writing now from the states once more, having decided to bring my peace corps service to an 'earlier than planned' close after 8mos in Madagascar. will elaborate on my reasons for doing so below. in no way an indication that i regret the experience. i feel incredibly lucky to have had the opportunity to do this type of work and to have gotten the peek into what life is like elsewhere. it was a

masoandro mody (lit. 'eye of the day goes home') over the 'sleeping woman' as seen from ambalavao

nothing says 'Madagascar' quite like this shot. (courtesy of danny hervol, health volunteer in the tomatave/toamasina region)

"no, mamy, it's not cool to have alot of girlfriends. it makes you less of a man, not more of one. and if she says no, she really means NO! but if she says yes...hold on. let me go get my powerpoint" can never start too early with the teachings. note the vazaha in the background...that's amanda, the environment volunteer that lived 14km away.

after the swearing-in of health volunteers at the embassy in antananarivo. 

downtime, 'slack-lining' in montasoa (site of a pretty exquisite peace corps training complex).  

'team betsileo'...taken during training with our language instructor Manjaka. Those of us being sent to the Betsileo region...me, leanna, amanda, lisa, and jamie. 

So i'm not sure if any of my previous posts have given a good, succinct overview of the nature of my work here. which deserves to be done. my role could best be described as 'grassroots community health educator'. We (that is, peace corps health volunteers) are commissioned by the Madagascar Ministry of Health to address certain health issues unique to life here in Madagascar...specifically, good

I’ve come to believe that the greatest misunderstanding with regards to HIV/AIDS in need of remedying here in Madagascar (and i suspect many places elsewhere that share some of the same challenges as this place) fall into two categories: the belief that you have to do something wrong in order to become infected (ie that infected people deserve the illness due to immoral or mis – behavior) and the

here's a shot of the 'avenue of the baobabs' that i lifted off the net. i spent the night under the awning of the middle school nearby on my way to morondava.

writing on easter sunday from morondava on the west coast with the mozambique channel that separates madagascar from mainland africa washing the shore. my ideas for spending a few accrued vacation days morphed into 3 days on bike/paved road 220km; 3 days on river hiring a malagasy guide and renting a canoe/>100km; and 2+days on bike again/sand road 165km. a bit overly ambitious and unrealistic,

so today marks 6 months in country and i am in the capital of antananarivo awaiting the 3-day training session that all volunteers take part in after being at site for 3 months (though it has been closer to 4 months for us). i had a steady february, yet a slow march. have taught HIV/AIDS lessons at the local highschool and middle school. but my primary work continues to be making trips out to the

wow. as much as i predicted that regular posts on this blog would be few and far between, i could not have predicted that they would be this few and far-between. little time and much to say. our 2mos. of training is now all but over. we (the 16 of us that make up the health 2005 'stage') disperse to our respective sites this next week. i will be going to ambalavao and feel very lucky about that.

Greetings friends. In an attempt to stay connected from across the miles I am attempting to maintain this site to post thoughts and pictures from Madagascar. I am currently residing in Ohio, sharing my parents home with them (or I should say, they are sharing their home with me). Barring anything unforeseen, I am to commence a 27 month volunteer assignment with the Peace Corps in Madagascar in

Mailing address for the 2 1/2 months (until mid-December 2005) of training in 'Tana' (the capital). Bureau du Corps de la Paix B.P. 12091 Post Zoom Ankorondrano Antananarivo 101 Madagascar Parcels and packages are discouraged, letters most welcome!

More tinkering and experimentation. Just wanting to know what capabilities I have whilst I have steady access to the web before leaving. Going on a tangent providing a link to some climbing pictures. Not too terribly related to volunteering in Madagascar and a bit self-indulgent I admit. But why have photos if not to show them off? Trying to include one photo within the body of this text and a

Here is a copy of my Motivation Statement followed by a Crosscultural Experience essay. These were part of the volunteer application.