Recently I received a letter from one of my aunts with a list of questions about my life at site. They seemed like questions that would be of general of interest to all of you so I’ve decided to post my answers.
1. Have you made the trip in from your site to your banking town yet? How long does it take? How do you get there? And what can you do while you’re there?
The banking town is literally just the town where your bank is located. PCVs are allotted three days every month to go to their banking town and take out money. Why three days you may ask? Because for many volunteers it takes that long just to get there and back again. My banking town is Ambositra. I am very lucky in that my site is only 17k from my banking town, the road is fairly good and there are taxi-brousses going back and forth between the two towns every day and several times a day. It’s about a 30-45 minute drive to Ambositra. The length of time for the trip is determined by whether the driver has enough gas or is trying to save gas by periodically turning the car off and coasting as much as possible. Many people walk or bike the trip, which I’ve recently considered doing in order to come and go as I please rather than wait for the brousse to fill up and leave (our taxi-brousses are old station wagons which they cram at least 13-14 people into).
What do I do while I’m there? Well, other than go to the bank, I usually bring a few things to charge. I always eat at least one thing that I can’t get at site (ice cream, baked goods, French fries, something with cheese etc). Most of the time I end up doing some shopping for food or household items that I can’t find at site (butter, ketchup, olive oil, toilet paper, kitchen stuff…there’s even supposedly a place where you can buy real cheese but I have yet to see this legendary place actually open). Also, I always take advantage of the nice bathrooms at my hotel and take a hot shower. This is one of the things I look forward to most when planning to go to Ambositra. I am very unlucky in that Ambositra does not have internet access so checking my email or updating my blog is not something I can do when I go to my banking town.
2. Are you going crazy yet?
No. At least I don’t think so. Although it would be hard for me to tell since the people at my site would think anything I did was completely nuts. Some of you may be laughing but this is actually a reasonable question. Going crazy is apparently a legitimate problem for PCVs. People get MedEvac-ed for going crazy more frequently than I’m comfortable with. So frequently in fact, that we have a special name for it – WackEvac-ed. Also, I recently found out that PCVs are granted three free psych visits upon returning to the US. So I’ll keep you all updated on my level of sanity.
3. What is you “hut” like?
My “hut” is two rooms of a three room house. It’s a one-story cement house (when I say cement I mean cement everything, walls, floors, everything but the wood doors. It’s winter now so most days it feels like I’m living in a cement refrigerator) with a tin roof. I have a porch with a fenced in front and back yard. It’s a way bigger house than I ever imagined I’d be living in during my service and I really like it aside from the large rodent population living in my ceiling and the window in my kitchen which is large and low enough for the kids to perch themselves on it and stare at me nonstop.
4. How do you furnish your house?
My actual furniture (bed, chairs, table, shelves etc) was ordered and made at site. Everything else was purchased in my banking town on my way to being installed, including my mattress, gas stove, pots and pans and other kitchen supplies and LOTS of plastic buckets of various shapes and sizes. People here are obsessed with plastic. The other day one of my neighbors was over while I was cooking and I was using a metal mixing bowl. She told me I shouldn’t use it and shouldn’t have bought it and that I should go out and buy a plastic one.
5. How do you get food to eat?
As far as sites go for environment volunteers, mine is surprisingly well stocked. We have a market three days a week where I can buy just about any fruit or vegetable, beans, rice and other various items. The main street of my town is lined with about a dozen epiceries. These stores are the Malagasy equivalent to convenience stores and sell everything from flour to needles and thread to candlesticks. I can’t figure out how they all stay in business because they all sell exactly the same things at exactly the same prices.
I also have the option of buying live chickens, ducks, turkeys and rabbits to kill and eat. I haven’t gone down that road yet and I’m not sure I ever will. Meat here is a bit of an issue for me. I haven’t been able to bring myself to buy it. The stuff that isn’t still alive has been hanging outside for who knows how long. I’ve actually seen people using fly swatters but swatting directly at the meat. Last week I was given a serving of meat which I tasted, choked down and was then too terrified to ask exactly what part of the cow it was. My friend Nicole served me cow tongue in honor of Madagascar’s Independence Day. At first I thought it was kind of cool to be this close to my food source. Now I’m over it. I can’t wait to go back to the US and be able to buy meat and not immediately be able to tell exactly what animal it is. Nicole’s family was floored when I told them we buy all our meat already dead. Meat dishes here are almost always served up with uncomfortable reminders that they were once living things. There’s usually at least one organ along with the dish. Birds usually still have some of their quills. Mammals often still have some fur. And fish are served whole with the eyes staring up at you from the plate.
6. What’s the deal with your indoor shower?
Indoor “showers” in rural Madagascar are really just tiny rooms about the size of a walk-in closet with a hole in one corner for water to drain out. That’s it. I still heat up water and take a bucket shower. Hence my excitement at the opportunity for real showers in my banking town.
7. Do you ever see any of the other PCVs?
Because my site is relatively accessible, I get to see other PCVs fairly often. I usually run into at least one when I go to my banking town. Last month I was able to go to Fianar with a bunch of other PCVs for a big meeting and then tag along with my APCD for a bunch of visits to other sites. Two weeks ago the environment volunteer that lives closest to me showed up at my door to take me to see her site and visit some other PCVs on the way. And now I’m back in Fianar celebrating the Fourth of July and a fellow volunteer’s birthday (and of course doing “business” too since that was how I got permission to make this trip in the first place).
8. Have you made any friends with the locals?
Since I replaced a volunteer all her friends automatically made themselves my friends too. At first I thought this was kind of weird seeing as we’re not the same person. But I quickly got over that and was just happy to have people around who know how to speak Malagasy to someone who just started learning the language. They’ve been incredibly helpful too. Aside from taking it upon themselves to teach me the language (they get a lot of humor out of this), they also show me around town, take me to meet people, help me find stuff I need, act as my interpreter and help me deal with issues like, say, for example when a drunk guy follows me home and politely asks if it would be alright if he slept with me. Honestly I don’t know what I’d do without them.
9. How do you spend your days?
Right now my days are pretty uneventful. I usually wake up at around t6:30 and lay in bed mentally preparing myself for my day until at least 7. The earlier I get up and open my windows the earlier I have to deal with people staring at me through them. My house is on the path that leads to the only middle school in my commune so if I get up before school starts I have to deal with every single middle school aged child in Andina walking by my house. This entails lots of staring and laughing – a few are brave enough to say hello. Students here go home for lunch so they walk by my house four times a day so if I can eliminate the morning walk by not waking up I’m down to three waves of the staring. All in all there’s really very little incentive to get out of bed. Then I get up, eat breakfast and listen to the news on either BBC or VOA (I don’t know what I’d do without my short wave radio – I listen to it all the time). After that I do the dishes and clean my house. I’m pretty anal about cleaning my house because I don’t want the family of rats living in my ceiling to discover my kitchen and fleas are a huge problem here on the plateau.
At around 10 I usually leave my house and choose between one of a few daily activities. I can help someone with their farming. From time to time there’s a meeting I have to attend. Sometimes I walk around our “downtown” and talk to different people. If it’s a market day I’ll go to market but this has to be done early in the morning or the men are all so drunk that it’s more of a hassle than it’s worth. Sometimes I make the 5k trek to my counterpart’s house. This is always nice because it takes up pretty much the whole day. If I’m feeling adventurous I’ll go for a walk to places I haven’t visited yet. About one a week I’ll pay a visit to the mayor’s office and remind them that they still haven’t fixed my fence or the leak in my ceiling. Lots of times I just go to my friend Nicole’s house and spend time with her family. They like to teach me about Malagasy culture and how to cook different Malagasy dishes and ask me all sorts of questions about the US. They also take me to meet different people in Andina and teach me how to farm different things.
If I’m at someone’s house when it gets to be lunch time I’ll eat lunch with them. At first I felt guilty about this because I have plenty of money to buy my own food while the people here a pretty poor – we’re talking paying for stuff with rice poor. But I’ve since realized that when people are cooking they’ll pretty much feed anyone who is nearby so I guess it’s just part of the culture. Plus the people here are such good farmers that they have way more food than they could ever eat on their own so I don’t think feeding me is really all that much of a strain. Anyway, if I go home for lunch then it’s pretty much a repeat of my morning routine and I leave my house again, choosing a different activity for the afternoon. Everyone bars themselves inside their homes when it starts getting dark so I go home, eat dinner, read a book and go to bed. I have an exciting life here in Madagascar.
That’s it for the questions. Feel free to send me more. I’m happy to answer them. The third goal of Peace Corps is after all to teach Americans about your country of service.
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Creepiest Cultural Exchange Ever
A week or two ago I attended my first Malagasy wake. Well, not exactly my first. My first was during training but it was with all the other trainees and there were so many of us that we just cycled in and out and I was probably only in the house for a total of about 5 minutes. So that experience hardly counts.
Anyway, the husband of a woman I’d farmed with a couple of times had died. My friend, Nicole, told me the news the day it happened and said that in two days we would go together to visit the family. I was relieved to hear that because I still wasn’t 4exactly sure what was culturally appropriate for the Betsileo people when it came to deaths.
At around seven the next morning, one of the daughters of the family showed up at my window and calmly told me that her dad had died the day before and asked if I would come with her to her house. Now, 7am is pretty early for me. I usually don’t even get out of bed before 7 because the earlier I get out of bed the earlier I have to figure out what to do with myself for the day. But for some reason I was up that morning but I still hadn’t eaten or gotten dressed so I really couldn’t just follow her out the door right then and there. So, not knowing how to explain I’d already made plans to visit the next day and fearing it would be offensive to refuse the invitation, I told her I would come later. “What time?” she asked me. I replied that I didn’t know but would come later in the morning. “But at what time?” she asked again. I was pretty taken aback by her insistence on me giving her a time since Malagasy people have zero concept of time and I’m usually the one asking for times of activities and then assuming that the planned event will happen somewhere within three hours of whatever time I’m given. So I again told her I wasn’t sure but I would come over as soon as I finished my morning chores. I guess she found this answer acceptable because she said ok and left.
Fortunately, I decided to get dressed right after she left because 15 minutes later she was back at my window with a bundle of flowers so huge she could barely see over them. “Ok, let’s go!” she said. “But I already told you I was coming later” I replied, slightly confused. “I know, so let’s go!” Seeing there was no way I was getting out of this one, I locked up my house and followed her wondering the whole time what I would have to do once I got there and whether or not I should appear sad since she certainly didn’t and I had never met the guy – I didn’t even know his name. On the way over, she asked me if I was afraid of dead people. I told her I wasn’t and she said that was good. This made me a little nervous.
When we got to the house, there were more people than usual but everyone seemed to be going about their daily routine. The daughter immediately left me upon entering to go clean up the house. The mother happily greeted me and led me into the next room where I found myself faced with her dead husband lying on a bed covered by a white sheet and another white veil. She led me up to the bed and lifted the veil so I could get a closer look at him, thankfully. His face was wrapped up in some kind of white gauze almost like a mummy.
After she felt I’d had a good enough look, she led me to a seat that was directly in front of the bed. She then proceeded to ignore my existence and go about the room straightening things up and talking to other people. I had never met anyone else in the room before and couldn’t understand much of what they were saying so I couldn’t participate in any of their conversations and everyone seemed to be perfectly content ignoring me. My chair was one of the woven little “stools” that are about six inches high which are so popular here so I was pretty uncomfortable and literally had nothing else in my view except this dead body.
After 10 or 15 minutes of sitting in silence not knowing what to do with myself and desperately wishing there was some sort of picture on the wall behind the bed to look at, the mother came up to me again and matter-of-factly told me that he had woken up at four in the morning, thrown up a few times and then at seven in the morning had died. I could have done without the details. She then left the room, I can only assume to do work around the house like everyone else. So, there I sat, with no one to talk to and nothing to do except continue staring at the body of a man who I knew nothing about except that he had woken up, puked and died the day before.
About an hour later when I was thoroughly creeped out to the point that I really couldn’t take it anymore, I started to think I would have to just get up and leave. Other people had been cycling in and out of the house all morning so it seemed that I should be able to as well. Plus it had become clear that I wasn’t actually expected to do anything and I was afraid that if I didn’t get up to leave, they would have me sit there all day. So, gathering up my courage, I got up, walked out of the room, found the daughter and told her I was very sorry but that I had already made plans to see my counterpart that morning and I had to go (a complete lie). She said that was alright and walked me home. That was it. No one was sad or upset. No one seemed to really be doing anything other than their normal routine or sitting in the room and chatting about everyday things. And to this day I still have no idea why they wanted me there so badly when no one seemed to take any notice of me once I was seated.
Anyway, the husband of a woman I’d farmed with a couple of times had died. My friend, Nicole, told me the news the day it happened and said that in two days we would go together to visit the family. I was relieved to hear that because I still wasn’t 4exactly sure what was culturally appropriate for the Betsileo people when it came to deaths.
At around seven the next morning, one of the daughters of the family showed up at my window and calmly told me that her dad had died the day before and asked if I would come with her to her house. Now, 7am is pretty early for me. I usually don’t even get out of bed before 7 because the earlier I get out of bed the earlier I have to figure out what to do with myself for the day. But for some reason I was up that morning but I still hadn’t eaten or gotten dressed so I really couldn’t just follow her out the door right then and there. So, not knowing how to explain I’d already made plans to visit the next day and fearing it would be offensive to refuse the invitation, I told her I would come later. “What time?” she asked me. I replied that I didn’t know but would come later in the morning. “But at what time?” she asked again. I was pretty taken aback by her insistence on me giving her a time since Malagasy people have zero concept of time and I’m usually the one asking for times of activities and then assuming that the planned event will happen somewhere within three hours of whatever time I’m given. So I again told her I wasn’t sure but I would come over as soon as I finished my morning chores. I guess she found this answer acceptable because she said ok and left.
Fortunately, I decided to get dressed right after she left because 15 minutes later she was back at my window with a bundle of flowers so huge she could barely see over them. “Ok, let’s go!” she said. “But I already told you I was coming later” I replied, slightly confused. “I know, so let’s go!” Seeing there was no way I was getting out of this one, I locked up my house and followed her wondering the whole time what I would have to do once I got there and whether or not I should appear sad since she certainly didn’t and I had never met the guy – I didn’t even know his name. On the way over, she asked me if I was afraid of dead people. I told her I wasn’t and she said that was good. This made me a little nervous.
When we got to the house, there were more people than usual but everyone seemed to be going about their daily routine. The daughter immediately left me upon entering to go clean up the house. The mother happily greeted me and led me into the next room where I found myself faced with her dead husband lying on a bed covered by a white sheet and another white veil. She led me up to the bed and lifted the veil so I could get a closer look at him, thankfully. His face was wrapped up in some kind of white gauze almost like a mummy.
After she felt I’d had a good enough look, she led me to a seat that was directly in front of the bed. She then proceeded to ignore my existence and go about the room straightening things up and talking to other people. I had never met anyone else in the room before and couldn’t understand much of what they were saying so I couldn’t participate in any of their conversations and everyone seemed to be perfectly content ignoring me. My chair was one of the woven little “stools” that are about six inches high which are so popular here so I was pretty uncomfortable and literally had nothing else in my view except this dead body.
After 10 or 15 minutes of sitting in silence not knowing what to do with myself and desperately wishing there was some sort of picture on the wall behind the bed to look at, the mother came up to me again and matter-of-factly told me that he had woken up at four in the morning, thrown up a few times and then at seven in the morning had died. I could have done without the details. She then left the room, I can only assume to do work around the house like everyone else. So, there I sat, with no one to talk to and nothing to do except continue staring at the body of a man who I knew nothing about except that he had woken up, puked and died the day before.
About an hour later when I was thoroughly creeped out to the point that I really couldn’t take it anymore, I started to think I would have to just get up and leave. Other people had been cycling in and out of the house all morning so it seemed that I should be able to as well. Plus it had become clear that I wasn’t actually expected to do anything and I was afraid that if I didn’t get up to leave, they would have me sit there all day. So, gathering up my courage, I got up, walked out of the room, found the daughter and told her I was very sorry but that I had already made plans to see my counterpart that morning and I had to go (a complete lie). She said that was alright and walked me home. That was it. No one was sad or upset. No one seemed to really be doing anything other than their normal routine or sitting in the room and chatting about everyday things. And to this day I still have no idea why they wanted me there so badly when no one seemed to take any notice of me once I was seated.
Random Tale from Week One
Apparently the first week at site is notorious for being extremely difficult to get through. When I ran into a fellow PCV who was getting ready to COS, the first thing she asked me was how my first week went. After admitting that it had been pretty rough she told me not to worry, that she had spent her first week holed up in her house crying. So, to demonstrate the emotional roller coaster that was my first week, here is a description of a particularly interesting day:
On the morning of my fifth day in Andina, I made my way to a meeting for the rice planting organization. I had absolutely no desire to go to this meeting because I still sucked at Malagasy so I wouldn’t understand anything and I was really worried they’d make me give a speech, which, given my difficulties with the language, would have been more than a little embarrassing. But I agreed to go because one of the members of the organization had come to my house insisting that I attend. He actually made quiet the spectacle in asking me. He showed up at my house speaking in rapid-fire Malagasy about this meeting. Of course I didn’t understand him so I told him I’d only studied the language for ten weeks so he needed to speak slowly. He then repeated everything, but this time in rapid-fire French – naturally. So I again requested that he speak slower. This went on with him switching between the two languages until I finally managed to piece together what he wanted but I still didn’t know where the meeting was. When I asked, he sighed, sounding exasperated and said, “You don’t know Malagasy and you don’t know French!” By this time a huge crowd had gathered and he went through his whole spiel again but this time he wrote everything down, checking after each individual word to make sure I understood, but in English (don’t ask me why he waited so long to go the English route given that he knew I was American). However, he still neglected to tell me where the meeting would be held. Tired of dealing with this guy, I told him I understood and would be there; all the while hoping I’d be able to find out where the meeting was from someone else.
Anyway, at 8 in the morning I headed to the meeting, prepared speech in hand and dreading having to face this guy again. No one was around and the room was locked. I waited around for 30-45 minutes until someone finally told me the meeting was actually at 10. Perfect. So I headed home grumbling the whole way about how that guy had treated me like such a moron yet couldn’t even tell me the right time for his precious meeting. Regardless, I returned at 10 and the meeting finally got underway at around 11. It lasted for a couple of extremely long hours. The whole time the presenter kept stopping to ask if I understood what he was saying. Each time I said I understood a little but really the only thing I got out of the whole thing was that he was trying to convince the people to plant some sort of plant in their rice fields. Also, periodically throughout the meeting, my favorite member would sneak up behind me to check and see if I was taking notes and understanding. I finally started writing random things down in English to get him to leave me alone. Needless to say, I came out of the meeting with a huge migraine from trying to understand the language for so long and irritated that I’d been forced to go at all.
All I wanted to do when I got home was and lunch and take a nap to recuperate. But, as always happened when I got home, as soon as I opened my windows kids swarmed in from all corners of my village and started screaming my name. Thus, napping was officially out of the question.
Desperate for some peace and quiet in order to maintain my sanity I decided to go for a walk. I somehow managed to forge a path through all the kids and made my way along a footpath that looked mildly secluded. After walking for awhile I was finally starting to feel normal again when I stumbled upon a huge house with a group of kids outside who looked absolutely terrified of me. Now, I should explain that someone at some point in the history of Madagascar started a nasty little rumor that white people eat babies. From what I understand, this rumor is still in circulation. So, when I see kids cowering in fear at the sight of me I try to talk to them to prove that I’m not actually going to cook them up for dinner. With that in mind, I started trying to chat with these kids. Before I knew it, heads were peaking out of every window of the house and a man with a lame leg hobbled out the door to find out who I was and invite me in. This was the last thing I wanted to do and my first thought was to turn and run to avoid suffering through an inevitable long and difficult “conversation” with this guy but that didn’t seem like the best reaction if I ever wanted to integrate myself into this society. So I reluctantly followed him in and sat down with him and his mother (who was so tiny and shriveled that I seriously think she may be the oldest woman in Madagascar). To my surprise, we ended up having a relatively good conversation. This guy, Edouard, had known and worked with the volunteer I replaced and was excited to be able to work with me.
On my way out we walked past a huge room packed with people screaming and yelling at each other. I asked what all the noise was about and, as luck would have it, I had stumbled upon this family on the one day that they were hosting the monthly town meeting. Of course, they all insisted that I go in and give a speech. I couldn’t believe it. Just as I thought my day was turning around I was being forced into a room so full of Gasy people I could barely find a place to stand and I was going to have to address them all. Awesome.
The whole room fell silent and they all looked at me expectantly. I took a deep breath and, hoping I could get through everything in one piece, dove into a brief speech. It actually ended up being a hilarious experience. As I stumbled through my self-introduction and explanation of Peace Corps, the whole room would periodically erupt into chaos for some unknown reason. Then Edouard would stand up and get everyone to be quiet and I would begin again only for another outburst 30 seconds later. The whole time everyone kept telling me how great I was at Malagasy and how they loved Peace Corps and couldn’t wait to work with me. I agreed to meet with Edouard again the following week and walked home feeling like I was on cloud nine.
On the morning of my fifth day in Andina, I made my way to a meeting for the rice planting organization. I had absolutely no desire to go to this meeting because I still sucked at Malagasy so I wouldn’t understand anything and I was really worried they’d make me give a speech, which, given my difficulties with the language, would have been more than a little embarrassing. But I agreed to go because one of the members of the organization had come to my house insisting that I attend. He actually made quiet the spectacle in asking me. He showed up at my house speaking in rapid-fire Malagasy about this meeting. Of course I didn’t understand him so I told him I’d only studied the language for ten weeks so he needed to speak slowly. He then repeated everything, but this time in rapid-fire French – naturally. So I again requested that he speak slower. This went on with him switching between the two languages until I finally managed to piece together what he wanted but I still didn’t know where the meeting was. When I asked, he sighed, sounding exasperated and said, “You don’t know Malagasy and you don’t know French!” By this time a huge crowd had gathered and he went through his whole spiel again but this time he wrote everything down, checking after each individual word to make sure I understood, but in English (don’t ask me why he waited so long to go the English route given that he knew I was American). However, he still neglected to tell me where the meeting would be held. Tired of dealing with this guy, I told him I understood and would be there; all the while hoping I’d be able to find out where the meeting was from someone else.
Anyway, at 8 in the morning I headed to the meeting, prepared speech in hand and dreading having to face this guy again. No one was around and the room was locked. I waited around for 30-45 minutes until someone finally told me the meeting was actually at 10. Perfect. So I headed home grumbling the whole way about how that guy had treated me like such a moron yet couldn’t even tell me the right time for his precious meeting. Regardless, I returned at 10 and the meeting finally got underway at around 11. It lasted for a couple of extremely long hours. The whole time the presenter kept stopping to ask if I understood what he was saying. Each time I said I understood a little but really the only thing I got out of the whole thing was that he was trying to convince the people to plant some sort of plant in their rice fields. Also, periodically throughout the meeting, my favorite member would sneak up behind me to check and see if I was taking notes and understanding. I finally started writing random things down in English to get him to leave me alone. Needless to say, I came out of the meeting with a huge migraine from trying to understand the language for so long and irritated that I’d been forced to go at all.
All I wanted to do when I got home was and lunch and take a nap to recuperate. But, as always happened when I got home, as soon as I opened my windows kids swarmed in from all corners of my village and started screaming my name. Thus, napping was officially out of the question.
Desperate for some peace and quiet in order to maintain my sanity I decided to go for a walk. I somehow managed to forge a path through all the kids and made my way along a footpath that looked mildly secluded. After walking for awhile I was finally starting to feel normal again when I stumbled upon a huge house with a group of kids outside who looked absolutely terrified of me. Now, I should explain that someone at some point in the history of Madagascar started a nasty little rumor that white people eat babies. From what I understand, this rumor is still in circulation. So, when I see kids cowering in fear at the sight of me I try to talk to them to prove that I’m not actually going to cook them up for dinner. With that in mind, I started trying to chat with these kids. Before I knew it, heads were peaking out of every window of the house and a man with a lame leg hobbled out the door to find out who I was and invite me in. This was the last thing I wanted to do and my first thought was to turn and run to avoid suffering through an inevitable long and difficult “conversation” with this guy but that didn’t seem like the best reaction if I ever wanted to integrate myself into this society. So I reluctantly followed him in and sat down with him and his mother (who was so tiny and shriveled that I seriously think she may be the oldest woman in Madagascar). To my surprise, we ended up having a relatively good conversation. This guy, Edouard, had known and worked with the volunteer I replaced and was excited to be able to work with me.
On my way out we walked past a huge room packed with people screaming and yelling at each other. I asked what all the noise was about and, as luck would have it, I had stumbled upon this family on the one day that they were hosting the monthly town meeting. Of course, they all insisted that I go in and give a speech. I couldn’t believe it. Just as I thought my day was turning around I was being forced into a room so full of Gasy people I could barely find a place to stand and I was going to have to address them all. Awesome.
The whole room fell silent and they all looked at me expectantly. I took a deep breath and, hoping I could get through everything in one piece, dove into a brief speech. It actually ended up being a hilarious experience. As I stumbled through my self-introduction and explanation of Peace Corps, the whole room would periodically erupt into chaos for some unknown reason. Then Edouard would stand up and get everyone to be quiet and I would begin again only for another outburst 30 seconds later. The whole time everyone kept telling me how great I was at Malagasy and how they loved Peace Corps and couldn’t wait to work with me. I agreed to meet with Edouard again the following week and walked home feeling like I was on cloud nine.
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