My reed hut sits 3 meters from the ocean. Our complex (6 huts, a house, a mess hall and a small boat) is a 6 minute walk along the beach from the village of Ifaty. Except for those relatively few occasions when a funeral, marriage, seance or volleyball match send pulsing beats of bass, childish shouts of excitement, or high-pitched whistles and cheers, the village is out of earshot. Walking toward the village, the soft silence of our compound is overtaken by the energy and chaos of Ifaty.

Under the glossy sparkle of starlight the gentle waves flop morosely onto the shore. A light rumbling of voices and portable gas generators drifts in and out of the ear as the ocean`s breath inhales and exhales gently. Distant dogs ring out a low bassline accompaniment to the scattered and hurried beat of multiple speakers playing a multitude of music. The sweet and newbie flurry of children`s singing rises ahead ending in frustration and cheers. A passing man violently interrupts your thoughts with an exasperated `Bonjour Vazaha!` A bleating goat pulls you back into concentration as you pass a crackling fire and snapping sail whipped around by an excited gust. A gush of laughter whooshes around you as children grab at your hand screaming `Soni, Soni, Soni!`

 
<<Tonga Zaho>> I've arrived. This is Ifaty.

Hello all. I`m back in Toliara for a bit. I came in yesterday and I go back tomorrow. I`ve had 2 steaks and 2 ice creams and several showers with running water. Life is good.

I thought I`d use this post to explain exactly what I`m doing here since I was a little sketchy on the details before I left.

 I work for an NGO called, Reef Doctor. We are a tiny NGO that works only in the Bay of Ranobe here in Madagascar. Our main objective is to organize a community resource management scheme for the entirety of the Bay in order to preserve the reef system and therefore the lives and livelihoods of the people who leave there. The first step toward this goal was reached last year with the formalization of a traditionally protected piece of coral known as `The Rose Garden`. Reef doctor worked with the local community, local officials and the national government in order to put in place the first officially (legally) recognized community managed Marine Protected Area (MPA) in Madagascar. From here the goal is to use the legal framework already developed to create several more MPA`s in the bay as well as to set up rotational fishing areas (where fishing is closed for months at a time) in order to relieve fishing pressure on sensitive areas during breeding times.

Secondary to this main project, Reef Doctor does marine research and runs environmental education and community development programs. My primary task is to help organize the education and development programs. To this effect I will be taking over coordination responsibilities for the local women`s group that we helped organize, the sunday kids club where we teach kids about the environment and also get them out of there normal work chores for a bit of fun. Additionally, I am working to further develop the Pirougers club which is an association of local guides who take tourists out snorkeling on the reef. Also, I`m going to be working with the local primary schools to introduce a new environmental education program and also a weekly art class.

So there. That`s what I`m doing. So far I`ve found the villagers to be friendly, open to new ideas, and very receptive to our ideas. It`s going to be a busy year, but one that I know will be highly rewarding and meaningful. Life is good. 

I'm not quite sure how it happened, but I appear to be back in Madagascar. Perhaps I never really left, but just had a particularly vivid malaria-induced dream about going back to America-land, sleeping until noon, eating chubby food, and driving around in a Ford Taurus wagon. That seems most likely.

 It smells like Madagascar. Dust, diesel fuel, rotting vegetables, bananas, baking bread, charcoal briquettes, sweat, cows, and cheap perfume. It also smells of hot, like I can smell the sunshine. Maybe it's only the smell of my skin tanning.

Walking down the street is an activity worthy of strong concentration. No leisurely strolling allowed. Dodge the car, step around the muck, watch out for the approaching rickshaw, "who's that following me?," "where's the hardware store?" "what's that guy saying to me?" "tell the painted lady to go away," watch out for the car! "that's a particularly offensive smell," "that girl is cute!" "no thanks, I rather don't need half-rotten bananas or coat hangers, maybe next time," "sorry, beggar, no money here"

Note to readers:

I ask two things of you now. You must remember two places. Toliara and Ifaty. I can't explain them in every post, so don't forget them. Here they are:

Toliara: My banking town. The place where I do all business that I can't do in Ifaty, my village. Toliara is the second largest city in Madagascar. 400,000 people. It is hot and dusty and full of charm, hotels, slums, ox-carts, and great and not-so great restaurants. It is the only place where I have internet access. Hence, I am here right now.

 Ifaty- My village. Located 25Km north of Toliara. There are 3 fancy hotels nearby and 7 or so fancy hotels sort-of nearby. The village is located on the Bay of Ranobe. This is the lagoon / reef system which Reef Doctor (my new employer) is aiming to protect / conserve / slow the destruction of. Ifaty is quite a bit bigger than my village from my Peace Corps days (that village was called, Antsanitia as my frequent readers may remember). Ifaty has 1000- 1200 people. It has 2.5 bars. It doesn't, of course have electricity, running water, or fabulous cell phone reception. Actually, it doesn't even have fresh water. The girls and women fetch water (in buckets on their heads) from a source some 2 kilometers away. It can also be purchased from a rich villager who trucks it in from Toliara.

So those are the future settings for the play. Remember them. For now I've got to run. I'm back to Ifaty for another week or so. I'll write again then.

Farewell,

Shawn 

I woke up very early to the sweet sound of my dear friend, Monesa, whispering to me from the other side of my hut's wooden slats. "Wake up Soana, the sun is coming."

 "Yes, sister, I'm getting up now."

 A few moments later, she's at my side as I start up my gas stove and put on a sweatshirt. It's dusty from disuse. I rub my eyes and ask her to hand me the eggs. "You haven't any eggs, of course." She says with a smile and hurries back to her hut to fetch some from underneath the still sleeping ducks.

The goat tied up outside my house bleats as she comes back in. "I hope that one goat and 2 chickens will be enough food," I say.

"It's enough, Soana."

"If I bought a turkey too, would that be good?"

"It won't go uneaten."

"So it's a good idea?"

"There will be enough to eat."

"Ok, I'll trust you."

"Thank you, Soana."

As I sit down to eat my 3 fried duck eggs. The yokes are bright orange and gigantic compared with chicken eggs. I bite in. They taste roughly like chicken eggs, only with a stronger yokie aftertaste. They need lots of salt.

Monesa's baby waddles in the door. Her name is Ziena. She is my favorite person in Madagascar. She is adorable, sneaky, clever, quiet, and has a veracious apatite for a 3 year old. She has a special little buddah belly. Everyone in the village is rewarding her cuteness with extra rice cakes and fried bread. I pull her up on my lap and give her the last of my eggs.

"She's going to miss you, Soana."

"Really? Will she remember me? She's so little!"

"She'll remember you, I think."

"Ziena, listen to me really well. I'm going to tell you something very big and important. I'm going away tomorrow. I'm going home to the land of my ancestors. I won't be here in this hut anymore. However, I promise to come back and see you. I don't know when. Maybe a long, long time. But, I'll come back. And here's what you have to do. You have to remember me. Don't forget me oh! Don't run up to every tall white man you see, yelling, 'Soana, Soana!' No. Remember me and don't be confused. I will miss you, mon cheri. Don't forget!" My voice cracks as bit as I choke back some tears.

Ziena looks over to her mother and then starts to cry furiously. I pull her into my arms and rub her back. "It's ok, cheri. I'll be back. Don't be sad." She's asleep in a few minutes.

I hand her over to her mother so that she can put her back to sleep in her house. When she comes back I say, "Oiy, aiy, I didn't really think she could understand me. She doesn't talk much yet."

"She understands enough. Now, come. Who do you expect to cook all this food today?

"All of us?"

"Yes, yes, of course. now let's go get everybody out of bed." 

For Christmas this year Santa sent my part of the island a class 1 tropical cyclone (category 1 hurricane). Amazingly, I saw zero preparation for the storm in Majunga. No one put sandbags on their roofs, boarded up windows, or fortified weak structures. Although the hurricane warnings had been on the radio for more than a week, no one seemed to believe them or take any heed. I asked a homeless woman in the street where she was going for the cyclone, with a perfectly calm, if not defiant face, she said, "There's a cyclone? Gimme some money."

In preparation for the immanent doom, I took shelter in an ocean view hotel with 10 other volunteers (it was the cheapest one with AC, right next to the night club, and there were only rumors of a cyclone when I made the reservation, plus- it kinda seemed sturdy). Being the total professionals that we Peace Corps Volunteers are, we stocked up the absolute essentials- water, and beer. I mean, we aren't stupid... what if theepiceries closed down for a day?

At 7 AM, as the storm began to make landfall, we headed down to the beach to work on our suntans. There we met up with the "brochette" saleswoman we had arranged with from night before to make us breakfast brochettes. A brochette is a long thin stick with 2 small chunks of grilled beef and 1 chunk of grilled fat. No, it's not normally breakfast food. After exchanging Christmasgreetings, we sat down and ordered up 200 brochettes while taking cover under a sheet metal awning. Stella (the brochette saleswoman) and us, quickly became great friends. She cooked us up hundreds of brochettes, attempted to join in on ourChristmas caroling and even joined us for a few rounds of beer.

Our cozy Christmas morning, got all the more merrier when the Chief de Destrict (equivalent to a deputy Mayor) came passing through. We invited him for a beer and he stayed with us for the next few hours. He was a very serious, polite, older gentleman.... until the beer got to him. Pretty soon he's joining in theChristmas caroling, calling out toasts like a champ and demanding my friends hat as a cadeaut . My friend happened to be very attached to his hat and so things turned a little ugly. After 15 minutes of intense discussion, (meanwhile,btw, there's a friggin hurricane pounding us with rain and wind) we are saved from a major altercation and international political incident when my friend's girlfriend (who'sgasy) stands up and reads him the riot act in french (french is the language of STFU in this country). In the end, he stole a pack of cigarettes from my friend and quietly stumbled off.

At around 12, when trees started to blow over and Stella's awning was threatening to blew away, we decided to make a run for it back to the hotel. We arrived safely, though slightly damp. Over the next several hours we waited out the storm in our rooms playing poker and speculating on whether or not those of us who live nearby on the coast would still have houses come morning. At some point, the roof of the night-club adjoining our hotel loses its roof in one fantastic screeching crash. Gigantic pieces of corrugated sheet metal lifted off and rained down on the street in front of our hotel. Shortly thereafter, A large wooden TVantenna came down in the courtyard of our hotel and the small gasy food stand across the street completely blew away. Overall though, the storm was really not all that strong, but when no one makes any preparations for an approaching hurricane, things get f*ed up.

At around 9pm, we discovered that we had forgotten to stock up on food and we're hungry. As the storm began letting up. my friend Nate and I decided to make a break for the "Bizary" where food was rumored to be found. (PS, by this time the beer has been long gone and we are no longer intoxicated in any way) While trying to cross over the roofing debris from the nightclub and the destroyed food stand, I slipped. I fell very hard, stubbed my toe and sliced open my hand on a huge piece of timber. Strangely, I at first was only conscious of stubbing my toe. I grabbed hold of my friend's shirt and as I hopped around on one foot, my friend notices that I'm bleeding everywhere. We walked back to the hotel where I sit down on the floor. Everyone is a bit freaked out as I am sitting, then lying on the floor next to a small puddle of blood. I keep trying to tell them not to worry, I just stubbed my toe and got a little paper cut. Then I take a good look at my hand, see the gash and instantly feel dizzy. The gash runs about two inches from the inside of my right pinkie vertically down my palm to the outside of my hand. The cut is deep into the meat of my hand, but luckily, it missed all my arteries and tendons. My friend's brother who is a hardcore "hot shot" forest firefighter, administers some professional first aid and I easily wait out the next 12 hours before the streets are cleared so that I can get to the hospital.

The next morning I nervously head over to the best hospital this 3rd world provincial capital has to offer. The doctor's assistant viciously rips off the dressing from the night before and after only an hour wait with my gaping wound staring me in the face, the doctor shows up. He immediately cleans out the wound (ouch!) and gets ready to put in 4 stitches with what seems to me to be an excessively large sewing needle and some fishing wire (although I'm sure it wasn't). I asked if they had any pain dulling spray or maybe an anesthetic shot or a Tylenol or anything. He looks at me like I just asked him for a lolly-pop and hug. Needless to say, I cried out like a little girl who's favorite dolly just got microwaved.

So that was my Christmas. Overall, it was a great time. Next year however, I'd prefer a white Christmas among friends and family.

PS- It's been 10 days and I just had the stitches removed. No problems- I appear to be healing nicely. GG