Efa Tamana

Well I'm writing to you'll now from Mananjary, my banking town; where apart from stocking up on all things not beans and rice, I have been also getting seeds together for my garden and looking for materials to repair my community wheelbarrow.  I was welcomed immediately to Ambalona, located within the commune of Sandrohy by the majority of its able bodied residents fast at work repairing its washed out road.  The road which has still yet to recover from the cyclone, gives Vermont's mud season a run for it's money; and while back home there isn't much a dump truck and grader can't do, their isn't much a spade toting village can't do either.  We rolled up to my house and the initial shock took hold, but thinking quickly as half the village gathered round the PC truck, I started dishing out pound-its to all the kids.  My house which had been kind of a mystery, soon had swarm of workers making last minute repairs and even starting my fence; which is still incomplete.  I met with my counterpart Fidy hopeformadagascar.org  and Gaspar the Chef du Fokotany of Ambalona, essentially a Malagasy Mayor.  This was followed by a village tour, and a complementary meal of rice and beans served with coffee.  After a surreal first day I went off into that dark first night.

Dishing out Dunas

There have been many surreal days and dark nights since that first one, but while there have been ups and downs I've learned a lot about myself, my community, and just how different life is on the other side of the world.  I've spent the first two weeks making friends over small engine repair, washing my laundry by the river's edge and scanning for crocs all the while, fashioning my own tool handles in the vein of Alone in The Wilderness, dawning my village colors on the football pitch, building raised bed gardens out of bamboo, smuggling pork into my village, helping with the care of the school's gardens, fetching water from a pump 1/4 mile away from my home, training for the Tour du France, making the best fish'n'chips the bush can offer, and above all carving out that little place where I can be home away from home.

Salama

Nick

Sworn In and Site Bound

Well it's been over a month since my last post but much has happened in April alone.  When we last left off, I was awaiting my site anouncement; which I have since received and as I write this am en route to.  I will working in the Fokotany of Ambalona which is located in bertween the coastal cities of Mankara and Mananjary, the latter being my banking town which is about a 90 minute journey by taxi-brousse.  I will be starting a brand new site and will be partnered with Hope for Madagascar (HFM). HFM is an NGO that was started by Malagasy-Americans, and is based currently headquatered in Boulder, CO.  They working a variety of sectors, but the majority of work centeres around evironmental education and construction projects.  There will be many oppourtunities to work along side them on existing projects, but also the freedom to develop projects pertinent to my community's needs.

Following the anouncement our sites, each sector of our Peace Corps Stage headed on technical field trip.  As a member of the environment sector I travelled to Andasibe, where we hiked through a section of VOI managed rain forest; then a brief stay in Tamatave, where we visited the lemurs at neighboring Ivolina park; after that we headed to Foulpointe, a small coastal town with sandy beaches, and a neighboring protected area managed by Missouri Botanical Gardens.  We returned to the training center with a new zeal for our service and made the final push through language and technical training.

Mornings in Foulpointe are about as rough as the surf

As I write this it's hard to believe that the first itiminating 9 weeks of training have come to a close and that I am now finally on the way to my site, which I will call home for the next 2 years.  The first chapter of my adventure has come to a close and it's time to start writing the pages I've been waiting for.  I'll be spending tonight in Fianar and tomorrow we will make the push to Mananjary, where'll try to get my hands on all the bear-necessities: hammer & nails, pots & pans, rice & beans, and of course dines.  As for my house, it's a fixer-upper, and I'm not sure if I'll even be able to move into it by the end of this week; we'll leave it on that cliffhanger for now.

Salama

Nick