End Phase One. Begin Phase Two.

This week is my last full week in Tana. I have developed a rather loving relationship with Tana and my host family here so it will be a bittersweet parting on Saturday. Fortunately for me, I have a really exciting month ahead of me in which I will be spending in the coastal town of Diego Suarez which is basically as far north as you can go in Madagascar. (If you would like to see a visual map refer to one of my older posts here.)

In the meantime, I am going to enjoy my last few days in Tana, even though this time is going to be spent stressing out about going away for a month to a place I've never visited, what my plans are for the execution for my ISP and of course, the omnipresent 15 page paper that has been hanging over my head. So on second thought, maybe "enjoy" is not the correct word to choose... No matter how my time is spent, I know one thing is for sure: I am going to miss my family here SOOOO MUCH!!!! They have been wonderful enough to take me under their wing and accept me as a part of their family. They were so happy to show me everything and I saw things in and around Tana that I would not have otherwise seen.

Before I get too disgustingly sentimental, there is good news: I will be seeing them for a few days after my ISP and might be staying with them for these few days. Yay! So its not goodbye after all!

Anyways, just a few pics and captions to capture my last week in Tana...

I had been wanting to prepare and American sakafo (meal) for my fam for a while- finally got around to it the last weekend I was here. Since Madagascar isn't really known for their cheese, and my family only has two burners and no oven my favorite American dish mac and cheese was out of the question. So, I decided to go for a less cheesy version of the Italian favorite chicken Parmesan. 

Now in order to preface this story- my family had first of all never had chicken parm before and second of all, never even heard of it. So, I was not surprised when I walked into the Shoprite (grocery store chain here) and could not find mozzarella cheese let alone parmesan. I settled on some random cheese wheel which I later grated and put on top of the final product- It wasn't too bad, nothing like the city market cheese in VT that I'm used to but, as a cheese snob, I dealt with it. Also, boneless meat does not exist in Madagascar so, in addition to pounding and breading the chicken for preparation, me and two other family members spent 20 minutes carving the bones out of raw chicken thighs. Priceless. 

If you were to go into a Burmese restaurant, you probaly wouldn't know how to serve yourself or arrange your meal. I guess that is a dumb analogy of how my family felt when I showed them that you take pasta first, then chicken and then top it off with some sauce and cheese and voila! Chicken parm! 

Accompanied by some fresh, Malagasy green beans it turned out to be a pretty good meal! I bought a can of sauce at the Shoprite (probably not the best of decisions but, given our cramped kitchen situation with two burners I did not want to try and do the homemade sauce thing- I would be "azafadying" until the cows came home... azafady is the Malagasy way of saying anything from pardon me, to please, to excuse me and pretty much anything else. Azafady is a staple in the Malagasy vocabulary) Anyways, sad story- the sauce tasted like something McDonald's would make if they were to ever go into the pasta business, kind of sad, but the meal was still enjoyable. 

As you can see, the McDonald's type sauce did not faze my family as they literally ate every last bit of everything! They loved it so much that for lunch the next day they had pasta, cheese and sauce (minus my delicious chicken unfortunately). It was nice to have an alternative of rice in addition to a great meal, Olivia being a great chef praise and a tri-cultural experience (if you include Italian of course). It was a good time and good eats had by all!

A few days later was another big day! My older brother Joe presented his master's thesis in front of an academic jury board. This required a lot of prep from the family including concocting little goodie bags of bonbons for the guests! This was really exciting for me, because being the six-year old I am, I got to eat the candies left over! Anyways, the presentation went well, unfortunately I was not there to see it because I was held captive in the SIT center working on my paper but it was another good time had by all. 

To summarize, things have been totally crazy this week because it is the end of phase one of the program with classes and group excursions and such and the beginning of the second phase in which we commence our ISPs. Now, before any of that happens, we have had a ton of work to finish up from the first part of the semester, one of which involves a 15 page research paper due by the end of the week. Luckily I am all done as of right now, or I wouldn't be writing in this blog. I had a few opportunities to visit infant and maternal health centers and interview individuals on their views of family planning in Madagascar so I had enough information to easily write my paper. Now onto the ISP.... 

Before I get onto the subject of the ever omni-present ISP, I had a pretty ridiculous day today. Compared to life back home it was pretty ridiculous but, I guess it really could just be compared to another crazy day in Tana- So anyway, today was a national holiday and we didn't have classes, actually nobody had school in the country and most people were off of work. clearly,t he most rational thing to do on a national holiday is to have insanely populated street markets right? Well thats what people here do. So, in addition to their being crazy street markets there was this other market we heard of taking place in this giant stadium.

So naturally me and some friends decided to pack up and go. Unfortunately it was the "GO"ing part that was a problem. You see, we ended up walking around for probably thirty minutes trying to find the correct taxi be stop. Things here are not marked like they are back home, so when we stopped and asked people where the stop was for 153 and the pointed in a general direction, it was probably as helpful as someone telling you that they hid your sewing needle in a haystack. To make a long story short, we found the taxi-be stop right next to the location where we had started out, we were relieved to finally be on the taxi-be and headed in the right direction when suddenly, everyone got out, a bunch of people got on so that we were literally smushed like sardines in this vehicle and what do you know? The bus started going in the opposite direction of where we wanted to go. We knew that the location in the opposite direction was close so we decided to stay on the overcrowded taxi-be and wing it. Though, when we got off we did not have a great idea of where we were.

Luckily though, with my great directional skills- (I say this jokingly because I actually have horrible directional skills but for whatever reason, in Tana I have been able to find my way around quite flawlessly) we walked for a few minutes and stumbled upon a zoo that I had visited with my host family the first weekend I was here. I remembered that there was a taxi be stop across from the zoo that would take us where we wanted to be. Thank god for my memory!

Fast foreword to the stadium market: picture U.S. style convention selling anything you could imagine in little booths set up outside some sort of arena. That's what this was like. Apparently its like a four times a year thing that they have here and its totally fantastic. It was super clean, there were moon-bounces, trashcans, I really did feel like I was back at home. I bought another pair of crazy colored flowy pants, which God only knows when I will wear because they are ridiculous but I love them all the same. 

After indulging in some popcorn and cotton candy we made our way outta there. I ran into my sister in the middle of a busy market, which was slightly ironic and then took a taxi to the swanky Colbert hotel where we met up with some other friends and indulged in some delicious Italian food down the street. We made our way back to the colbert to mange some sinful desserts (they are known for their pastisseries- I think I have a picture of their dessert case in one of my older posts) but I ended up getting a peach and mango sorbet which was totally magnificently yummy. 

Back to reality after that- back to the center to work on my paper. But a good day was had by all, and now I'm done with my paper- which means I need to focus on my ISP. I am buying my taxi-brousse ticket tomorrow for Diego. I am super excited but very much nervous at the same time. I do not know what to expect and do not know a soul up there. Luckily we have some old program parters up there who are going to help me out and put me up in a homestay but nonetheless, its exciting, but a bit scary. Especially because the nature of my topic is so sensitive and difficult, it will add a new spin to scaryness. For those of you that don't know, prostitution is legal in Madagascar and is very common and thus, a hige problem. I am going to study female sex workers: the reasons why they find themselves in the business and the reasons why they do not get out. Don't worry though, I will be safe, it isn't as dangerous as it sounds and I and really excited to get started on it. I will keep you all updated!

I probably will not get a chance to update again until I am settled in Diego probably around the beginning of next week. So wish me luck in my two twelve hour taxi brousse rides on Saturday and Sunday. I hope I don't go crazyyyyyyyy

no electricity, no running water, no problem.

Hello all! I am sorry it has been so long, but unfortunately I was not only without internet for quite a while, but without running water and electricity as well. But you will hear all about that later- In my last post, I gave a little snapshot about what the rest of my time in Madagascar was looking like, where I have been, where I am going to go and what I am going to do. As many of you know, I spent that last week south of Tana in and around the second largest city in  Madagascar called Antsirabe. First off, the road to Anstirabe was absolutely stunning. The highlands of Madagascar (basically the center of the country) are made up of landscapes of mountains, valleys and beautiful farmland. The region south of Tana, the Antsirabe region is actually volcanic, which makes it very fertile it is also pretty temperate which allows for a wide variety of crops to grow. Needless to say, I ate pretty well down there. 

So to just summarize our itinerary, we left for Antsirabe last Thursday morning (3/15). Our plan was to stay in the city for two nights (Thursday and Friday) and then on Saturday morning head out to Betafo, a town south of the city which was the contact point for our village homestays. Saturday was the start of the homestay and it lasted until last Thursday morning (3/22) when we were picked up. 

To start off with- our academic director surprised us upon our arrival to Antsirabe with a tour of the Star brewery! If I have not mentioned Star before, it is a company that basically manufactures coke products for all of madagascar, spite, fanta etc. Also- all those water bottles labelled "Eau Vive" that you have seen in various photos- the vazaha water of choice- that is manufactured here too. And finally, THB (the horses beer) is the backbone of the star company. You literally cannot go anywhere in Madagascar without seeing THB signs or ads or the beer itself. its everywhere. (unfortunately, for it being so popular, its really not that good- I prefer the other beer that star manufactures called Gold.)

So, to make a long story short, we got a tour of the brewery. It was pretty cool. Everything seemed pretty sophisticated too. Everything was automated- they even manufactured their own yellow crates here as well. Just to note, in Madagascar glass bottles like beer bottles and drink bottles are reused, so one returns the bottles after use, and they are shipped back to this factory to be sanitized and reused. Interesting huh? Anyways, the factory tour was cool. I got to see a lot of beer being made. They whip out 500,000 bottles of beer a day (and the bottles are the equivalent to the double sized bottles in the US). Unfortunately for us there was no free beer at the end of the tour...(just to note- the drinking age here is 18-)

So, for the remainder of the day and the next that we were in Antsirabe, we paid some visits to some local contacts ], prepped for the village stay, and explored. I wanted to post this picture of the produce that I saw at one of the markets here one- because it is a beautiful array or fruits and veggies and two- to give you an idea of what they grow in this area and how fertile the land is here. 

Anyways, our stay in Antsirabe had to come to a close at some point and on Saturday morning we were all packed back in the sprinter and off to Betafo to face the unknown....

After paying a few viits to local authorities, we packed into private taxi brousses which dropped us off at our respectie homestays. Here is an example, and a beatiful view, of what we had to get across in order to even access some of our houses. 

Unfortunately some weren't that accessible. After almost kareening down that dirt hill in the former picture- we had to resort to this: (with the help if many Malagasy men and to the amusement of many children)

Finally, after many unforseen adventures in the taxi brousse I was home sweet home. My family were farmers. I had one sister aged 13 and two brothers aged 10 and 4. They were all super sweet and hospitable and really excited to host me. This area of Betafo is the first time that the SIT program has done village stays in this region so all of the families were super enthusiastic to host us and find out more about us. My family were farmers. They owned many plots of land in the area and grew crops such as corn, beans, potatoes, cassava,and of course, rice. We also had quite a family of animals as well- seven baby pigs, two big pigs, two baby cows, one big cow (I had fresh cows milk everyday- probably one of the best things in the world.), two dogs, a bunch of chickens and a rooster. 

Above is a picture of my house that I lived in. The bottom level is accessible by ground and is used as a kitchen and storage space. The second and third levels were living space- with a kitchen table and my parents bed and a sofa on the second level and me and my sister's room on the third level with the incredible terrace. And thats my four year old brother on the terrace- he was adorable- but a handful to say the least. 

My family owned a little epicerie that was outside the house and catered to all the villagers, cigarette needs, rum needs, soap needs and of course, my favorite, mofo gasy and beignets. If you do not know what mofo gasy and beignets are, which you probably don't, then it is time you come to Madagascar. Mofo gasy ("mofo" means bread in Malagasy and is pronounced "moofoo" and gasy is an abbreviation for anything MalaGASY) anyways, mofo gasy are these little english muffin type breakfast treats made out out rice flour- they are delicious! And I got them fresh every morning! Beignets are a Malagasy version of doughtnuts (beignet means doughnut in French) and they're basically these friend bread sugar things that are a heart attack on a plate but also totally delicious. 

I shared a room with my thirteen year old sister and spent most of my days helping with the farm work- milking the cow, fixing meals, picking corn... you know, the works. I was lucky enough to have a huge terrace outside my room where I could watch the beautiful sunsets, sunrises and enjoy the beautiful mountains and valleys of Betafo. 

Here's a picture of my sweet mother preparing dinner. The Malagsy use mainly charcoal for cooking (which unfortunately is destroying the environment and leaving urban centers like Tana, very much polluted). What is most likely cooking in this picture is rice. We had rice at every meal- breakfast lunch and dinner. To note as well- rice for the Malagasy is not the small side portion we are used to, it is a giant plate of rice with a little bit of loaka (the food that accompanies rice- usually meat, beans or veggies) on the side. For someone that is not a huge fan of rice, such as me, it made eating in the village especially difficult. 

Since I did not eat all of my portion of rice that I was given- A huge plate of it at all meals- My family  very much alarmed and were convinced I was hungry all the time. This resulted in my mother making me a giant bowl of homemade soup for snack (yes, snack) and sat and watched me to make sure I ate it and liked it. It wasn't as if I wasnt eating though- It was just at mealtimes I would eat five times the amount of loaka (the side dish served with rice- usually beans, veggie or meat) than the rice. And the malagasy eat ten time the amount of rice as loaka- so since they saw me not eating a lot of rice they assumed I was starving. Also- I forgot to mention that the Malsgasy are very very hospitable people, especially when it comes to food and especially in rural areas, where harvest is a sign of wealth, having hungry children (or guests in my case) is very much looked down upon. Needless to say, my initial though of maybe starving in the village was proven to be false- I'm pretty sure I gained five pounds. By the way, this photo above was taken from my terrace one morning- I was constantly amazed at how beautiful the landscape was. 

Sunday, my first full day in the village, brought a three hour long Catholic church service in Malagasy, in addition to a bake sale in the middle of the service- I guess to raise money for the church? I have learned not really to question things here much. Monday was the market day in Betafo. Everyone in the area went to the market on market day. some people had to walk miles to get to the market- this picture was taken on our (my mother and me) four kilometer walk to the market. More beautiful mountains. 

Do any of you know how rice is grown and harvested and eventually prepared to be eaten?? Well, below is a picture of a rice paddy, where rice is planted almost in a swampy environment. Then it is cut, harvested and dried to look like this picture above. (I don't claim to be an expert on rice growing by any means, I don't even like rice- so I apologize for any vagueness in my rice explanations. Anyways, on our way to the market, my mother and I stopped by her fathers house to introduce me- while I was there I also got to see a machine that shucks/ cuts? I don't quite know- but it does something to prepare rice. The little grains on the ground are rice grains in their shells that have just been cut off the stalks with this machine. 

After my little rice tour detour we continued on to the market. There, I encountered several other students from my program who were spending their days doing the same as me. We also met up with my brothers and sisters who go to school in the town of Betafo. But, when we first arrived at the market, my mother and I went into a hotely (Malagasy dive restaurant) for a snack- the diary in the area is ridiculously delish so we both got homemade yogurt and it was probably the most delicious yogurt I've ever eaten! After, we did a bit of shopping- she bought me a hat and bag as gifts in addition to a bracelet with pictures of Jesus all over it- I think she was trying to convert me because she was astounded that I did not practice any sort of religion. Before we met up with my siblings she took me to a beautiful lake in the town of Betafo- before I get into it though, I would just like to note that not only does this above picture have beautiful rice paddys but, that woman in the foreground is tying a basket full of live geese to the back of her bycicle. Like I said before, I tend to not ask- and just accept these things for the way they are. 

So we took a walk around the stunning lake surrounded by mountains- I ended up running into one of the girls from my program on my walk so I was lucky enough to have her take a photo for me-

After walking around the lake we met up with my siblings at their school, had lunch, bought some fruit at the market and then me and my host mother took a taxi brousse back home. It was a day well spent! Anyways, rather than boring you all with the crazy details of village life, I have selected a few photos that illustrate the rest of my stay. I developed a bit of a routine there after five days, and when I wasn't helping with cooking, cleaning or doing farm work, most of my time was spent lounging around, playing with children, reading and writing. 

Tuesday morning my mother took me to see a river just a short walk away from our house. It was like a little mother-daughter date- it was adorable. We walked along the banks of the river, I took some photos, she pointed out crops to me and then we sat on the grass and had snacks of mofo gasy and beignets. Oh- and I almost forgot to mention! My host mother spoke pretty good French so I was able to communicate with her using French. My father and sister spoke a little and my brothers only spoke Malagasy- so I was relieved that someone in the family spoke French well because it made the communication piece a whole lot easier!

Crossing the river Malagasy style-

As you can see by the photo above, I was well accustomed to Malagasy rural life. In this photo I am grinding grain to feed to the pigs and cows. Too badd my arms got tired after two minutes and my mother and father had to take over...

My cutie little brother and sister checking on the rice being cooked over the charcoal cooker. This was how we cooked meals every night.

My last night with the fam! My youngest brother Aro is in the front and Gael the ten-year old in the back. Unfortunately, my sister was not with us the last night because she had to take care of the children of a family member. Luckily I got to stop by her school the next day to say goodbye.

My goodbye pic! My parents are on the left side of me and the man on my right is a program parter who picked me up and decided that he wanted to be in the picture too- haha. 

Anyways, to wrap things up, I had a wonderful stay in the village with a fun, nice, and welcoming family! It was the experience of a lifetime- I learned so much about myself and malagasy life. The only setbacks were the constant food being shoved down my throat and the major flea infestation (my body is literally covered in nasty flea bites). Oh and I almost forgot to mention that most of the food and utensils served to me were not clean and washed in dirty water and I just decided that "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" I decided to screw it and eat everything anyway. It worked out for me until the last day- luckily I was back in the care of SIT then but, we had a very windy ride back to our hotel. After some horrible nausea and one emergency bathroom stop on the side of the road- we arrived at the hotel where I took cipro, took a nap and then woke up to be magically better. It was the most mysterious illness but whatever it was its gone now-

I wish I could add more to my descriptions and stories of my village stay but I would be here forever and I have a busy week ahead of me and lots of things to do! It's my last week in Tana and I have a fifteen page paper to write in addition to prep for my ISP. I cannot believe how time has flown! At this time next week, I will be en-route to Diego Suarez in Northern Madagascar to start my ISP. I couldn't be more excited!!!!

Until next time-

~Love You All~

Where in the world is Madagascar?

        I have a sad story tell: One of my dear friends back home received a letter from me a few weeks ago so naturally, she decided to write me back and send it alone the old fashioned way to my Madagascar Postal address (it is the program's address btw). So, she goes to the post office in Evanston Illinois and asks the lady at the desk how much postage to Madagascar would cost. The lady looked at my friend, Kate for a bit so Kate repeated. The lady then looked at the envelope, looked at Kate and asked "Is that international or domestic?"

      I guess I should not find this story too surprising considering the fact that many Americans cannot even locate their own country on a map, let alone one as exotic as Madagascar. I also should have known based on some people's reactions to where I was studying abroad. It was either a "wow! Madagascar?! Why are you choosing to go there instead or Europe?" or the simple "Where is Madagascar?" reaction oh and I also got a lot of: "Oh man! Like the movie?!". In any case, it saddens me that many people do not know of this beautiful, wonderful, exotic country off the eastern coast of Africa. 

     Just for visual purposes, I have posted a map below with the African continent and the country of Madagascar off the Southeastern coast. I expect all my readers to be able to pinpoint Madagascar on a map but, if you ever find yourself bored at a party or something, whip out this map and teach your friends a thing or two about geography!... I actually really hope that none of you do that- 

       But anyways, to those of you who do not know where in the world I am on a map here it is:

      Now that I am sure you all know where Madagascar is, time for another geography lesson! Throughout the past few weeks, I have been moving around a lot in Madagascar. Here is a map to show geographically where exactly I have been and where I plan to go during the rest of my time here. 

      I have so creatively used a photo-editor to star places in pink that I have visited or plan to visit, Let me start explaining...

*Antananarivo: The capital of Madagascar and the center of the ongoing political crisis. Due to the crisis it has become pretty dangerous here and many of you have probably read some of my blog entries about students from my program being mugged, followed, pick pocketed etc. CONSTANT VIGILANCE is essential here. Anyways, its not all bad though. I actually quite like it here aside from the danger and airpollution. There are some great restaurants, shopping, culture and of course in any busy place, my favorite pastime of people watching. This is where our program is based. I spent my first three weeks in Madagascar here. After our Majunga and Nosy Be excursion I spent about a week here and after our village stay I will stay here for another week before the start of ISP. 

**Mahajanga: This was our first stop on our coastal communities tour. Actually before Majunga we stopped at Ankarafantsika National reserve which is a little bit southeast of Majunga if you look on the map. Anyways, we spent twelve days here with host families. It is a sleepy city where everything shuts down between the hours of 12 and 3pm due to the hot climate and the fact that people take "siestas." The main attractions are the giant baobab and the boardwalk where you will most likely find lots of people socializing and walking in the early morning and early evening. 

***Nosy Be: Oh how I wish I was back in Nosy Be! I won't go into too much detail about this because it is so recent in my blog posts but, it is the number one tourist destination in Madagascar. It is know for beautiful beaches and tourist resorts and restaurants. At the same time though, one is still able to get a sense of the Malagasy culture and way of life on this island. We spent three nights in Nosy Be after our 12 days in Majunga as a kind of mini "spring break."

****Antsirabe and our village stay: Tomorrow I depart for the city of Antsirabe, the second largest city in the country  (Tana is the biggest). As you can see by the four pink stars, it is a bit south of Tana but not too far. It will take us about 4 hours to get there. We will spend two nights in Anstirabe and on Saturday morning all the students will depart for their respective villages in the area for the village stay! I am so nervous for this- I am spending five nights in a rural village. My parents are farmers, I have three siblings, I will most likely be shucking rice all day, no electricity, no running water, sleeping on the ground, having wooden huts for shelter- this will most certainly be an experience... wish me luck!

*****Diego Suarez: If I survive the village stay and my last night in Tana then I will find myself off to begin my ISP. Nothing is set in stone yet, but I hope to study sex tourism in the northern, touristy port town of Antisiranana, also known as Diego Suarez. You all might be wondering why I want to study this topic well, that is for another day- all I have to say is that prostitution and sex tourism is a huge problem in Madgascar, especially the more touristy parts where men will literally come to Madagascar for the sole purpose of sex tourism. Prostitution is legal here and was appalled to see unimaginable things happening right before my eyes in Majunga and Nosy Be. Anyways, more on that topic later- I will have a whole month to tell you all about it!

I am going to have so much to say in my next post! I hope I survive the village!!!!!

Veloma!!! :-)

Olivia + Tana = Reunited

So it was tough on Friday to say goodbye to Nosy Be and the coast. Back to Tana and back to reality is how it felt. Though it wasn't all bad, I was super excited to see my Tana family again and I know that I will be back in a town on the coast of Madagascar for my ISP. I wouldn't be able to leave without some parting photos though: 

Oh Nosy Be beach right outside my hotel, I will miss you dearly...

Enjoying our last moments of beach and vacation until we go back to the realty of Tana

Things aren't all bad though: It's a good thing that Madagascar has such a stunning landscape that I could see throughout my whole plane ride from Nosy Be to Tana

So Tana and I are reunited again. We got in late Friday night from the Antananarivo airport and took cabs back to our host families. I think the reason why I was not super bumed about leaving our vacation spot was the fact that my host family in Tana is so amazing and I have missed them bunches. I was actually homesick for my Tana host family while I was away, I guess that really says something about compatability and general awesomeness. Anyways, of course they were happy to see me as I was happy to see them. I went to bed on the early side on Friday night because I was a bit tired and Olivia and I had some fun plans for the next day...

So as you can see from two photos above... We took a trip to the University of Antananarivo, where Olivia studies English. Unfortunately, due to a student strike because students are not receiving their government-funded scholarships, the University is closed until July until a formal agreement can be reached. It is such a shame that these students are not able to have access the higher education they have worked hard to achieve. (Oh and that is a pic of me striking a silly pose on the university campus if you have not figured that out yet...)

After touring the University and stopping by Olivia's childhood home I decided to treat us to a cold drink and ice cream at the Hotel Colbert. The Hotel Colbert is a four star hotel in a more high end section of Tana which has an incredible patisserie and restaurant, adjacent to it. I was craving a good old American-style iced coffee or tea so I insisted on the colbert. We ended up ordering iced green teas which were reminiscent of the Panera iced green teas, if you have ever had one you know what I am talking about and trust me, they are deeeelish! So basically that drink hit the spot and satisfied my craving for the meantime. We also got ice cream- I got a scoop of homemade vanilla caramel swirl praline whch was probably one of the most incredible flavors I have ever had. After this, we went home, had lunch and continued adventuring around the city and window shopping of the afternoon. 

Sunday morning brought my host mothers 50th birthday and me being the master chef in the kitchen making pancakes. (I brought my family VT pancake mix and maple syrup for a gift from home)

There's the fam enjoying the pancakes! We also had nutella in the house so they ended up being nutella pancakes with maple syrup. I couldn't have asked for anything tastier!

The morning was made up of running errands for the big 50th birthday party that was going to be at the house tonight. For lunch, we decided to go out for a special treat for maman's birthday. We ended up at some French restaurant in the center of the city in the quartier of Analakely. I orders chicken cordon bleu which I thought was delicious, it is nice to have a comforting, familliar meal once in a while, not to mention, it was really tasty! Haha oh and I love how I am the only one looking at the camera in this picture. I also remembered I haven't quite introduced you all to my Tana fam yet. Well, starting with me and going counter-clockwise, there's my brother, Aine who is 12, next to him is one of my uncles who accompanied us, across from him is my sweet host mother and next to her is my jokester of a brother, Joe, he is 25. Olivia, my twin sister is taking the picture. 

After the delicious lunch, I decided to take advantage of having access to a car and being with my Malagasy family on a Sunday in Analakely. If I have not yet told you all, this is really the most dangerous part of town and where most of the crime and pickpocketing happens. I have had a friend get her purse snatched off her here and another who got her necklace torn off her neck, my host mother also got her earrings stolen while she was wearing them! This is also where most of the political demonstrations happen, so as you can see, one does not want to be wandering around here by oneself with valuables. To make a long story short, I took advantage of my relatively safe circumstances to snap a few photos of Analakely-

After that, we found ourselves back at the Colbert for ice cream. This time  was able to snap a few photos of the patisserie part of the colbert. Doesn't this look like heaven??? Oh and ps- I got praline ice cream this time and it tasted exactly like the hazelnut praline you would find inside of a chocolate. It was absolutely delicious!

So after our afternoon romp was when the party began. We spent the afternoon preparing for the large Malagasy family that was to come over and celebrate my host mother's 50th birthday with us. The food and company were great. I even got to chat in English with some family and friends that are trying to learn. I also made a few friends during that time as well as you can see from the photo above... haha

 Joyeuse Anniversaire Maman!!!

Maman cuts the delicious cakes we had made at one the local patisseries one of them was chocolate mousse which was my favorite. 

Basically in all, I am very glad to be back with my family in Tana. I cannot say enough great things about them and I cannot thank them enough for doing all of the wonderful things they have done. I only have one more weekend left with them and it saddens me greatly to think that I will have to say goodbye at some point- but that is then and this is now. I am going to enjoy every last second I have with them until I leave! Love you all!

It is time for me to go to bed. it is 11:15 here an I have to get up at  for classes tomorrow or else I could write much much more. But get prepared for the next blog entry which will detail where I have been in Madagascar thus far and where we plan to travel. 

~Much Love~

Paradise.

         So the last few days have been absolute paradise to say the least. Yesterday we moved location from the port town of Hell-Ville Nosy Be to a more touristy beach location. Our hotel is right on the beach with its own bar and restaurant and other restaurants, shopping and nightlife are just a short walk away!

            Yesterday brought snorkeling, beach time and sun buns for most (not me though! I was one of the lucky ones-). The snorkeling was amazing and I do not think I have ever been in warmer water. It is incredible. We took a boat to a small island called Tanikely where there are reefs right off the shore.

            I have to keep reminding myself that I am on a little volcanic island off the coast of Madagascar 

because this all seems so unreal to me. I am so lucky to have these kinds of opportunities. Like in the last post, I won’t bore you with crazy boring details, basically my last few days have involved beach, snorkeling, walks on the beach, runs on the beach, ice cream and happiness. Here are a few pics to illustrate:

Tanikely- The little island where we spent our day snorkeling

Beach at Tanikely

So one of our SIT contact on Nosy Be was up at 5 am preparing this beautiful and delicious lunch spread for us- it involved shrimp and beef brochettes, fresh crab, giant fresh swordfish and barracuda, avocado and tomato salad, coconut rise, a little salad medley of carrots, zucchini and potatoes and fresh fruit. Sound like heaven? It was. 

Some of the girlies taking advantage of the warm bathwater

There was a lighthouse in the middle of the island which we climbed up- this was the view that greeted us. 

The beach outside our hotel at sunset

Getting ready to go to lunch! Note our awesome tans-

         So thats it for Nosy Be! I am sitting in the hotel restaurant right now looking out at the beach and wishing that we could stay for longer... But unfortunately our flight back to Tana leaves this afternoon so I am going to have to come to terms with parting with Nosy Be for a while. I still have some tropical beaches waiting for me (Mauritius anyone??!!) so I guess its not all that sad...