I'm down with Mada and the mud

Welcome! We left off with me arriving in Madagascar, but not yet at my “site”, for lack of a better word. So I have been at site for 4 days now! I LOVE it! The house that I will be living in is not ready yet, there are 2 volunteers that are living there at the moment since Honko is building a new volunteer cabin. Once that is finished (this upcoming week), I will be moving into my new place. There is a women that cooks our food Monday to Friday, and we cook our own food during the weekend.

Right now there are 4 volunteers here. One is doing a nutrition study in the villages we work with and 3 are doing the mangrove monitoring project. They are from all over, France, America, Germany and Belgium. I went to the mangroves with them yesterday and man was it hard!!!! The thing with mangroves is that the water in them flows with the tides, so depending on what time of day you go, it can look like a completely different place. To do the work, we have to go during low tide, this also means that there is a TON of mud that you have to walk through…a good way to keep those legs in shape. There are times where you sink down to your thighs, and have to get help getting you out! My problem was that I went barefoot and ended up cutting my feet with the roots….Ow! It is very hard work out there and I have a lot of respect for the volunteers that are here doing it.

The food so far has been good; lots of rice and beans. Their sauces are great, thank you France, and so are the pastry’s! It is very beautiful here, dry with plenty of wind, which makes it feel not quite so hot. Since I have been here 4 days, I of course already have sunburns on multiple parts of my body….stupid white skin and strong sun. I have adopted a dog….even though we don’t really need another one, but she is pregnant and I can’t say no to a dog. Her name is Mama and the baby daddy’s name is Dog. There is also another dog named BB who comes and goes, and a lazy cat named Sally, even though she’s a he.

My house is not yet ready, so i am living in a different house. The houses in the villages are made with reads, both the roofs and walls are made of this. My house will is on stilts and made from small plant wood. It is at the edge of the mangrove and  has an amazing view (pictures to come soon when it is finished.)

The hardest part of life here is not comparing EVERYTHING to Ghana! It is hard to stop and just appreciate what is in front of me and not make comparisons. My French and Malagasy are coming along, I know it will take time, so I will be patient. Over all life here is going to be great! I am enjoying myself and feel very comfortable here. Till next time and Merci!

Adventure....the 4 flights it took me to get to my new home!

Welcome!!! I am now in Madagascar! Here is how i got here, get ready for some interesting times: I left Indiana at a decent hour of 1.20pm and arrived at JFK (New York) around 3.30 pm. My long time childhood friend Andrea picked me up and took me to her place in Queens. I stayed there over night and had a BLAST!! We had burgers ( as american as i can get) then went to a Latin dance club and danced the night away. We had to leave at 7 am the next morning to make the my flight to Johannesburg, south Africa. This was a 15 hour flight, no lay overs. It was a good flight, watched a TON of sweet movies. Near the end of the flight there was a bit a drama....a older man had a heart attack!!!! They were doing CPR on him in his seat, then finally a bunch of people came and lifted him up and took him to lay down somewhere. He ended up being ok, but we had to wait a while to get off the plane so that he could leave first. This made me a little nervous as i only had a 2 hour layover there before my flight left for Antananarivo, Madagascar.  I had to go through security, and immigration, then get my bag and go up stairs and get it re checked in and then find the place where my plane was going to leave. I would have been SUPER late if it hadn't been for this one AWESOME guy that helped me out. He worked at the airport and we skipped all the lines i would have had to gone through and sent me to the VIP lines. I got there in good time and was WAY less stressed then i would have been. Way to go awesome guy!
I then boarded my plane and left for Tana the capital.* If your keeping tract this is my 3rd  plane and i will have been on a plane for 18 hours. *  I get there, get my bags, exchange money, and find a taxi to take me to a hotel. The hotel is great, I take a 2 hour nape and have a Margarita pizza for dinner. I shower since it will be one of my last, and go to sleep around 9. I then wake up at 10 ( yes, i sleept A LONNG time) pack my bags and get ready to leave for my last flight. At the airport which is small but nice i get to practice my french and learn how things are done. This is a short flight, only 1:45 mins. This will take to me to my regional capital, Tulear.
So here i am, in Tulear, at a house that is shared by Blue Venture (another NGO) with wifi, food, and happiness. I will be picked up tomorrow morning by my NGO ( a word you are going to see ALL the time in this blog, meaning non-governmental organization). From there i will see where i will be living for the next year! I will try to keep you up to date with what my life is going to be like! Enjoy and Merci!

7 months later

Hello World! I am back in the blogging game again, only this time i am on my own, without the backing of the Peace Corps! I am starting a new job in Madagascar, in the small village of Ambondrolava, with an NGO (non governmental organization) called Honko mangrove conservation and education (http://www.honko.org/). I will be leaving THIS march 15th (that's right, only 8 days away)! It is going to be a LONG trip; 18 hours in the air and 20 hours on the ground to get to my new place. I am going to be the first Project Coordinator (once i get there, i will let you know more about what all i am going to be doing). I am brushing up on my French as i have not spoken it for sometime, but i feel confident that it will all come back to me. I already have all my shots, pills, and most of my clothing since it has only been 7 months since i left the constant summer that is Ghana.
I will try to update this as often as possible, and you are more then welcome to read my old blog from my times in Ghana (An unbelievable place.....).