As I have been reminded, my posting on my experiences in Madagascar kind of fell short after being in Tulear the second time. I'll try and catch up a little at a time, since I don't think I'd be able to fit it all in one post.
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| Hailstorm in Fiana |
We left Tulear at the beginning of November with a couple days stop in the city of Fianarantsoa in central Madagascar. In Fianarantsoa we spent our time looking for a bed sheet to replace a deteriorating one we had on loan from our neighbors in the village (surprisingly enough looked all over and didn't find any, found some other towns as soon as we no longer needed one). We also visited the Peace Corps office located in Fianarantsoa, to look into the possibility of getting a Peace Corps volunteer to work in the village, as I hope someone else would be able to work longer term than I was able to with the village. We also had some crazy weather, including lightning, sheets of rain pouring down & even a few moments of hail. Before the hail, walking among street markets I couldn't figure out why all of the vendors were closing down until the skies opened up. Obviously locals were a lot more used to this kind of weather shift than I was.
We escaped the weather of Fiana, took another taxi-brousse on windy roads to arrive back at the village. People were very excited to see us back, and I was happy to be back as well, excited to see trees everywhere covered in litchi fruits.(The last time I had eaten a litchi was two years ago my last time in Madagascar & they are delicious). Much of our time in the village the second time around was to wrap things up, and present the materials for obtaining a peace corps volunteer.
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| Litchis! |
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| Litchis! |
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| Hope for Madagascar visit, inspecting the river |
Hope for Madagascar visited before we left, to discuss the possibility of continued projects with Anosimparihy as well as planning for the construction of a well. The day before the Hope for Madagascar team arrived there was a total deluge, so much that buckets put under holes in the gutter were filled within seconds. Because of this, the water level was extremely high, and the water was extremely muddy in the river, giving a good idea of some of the worse conditions for water supply that the village faces.
After we left the village Hope for Madagascar dug and installed a hand pump for the well in the village on two separate visits. I was very happy that this happened- if nothing else, the villagers of Anosimparihy now have a good water supply, which was one of the things they stated they needed most. Before leaving the village we gifted the school, the village doctor and our neighbors with several of our supplies including my English-Malagasy dictionaries. I feel like it's not much, but at least there's something as far as materials go to helping the school.
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| Well Construction-Photo Credit: Hope for Madagascar |
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Well & Pump complete!- Photo Credit: Hope for Madagascar
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It was sad leaving, especially those who we had gotten to know and had been especially kind to us. The day we left some students from the school helped us haul our luggage the 3 km back to the road where we were lucky enough to catch a taxi-brousse passing by the moment we arrived. Strange thinking back to it now (especially here in the US) that I lived in a village for about 3 months, and after leaving the village we embarked on a new adventure heading down south along the east coast to Fort Dauphin. (to be continued...)
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