Hqppy Anniversary Miss Feinman!

Sometimes I feel like I’m living in an episode of Little House on the Prairie. Do you remember that show? I watched loyally as I was growing up ( not that growing up can ever be relegated to past tense) and it was possibly the first book series I ever read along with Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. But yes, an episode of that show can almost be applied to most of my days here.

“Pa, there were bullies at school (market) today and they said mean things ( that I cant speak Malagasy)”

“That’s ok Laura. Let me teach you about conflict resolution.”

“You mean I cant just punch them in the face?”

“That’s not conflict resolution. That’s conflict exacerbation.”

“Oh.”

Of course I am most members of the cast on most days. Everyone from the blind sister, to the rugged father. The hard working mother, the playful son or the willful and wily Laura who learns the difficult frontier lessons with her own unique style.

And so finishes my book report.

No, in all actuality, life here is wonderful and although the rude and inconsiderate people exist in no matter what level of development a country may be standing in, there are also many friendly and hospitable people to color the scene. My families, for example that continue to invite me to play dominoes and to chat with them are just those kind of people. Friendly, open, welcoming, struggling and still smiling. I have earned a great deal of respect for my community that I didn’t feel before. Everyone works here. Small children carry small buckets of water, big children watch out for their younger siblings and cousins and clean dishes, wash the floors, and carry food to the animals. Young boys herd young cows, young girls herd younger children. Women care for the house and the fields, and the food, and the children and the money. Men cart, carry, dig, build, weld, fix, and overall tend to the basic workings of our community. And I? I educate. I get children to practice English phrases with a glow of pride on their little faces to accompany the edge of nervousness in their little voices. Hopefully I will give them a small amount of time to hope for life outside of this constant turning of the wheel, and maybe work towards something different: college in America, travel, working in offices and cities to better the lives of their own, a career outside of farming, vending, planting, or breeding. Who knows. Mine is the only work that doesn’t show immediate results and fruits of my labor but I can only look forward to the long run. (shrug). Such is my lot loving accomplished.

Cleo gets bigger and bigger every day, and demands more and more food to eat. This is a problem some days when she refuses to eat sweet potatoes instead of potatoes, or waits for the cold rice to be reheated. Brat. She’s a brat. That’s what I get for giving her a name to instill strength, cunning and stubbornness. I swear I fully believe in the power of names. She’s also a wonderful companion, escorting me in the darkness to my kabone, to the market, and about on my errands. She created her first growls of warning this last week and is now barking at people approaching me in a small gesture of protection. Its still cute because she’s still small (comes up to me knee). Small is, of course, relatively speaking as she is a puppy and will eventually become a monster. For now though she only acts as big as her name and has yet to grow into all that fur.

October brought my one year anniversary since I left country. Can you believe it? What did you do last year? I traveled to three different countries, met people that will thrive in my heart and memory forever, was adopted by five different families, completed 3 months of training in two different languages and lived in three different communities affecting countless people, mainly children. I shard my culture and myself and learned and adapted to things that I never even considered anywhere in the realm of possibilities. I ate foods I would have gagged thinking about and liked (most of) them. I explored Paris for a day, Niger for 6 weeks, and created a life in Madagascar twice. And last year I was sitting at home in San Diego, on the internet, eating a chicken burrito. (Still wish I was eating those burritos.) I gained a sense of pride, accomplishment and adventure in my daily existence to replace the boredom and discontentment I felt constantly in a stale life I never contented myself with. That’s quite the year. In fact, its horrible to admit to myself that I accomplished more in the last year that in the last three. Its rough, although without regret when you realize that the only person holding you back was yourself although at the same time, the only person who could push you into and through the change is also yourself. That helps eradicate the feelings of self guilt that may occur.

Halloween came and went without much notice. One day I was writing on the board in my class and the student asked for the date. That was the only reason I realized Halloween was the following weekend. My mind flashed with decorations, store fronts dressed in orange and black, children chattering about costumes, adults planning parties, teenagers planning to drink as though no one will notice. That all means nothing at all here, but there were a few dance parties in the regional capitals. The dancing was great, the party wasn’t a party. But still, I love to dance.

Constantly dwelling in my mind are my kids, their classes, and our most recent speaking projects. Held a project in my class the other week where the students had to use the future tense to create responses to a few questions I had written on the board. One of them was “You have 1,000,000 Ariary. What will you do?” The responses varied but the two most cutting were:

“I will buy medicine.”

“I will eat.”

Those almost killed me. I didn’t know how to respond and felt a little silly that my example for that sentence was travel, buy a car, and go on vacation. Just a little stab to the heart, a little blood, and no facial expression. No one laughed, no one giggled. They all agreed and the next group shared their sentences. Rough.

And now here’s a happy transition.

Speaking of 1,000,000 Ariary though, I have already started planning my Christmas break. Morondava baby! Woohoo! Known for the most photographed place in Madagascar, the Avenue of Baobabs, Morondava rests on the west coast, the shore line of the Mozambique channel. Six days of seafood, swimming, photographing, more eating, and relaxing and sightseeing are in store for me! It is also a large cultural capital ( African predominantly due to the location) and has large celebration feasts on holidays, like Christmas when I’m there so hopefully I will be able to go to one of those as well. There are also large tombs in the area that are supposed to be amazing to see. I am so very excited and can not wait! In fact, its powering me to make it through the mental tiredness. A few more weeks and I’m off to surf, shellfish, and massive trees! Such a sweet deal and will hopefully be a pleasant distraction from the sadness that comes with the holiday seasons. I miss making cookies with Pam, opening stockings that jingle on my bed, sitting and staring at the Christmas tree, shaking presents, smelling pine mixed with cinnamon and roasting food, laughing, drinking eggnog, sleeping through excitement. Twinkling lights, orchestras, and comfort food. Sugar plum fairies, nutcrackers, partridges resting in trees, Charlie Brown searching for his tree and Snoopy dancing on a piano. No matter what I’m doing, those memories remind of what I’m missing, not that I ever cared about missing it before. But, now, they are only memories, not expectations. But here, children hope to eat, to have medicine for family members, to visit family, maybe take a vacation to a nearby town. I feel like I should slap my own knuckles. So much appreciation for so many things in so many ways.

So that’s that for now. There is a wonderful proverb in Malagasy that seems only fitting right now as the holidays approach along with my one year anniversary in country.

“Be like the Chameleon. Always looking forward with a quick glance behind.”