Compartmentalization

Well, according to Wikipedia, which is the source for all that is good and right, compartmentalization is defined as this:

Compartmentalizing is the act of splitting an idea or concept up into (sometimes more or less arbitrary) parts, and trying to enforce thought processes which are inhibiting attempts to allow these parts to mix together again. This process is performed in an attempt to simplify things, and to defend against anxiety...compartmentalizing experiences prevents conflict stemming from the incompatibility of the two polarized aspects of self or other'. Often, 'when the individual is confronted with the contradictions in behavior, thought, or affect, he/she regards the differences with bland denial or indifference'.

^{And now that I haven't ascended into heaven or been raptured or died from some foreign disease that's incompatible with life in the United States, I decided the time has come to finish up this blog and give it some closure.}

^{So why have I named my closing post compartmentalization? Because I kind of feel like I never left. Coming back has been weird in the sense that it hasn't been weird at all.} 

^{I guess my culture shock, if there was any, took the form of materialism and in the first three days I was back, I managed to spend the equivalent of a month's allowance in Madagascar, found myself in a nail salon for 3 hours for like the second time in my life, and have been really confused about why people want to see me because I don't really feel like any time has passed.} 

^{So as I type this with strange acrylic pink nails, that are not my own and should not be on any part of my body, I can't really think of anything concrete to say about concluding Madagascar. When I think about the experience, it kind of comes back like the memory of a dream, a little fuzzy and more like an emotion or feeling than a tangible thing that happened. This is why I've started off with the spiel about compartmentalization... I don't know how to reconcile there and here because living there feels like a completely different life, with different people and different challenges.} 

^{Sometimes little things will happen that will flash me back there, like this morning when I had to clean out a vase at work and a centipede ran out of it into the sink. I was struck with a vivid flashback to the night that a malicious centipede bit me on the arm and it was the most painful bite I've ever received, making my arm feel like it was on fire for about 10 hours. And now, I'm back here with this new and intense fear of centipedes that is hard for me to understand unless I allow the two worlds to merge... which I haven't.}

^{I wonder if in the future things will mesh together better, or if Madagascar will become one of those things I did that I don't remember until someone reminds me. I know that might sound silly, but if out of the blue you ask me if I've been to Greece, my first reaction is always no ...even though I was there for 5 weeks. I never brought it back to my life here and now it just sits in a weird place in my head that I don't think about. How do you make something real and integrated into your life, when it has nothing to do with the reality that you know?} 

^{So that's where I'm at... 99 entries later and I feel like I never left and this blog and some pictures on my computer are the only remnants of my trip. Maybe that's a bit dramatic. I know there's 16 other people who are now scattered around the country who could prove to me that I went to Madagascar and what we did was real... but they're not here and I'm back to life as I knew it. This bothers me and I feel kind of hollow about it. But for the time being when I get that inevitable question that I hate oh so very much, I'm sticking with my vague and nothingness response of "It was awesome, I'm really glad I went." So, for the love of God, please, do not ask me this question. Go with something specific. Literally, ANYTHING, that is not "How was Madagascar?" Ok that's all. How could I close out my blog without a mini rant?}

^{For now, I'm just staying on the surface, going through the motions, and taking my time to figure things out.}

^{That's all I've got for now. Somewhere down the line, maybe a month, a couple months, a year, I'll conclude this with the 100th and hopefully have something a little more... Tangible? Coherent? Optimistic?  Who knows. Until then... thanks for reading :)}

Paris

Paris has been strange. I feel like it's a good middle ground from Madagascar to the United States, but it has still felt funny and weird. Because I don't have the energy to write out a long one of these due to, what I believe is a parasite I've named Marques living in my intestines, here's a couple quick thoughts on the experience so far.

Like typical girls in Paris, we've spent more money on clothes than food and have compensated for the high European prices by splitting everything, only eating baguettes and street-side crepes and living in grungy backpacker world.

Yesterday, at the Eiffel Tower, a man jumped to his death 50 feet from where we were standing. It was shocking and sad. After much ethical debating, we decided we would still ascend the tower. It was beautiful, but still sad.

Our hostel is so typical European college backpacker. Everyone speaks English. No one is over 30. People roller blade out of here. It's never quiet. We're locked out from 12-4 because of "cleaning." The shower is a harsh and unpleasant experience. We're living in a room with 4 other people, bunk bed style. They don't provide sheets. There's only one key for the entire room.
...the funny thing is every part of it is nicer than anywhere I stayed in Madagascar.

We've managed to see all of the quintessential Parisian sights in three days, thanks to Rick Steve and are leaving for Amsterdam in the morning.

I have been sick the entire time and become an whiny and discontented child after 8 PM. I found an anti-parasitic at my 4th pharmacy today and will be taking that soon... here's hoping the situation improves.

Paris is beautiful in the spring, but the entire world and their mother is/are (grammar quandary!) here too.

Ramble, Process Time

I have a feeling that the next couple of entries are going to be messy rambles that don’t have points and are serving the purpose of allowing me to process. I believe in the idea that you have to leave a place to really understand how you feel about it and what it has done to you. Distance is good. So as I sit here in time zone limbo, sick as a dog, I being the processing.

I’m going to use one of my favorite journal strategies to get the ball rolling. I call it the two-minute blitz. I think of a topic and then I have two minutes to write about it. No filtering. No over-thinking. Here we goooo:

1.       Learning Malagasy – I feel very disappointed in myself and frustrated that I didn’t put more of an effort to learn the local language. I acquired some basic phrases, some expressions I thought were funny and then I stopped. I gave up. I spoke French or I didn’t speak at all. I think I feel most guilty about this in the village. I know I had rough circumstances, but the more time I put between myself and that experience, the more I realize how I mentally shut off around day 4 and just…quit. I’m not a quitter but I just quit. This is hard to accept. 2 minutes!

2.       The Food – It’s funny how quickly a lot of us adjusted to eating the typical foods here. Even after bitching about the amount of rice that people ate and the lack of nutritional diversity in their meals, I still found myself order plates that come with rice when I had an option. I currently feel weird about the thought of returning to an American diet. I am ready to never eat meat again. I have eaten my quota of zebu (a cow with a funny hump) for my entire life. Give me tofu. Give me raw vegetables. But maybe also give me some rice… Two!

3.       Doing Research – This one kind of connects to just what I want to do in life. Before coming here, I thought I probably wanted to teach at the college level. I thought I probably wanted to do research. And now I feel like I’ve gone through a tailspin. I didn’t really enjoy my month of Independent Study Project and after being with a group of unorthodox people who are most likely not going to take traditional life paths, I’m realizing that maybe it’s totally OK for me to do that too. Unfortunately, this opens up a mess of possibilities and I feel confused and overwhelmed about the future.

4.       Being Sick – Not to sound like an exaggerator, but I was actually sick for about 80% of the program. Sometimes it was just indigestion and other times it was food poisoning accompanied by other fun surprises like parasites or sun poisoning or hair loss and other things that I’m not even telling you about. I’ve lost faith in Malagasy hospitals and doctors. I just want to feel normal again. I want to not constantly feel worn down and ill. It sucks and severely impacted my perception of Madagascar. Oops 2:10.

5.       The group – I can’t begin to explain my feelings about this one in two minutes because this might have been the most impactful part of my experience, which is funny because it has nothing to directly do with Madagascar. But after spending 4 months with people who were turned out exactly like everyone expected, “Michelle, who goes to Madagascar? I kind of think you’re going to be with a bunch of people who are… who are just like you. That’s going to be really interesting and really weird.” And it was. It was the first time in my life I’ve ever fit into a group and as much as I found a niche at Villanova and other places, sometimes I felt out of place and it’s awesome to know that there’s people out there that I just didn’t know existed. I’m the most sad to leave them.

6.       Study Abroad – I recently had the thought that yes, I will be leaving Madagascar and it will be end of a chapter of my life, but then I realized that this is bigger than I realized. For two and a half years I’ve thought about study abroad. Everyone who goes abroad has their study abroad experiences and it’s something I’ve looked forward to doing. But now it’s over and I have no idea how the time passed so quickly. It’s weird to think… study abroad is over. Not just Madagascar, but something that I’ve been hyping in my mind for years is forever over. I can never do that again, under the same circumstances. And it was everything that I wanted it to be, I would never do anything differently. So that’s awesome.

7.       Madagascar – I’m really nervous to go back to the United States because of the question “How was it?” If you ask me this vague and meaningless question, I will probably give a dead face look until you feel uncomfortable and talk about something else. But really, I don’t even know where to begin with describing this experience. I don’t want to just remember the “crazy” things or being sick or eating rice because it was so much more than that. It’s hard for me to think about the fact that most of the people I’m going to meet in my life will have no foundation or base with Madagascar. It’s like always starting from zero with this place. I can’t just drop that into a conversation without always getting a weird look. And now it’s this huge part of my life that feels fady (taboo) to talk about.

8.       Lemurs – On a lighter note, lemurs. Lemurs are like, cool… but they’re also just kind of like monkeys that are native to Madagascar. I think it’s kind of silly when people only think of lemurs when they hear Madagascar, but I suppose that’s more a product of shitty publicity and poor international media about Madagascar, which I’m not saying is a shocking or surprising because this place is small, corrupt and in the middle of nowhere. It’s not even really Africa. It’s kind of like Asia… but not. I still love it. But yeah, lemurs, kind of cool, not at all descriptive of Madagascar.

9.       Hygiene – I kind of…….forget what “normal” hygiene standards are. I think I might have taken the prize for that in the group… which is “gross” but also, it just doesn’t matter here. As you might have noticed from what is currently my profile picture, my lack of hygiene climaxed in me traveling home from Sainte Marie looking like a mix between Ke$ha and a gypsy. But who really cares? Also, sometimes I think about this blog and people’s perception of me… I’m am like the opposite of datable. Soo, sooo un-datable and slightly repulsive. Mmmmmmmm, call me!

10.   The window seat on an airplane – WAH. The men sitting next to me are both asleep and have not gotten up to go to the bathroom on their own, once. This makes me the annoying American who’s muttering in French to them and carrying my bag of vomit past them as I classily walk to the bathroom. PUT ME ON AN AISLE. I will never make this seating choice mistake again. I hate sleeping plane men. I’m so unhappy on this flight.

11.   Norms – This one is kind of like the hygiene post, but external. I have gotten used to SO MANY THINGS because of this damn country. I ignore the cockroaches in the shower, only glance occasionally at the half dollar sized spider in the corner of my room, can sit on Taxi-Brousses without much complaint for 20 hours, don’t really think much of bedbugs, am confused when bathrooms have toilet paper, a seat and an actual toilet (where did these come from!?), automatically walk with one hand over my bag to avoid pick pockets, anticipate that hotel staff will go through my stuff (occasionally take pictures of their penises) and maybe steal stuff or maybe not, hand-washing my clothes is expected, I’ll eat bread that has been covered in flies, I scoop around the ants in the jelly jar, and why would you do anything but shower with cold bucket water? I went over 2 minutes. Gotta stop there.

I feel good about that processing sesh. Hope it wasn’t too jumbled. I’m sleepy and am going to try to sleep like my sleeping plane men who never move because they’re not throwing up every hour or don’t probably have little baby worms living in their intestines. In the Reunion airport CC and I decided my nickname could be: Hotely Biby Kely (translates to : Hotely – Malagasy hotel or eating establishment, Biby – insect, Kely – little, therefore Biby Kely – means little insect, and can be used to describe parasites and I am a hotel or eating establishment for them, hence, Hotely Biby Kely) Yeah that’s really gross. Me and my new puppy will have so much in common, as he was recently de-wormed as well. BEST FRIENDS.

Madagascar’s Farewell

It wouldn’t have been a proper goodbye between me and my study abroad experience if I had left in good health. No, no, instead, Madagascar waited. It waited until I had physically left the country and then it attacked.

In the beginning of my 4 hour layover which proceeded an 11 hour flight, I said hello to another round of food poisoning or maybe worms or some sort of mysterious stomach bug. With Madagascar… it could really be a lot of things. The kind of stomach bug that makes me vomit every two hours. The kind stomach bug that wants to come out of every orifice I have whenever it says so.

So here I am, sitting in my airplane, in the window seat, wishing desperately that I was in an aisle, when of course, in the way that fate likes to work, an adorable Reunionain sits next to me.

Attractive men never sit next to me on planes! They don’t! But no, on the plane ride where I’m about to be throwing up into bags for 11 hours, Laurence takes his seat. We chat and then I awkwardly drop of the conversation to build a vomit fort.

And now we’re 3 hours in and the situation has only gotten worse. I’ve constructed a small tent with my airplane blanket and have been ducking into it and throwing up into a Ziploc bag. Unfortunately the bag is nearly full (of pretty much only water and stomach bile or whatever is still left in me, so it’s not that gross) so now I’m going to have to smuggle this bag of vomit to the bathroom where I’ll be rinsing it out and reusing it.

I am so unhappy.

And that’s where I’m at… possibly the lowest point of my study abroad experience and now I have to truck through a week of Paris before seeing my doctor. I want to cry, crawl in a hole and never eat again. Help.

[7 hours later…]

I’m hopeful that the vomiting has stopped, but it’s hard to be certain. So far the count is at 7. I have now added to the list of life happenings: Using an airline barf bag, using a Ziploc bag as a vomit bag, cleaning out a Ziploc bag in an airplane bathroom and mastering the art of silent puking. Yay! (That was the most sarcastic “yay” I’ve ever written by the way.) I am at one of my most miserable states in life.

Somewhere in the middle of the flight, I got so desperate that I tried to call my mom with an airplane phone. It was bad when I read the line that said “10 dollars a minute” and thought… yeah it’s worth it. 10 dollars! That’s 20,000 Ariary! More money than you need to feed yourself for a couple days in Madagascar. I’m feeling a bit heartbroken to have left. It’s starting to set in… even when I know that because of Madagascar, I’m throwing up my entire life into bags in the window seat, I still miss it horribly. That might be grounds for an abusive relationship.

I can’t stop drinking water. I’m so thirsty, but it makes me throw up. But I keep drinking it… trying to pace myself with little baby sips and then the part of me that hates self-control and moderation tips the entire cup down my throat and it’s gone. Commence cycle of stomach pains, nausea and vomiting.

This is happened seven times. I want to cry.

I am not happy. Tsy faly.

PS. The vomiting appears to have stopped! J I am significantly less miserable, but still mal au ventre. Wah. 

I actually left…

Stress, stress. Panic, panic.

We’re sitting on the runway. We’re waiting. We’re leaving.

When did we get to this point? Where did study abroad go?

I feel a little bit overwhelmed, but mostly dead and emotionless. It’s not hitting me. I’m not processing what it means to leave. All I know is that I have a sad feeling somewhere and I’m not sure what to expect when I get somewhere else.

[shut off computer for take off]

Whenever I’m on planes going somewhere, I have this weird habit of thinking about the plane ride home. I imagine it in vivid detail, what it will be like, what I will be wearing, the feeling of seating in these seats again. It’s the one thing that I can know at that point, so I think about how, in X amount of days I’m going to be on a plane again, things will have happened, I will feel something towards what is currently an unknown and time will have passed. I know that this isn’t the most productive or beneficial habit because it just causes me to live in the future and miss things going on in the present. But I still do it and I still find it really weird when I really am on that return plane.

But here I am. Sitting in seat 7A next to two old French men, who from the looks of it, didn’t enjoy their plane food. I thought it was phenomenal, partly because I’ve been eating rice and loka (anything that’s not rice) for 4 months, but also because that food was just good. But, as I’m sitting on the return plane, I’m…. I’m… confused? Emotionless? Processing? Nothing really. I’m just functioning on a very shallow level. A level  that doesn’t include thinking beyond “this food is good” “these seats are SO comfortable” “there’s cheese in the meal!” No comparisons. No analyzing. No deeper thought. Maybe I’m hoping that the crazy turbulence happening right now will only result in minor typos and not death.

This entry really isn’t saying much… but it’s all I’m capable of saying about the feeling of leaving Madagascar. I don’t know.. I’m upset. But for a lot of reasons that are beyond the physical leaving of this crazy, crazy country. I’m afraid of coming home.

Pictures with Geese

This one doesn’t really need a description… sometimes I see weird photo opportunities and force people to play along. Today’s theme was “Take a picture with the angry geese!”

We also like to pretend like we’re vampires with high collars…

And pirates at a pirate cemetery…

(I openly acknowledge that I am just gorgeous in both of these pictures)

And fall asleep like small children on boats.

And we do lots of other things, but I’m leaving it with that for now. 

Coral: 3 Michelle: 0

Throughout our time in Madagascar, I have been made fun of for my unfortunate health and occasional bad luck in Madagascar by the rest of the group. I’m in the process of making a final list of Madagascar vs. Michelle (let me spoil the surprise and tell you that Madagascar wins by a landslide, but I did what I could) but this game can also be applied to small scale occurrences. This is the Coral vs. Michelle battle. Watch:

[a1] In a snorkeling mishap I found myself trapped in shallow water surrounded by coral and sea urchins. I don’t want to sound like a total whiner… but it was rather traumatic and I threw a petit pity party when I got back to shore. But still… 3 days later I have these blistering bumps on my knee that look like a disgusting contagious disease. No, no, I just tumbled onto some burning coral. AND IT ITCHES. Coral: 1

Sliced my toe on coral… it just really hurt. Coral: 2

And cut a little baby hole in the bottom of my foot from the traumatic shallow water incident, that will only be refered as that for the rest of time. This was unbelievably inconvenient for walking around the dirtiest city in the world. Oh, and it hurts like a bitch. Coral: 3

I can only hope that like some corals, this one instantly died after assaulting me. Sorry, I’m usually pro-environment… but this guy was just malicious. Maybe Michelle: 1, maybe.

A few pictures

I have some crummy internet, so here's a few pictures from Saint Marie. I might post again before leaving... but with 1 day, 19 hours and 19 minutes I'm feeling a little panicked about the thought of leaving this place so I don't know if I'll be spending that time online. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Saint Marie

I'm flying to Saint Marie this afternoon with the entire group. It's an end of the semester vacation.

Saint Marie looks like this... It's going to be awesome. Fucking awesome.

But, I'm not bringing my computer and will just be posting a bunch of entries when I get back, so again, hang tight, go see some sunlight, I'll be back on Wednesday.

And then leaving Madagascar on Thursday. This thought is equal parts terrifying, wonderful and so sad. More later. Byeeeeeee

The Dick

There is a picture of a penis on my second camera. The camera I don't ever use, that sits at the bottom of my bag.

The picture was taken on April 28th around 1:45 PM. I know this because my camera records the time and date of pictures taken.

After careful consideration, we have placed my location to be having lunch at my friends apartment, 5 minutes down the road. The camera was in the bottom of my bag. This leaves us with the following scenario.

On April 28th, someone with access to my room, aka the hotel staff, snuck into my room, rummaged through my backpack, took NOTHING, and then picked up my orange little camera and took a picture of their dick. AND THEN THEY PUT THE CAMERA BACK IN MY BAG.

This actually is the weirdest thing to happen to me in Madagascar.

I can only speculate who the dick belongs to and will never know because it happened in Morondava.

So there, that is my life.

MIA

I haven't written in so long! But I'm busy and have been writing my silly 40 page paper. It's done now. Maybe I'll post sometime soon, but with less than a week left in the country, there's lots to do!

TSY METY ISP!

Tsy Mety = Not Okay

Unfortunately with the rapidly approaching deadline of my Independent Study Project (ISP), which is accompanied by a 40 page paper, I'm a little pressed for time to blog.

I'm currently living in Morondava which is on the west coast of Madagascar, a little bit south of Mahajunga (the town I was living in with my host family and Bruno). Morondava is beautiful in an entirely different way than Fort Dauphin and I really like it. It's completely flat, dry and beachy. It doesn't rain, which is quite the change from FD and there's palm trees and baobabs everywhere. It's kind of what I pictured Madagascar to be before coming here.

The town is ripe with distractions for ISP including an enormous stretch of empty beach right outside of my hotel, a bunch of good restaurants, ice cream that almost tastes like US ice cream, and of course my good friends from the program are living here as well, so my ISP isn't moving as quickly as I'd like it to be.

So, having said that, here's some pictures thrown on the blog and I'll update you when I get back to Tana, have fast internet, and am hopefully printing out the 40 pages of this miserable, miserable paper. This will be on Monday or Tuesday, so don't lose sleep over my brief disappearance.

I'll see you 40 pages, one botched time log, 20 hours on a Taxi Brousse, 3 days of tanning and a bunch of Dan Savage & How Stuff Works podcasts later.

Until then!

Pictures from the Avenue of the Baobabs that I took with C.
It was awesome. I loved loved loved it. It was probably one of my favorite things I've seen here.

Me, as a baobab tree

so0o0o study abroad
(I made C take this)

Being an upside down tree...

BABY GOATS

Baobabs at sunset

Just some cows
Photo by C

The Avenue of the Baobabs

THE AVENUE OF THE BAOBABS WAS SO COOL.


I have pictures.. and I'll post them later, but for now, all I'll say is, IT WAS AWESOME.

Here's one for now.

A Very Madagascar Travel Experience

I wake up at 4:00 wondering what exactly was biting my legs last night. The mystery remains unsolved. I walk over to my computer, WiFi’s back! I forget that it’s not 4:00 AM in the states so I’m surprised when someone messages me. I look over at my leftover pizza from last night, yes, I somehow managed to find a take-out place here. And I debate eating it until a cockroach runs across my foot. That though bubble popped rather quickly.  I’ll just stick to the Easter candy I’m bringing my Morondava friends. I chew on some gummy fruit rings.

I look up at the twisted and deformed 10 inch chocolate Easter bunny sitting on the desk, who melted, shortly after being purchased, in the Taxi yesterday and now looks like something out of Donnie Darko. You ready to go Frank? Alrighty, On y va.

I walk down the stairs of my castle-esque hotel and spot a man at reception. I tell him I’d like to pay and he seems very flustered. He keeps looking up and smiling while writing up my receipt. I really just do not like the men in this country. Maybe if I start wearing a mustache or something they’ll treat me normally. He hands me a receipt for 60 Euro and I hand him my card.

“Oh… We no.. take card”

You’re charging me 60 Euros a night and you don’t have a credit machine? WHAT IS THIS COUNTRY?

I should have figured. Welcome to Madagascar. We stare at each other for a moment, both equally confused about what to do. He picks up the phone and calls his boss, who was most definitely sleeping. And then he pushes the phone at me. Great! I love talking on the phone in French with sleepy people.

The boss and I decide that I will find an ATM at the airport and pay the chauffeur 172,000 Ariary (the equivalent of 60 Euros). Doing the math of what this is in dollars reminds me of how much it still sucks in comparison to the Euro…but that’s falling too, say hey, maybe one day. Preferably before I’m there on the 12^th of May… what do you say EU?

A Japanese girl walks downstairs. She is also going to Morondava. The man at the reception tells me to talk to her… ok? I try to ask her why she’s going to Morondava and quickly realize that her English is about as good as my Spanish. Estoy enojado porque tu tomaste mi trough! (We didn’t know the Spanish word for “trough” at the worksite) And that’s all I’ve got. I’m a little shocked that she’s traveling around Madagascar alone only speaking Japanese…but whatever works for you I guess.

We get to the airport and the chauffeur points me down a long hallway, which I’m assuming will end in an ATM. The hallway pops up in the International Departures section. SUCH A TEASE. I watch all of these Europeans prepare to go home as I pull 200,000 Ariary from the ATM. I feel a little bitter and jealous towards them. On my way back, I find the chauffeur who had come looking for me. I guess I took too long?

I count out my money and of course he doesn’t have change to break a 5,000 Ariary so I’m digging through my bag, looking for 100 Ariary notes to add up to 2,000.

I wait in line to check in for 35 minutes because the computers are all down and they’re hand writing all of the tickets.

Of course… this is Madagascar after all.

I finally get to the desk and the man is flying through the writing of my luggage tag. Oh my stuff is totally getting lost.

I overhear the French people yelling next to me. They’re saying “Neuf heure et quarante-cinq ! Mais Pourqoui ? » (9:45 AM ! But why ?) I grow slightly concerned because they’re on my flight… but I decide not to ask.

I’m sitting in the waiting area when suddenly someone says something on the intercom and everyone is hustling, if not running, to the front of the waiting area. It’s chaos. Why are people running? I probably shouldn’t be listening to my iPod when traveling alone… Hmm. I overhear some blond girls speaking English and start talking to them.

“So… is this the ‘line’ for Morondava?”

“Yeah, we’re trying to figure that out too. We have no idea, this is crazy. Where are you from”

…we have that whole conversation. Blah blah blah.

And then I’m in a small cluster of Americans who are going to Morondava. How did I get here? This squat woman is then pushing my backpack whispering “Go! Go!” and her husband is shepherding all of the Americans to the front of the pack of people. He’s saying something like “Let’s go! Let’s go” while directing each one of us as if he were our father. I’m laughing at how ridiculous and American this is…but at the same time, I don’t hate it. Sorry angry French people, looks like we’re living up to some stereotypes today. The squat woman pushes me into the ticket checker and we completely cut off some other line.

Then we’re outside, this little American cluster, and there’s like 10 planes and no personnel. Uh… what? Where do we go? We finally spot someone as we’re wandering the tarmac who points to the 4^th plane in response to “Morondava?”. We make lots of jokes about boarding the wrong plane.

I climb the stairs to the plane and of course there are no assigned seats due to the computers being down so I sit by a window and try to pull my dad’s and my favorite traveling tip, which is to try take up space or look as menacing or sick as possible so people choose not to sit next to you. I’m not going to lie, I’ve faked coughing fits before that have lasted several minutes. An empty seat makes all the difference. I succeed!

The intercom turns on and the flight person (I can’t remember the name of this occupation at the moment) begins her spiel in Malagasy and then French… did they just say we’re going to Fort Dauphin and Toliar before Morondava…? Did I hear that correctly? …And then they come on in English. Oh yeah, there’s the confirmation in English. I just got on the most roundabout 4 ½ hour flight around Madagascar. In case you’re not familiar with the physical layout of the country… let me draw you a little map.

So as you can see THIS IS THE MOST RIDICULOUS FLIGHT PATTERN EVER TO HAPPEN EVER, IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD. LIKE, LET’S TAKE MAGELLAN FOR EXAMPLE. HERE’S MAGELLAN’S TRAVEL PATTERN.

AND THEN HERE’S MINE

                                                                  

I literally just flew from Fort Dauphin here… two days ago. And now I’m flying back… and then to Toliar AND THEN TO FREAKING MORONDAVA. I’m a little bit upset about this development.

They try to pacify our anger by handing out chocolate Easter eggs.

Ok, mine is slightly pacified.

But then I remember I’m stuck on this plane for 4 ½ hours and possibly could have flown direct from Fort Dauphin to Morondava… anger.

…and this is called traveling in Madagascar.

(I’m dedicating this post to Magellan and to one of my old volleyball coaches who called me Magellan because I used to take very indirect paths while running around the court. Whatever… I like the scenic routes I guess?) 

TextsFromTheAirport

(032) just projectile vomited all over a bathroom in the airport…golly, some days I just love Madagascar

(267) WHY

(032) Oh… in this country it’s hard to say… malaria? parasite? food poisoning? And now I’m boarding a plane, awesome!

Then I boarded a plane and sat for 90 minutes with my head between my knees. Weirdly enough at the end of the flight, the only thing the man next to me said was “Tu lit le francais?” (You read in French?) Really? That’s ok.

(032) Did you make it through the plane ride without vomiting?

(032) …somehow, yes. But the taxi drive is highly questionable

The taxi drive was equally miserable but as I was walking up to Americanville, I felt hopeful that maybe the urge to vomit had passed. This was until 3 seconds before Betsy (my American hostess) was opening the door to let me in. Quite the way to say hello.

And then I was vomiting every 2 hours. It was special.

And then I was at an American housewarming party because I felt too guilty to say I was so sick I couldn’t keep down water…. So I socialized and secretly threw up water for four hours… I might be calling today a low point of Madagascar.

The food poisoning stopped somewhere in the middle of watching She’s the Man in the living room at 1 AM. I was grateful

Now I’m drinking Gatorade, watching Entourage and UP and pretending to be in a developed country while completely ignoring the reality of being in Madagascar.

Flying to Morondava tomorrow. EXCITED. 

A Mental Vacation @ Kaleta Hotel

Here's the pictures I said I would post earlier.

I think it's one of those no captains needed situations.

Just proof that I'm there

Just a Casual Letter...

Last night I was sitting in the lobby when one of the waiters who works in Kaleta and walked up to me. In his attempt at English, we had this conversation and I was left with a little note... 

Waiter: Uhh...sorry?

Me: Oui...or uh.. yes?

Waiter: Do not...forget about me.

Me: OK....... I will.. not?

Waiter: Can I.. can I give you my number?

Me: Oh goddamnit not this again. Uh.. oui.. oh, I mean sure. 

Waiter: *Leaves piece of paper on the table.* Says "Do not forget about me" and walks away.

Note: I've never had more of a conversation with this man than "Je voudrais un cafe au lait" & "Merci"

I didn't actually look at what the paper said until later that night. 

This just made me sad.... But I mean, if you're interested... let me know. 

Last Post for the Day

OK ok, I'm going to bed because it's kind of late here... relatively... for someone over the age of 80... it's hot? I don't know! I'm just sleepy. But here's my question of the day... WHO IS READING THIS BLOG? I don't think I know enough people to justify this... but whatever. Thanks! Thanks for keeping up with me so far. I'll post more when I get back to Tana and then I'm off to Morondava on Sunday to see the Avenue of the Baobabs and Rock Forest and my friends yayayayay! Future posts about C & A & ES & EH!! Sorry Roland, Tsy Misy ISP. I'm headed to Morondava... Ok, goodnight.

Photo Shoot

Oops! I forgot to post this earlier, again, sorry for jumping around in time. These are from Sunday.

I decided to have a mini photoshoot at the summit of the mountain. I made N'Aina (our Malagasy guide) be the photographer and debated each pose in French. These are the ones we decided on:

M: D'accord! Pour la première, ce sera une vrai photo.

N: Oui.. oui.. et alors?

M: Hmm... je vais prendre un photo avec tous les lézards... parce je suis la reine des lézards!

N: Uhhh.... OK..... D'Accord

CC: You are literally the weirdest person in the world.

M: Shush, et pour la troisième.... uhhhhh pensez-vous? (N'Aina and I are not on "tu" terms...)

N: Hmm.... tenir quelque chose?

M: Ohh oui! Ce sera bon. Je vais tenir... le sac! Comme Simba!

And viola... this is what we got. I'm also not translating that. Learn French or just check out http://translate.google.com

Une vrai photo...

Just being the Queen of the Lizards... nbd.

And of course. The Lion King... or Queen... who really knows?

Ok... this is in Franglish because that's how my mind's been working recently. You'll figure it all out or something. 

Patience... a video?

Although these has not proved itself to work just yet... I may have loaded my first video. After like an hour of doing other things on the internet, here's a video of spiders. Sorry that it's... a video of spiders.

OMG NO PARENTSSSSSSSSSSS

Some things don't change no matter how old you get or what country you're in. When your parents tell you they're not coming home and you're home alone for the night... everyone wants to do the same. exact. thing.

Run to the nearby drink shack (OK I realize maybe this a little bit different because I'm in Madagascar...) pull out 6,000 Ariary (again... you might have some trouble following... but this is equivalent to $3), demand three beers in French (yeah ok... I get it, it's not the same, whatever, just go with it.), have the men sitting outside ask you if you're having a "grande fete" (giant party, aka RAGER), and then run back to your house through puddles, using your cell phone torch light as your guide and giggling as you pass the house guardian.

Whatever. No parents = Buy a giant beer and feel like bad ass. (OK not really.)

How to Break Into a Malagasy House

So you've found yourself locked out of your homestay house in Madagascar. What do you do? 

You break in. That's what. (Our host mom actually told us to do this... no worries.)

1. Find a flat-ish piece of metal lying around the house. (This shouldn't be too difficult, as you are in Madagascar...) 

2. Use the flat piece of metal to twist the screws off of the metal hinge thinger that is padlocked. (Kick yourself for leaving your Swiss Army Knives in the house.)

Comme ca.

 3. Continue to twist until you get one screw out. Hooray! You're halfway there.

4. Unfortunately, the metal has become too bendy and the second screw is reeaaallly screwed in there. 

5. Look for stronger metal.

6. Resort to climbing into the abandoned car and taking one the the car handles from it. 

 7. Oh yes!

8. Twist and twist until VIOLA! You have succeeded! 

(Most of the credit needs to go to H who was super resourceful and not me who took pictures and pretended that our search for metal was actually a Malagasy Easter Egg hunt... Good thing I got a tetanus shot before coming here.)