Even the Chickens Stare at Me

I went into this whole deal anticipating that there was nothing I could really do to prepare myself for those initial days in country…and I was more right than I ever could’ve imagined. There is absolutely nothing I could’ve done to prepare myself for the extreme absurdity that made up my first days in Madagascar. It’s really been an incredibly surreal first week started off by the most awkward night of my life.

As soon as we landed, the group was herded to the medical office for our initial round of vaccinations, a whirlwind explanation on how to take a bucket bath and use a po (it’s fady, or taboo, to go outside at night here, which in a country largely without indoor plumbing necessitates the use of the lovely po, or pee pot). They then taught us a few key Malagasy phrases (“hi, my name is…” “I’m full” “I’m tired” “Where’s the bathroom?” etc) and crammed us into vans to go meet our families. While in transit to our village I should mention that I endured my first bit of “unwanted attention.” I don’t know why this surprised me, I always seem to attract the creepos immediately upon entering a new country. This time it was in the form of a guy wearing the creepiest mask I have ever seen coming up to the van and staring at me intently - to the point where the nose of his mask actually dragged along the entire window as we crawled along the road at a snails pace. Awesome. Way to get my stay here started off right. Anyway, this meeting of the families was a hilariously awkward endeavor. The mass of trainees all huddled together facing an even bigger mass of host families. One by one we went up to a PC worker to tell our name and they called it out repeatedly until the matching family emerged from the group to claim their trainee. I think I now know what it must feel like to be auctioned off…

After being united with my family, my host mom immediately latched on to my arm and half led half dragged me down the path to the house. It was pitch black at this point and after I stepped in about my eighth pile of what I can only hope was mud I began to seriously question Peace Corps’ insistence on us arriving in business casual attire. Those shoes will never be the same again. Not to mention the fact that we arrived at night in a place without electricity…I don’t think my host family had any idea what I was wearing.

We managed to make it to the house without incident. Notice I said house. For those of you who automatically equate housing in Africa with mud huts (and there’s a lot of you, I’m sure, so you don’t have to feel too embarrassed), I live in a lovely house with two floors and a thatched roof. Ironically enough, my room here, in a village of subsistence farmers, is about ten times bigger than the room I had in Geneva, a city of wealthy bankers. Anyway, we sat down to dinner and as the guest of honor, I was forced to sit in the only actual chair, which is about six inches higher than the benches my host family sits on. Now, the people who live on the plateau here are really pretty short. We’re talking at 5’4” I tower over almost everyone I meet. So as I sat down to dinner I was literally looming over the rest of the table, certainly adding to my already freakish appearance.

My family attempted to talk to me throughout the meal, but it was in vain given that the only thing I’d managed to memorize in Malagasy was “hi, my name is…” This, by the way, was a complete waste of brain power given that my family obviously already knew my name. I have never felt as worthless as I did that night with my host mom trying so desperately to have a conversation with me. The charade continued as I was ushered into my room immediately after dinner. At this point I was completely lost because I had been under the impression that at some point we would actually get our bags and that PC would give us a schedule for the orientation that was set to begin the following morning somewhere at some time. It was becoming abundantly clear that neither of those things were going to happen so I was beginning to wonder when and if I would see my bags I had spent so much time packing. Not to mention how I would attend training without knowing when and where to meet everyone. I’m pretty sure my host mom was trying to explain all this to me but she was talking to me as if I was a native in the language, apparently having forgotten how unsuccessful her previous attempts at talking to me had been. The only thing she managed to get across was how to light my candle and blow it out before I went to bed. Of all the messages for her to focus on getting across, that was probably the most useless. Although after appearing to have the mental capacity of a 5-year-old I suppose I can understand her concern with my ability to use a candle. After that riveting exchange my host mom shooed everyone out of my room and having no bag and thus zero entertainment, I went to bed.

My next few days grew steadily (though painfully slowly) less awkward. I began to figure out rudimentary sentences and could respond somewhat to my host mom’s attempts at conversation. I even began to figure out the “bathroom” and bucket showers and developed a bit of a morning routine. By about my fourth morning, I was feeling less like a fish out of water when my confidence was immediately shot down. As I went out to the kabone (bathroom) to clean out my po, one of my host family’s chickens cam over and watched me. I went about my business and then walked over to the shower to brush my teeth. The chicken followed me and proceeded to stare me down the entire time I brushed my teeth. By the time I was done I looked over at the chicken and met it’s gaze for awhile and all I could think was “holy crap, I am so out of place in this country that even the chickens here are staring at me.”