> Place an X by all the things you've done, or remove the X from the ones you have not. This is for your entire life:
> >
> >
> > Have a great day,
> >
> >
> > (X) Smoked a cigarette
> >
> > (x) Drank so much you threw up
> >
> > ( ) Crashed a friend's car
> >
> > ( ) Stolen a car
> >
> > (X) Been in love
> >
> > (X) Been dumped
> >
> > ( ) Shop lifted-gum
> >
> > ( ) Been laid off/fired
> >
> > (X) Quit your job
> >
> > (X) Been in a fist fight
> >
> > (X) Snuck out of your parent's house
> >
> > (x) Had feelings for someone who didn't have them back
> >
> > ( ) Been arrested
> >
> > (X) Gone on a blind date
> >
> > (X) Skipped school
> >
> > ( ) Moon Someone
>
> > (X) Saw someone die
> >
> > (X) Been to Canada
> >
> > (X) Been to Mexico
> >
> > (X) Been on a plane
> >
> > (X) Been lost
> >
> > ( ) Been on the opposite side of the country
> >
> > (X) Gone to Washington, DC
> >
> > (X) Swam in the ocean
> >
> > (X) Felt like dying
> >
> > (X) Cried yourself to sleep
> >
> > (X) Accidentally farted while talking/walking
> >
> > ( ) Played cops and robbers
> >
> > (X) Recently colored with crayons
> >
> > (X) Sang karaoke
> >
> > ( ) Paid for a meal with only coins
> >
> > (X) Done something you told yourself you wouldn't
> >
> > ( ) Made prank phone calls
> >
> > ( ) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose
> >
> > (X) Caught a snowflake on your tongue
> >
> > (X) Danced in the rain
> >
> > (X) Written a letter to Santa Claus
> >
> > ( ) Been kissed under the mistletoe
> >
> > ( ) Watched the sun rise with someone you care about
> >
> > (X) Blown bubbles
> >
> > (X) Made a bonfire on the beach
> >
> > (X) Crashed a party
> >
> > (X) Gone roller-skating
> >
> > (x) Gone Ice-skating
>
> > ( ) Gone Skinny-Dipping
> >
> > Any nicknames? Lor, Miss Nat
> >
> > What is your favorite drink? Passionfruit juice with rum
> >
> > Tattoos? nah
>
> >Body piercing? A nose piercing
> >
> > Birthplace? Minneapolis, MN
>
> > Favorite vacation spot? Mexico
> >
> > Ever been to Africa? I live there, baby!
> >
> > Ever steal any traffic signs? not yet
> >
> > Ever been in a car accident? also not yet
> >
> > A, B, C, D, DD cup size? B
> >
> > 2 Door or 4 Door? Like 2 doors, don`t have a car tho
> >
> > Salad dressing? What salad dressing? Vinegar & oil`s all I get
> >
> > Favorite pie? Strawberry rhubarb, à la mode
> >
> > Favorite movie? Amélie (at the moment)
> >
> > Favorite holiday? Thanksgiving
> >
> > Favorite food? Mexican
>
> > Favorite day of the week? Friday
> >
> > Favorite TV show? What`s TV?
> >
> > Toothpaste? Crest Extra Whitening, Fresh Mint. Cool Mint is NOT okay.
> >
> > Favorite smell? Ylang ylang groves on Nosy Be
> >
> > Favorite sound? The phone at the flophouse ringing for me
> >
> > What do you do to relax? Drink a beer with Allie
> >
> > Message to your friends reading this? I miss you!
>
> > How do you see yourself in 10 years? Married, baby, llamas, Dr. of something
> >
> > What do you enjoy receiving? Letters |
| You Are a Visionary Soul | 
You are a curious person, always in a state of awareness.
Connected to all things spiritual, you are very connected to your soul.
You are wise and bright: able to reason and be reasonable.
Occasionally, you get quite depressed and have dark feelings.
You have great vision and can be very insightful.
In fact, you are often profound in a way that surprises yourself.
Visionary souls like you can be the best type of friend.
You are intuitive, understanding, sympathetic, and a good healer.
Souls you are most compatible with: Old Soul and Peacemaker Soul |
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I wonder what's come over me lately. I feel strangely calm, strangely quiet. Even with the construction workers swarming around my house, hitting on me and then calling me "mean" if I don't play along, I feel relaxed. It's been 8 months and 1 week since I got to Madagascar, and I can tell that I'm a different person. It's a little scary, honestly. Whereas before, I had a temper, now it's hard to piss me off. Not much can ruffle me. But at the same time, I feel as if I've become boring. Sedate. Too normal. I always liked how I was temperamental.
At least school's almost over--just four months left--and then I get that looong break until school starts back up mid-September. But I find myself wondering how I'm going to get through teaching English for one more year. This is my problem. I know I don't want to teach EFL once this is over, but I've got to for now. Other PCVs find what they're into and do that. I've got this job, this schedule, and this waning interest. I love my students, but I don't love teaching them English. I love teaching them songs. And I love my town and the friends I have there.
Still, I can't help but feel dissatisfied sometimes. It's been hard to get my mind off of that and on something else, especially since I've been at my town for the past five weeks without a single letter from home. The mail here's slow sometimes--I know that--but every Wednesday I hike over to the post office, hoping. Now the postal workers have taken to saying, "You don't get any mail? Your friends sure do!" referring to the other 2 volunteers who use the same post office.
God, that last part sounds bitchy, but mail's important! I have only simple pleasures here, and mail's one of them. One of them is watching movies at the Peace Corps house. Donnie Darko was on and I had this idea of myself as Grandma Death, who walks back and forth to the mailbox. Okay, so I'm not there yet.
I run now. I'm a runner. I run and I look forward to the next run and I like the pounding of my feet on the dirt road to the market town. I like how my face flushes and steams up my glasses in the cold air at 5:30 in the morning. I like passing the farmers on their bicycles yelling "Malakilaky!" (hurry up! go fast!) at me, their grins wide as can be. Maybe that's where this calm is coming from, the sensation of my mind clearing as I watch the sun break through the morning's rain clouds, over the hills and rice farms and following me for the rest of the day. We'll see if it lasts. |
This is stolen from llothe, but I'm not in the mood for another sort of update. It's based on my area, where they speak the dialect that is called "official," but could also be called the Imerina dialect.
O is pronounced like OO, as in "noodle"
E is pronounced as a long "a" sound, like in "ache."
OA is "ooh-aah" at the end of a word.
AO is "ow" by itself and "oh" in the middle of a word.
R is rolled lightly, Spanish style.
This language has no accents on its letters! Easy to type.
Basics:
Malagasy - gasy
I know a little Malagasy - Efa mahay teny gasy fa kely (kelikely fotsiny)
Welcome - Tonga soa!
Thanks - Misaotra
Yes - Eny, Eeeeyen (it's a noise)
No - Tsia, Eh-heh
Nice to meet you - Faly mahafantatra
Goodbye - Veloma
See you later - miandrapiahoan-o!
Hello - Manaohoana or Salama
Good - tsara
Very good - tsara be
Smart - mahay
Very tasty - matsiro (be)
Bathroom - kabone
What is this? - Inona ity?
Food - sakafo
Bread - mofo
Water - rano
Earth - tany
Moon - volana
Sun - masoandro (meaning "eye of the day")
Lightning - kotrokotroka
Numbers:
1 - iray
2 - roa
3 - telo
4 - efatra
5 - dimy
6 - enina
7 - fito
8 - valo
9 - sivy
10 - folo
11 - iraik'amby folo
12 - roa amby folo
20 - roapolo
30 - telopolo
40 - efapolo
50 - dimampolo
60 - eninpolo
70 - fitopolo
80 - valopolo
90 - sivyfolo
100 - zato
1,000 - arivo
10,000 - alina
100,000 - hetsy
264,576 - enina amby fitopolo sy dimanjato sy efatra arivo sy enina alina sy roa hetsy
264,576 Ariary (local currency) = about $132
Geography:
High ground - tanety
City - tanana
Countryside - amban'ny vohitra
Rice field - tanim-bary
Village - tanan'kely
Villagers - mponina
Woods - ala
Sea - ranomasina (Holy waters)
Colors:
Colored - lokoina
Red - mena
Yellow - mavomavo
Gold - volamena
Blue - manga
Green - maitso
Black - mainty
White - fotsy
Purple - volom'parasy (flea hair)
Orange - orange (French)
Brown - marron (French)
Grey - gris (French)
Pink - mavo kely (little yellow)
People:
Girl - vavy
Boy - lahy
Woman - vehivavy
Man - lehilahy
People - olona
Me - izaho
You - anao, ianao
Brother - anadahy (for a woman), rahalahy (for a man)
My Brother - anadahiko, rahlahiko
Nose - orona
Tongue - layla
Mouth - vava
Butt - vody
Animals:
Animal - biby
Snake - bibilava (long animal)
Crocodile - voay
Fish - trondro
Bird - vorona
Cat - piso, saka
Dog - alika
Pig - kisoa
Chicken - akoho
Duck - ganagana
Mosquito - moka
Other important phrases:
I'm not French, I'm American! - Tsy vazaha fa Amerikana!
I'm just looking - Mijerijery fotsiny
I don't want to buy any - Tsy te-hividy
I don't want to come into your store - Aoka aloha!Current Music: Deathcab for Cutie - Transatlantacism |
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Jan. 4th, 2006 @ 12:08 am
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Happy New Year!
I just got back from my two week vacation on Madagascar's coast. I and 20 other volunteers left Tana on the 20th for Mahajanga, a city on the northwest coast. I hired a minibus for everyone so we could at least be comfortable for the 12-hour trip. We traveled at night, so there wasn't much to see along the way, but I'm told that there's not much to see in the daylight, anyway. We all spent two days in the city, but after two sleepless nights the buggy, sauna-like conditions in our hotel, my friends and I decided to splurge on a place with air-conditioning, beach views, and a swimming pool. By splurge, I mean spending the equivalent of $13/night instead of $4/night. One night there was well worth it, and we felt well-rested before catching the boat from Mahajanga's port to the island of Nosy Be ("big island").
The trip by boat took 20 hours, hugging the coastline the whole way. Because of the heat, it was impossible to sleep unless you were able to stake out a place on the upstairs deck, outside in the sea breeze. By the end of the ride, I was sticky from the hot, humid, salty air and lost no time in getting to a beach and throwing myself into the ocean. For the first few days, a few girlfriends and I stayed at a beachfront hotel. There we met up with a young Swiss tourist, Martin, who was traveling alone and on a similarly tight budget. We went on two separate island-hopping excursions with him--he hired the guides, and having six of us along helped him afford it and get a good deal.
Our first trip was snorkeling at Nosy Tanikely (it means "tiny island"), taking a one-hour pirogue trip to get there. A pirogue is a wooden canoe with one outrigger and an outboard motor strapped to it. It was my first time snorkeling, and it was amazing. Even though I had a leaky mask that I rented from some guy who kept the gear in an old rice sack, I got to swim among beautiful corals and fish that I'd only seen before at Preuss or other aquariums. I saw sea urchins, a firefish (kinda like lionfish, I think), little orange fish hiding in anemones, and I could even hear the parrotfish chomping away underwater! I now want to learn how to scuba dive--I'm already hooked.
The other excursion was to Nosy Faly ("happy island"). We took a long taxi ride through groves of ylang-ylang trees, over the worst road I've seen yet, and ended up in a little fishing village surrounded by mangrove swamps. Little girls strolled through with trays of bananas for sale on their heads, singing "katakat-e, katakat-e!", the word for banana in the local Sakalava dialect. We packed up and took a 2-hour pirogue ride to that island, where we combed the beach for shells and swam. That night, we were treated to a dinner of roasted fish in coconut-curry sauce, mango salad, rice, and cold beers in front of a palm-frond bonfire on the beach. Some curious kids came to listen to us speaking English, and after some conversation in Malagasy, we had a sing-along, which lasted until their parents called the kids to bed. We sat on the sand and star-gazed and talked until the rainclouds rolled in and we had to run to our bamboo-walled, palm-thatched bungalow.
So after celebrating Christmas and New Year with my friends, far away from my town and my little house and garden, I'm back in Tana. I flew here, a trip that took 40 minutes, instead of over 32 hours. School starts next week, and I'll be teaching more adult classes sometime this month. I'm also going to be working with the local working professionals' union on renovating a community center and helping them plan what they want to do with it, and finding grants for the services they want it to provide. I may also be moving to a new house in a few months, because the dirt road to my site is getting paved. The new road means tearing down a lot of roadside houses and shops, including the ones surrounding my house. So, unless I want to live nearly IN the road, I'll have to move. It all depends on how big and wide this promised road really is. I'll let you know!
Hope everyone enjoyed their holidays. It really didn't feel like Christmas at all here! I need snow for it to be Christmas! Yes, I actually miss snow. And of course, I miss all of you at home, too.
Happy 2006! |
Christmas is coming up fast, and my first semester is over. Well, the first term is over. Or maybe it's the first two of five terms that have ended? I don't get it. But I had to do 180 report cards by hand in 2 days and I got it done, thanks to some horrible coffee. And then I got the hell out of dodge a week before school officially ended so I could go to a training event at the lovely Peace Corps retreat. It would have been great had I not contracted food poisoning, and had to knock myself out with a bunch of different medicines. At least it's OVER...I'm fine now, as I'm writing this, but I'm still groggy from all of the anti-nausea pills I had to take.
It's going to be Christmas, and with no family around, guess who's my family? That's right...Peace Corps Volunteers! You know, so many people in my town invited me to spend the holidays with them, and I'm still debating whether or not to spend New Years' at least among my Malagasy friends and co-workers, but it's just not the same. A Malagasy person can't understand what I'm missing about Christmas and being away from home, but other volunteers get it. I have the feeling that celebrating the "taom-baovao" in Andramasina is going to involve getting dragged from house to house, eating, for an entire day. At least that's how New Years' was described to me. I guess as long as these holidays don't turn out to be as crap as my Thanksgiving was, then I'll be fine.
The plan is to visit a tropical paradise off the coast for several days. That trip may also have to involve a lot of laying on the beach or wandering around wrapped in nothing but my lamba and giant awesome sunglasses, eating hot brochettes. Rumor has it that I live on an island, and I'll finally be able to see the ocean!
And I'm putting my hair back to the red color again. I was worried about what people in my town would think, but I don't care anymore. They all say my hair is "menamena" (red) anyway, so what's a difference of a few shades? It's my head! And I like it better red.Current Mood:  groggy Current Music: Tropical rain |
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Nov. 25th, 2005 @ 01:53 pm
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| Your Birthdate: October 4 | 
You have an extraordinary character - moral, responsible, and disciplined.
Your sincerely and honesty shine through in almost every situation.
Driven and focused, you rarely let your emotions get the better of you.
You're level headed and rational. People count on your to look at things objectively.
Your strength: Your unwavering loyalty and ethics
Your weakness: Your rock solid stubbornness
Your power color: Navy blue
Your power symbol: Shield
Your power month: April |
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It's been one month since I felt the warm, glowing embrace of technology...oh, wait. Uh, bad technology! Bad! Evil, thou! After a month of the same no-running-water, spotty electricity situation, I thought I would be more relived to come to the city. I'm not. Tana is hectic and smoggy outside of the bouganvillea-clad enclave of a neighborhood where Peace Corps has its offices. And this place is artificial, all about high walls and barbed wire and guarded gates.
I'm starting to prefer my town, my house, my things put away on shelves and my slippers by the bed and my dog waiting by the door, riveted by the suspense of wherever we might be headed today. And I much prefer running through the moonlit streets under a clear, starry sky with Aina and Vatsy to sitting crammed onto a taxi-be. It's strange to be propelled by nothing but my own feet for so long and then have to get everywhere by car. I'm just used to my town, that's all...comforted by its familiarity in a place you might think would be so alien. The thing is, where I live, it kinda looks like Oklahoma, except with rice paddies carved into it.
So far, I've just been teaching. It's a lot of repetition, but that's the only real difficulty I've had--repeating the same lesson 4 times in one day, and pacing around a classroom for eight hours. My feet get SOooO tired! Oh, and I had my birthday. I made a giant pot of chili and brought it over to my friend's house. We cooked up a big pot of rice to go with it and that altogether fed about a dozen people. Then afterwards, we made carrot ginger cake, with one important shortcut: instead of baking the batter, I added some more flour and we just fried it like doughnuts. It was a HUGE hit, and I've made it a few more times since.
And thanks for all the letters, cards, and presents...it was a very good birthday!Current Music: Zero 7 - Spinning |
...there's always a cat. I thought screaming cats just might, perhaps, hopefully not be here. But of course, there's a bunch of cats who fight and wail lustily outside my window at night. Aahhh. That and pigeons. I guess a lot of people raise them here, and they walk around town cooing and pecking the ground and staring into space.
Well, school hasn't started yet. It was supposed to be underway already, but there's a sudden influx of new students in the level I'm teaching, sixieme. I'll have over 200 students this year! It's just taking forever to register the kids, which has to be done by hand/broken typewriter. I don't know what they're going to do about classrooms, either--there are only three classrooms for four classes of sixieme. We'll see.
My house is beautiful! It's painted now, with light yellow walls and bright green shutters. I have curtains up inside, and new window-screens to keep out the spiders (more of them than mosquitos this time of year). I have a pepper bush, three rosebushes, and right now I have the beginning of an herb garden. I planted seeds in buckets last week and they're happily growing away already, and in a little while they'll go into my flower beds.
The other day I went swimming in the river. I wore an actual bathing suit in front of the villagers--crazy for most PCVs, but I can't say I'm all that self-conscious here. Anyway, it's not like I was skinny-dipping! I played on the sandy riverbank with Hanta's kids and we covered ourselves in sand flecked with mica. As I brushed myself off, the mica clung to my arms and legs and made me look glittery in the glaring sunshine off the water.
In another week or so, Hanta, her kids, and myself are going to be hiking out to another volunteer's site to visit her. It's about 4 hours away, and once I know the road I might take my dog Boo along and go see her on my own. The week after that a different volunteer (he lives out in the boondocks by the lake) is going to come visit and stay with me for the weekend. Other than that it's school and hanging out with townspeople, cooking and cleaning, letter-writing and a lot of thick novels.
Rehefa avy eo, daholo! (Later, everybody) |
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Mahay
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Aug. 30th, 2005 @ 08:03 am
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The capital can be an overwhelming place. The sheer quantity and constancy of pushing, shoving humanity, people waving goods in your face, haggling over something worth $1.50, or even $0.25 in America...it's a unique experience to me. And now that I can speak Malagasy, the fact that I'm a "vazaha" (white person) who is "mahay be teny Malagasy" (a good Malagasy speaker) shocks and stuns just about every Malagasy shopkeeper. I'm famous whenever I go shopping in the street markets, that "mahay be" phrase following me and my friends when we're out and about, spreading up and down the marketplace. It's a good thing to be mahay, and I don't mind the ego boost, or the shock value of Malagasy pouring out of my mouth instead of French.
The school year isn't starting until September 12th, and I'm biding my time until then, fixing up my house and chatting with some cool people in my town. Hanta, for instance, is a single mom who threw out her no-good-drunken-lazy husband and loves talking about how she doesn't need a man, or her sister Ravo, who is a female cop in a precinct (in the capital city, mind you) without the money for either guns or weapons training for their officers. People here continually amaze me with either their grit or generosity or both.
A side note: I'm thinking of raising ducks. Not joking. Everyone here keeps animals and I might as well give it a go. I'm willing to accept suggestions for names here!Current Mood:  inspired Current Music: wind howling outside |
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