Today is Christmas Eve and I am at the Peace Corps house in Fianarantsoa, a big town 350 kilometers south of Tana at the base of the plateau. There are five of us girls here, three will continue on to Isalo Park the day after Christmas for a week of backpacking. Two, an environment volunteer and a newly sworn in health volunteer came to the Big Town for the holiday.

Today we are creating Christmas, making a Christmas tree, agreeing to Secret Santa and buying presents, and of course cooking. We spent the morning at the market. The market in Fianar is huge. A lot of tourists come through here so there is a lot of the traditional Malagasy basketwork etc for sale, and of course the usual fruits, vegetables, homeopathic medicines, animals dead and alive. It is the biggest market I've seen here in country. When I asked to take pictures here people demanded money from me, or a cadau. That has never happened anywhere else and is, I think, a testament to the amount of tourism here. Instead of paying I took their addresses and I will mail them copies.

I wrote a long email in Tana, but the computer froze when I opened my address book. I think I have ample reasons for becoming computer phobic here in M'car.

Christmas in Tana was crazy. Being downtown felt a little like being in the U.S. only scary and rough. Companies set up Santa displays on the main street, Santa and couch, Santa and toy, etc, and people would pay photogs to take their picture. Only Malagasy people don't often smile in photos so they were really funny to watch. In Shopright supermarket people were crowded around the aisles like it was a shopping mall at the After Thanksgiving Day sales. For a little bit, it was nice to get the Christmas atmosphere in Tana but then, like everything else in Tana, it got overwhelming.

I wrote to my mom that I think the way I write about Tana, you all must think it is a big wonderful magical place. It's not, but I write about it because it is so different. Not only from anything else I've experienced in the world, but also so incredibly different from my everyday life. It's exhausting, catching up on the food and friends and English and shopping and internet and books and people and movies and music and clothes and refrigeration and cars and roads and clubs… and in between all of that is the double difficultly of foreignness and poverty. Now at Christmas time Tana reminded me of the story of the Little Matchstick Girl, who sold matchsticks on the street but on Christmas Eve sold none and froze to death of cold and hunger. And I see her in the eyes of every child who tries to sell me a postcard or cigarette or wants to carry my bags for me. Especially at Christmas time that is difficult. Facing that while going to a fancy restaurant for dinner or getting into a cab is that much more difficult. A lot of you have asked me questions about the poverty here; relevant as M'car is the fourth poorest country in the world I think. I read a letter from the president recently and learned that the current average income for a family is 41 cents a day, U.S. So when I go to a fancy restaurant, as I did in Tana, and pay seven dollars for fish with creamy saffron sauce, green beans, wine and dessert, although that feels very cheap it feels exorbitantly luxurious and unnecessary also. Yet on the coast, where there isn't the difference so much between the rich and poor and everyone is just surviving—living, farming, having babies—it doesn't feel so bad. I never realized that poverty could be so emotional and relative. And that is why Tana is so exhausting.

Lucy and I traveled together from Tana to Fianar yesterday. Our taxi brouse was scheduled to leave at five am but we finally rolled out of the station at two thirty pm. As evidence of our assimilation into Gasy culture we actually didn't start to wonder about the brouse until about eleven in the morning. Six months ago I would have freaked out with worry, boredom and exhaustion if my brouse were nine and a half hours late. Yesterday I hardly even noticed. The drive down the plateau was amazing: the hills and mountains, all the colors of the rice paddies and watching the cultivation. The amazingly decorative tombs that line the highway (I say highway loosely as although it is the best road in the country, it is undivided one and a half lanes with no signs or markers with plenty of police willing to stop you to get a bribe.) were fascinating. And in Antsirabe the carrots were the most beautiful I have ever seen. Lucy and I bought a kilo through the window of the taxi brouse, the boy throwing them in the window by the handful as we pulled away. Tomorrow I will make carrot cake. The driver played old French music and Gasy Christmas songs most of the way and, despite the delay, it was the best brouse I've ever been on. We stopped for dinner at a roadside hotely and, feeling super assimilated again, I was thrilled to have a plate of rice and beans and water cooked in burnt rice. Traveling is also making me feel good about my language skills, although the dialect here in the highlands and in the southern region is very different. And I don't think twice about using the kabone (squat toilet) anymore.

In other news, the past three weeks have been a nightmare of grading. There is a very complicated calculation here that I don't understand why is desirable. Basically, apart from grading three exams for each of my 573 students, I have to take three different averages to compute their final score in my class. It's a depressing job. Most of my students didn't even bother to copy the test correctly. (Again it gets back to, if the students don't care to learn and the teachers don't care to teach (again I am the only English teacher at the CEG) then what am I doing here? Where is the local input?)

It has rained and rained and rained in Vohemar. And my wash never dries. I think I might bow before the clothes dryer when I get back to the States. I hate the rainy season for making my washing difficult, for turning my market to a lake I wade through knee deep water in to get my produce, for turning the town to mud, for the noise it makes on my tin roof, for it canceling my afternoon swims.

We are still in the "wait and see" mode as far as the election goes, though incumbent Marc Ravalamnanana is the declared winner. The losing candidates have said they don't accept the results but we'll see if they actually do anything about it. So far so calm. My news is coming from the BBC mostly, though sources say the reporter is getting quite a bit wrong. "He's young and has more enthusiasm than intelligence," someone who knows the scene told me recently. Hey, if he doesn't want the job, I'll take it!

Animal news: In Antsirabe Nord a bunch of kids brought lemurs over to Maggie's house for us to play with. Highly illegal, but what can you do? There were two big common brown ones, and three little mouse lemurs with the biggest ears and they snuggle right into you. So adorable. In Isalo I'll get to see the ring tailed lemurs for the first time and I'm looking forward to that.

During exams a cow walked into my classroom and I had to select some boys to corral it out. Malagasy people love American cow boys because cows are worth so much here, only they call them "beef boys." When I wear my straw hat around town, people call out to me: "Mbalatsara Beef Boy!" Kind of funny, even still.

I hate the roosters more and more every day though, especially the one who cook-a-doodles on my doorstep 24 hours a day. I try to chase him away with rocks but the rooster is dumb. I've named the beautiful green and red gecko that hangs out next to my light bulb to catch the insects Peter Pan because of the way his shadow falls across the wall from the bulb. And my neighbor's kitten has adopted me which takes care of my rat problem without me having to actually take care of a cat. I think it is a win win.

I briefly mentioned the cyclone when I emailed from Tana, and the scare is over. For a while it looked like a category five hurricane that was going to directly hit the island and everyone was freaking it. But it changed course and downgraded to a tropical storm. Not only was everyone thrilled for safety's sake, but it put all of our holiday travel plans back on the plate.

Tonight I am going to a French restaurant here in Fianar for dinner and we are getting all dressed up. Tomorrow morning I'm making scrambled eggs full of goodies like cheese (and NOT Vache but REAL CHEESE), creme fraise, scallions, tomatoes, mushrooms, garlic, spinach, green pepper. Courtney is making French toast and Lucy is making banana bread. We have hazelnut coffee from Starbucks! We'll have our secret Santa exchange and I painted pictures for the girls I knew would be here. So we'll have gifts in the morning. We've planned a hike around town because there's lots to see here and it's in the mountains and really gorgeous. Then we'll have roast potatoes, green beans, pea salad, pasta salad and carrot cake for dinner. Courtney, Haddy and Tammy are all from the mid west, Lucy's from the east coast and I'm the California girl, so it's funny and fun to combine everyone's traditions. Like, for Thanksgiving I had to make Macaroni and Cheese. Who has macaroni and cheese for Thanksgiving? Apparently it's a southern thing. Courtney, Lucy and I had talked about going to church (Courtney is Lutheran and Lucy Quaker) but we all went, "Nah." It's so much effort to understand and be stared at we decided to skip that stress, which would defeat the purpose of going. We were laughing this morning that the holiday feels a little bit like one of those TV shows where friends are stranded together for Thanksgiving and Christmas and how at first it sucks but then everyone has fun and there's a lot of holiday spirit and everything works out. So our motley group here will eat our motley meals and draw a Christmas tree on butcher paper and wrap presents in old People magazines and sing Christmas carols. Not so bad huh?

Merry Christmas!

It's the Christmas season here in Madagascar and there's plenty of good cheer, even though the country is between harvests and most families are guarding their piggy banks.

I am a junior high English teacher in a country where half of the population earn less than a dollar a day and the life expectancy is 53. A country, in short, that receives aid and philanthropy and thus stays on life support.

I wear another hat this month as well—translator of American missionary Christmas gift cards. A deep bah-humbug fills my heart as I am faced with this feel-good first world "investment" giving.

"Investment giving" is the phrase I use for the most insidious of the Nativity-themed cards and notes, the ones that come with strings attached, a holiday message of "help me help you help me."

I translate, for example, a note from an Adventist couple in Ohio: "We hope your family enjoys these gifts. Please take some pictures of the children playing with the toys to send to us!" Other letters urge the recipients to "write and tell us about your holidays." Or, as a New Jersey couple wrote: "We would like to know what your lives are like, our address is below."

All polite, all expressing interest in the people they are giving to, but all demanding a return on their gift. Photos to hang on the fridge, perhaps a letter of heart-warming gratitude. A forced connection. It is investment giving.

Particularly painful is that it is from people of whom so much is demanded just to survive daily. We demand yet more in the name of charity: gratitude to make us feel that we have done well and a story so our own lives may be enriched.

To these missionaries I say: Bah humbug.

A gift with strings attached—particularly between first world and third, rich and poor—is no gift at all. Like the giving of the well-meaning but ill-guided Mrs. Dalton in Richard Wright's Native Son, investment giving is "philanthropy as blind as...sightless eyes." Like blind Mrs. Dalton, whose character campaigned for social equality for African Americans in the 1930's and urged her black servant to attend night-school so he might improve his economic status, today's missionaries have only the best intentions in mind.

I do not doubt that their playing cards, jacks, Barbie dolls, and toy cars are enjoyed, appreciated, loved. But with these toys come demands for praise, affection, thankfulness. Faced with these demands, the giftees might wish—just as Mrs. Dalton's servant, Bigger Thomas, wished—to be left alone.

There is a better solution: Instead of investment giving, unconditional giving.

How much more joy would these gifts and letters bring if instead of demanding photos and letters they simply said, "We are thinking of you." Or, "We hope you have a wonderful holiday."

If the giving itself were enough, that would be philanthropy of true vision. That would be a Merry Christmas.

Hi everyone. Thanks for all the wonderful email messages. Unfortunatly yahoo isnt letting me compose, so hopefully you will check here. I got into Vohemar on Thursday evening and have been busy painting, cleaning, shopping and eating. I like the town much more this time around than over site visit. School starts sep 11 and Im looking forward to teaching oh, about 700 middle schoolers. Yikes. anyways, will post more in two weeks. times out here at the internet cafe

First letter from Madagascar. Its been almost ten weeks here and for the first time Im able to wrap my head around posting anything. Training has been long and difficult. But Wed I swear in and Thursday I fly out to my site on the north east coast. I didnt love it at site visit two weeks ago and I REALLY dont love teaching, so well see how it goes. Im looking forward to being out on my own.

I said goodbye to the family Ive been living with for the past 10 weeks, which was difficult. We got pretty close. The seven year old cried himself to sleep last night after the going away blockparty, then wouldnt say goodbye to me this morning. Living with a family was challenging... not the toys and games you might imagine, but my Malagasy skills are fairly decent now and I crave rice and beans at lunch and dinner.

Things are more difficult here than I imagined. I can now say I truely know what it means to live without running water... something I dont think you can know until you live with latrines, bucket bathes, and the morning trek to the river or well. Luckily Ive only had a mild dose of the stomache aches from the water.

The language is different but not difficult, the poverty striking. I visited a sweatshop where the women earn less than a dollaar a day, which is actually an ok, but not liveable wage here. One person could live off of it just above the poverty line. It does not support these womens families, but there are no other jobs. I wont mention the name of the designer, but they are well known.

Well, more to come.

I bought a cell phone today and to get that number or my adress contact my mom or email me. It is so wonderful to get mail here and I would love to hear from you. I am occasionally able to get on line, but the letters are extra special!

Laura

Leaping lemurs! I'm going to Madagascar!

A week from today I will be on the plane, flying over the Atlantic right about now before touching down in Antananarivo.

To catch everyone up, I am now officially a Peace Corps Trainee as I take a two year sabatical from journalism to do some travelling and teaching.

Sometime in September-- after three months of extensive language and teacher training in Mantasoa, I will be sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer and sent to the hinterlands of the Big Red Island to fend for myself in junior high and high school classrooms.

Where exactly is Madagascar? Well, put Mozambique right about here, across the Mozanbique Channel, and South Africa right below that. Madagascar is just about as long as those two countries.

Here are some fast facts, courtesy of Lonely Planet, online:

Full Name: Republic of Madagascar (Repoblikan'i Madagasiraka)

Capital City :Antananarivo (Tana) (pop 4,000,000)

Area :229,413 sq miles

Population :16,979,744

Time Zone :GMT/UTC +3 ()

Languages: Malagasy (official), French (official)

Religion: Christianity and Islam

Currency : Ariary (MGA)

Country Dialing Code: 261

I don't know yet where I will be assigned for my two years of service, what type of accomodations I will have or how often I will have access to the internet, but I hope to keep this blog updated with text and photos. Look for the lemurs whenever you can!

And more than anything I will look forward to hearing from you! Please keep in touch and check in often.

Cheers,

Laura

The Legal Stuff:

The opinions expressed and experiences described in this travelogue are those of one individual Peace Corps Volunteer. Nothing written here should be interpreted as official or unofficial Peace Corps literature or as sanctioned by the Peace Corps.