Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Teaching & Pictures

With almost 3 weeks of living in Fianar under my belt, I have been spending time learning where things are in the city, cooking with Nomena (my host sister), doing tourist things in Fianar and preparing to teach.

Before leaving for Madagascar, I was only really able to tell you all at home that I would be teaching English while I was here, now I have a little bit better picture of what that looks like, for now. 

I will be teaching the speaking, and listening lessons for English classes at each grade at Masombahoaka, a Lutheran school near the old city in Fianar, it is also the school where I live.  That will be 8 2-hour classes per week, with students from each age.  The Malagasy teachers will teach the grammar, spelling, etc lessons, and I will do speaking and listening so students can practice with someone who is a native speaker.

I will also lead an English Club on Saturday mornings at the school.  We will have formal English lessons, Bible studies, play games, cook, and anything else we think of that will help the students to practice English and learn about American culture.

I have also joined the choir at my church.  Learning the songs is a definite challenge, but the other members are very helpful and excited about helping me learn, and it is a great way to practice my Malagasy language skills.  The choir is also producing a CD, so I will be attending recording sessions!

I also have a few other things that I will help with sometimes, such as, organizing events at the school where students perform American Songs or we watch a movie in English and distributing rice and school supplies to youth in Fianar.


I also have some pictures over the last few weeks:  

On the way home from a day trip to a neighboring town, I took some pictures of the countryside from the car.  You can see the rice fields and many houses on the hill.

 This is Nomena and I.


 I live in the "Old City" of Fianar, the oldest part of town.  This is a door in that has a map of the old city.  This coming Saturday, the English Club that I help to lead will go on a tour of the old city, so I will have more information about it then.

This is my house.  I also have a bathroom and a closet that you cannot see, and my kitchen is on the porch outside.

 This is the view from my house.  You can see the banana trees and part of the city of Fianar.

 A similar picture, but the view from Nomena's house.

Saturday, September 20, 2014

Hopes

I have been living in Fianarantsoa for over a week now.  I have not started teaching yet, and will not start until October.  So, this first month or so that I am here is about getting settled, working towards knowing the map of the city, knowing which market is good to go too, learning how to cook, and learning to love my new home.  Sure, some days have been harder and some days easier.  But, I find that the day is always better when I force myself to go explore.  That is how I will learn the streets here and begin to be comfortable, even if it involves a lot of getting lost. 

The school that I live at, Masombahoaka, sits almost on the top of a very large hill.  My house is small by American standards, but great for what I need.  My neighbors are all people who teach or work at the school.  One of the families has just part of my Malagasy family, I cooked and at with them the first few days I was here, and on Sunday’s after church for the year.  One of their daughters, Nomena, has helped me to go to the market, cook my dinner, answer all of my, often confusing, questions, and we continue to laugh through it all.  We often cook together, or go on adventures looking for things, and she with her, I helped to kill a chicken.  I did not actually use a knife, I left that to Nomena’s skilled hands, but I held the bird during the cutting and helped to pluck the feathers.  It was an adventure.  Nomena’s mother is Miandry, and there is always much laughter there too.  Like, when Miandry mispronounced “snack” and said that we were eating a snake.  There is also Papa, his name is actually Joseph, but everyone calls him Papa.  He is my site supervisor, but mostly, he is just Papa.  He is full of laughter and jokes as well.  One of the first few things that he said to me when I got off of the taxi-brousse (the bus that runs from town to town) as I arrived in Fianar, and into the taxi that would take us up the giant hill to Masombahoaka, was, “you already stopped for lunch?  Well, in Madagascar you must have two stomachs!”  I learned shortly that this was because there was a second lunch waiting for me when we arrived, but at the time I was very confused. 

I have two more sisters, they are Margot and Elina.  Margot is the self-proclaimed extremely talkative leader of the English club that I will be working with.  English club is a club for youth who want to learn English.  I think they will be mostly between the ages of 14 and 20.  We will have some formal English lessons, but also play games, watch American movies, eat American food, and whatever else we decide will be fun to learn English and about American culture.  Elina is another leader of the English club; she is a student at university in Fianar.  We have adventured together as well, we went to the viewpoint, it is another very tall hill where you can see the whole city of Fianar, and to the lake that is near where I live. 



A few days ago, standing on the deck at Nomena’s house she asked me, “what did you hope Fianar would be like?”  I responded that I hoped that people would be helpful and nice, and that I would have fruit trees in my yard.  I have bananas in my yard, and Nomena’s yard has a mango tree and a peach tree.  So, I have everything that I hoped for.

Saturday, September 6, 2014

Mofo & BonBon Coco


We are comfortable here, relatively. Sure, there are still times when I am walking down the street and there is something that makes me uncomfortable, or when I am attempting to buy something and the seller cannot understand my broken Malagasy, or when we are served full fish for lunch and have to figure out how to take it apart to get the most meat we can. But, compared to when we arrived in Madagascar, we are comfortable here where we have a strong community of people to lean on. But, I know I cannot rely on that community forever. I know that on Tuesday I will wake up and have a squeezed bus ride next to 3 other YAGMs and a Malagasy friend, and then I will head to my placement with people from my host community and it will be me. I will have myself to rely on. Sure, I know that my host community loves me and will do anything they can to help, but that is a very different community than a group of YAGMs who share a culture, language and experiences here. Both of these communities are endlessly valuable, but it is scary to leave the community that I understand.
This Saturday morning we had an experience that both brought these fears to light and reminded me that I am strong and have the skills and knowledge to enter into my host community this coming Tuesday. Our country coordinators sent us on a “culture capture.” We were a short list of things we needed to buy along with a small amount of money and were sent into town independently to find them; then we came back together and explained our experiences. I bought a loaf of Malagasy French bread from a woman selling bread out of large baskets on the street. I knew that I needed to find a baked good, so I had been repeating, “Ohatrinona ny mofo,” in my head as I walked down the street. As I bent down to actually say the sentence aloud, I said in the best pronunciation I could muster, “Hello, how much is the bread?” he responded with a French number said quickly that I couldn’t understand, and when I asked her to say it in Malagasy I finally felt confident. She responded in Malagasy and I found the Ariary in my pocket and bought one load of bread. I continued down the road with bread in hand, knowing that I still needed to find peanuts and to find something that I didn’t know what it was. I checked out multiple peanut stands looking for the best ones. I finally picked some was able to remember to for a cup of peanuts even without remembering the word for peanuts. Walking around for my last item, I had no idea what to pick. But then, I saw the coconut cookies that I made for my family and members of my home church congregation to share about the adventure that I was going to have. I was so excited that the recipe that my mom had found online in July actually existed in Madagascar that I had to have them. I decided that even though I knew what they were, they were going to count as my third item anyway.
I continued back to the center where we are living feeling successful. I know that my communities around the world are never too far away and that I do have the skills and knowledge to live in my new community, all thanks to some baskets of bread and some coconut cookies.

Here is the recipe for the coconut candies that really do exist here in Madagascar.

BonBon Coco
Coconut Candy
2-1/2 C coconut, grated
1 C sugar
1-1/2 C water
Pinch of salt
Combine coconut, sugar and salt in a heavy cooking pot. Add the water; slowly bring to a simmer over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Continue to cook for about twenty minutes, or until coconut mixture is thick and all liquid has evaporated. The coconut will begin to brown; mixture will be stiff and sticky. Remove from heat. Form coconut mixture into balls. Place balls on a sheet of waxed paper; flatten by placing a second sheet of waxed paper on top and pressing down. Set aside to cool completely before removing waxed paper. The balls should be firm but not crunchy. Serve.