I Sit, I Live

Hey everybody! I have had a pretty busy week with my site visit; I've
probably experienced more new things this week and grown more
comfortable here in Madagascar than I will in any future week.
Between taking taxi-brousses, speaking Malagasy to survive, and
exploring new places, it has been fairly eventful. Also, check out
new photos I've posted, though the internet isn't allowing me to post
all of them.

Some Highlights:
1. As my close friends and family know, I'm usually a pretty busy
guy, always on the go. The skill of doing nothing, aka relaxing, is
one that I have only recently being practicing. The Malagasy culture
is just so much different than that of the United States. Where as we
are concerned about the future and careers, most Malagasy people don't
think that way. In fact, the word for "to live" is the same as "to
sit." On my site visit, I asked my counterpart (the nurse of the
local clinic) what he did on the weekend. His reply: Mipetreka, I
sit, I live. He literally meant that he just sits around and hangs
out with local friends and family, but the double meaning of the word
is emblematic of Malagasy culture. People here are concerned about
putting food on the table and they don't mind free time to simply sit.

2. Diego is an awesome town and I feel very lucky to be in the North.
It has a very small town feel, but has everything we could need:
pizza, ice cream, banks, a beach, a market, and internet. The plan is
go once a month to bank, use internet, and take a shower with running
water to rejuvenate.

3. The people in the North are very different than the people in the
highlands. Whereas the highlanders are small (under 5 ft 5 inches for
men), the Sakalava people of the north are my size. This is due
primarily to nutrition. The coastal areas get fish (protein), while
the highlanders eat very little protein.

4. My site is a 5 hours from Diego via taxi-brousse, an hour from
Ambanja and Ambilobe, and probably about 3 hours from a National Park.
The town that I will be living in is very small; I can walk from one
end to the other in 5 minutes. There are 4 volunteers around Ambanja,
which means that once a week we can all meet up to go to the market
together and hang out.

5. I got solicited by a prostitute for the first time. Diego is
rampant with prostitutes, in fact, we've heard that upwards of 90% of
the women there (as in age 14-30) are prostitutes. While on the
beach, a woman came up to me, asked if I wanted a massage in Malagasy,
after I said "no, thanks. I don't need one," she asked "Do you want
to buy a prostitute?" Straight up, just flat out asked at 1pm in the
afternoon. As the closest health volunteer to Diego, one of my
projects will actually be working with prostitutes to practice safe
sex. Not to stop them from the activity, but to promote condom usage.

Overall, I think my site fits me very well. With a town so small,
without a market, and with a clinic that only sees 10 patients a day,
I think most volunteers would be bored and frustrated. I certainly
think that my biggest challenge will be staying occupied, but that
lack of busyness will allow me to choose what projects I want to work
on and to explore. The current plan is hike around the mountains by
my house often, bike (hopefully enough so that making the 50Km ride
from my town to Ambanja is routine), read a lot (something I haven't
had the time to do for awhile), find a couple projects to really put
effort into, and plan short trips every month or so to the national
parks in the North. Sure, an ocean front property could have
sweetened the deal, but a 2 hour ride to the beach isn't much to
complain about. Most of all, the other volunteers I am around are
adventurous and we should have some fun exploring the area, learning
to live the Malagasy lifestyle, and doing our part to help the country
advance itself.

I have much more I could say about the week, my site, and fun stories
(including a 29 person taxi-brousse ride), but I'll let your eyes rest
for a bit. Call me up or email if you want to hear more or have
questions.

If you're white, you're French,
Jason