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