those lines. I may have been the first American any of them had spoken to and there was a clear inferiority complex amongst the Malagasy to feel as if they had to apologize to me for the village and explain that it was a poor place. As if I hadn’t chosen to come live there with them and experience it, although many people seemed very grateful for that fact and thanked me personally. Multiple students seem to have had similar experiences. Often I would be referred to as rich and each time I wanted to explain otherwise. That the cost of living in the US was high, that I was going to have debt from going to school, that I knew a lot of people who were much wealthier than I but each time, I couldn’t rationalize telling someone without running water or electricity that I wasn’t rich. I mean I had just flown halfway around the world to Madagascar and even that was incomprehensible to these people.
No matter whose house we stayed in, or our living conditions, this was certainly a once in a lifetime experience and I am extremely lucky to have lived it. I have a few more posts that I plan on writing related to the village stay but it is quite difficult to convey what I just did. Hopefully this gets it started!
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Off the Grid
Last post before I leave for my 2nd homestay of the semester. We are going to stay in rural villages and it is said to be one of the most intense things we will encounter here. Not to say it will be bad, many students love it, but I don’t think it will be easy. I was going to tell you guys what I know about it but instead I will just say this – I am not going to have internet access for the next 10 days and it is very rare that my telephone will work, so I hope nothing that urgent comes up. You will have to wait to hear about this upcoming experience!!!!
Saturday, September 24, 2011
My Walk Home Cont'd
9/23 Friday evening and I just got home a bit ago from my first walk home! It took about 75 minutes to get from our program center, which is located in the North part of the city-center, to my house located in a southern neighborhood removed from the center. I brought my camera along and this post will just describe the pictures in more detail than their titles.
First up is the taxi-be that I take to and from school everyday: the 139! It is usually red like in the first picture but there are a few out there that are hot pink and purple as seen in photo 2. Some have a sliding door on the side that you enter from while others have one that opens in the back. No matter the type of car, all taxi-bes have a driver and another worker who’s job is to collect the bus fare as well as call out where the bus is going and which stop is coming up. When you arrive you tell the worker “misy miala” and he alerts the driver to stop so you can get off. The smaller ones are made for 12 people not including children sitting on laps and the bigger for 16 but in reality full capacity is closer to 20 and 22 respectively.
Nabbed a picture of one of the taxis here as well. They are generally very old (some even 30+ years old) and may or may not require being hotwired each time they are started. Gas is extremely expensive so filling up the tank is extremely uncommon – much more likely is driving around near empty with an extra water bottle filled with gasoline under the driver’s seat in case the passenger has requested a long drive. Also worth noting, they are unmetered and you must agree/bargain a price before getting in. That means that the price goes up if you are a vazaha or if it is late at night etc… Worst taxi that I have taken was the one that required I hold the door closed while we drove.
Antananarivo is a very spread out city with essentially no planning. There are main roads that you can take but the city is filled with staircases everywhere you look. Some are big, some are narrow, some cement, some dirt, some lead to private residences, others are shortcuts. The only way to know where a staircase takes you is to try it out. The next few pictures are just a few examples of some staircases I passed by.
The concept of a store is very loose here. There are traditional stores that rent space in a building but the Malagasy are also extremely creative in their building practices and can set up shop just about anywhere.
The rest of the pictures are just random sights and views that I found interesting. A woman standing in front of a more legitimate store with her baby tied to her back via a traditional piece of Malagasy clothing called a “lamba” also balancing a large bag on her head as she walks home. A kid in a rice paddy. A few examples of nicer cement buildings and the backyard/dryer of a group of houses. The chain of gas station that has my favorite color way of the 3. The view from a block or two from my house; I usually come home around sunset and this view is even better when the sky is pink and orange. A barbed wire fence covered in beautiful flowers. And finally, one of the many chickens I encountered that roam the city.
First up is the taxi-be that I take to and from school everyday: the 139! It is usually red like in the first picture but there are a few out there that are hot pink and purple as seen in photo 2. Some have a sliding door on the side that you enter from while others have one that opens in the back. No matter the type of car, all taxi-bes have a driver and another worker who’s job is to collect the bus fare as well as call out where the bus is going and which stop is coming up. When you arrive you tell the worker “misy miala” and he alerts the driver to stop so you can get off. The smaller ones are made for 12 people not including children sitting on laps and the bigger for 16 but in reality full capacity is closer to 20 and 22 respectively.
Nabbed a picture of one of the taxis here as well. They are generally very old (some even 30+ years old) and may or may not require being hotwired each time they are started. Gas is extremely expensive so filling up the tank is extremely uncommon – much more likely is driving around near empty with an extra water bottle filled with gasoline under the driver’s seat in case the passenger has requested a long drive. Also worth noting, they are unmetered and you must agree/bargain a price before getting in. That means that the price goes up if you are a vazaha or if it is late at night etc… Worst taxi that I have taken was the one that required I hold the door closed while we drove.
Antananarivo is a very spread out city with essentially no planning. There are main roads that you can take but the city is filled with staircases everywhere you look. Some are big, some are narrow, some cement, some dirt, some lead to private residences, others are shortcuts. The only way to know where a staircase takes you is to try it out. The next few pictures are just a few examples of some staircases I passed by.
The concept of a store is very loose here. There are traditional stores that rent space in a building but the Malagasy are also extremely creative in their building practices and can set up shop just about anywhere.
The rest of the pictures are just random sights and views that I found interesting. A woman standing in front of a more legitimate store with her baby tied to her back via a traditional piece of Malagasy clothing called a “lamba” also balancing a large bag on her head as she walks home. A kid in a rice paddy. A few examples of nicer cement buildings and the backyard/dryer of a group of houses. The chain of gas station that has my favorite color way of the 3. The view from a block or two from my house; I usually come home around sunset and this view is even better when the sky is pink and orange. A barbed wire fence covered in beautiful flowers. And finally, one of the many chickens I encountered that roam the city.
My Walk Home
My Walk Home, a set on Flickr.
Last Friday was a beautiful day and we got the afternoon off. I decided to walk home and see the city a little bit. Took about 75 minutes, so I estimate about 3 miles, maybe more. Knowing my sense of direction, I literally just walked the bus route back, not sure if it was quickest, or had least turns (dad...) but I made it.
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