lens crafter

Do you think your Wu_Tang sword can defeat me?

Ghost face, that's what I have. Allways showing up and diseappering. My latest act was at CNELA teaching English again. It was lots of fun. I think I need to stick closer to the curriculum next time, because though my students had about average test scores, I can do a lot better. One of my students did get one of the highest scores so I am proud of him and also of the rest of my students, even those who didn't pass. Because each of them made an effort to learn something, and it was my fault if what they learned from me didn't help with the exam. I hope it helps in a different way.

We had a party on Wednesday. It was a great party. They served duck. Each person in the hall stood up to introduce themselves. I copied the format everyone used so I could say I my name and my job in Malagasy. There is a sort of begining dance at the begining of a celebration. I participated. There was a gift exchange. I got a ceramic pink elephant. I just gave the elepant to two girls who play outside near my apartment. After the party I went to a bar with a teacher and his friend. I was pretty inspired by the faith of the teacher in the US. He said that he is glad the US polices the world. The US put liberty first and is therefore supported by God. That is why, he says, I shouldn't fear our decline.

We met some Peace Corps Volunteers. They seemed pretty nice but they left to meet someone, inviting us to tag along. I talked to a British guy for a while. He just finished some kind of management gig down near Toliar. He left for the UK yesterday, on Thursday the 19th of Dec. So after talking to him, we did catch the PCVs, who were pretty nice. Some were new, some old, most younger than me. I talked to the brother of my colleague's friend in French. We talked about girls here. Like, I have to learn Malagasy before finding a girlfriend. He didn't really agree, because a girl to whom I am close could teach me Malagasy. I still feel like prudence is the best policy at this juncture. After, the teacher went home to his wife, and I went to another bar with the PCVs. There were a lot of foreingers and beautiful Malagasy girls. I guess it was pretty obvious what was going on. I tried my best to speak Malagasy, but eventually my headache took my outside to catch a cab.

Anyway, Merry Christmas, gj to New Mexico on same sex marriage legalization, and be calm come the new year to Washington and Colorado. I'll be 60 clicks north of Tana trying to learn Malagasy soon! Is it weird that the only songs to which I know the lyrics are from Disney movies? I guess the party was on Wednesday and today is Friday the 20th. It is a holiday because of voting. So give your best wishes for the future of Madagascar.

I can't believe I still intend to watch Naruto after the Chikara arc, which completely clashes with both Bee's training of Naruto and the war prepartions in which Konoha failed to mention Kabuto to its Allies.

Other random tidbits. I am using a distro of linux whose default default audio player is a video player and even when you open a file with no video it opens a window and plays the song. But i am like having enough of songs before there over and closing the window, but i obviously dont stop the song first because that should just sort of come along with closing the window, otherwise i would be minimizing it wouldnt i? the song keeps playing... on the flipside, i learned that if i just hold the cursor over the icon of an audio file, it starts playing after a few seconds, and stops when i move the cursor off of the icon.

I finally finished Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics by John Lyons. The beginning was super interesting, since it came packed with fun language quirks and had plenty of examples. As the book goes on, the clarity decreases as the number of examples goes down. It is pretty useless after the stuff of Chomsky. I started it in May and read the first four hundred pages by like July when I took it to SEC and talked with Jonathan and Renee's wife's older brother. Like, flying planes are dangerous and flying planes is dangerous. Or eating apples is healthy and eating apples are healthy, but not the ones that are like the one given to Snow White. The whole idea of deep structure vs surface structure seems like there is stuff we don't understand and stuff we do understand.

I watched 8 Diagrams Pole Fighter, Five Deadly Venoms, and The 36 Chambers of Shaolin. The last is by far the best. It tells the story of someone who learns kung fu to fight injustice. Of course, despite his late start, he turns out to be a prodigy and is held in high regard by the other monks.

Base

So guys, I am not sure what the reason is, but I am really starting to enjoy life here. Part of it is taking internet courses on computer science. Of course, I could do that anywhere. But here, the internet connection is dicey on the best days. Like, I am writing this offline, dicey. So it is a bit challenging just to have the chance to complete the lessons.

Another thing that is OK is that my roommate and I have come to a bit of an agreement. I buy a lot of the food and keep the kitchen clean, and he lets me by with less than half the rent. Thanks to mom's packages, we have exchanged movies. He is a good listener but doesn't like to speak about his work.

Some areas here, especially the alleys, are like, is there a war going on, bad. Lots of people her know my name. And I mean like some people whom I don't recognize shout my name as I walk. I am a bit afraid to talk about a book while I am reading it, but a sort of guru character in the book Infinite Jest says to be careful not to attract more than your own weight.

In other news, some students thanked me for teaching them at the end of the last class. It made me feel good like it sort of dissolved some anger I accumulated trying to be interesting for three months. Teaching was mostly fun, but I did sort of fall into habits that weren't so productive. So I am really happy that some students forgave me for this.

The teachers are pretty supportive. But Zoely stands out: she gives me lots of suggestions and she even lets me use her photocopies. It is great because it helps me deliver some things that the students expect.

I plan to go to Tsarasoatra later this month, to the home of one of Zoely's cousins. It is 60km north of Tana and there is a taxi bus stop within walking distance of the town. The rice harvest is coming up, but in Tsarasoatra rice is only planeted once a year so it wont be planted again until later in 2014 than I am able to stay due to my contract with the school. I plan on staying there for a part of the break in teaching from Dec 19 to mid April.

There is also wushu, which is fun in a big way. I get to listen to instructions in Malagasy. The master doesn't give us much time, but there are a few students who are leagues better than me. There is a good crowd there every weekend. We practice Saturday all day and Sunday morning. I am petitioning for a Wednesday afternoon session because a five day lapse leaves me wrecked when the training starts.

Solar Power

When someone installs solar panels, they use less power from the grid, meaning they spend less money on electricity. power companies are saying that when someone leaves the grid, it increases the price of electricity for those who stay on the grid. Well, doesn't that assume a fixed revenue?

This article takes the price hike to be a given:

http://www.abc15.com/dpp/news/region_phoenix_metro/central_phoenix/solar-power-in-arizona-aps-in-fight-with-rooftop-solar-firms-over-rates




From page 2:
"She said utilities are worried about a vicious cycle -- more rooftop solar panels means they have to raise other users' prices, which drives even more people to solar. She also said the installations are more common in affluent areas, shifting costs to poorer customers."

For the first point, I have to say that there is nothing vicious about the cycle. But,if the price hike occurs, the second point is a genuine problem , since some people don't have the cash to install solar panels. So, what is necessary for everyone to benefit from the use of solar panels is free installation.

Alright, maybe not EVERYONE is going to benefit from that, or, at least, there will be some people, for example, power company employees, who will complain, even if the environmental impacts are good for them. But what if the rich people who can afford solar panels today do not reap the benefits of net metering. What if instead, they just get to save on the lower consumption of power company provided electricity due to their personal collection. Well, who would get the cash from selling the extra solar energy  to the power companies? Well, I propose that the money goes to installation of solar panels on the homes of people who cannot afford them. So power companies will be buying the products that are going to render their current product useless. But they would also, as a part of the deal, earn stock in the solar companies with which they ally. That way, power companies will willingly shut down their polluting power stations in favour of a predominantly localized and environmentally friendly energy solution, in which they have financial interest.

This vicious cycle of increased solar panel usage making solar panel usage increasingly popular sounds to me as good as cold fusion or any other perpetual energy solution.

Anyway, I think that the situation is a bit more complicated than I have portrayed it. Solar panel users do not generally leave the grid. Actually, in some situations they don't even use the energy from the solar panels on their roofs. They sell it all to the power company. Further, solar panels panels feed the grid at night. But in Arizona, AC must use more energy during the day.

One week from visa decision

Apparently, there are eligible voters, and voters that are on the voting list. Each election, people are sent to every home where there is an eligible voter. If there is someone at home, the eligible voter makes the voting list. So some of my friends, for example Gaelle and Fany, were unable to vote in this election, because they were not at home to receive the election employee. For them though, there is good news. Their dad had a stroke about 3.5 weeks ago. He came home from the hospital on Tuesday. I saw him yesterday. His movement was limited, but he seemed as lucid as anyone does when they are speaking a language I cannot understand.

No, my understanding is improving. I was able to catch a few conversational points Rado's mom made at lunch and another in the teacher's lounge yesterday. But each time, I was involved in an english conversation, which  was continued in Malagasy to another person. In that way, even getting only one word of an utterance was enoguh for me to guess the meaning. On the flipside, I am definitely learning something about English as I tried to teach. The thing that impresses me most though is how much people want to learn English. But I am a bit worried that I am compromising my English to make it easier to understand. People comment that I swallow the letter /t/ in certain words, especially when it occurs at the end. I don't think i completely swallow the sound, but I don't at an /s/ sound to the end of my /t/ sound so 'lot of' sounds more like 'lodov' than 'lots of'. And somewhere in the middle, I can now watch films subbed in french and films dubbed in French pretty comfortably. I am going to try an actual French movie one of these days.

I finished reading One Hundred Years of Solitude yesterday, on Thursday November 7th. It is by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. A married couple flee their town. The woman is afraid of inbreeding, but they were haunted by someone the man killed. They founded a new town. Gypsies visit. They have kids. A war breaks out. The kids have kids. The man and a gypsy study. The woman grows old, keeping order. The kids kids have kids. A train comes to the town. A banana company is founded in the town. The working conditions are not good. Their is at least one more generation. What is crazy is that the guys are all of two names. One wife is from a neighboring town. She has the habit of not calling things by their names. One of the original kids crafts some golden, jeweled fish, boils them, and restarts. The book is only annoying because it never calms down. The writer will tell a story in the past tense, and ends it by telling the end of another story. He proceeds to tell the story, but always from a seemingly unrelated starting point. It is only as he is about to end the next story that I remember what he is explaining. There is a lot of magic in the village, and people are unimpressed by technology. There is also a lot of talk of the circularity of time.

Election Weekend

Gae, Miora, Tony

 

View from the house of the man below

 

 

Happy on voting day

 The man: Tovo

 Toaka gasy warms the belly

Learning to flow

Below is the hostess, whose wedding we went to in Ambositra

 

AFter party

quirks

On thing that everyone must know is that there is some tea that smells and tastes like a fruity pebbles with milk: verimanitra/

Another thing: this is such a poor country. There is trash everywhere, the streets are use as toilets, most of the buildings are severely damaged, and the cars were made before catalytic converters. What gets me is how ridiculous people look when they get rich. They spend their money on a new car, flashy clothes, and a nice place. But when everyone is wearing dirty clothes, you just look like a chump getting out of your Range in a suit.

Another thing that is important: the different between loaka and a vegetable dish in the US or Europe is not in the ingredients. Rather, since loaka is made to be eaten with rice, it should be that a small morsel flavors a spoonful of rice, so it needs a lot more flavor than a side dish.

Google loses searchers to Facebook, because when people watch a video that is posted on fb, they do not search on Google for the video. What may have been outweighing this fact is that Google gains searchers via the gain in number of people using the internet caused by Facebook.

I was asked by three guys who smoke and drink at the market near my place my opinion is on how to improve Madagascar. I was surprised, but I talked, even though I am sure they have ideas of their own that they wanted to tell me. But you know, the French abused the Malagasy, and the Malagasy still want to be like foreigners. In fact, the only foreigners the Malagasy people know well were abusive. The people that are in power are those who are willing to be as abusive as the French, so it is pretty amazing the is no civil war; I mean, it shows how the Malagasy understand without imitating, all except for those in power. What matters is that the Malagasy thought the French were abusive. I don't know whether the French were actually abusive; I don't know whether they tried to be abusive. They might have thought they were doing a lot of good by bringing cars here. Cars are a lot less useful when you cannot use them to travel to other countries. Plus, they brought dirty, old cars here. Anyway, I told them they should not rely on another country.

Another weird thing about this country is that potholes are not always covered. So, once in while there is a hole on the curb. Most of the time its only a few feet deep and full of trash. But sometimes the drop is about fifteen feet down a narrow passage. So, pedestrians and drivers have to look out for these. This is another danger of traveling at night.

There are some streets that have bumper to bumper traffic all day long. One such street is home to the school where I teach. Despite the fumes from all these cars, there is a huge tree across the street from the school that has managed to produce blue flowers.

I recently finished reading The Pillars of the Earth by Keith Follet. It was fun to read, but it was a bit shallow. The best part was how the book covered such a long time period without dwelling on boring events. That is to say, the pace was good and the distance was also good. But the book was written by a good observer, not a great inventor. It is a long book, and sometimes he used the same words to describe one of the villains. That was one way I picked up on his weaknesses. But the lack of depth was mostly in the commentary on the relationship between secular magic and Christian magic.

Two people have told me that one reason there are so many forest fires here is that people like to see them. As a volunteer, we were told that the practice, tavy, is to fertilize the soil, but that its effect was short lived.

Shoulders

OK well its ten pm on Sept 26. This is Thursday. Tomorrow is the last day of the second week of my first trimester teaching English at CNELA. It has been fun. I tell a lot of jokes and I get the students to talk at lot.

I am living with Fred. He is 27 and he has a high paying job in the surveying industry. He is a boss. He works late. My second class ends at seven thirty pm and my first class starts at four pm.

I teach from a packet and original materials. So far, I have had some success with having a few plans from which I can chose. The first class is going a bit better than the second. But the second class is a bit bigger than the first, so it is a bit harder to keep everyone interested.

I am cooking a lot. There are bugs in the house, but I am starting to get used to them. I was only slightly bothered when I found a dead cockroach in my bed two mornings ago. I guess they are here because my roommate was living alone for a while before I moved in and he doesn't really clean the kitchen all that much. 

I plug some weird type of thing into the wall in the evening to repel mosquitoes. I would prefer to use a net since I have no idea what I am breathing, but I am just using a mattress with no bed frame, so there really isn't a good way to put up a mosquito net.

I started drinking beer again. The few cigarettes I smoke leave me paying the price of a sore throat the next day.

I meet with the mother and family of my roommate on Wednesdays. We speak in English mostly, but they aren't quite as good as my roommate, so I usually learn some Malagasy. The second son of the family is my age. This weekend he has his finals for a correspondence course in computer science. The last child is a teenage girl who seems pretty mature.

Last weekend I started learning Wushu from some sort of official school. The master didn't really appear, but there is probably a lot of conditioning work for me to do before it is really worth his time.

I am watching Naruto. It is OK, but I had to start with the second season, in which Naruto wears orange and black. There was an arch in which four people attacked Konoha that seemed pretty worthless. It is becoming more serious now: Team 10 and Team Kakashi have just defeated two Akatsuki.

Lastly, the internet needs to be free and stay free. The biggest problem with democracy is that voters are uninformed. The internet gives people a chance to be informed. Therefore people need access to the internet. Further, the information on the internet can neither be censored nor costly. That is way I mean when I say that the internet needs to be free and stay free.

Brooklyn

So on the day after I got back from Ambositra, I went to see a dance contest with Gaelle. The contest was for a position in a Brooklyn Arts School competition. There we many foreigners amongst the guests. We sat with a boy and his sister. I have seen the boy before, but I don't exact remember where. He must have been a contestant in the last show I judged. Anyway, there was a band playing while we waited for the contestants. I got to hear the traditional instrument, Faly incorporated into a band, instead of into a sales plot for tourists. It is cylindrical, but basically like a guitar. At first I could hear it, but not the accompanying guitar, but I learned to distinguish the guitar from the sharper notes of the Faly.

There were four performers: the first incorporated many different tribal traditions. It was the best all round performance. There were bright colors, many costumes, and enthusiastic dancers. The second group feature some boys in shiny, sky blue suits with white sashes. Their dance was a bit like some of the Tai Chi I know. I really enjoyed this, but then some big middle aged women came onto the stage and I was a bit disappointed since they couldn't really dance and their voices were pretty much drowned out by the band and the other signers who had mics. After, A beautiful young girl came out alone. She was nervous but capable. At the end she settled down. The third group I don't really remember that well. Oh yea, the second group was from the Highlands according to Galle. Anyway, I think the third group was doing a Tandroy dance. There was a mock fight over water. The last group depicted a famadihiana, or turning of the bones. There was some miming that I didnt really understand. I haven't actually ever seen a turning of the bones festival, so I guess that is one reason I didn't get the mining. this group was pretty creative with some dark cloth. They created something like a tomb, and did some visual trick with the body in which it was difficult to track which person was supposed to be dead. Then everyone was dancing.

Well, after the first two groups, there was a performance by a younger group. Two kids that must have been less than ten years old were the main singers. They had pretty big voices. Also, at every break, there was an emcee who did his best to speak in Malagasy, French, and English. His comfort decreased while using languages further towards the end of that list. He was pretty funny anyway. The competition ended with a talk by two guys from the US. It was translated into Malagasy by an internationally famous Malagasy singer. I hope someone will remind me of her name so I can listen to one of her songs. At the end, it was announced that Bakomanga won.
I walked Gaelle home with Francia, the previous president of the group that put on the English Speech contest in Trano Pokonoly. We were a bit scared to walk in the dark, but there were no buses. I took a bus back to CNELA from Gaelle's.

Double vests

I went to Ambositra on the morning of the 25th of August. I was with Fred and three of his colleagues. We arrived at the house of Jira, the boy whose wedding we were to attend, just before dark. We had some beer on the balcony. I think that gave me a headache. Over 50 percent of the last five times I drank beer I got a headache. Around nine pm, we were invited into the kitchen. It was about the size of a closet and featured two open flames. Oh man there was a lot of smoke. But it was warm. I wasn't feeling great when dinner came around. I remembered some times in Nepal when there was an impossible amount of food in front of me. I had to concentrate to stomach every bite. Deep breaths. Its not that the food was bad: it there were even vegetables for me. But the traveling, the beer, the heat, and the foreign environment got to me. We slept in the groom's room. I woke up earlier than the rest to hear Fred snoring. I though, geez, I will never get back to sleep. But when everyone was up, the others said I was just as loud as Fred! 

We took a long bus ride in to the town of the bride. It was nice because we had frequent stops and I got some mofo gasy and a finger of toaka gasy. We arrived at the civil building just before lunch. We waited outside as the entourage of the bride walked up the red, dirt street. There were three officials in the hall. Two of them had some things to say. The other supplied the couple with some papers to sign. The father of the bride said a prayer. To me, this ceremony married the couple, so I left some money in a collection box.

Next, we went to the house of the bride's parents. There was a buying ceremony, in which small amounts of money were given for one reason or another from the groom's party to that of the bride. With each addition to the pot, there were some formalities said on both parties. Fred told me that most of the time a professional takes care of this. It was a bit trying for the patience of some people. I was just trying to understand.

Lastly, we went over to a recreational center for a feast. Boy, radish, cauliflower, potato, zucchini, and I don't know what else made for a great salad. There must have been some type of mayonnaise. The next course was bread in a really rich cream. Then we had rice and zebu. I was not a vegetarian during this trip. Zebu was fine, but when I ate chicken, I didn't feel great. Anyway, everyone who attended was introduced over the microphone. The dad proved a funny emcee. The was karaoke, dancing, and cake. Then we left. It was really simple, but there is still supposed to be a marriage in the church. When we returned to the house of the groom, it seemed like the whole neighborhood was there to usher the newlyweds into their chambers.
We grabbed our stuff and headed for a hotel. We had a nice meal in a touristy spot and stayed in a great hotel.

The next day, I had tongotromby, or zebu foot soup for breakfast. It was alright, but there was not much meat, mostly just fat. I should mention that all Fred's colleagues and the couple could speak OK English. Still, mostly everyone was in Malagasy, so I was pretty quiet. Fred has a tendency to repeat things three times for emphasis, and imitating him helped me get comfortable with some easy phrases. I learned how to say 'no way' (tsy tafa voaka) and we all repeated it frequently. We met the bride and the groom one last time after breakfast before going to the taxi brousse station. While waiting, we had some spirits and some seriously salted jerky. The ride home was a bit rough for the kid next to me. We were four, but a manager insisted we squeeze another full size man in the row. So this preteen had two shoulders nearly touching in front of his face for about eight hours. We had to stop to change break pads on the way back. Hmm... When we arrived, another employee of Fred's company (ILS?), which, btw, is where the bride and the groom work, was at the taxi bus station to pick us up. We has some soup and I finally tried Nem;).

I didn't bring my camera, but maybe there will be some picture on fb soon...

Books - The Glass Castle and Cutting for Stone

Jeanette Walls begins her book, The Glass Castle, with a desert setting. The story is from the perspective of the second child of an artist and a drunken electrician/ The first chil is a clever girl. The second child is close to the father. All four kids, but especially the first three, learn to fend for themselves in their gypsy lifestyle. The mom wants her kids to be strong and believes that what doesn't kill someone makes that person stronger. The mol has a large inheritance, but won't sell land. The kids end up caring for the parents in the backwards town Welch, WV. They move to NYC to break free.

I really enjoyed the book. I don't know why now. My mom said she didn't like it too much, but it caused a riot at her book club because people had different views on how to deal with alcoholics. I got it from a Californian guy named Kevin who visited Madagascar in a break from his semester (or was it year?) abroad in SA.



Abraham Verghesse did something pretty cool by writing Cutting for Stone. The beginning is sweet, and it continues like that for a while. But the plausibility breaks down about two thirds of the way through. You know, the book made me proud of my dad because he is doctor. Also, it really drew me into the relationship between the narrator and his twin brother. Basically, a doctor fucks a nun in Ethiopia. The doctor fucks up the delivery. Twins that were conjoined in the womb survive; the mother doesn't.  The doctor runs away to the States, becoming a renowned surgeon. The midwife at the hospital takes in the babies, marries the internal medicine doctor, and they live happily. There is a really sad story about a girl, but it gets unbelievable, like the author didn't have the guts to really describe his ideas. There is war in the country and, because of a relationship with the girl, the protagonist has to flee. He goes to America, where he meets his father and provides some nice comments on being a foreigner in the US. The book culminates in a medical challenge in which the father has a chance to redeem himself through the ingenuity of the twin. 

Living alone

I just finished watching the anime Clannad After Story. It is about a couple. There are two stories about the same couple. In the end, one turns out to be the actual story, but it is not the one in focus. In fact, there were three stories, but one was about the daughter and the dad. This one is related more closely to the sad story that was the focus of the second half of the series. Lastly, there was a drama put on by the wife in the year she met the main character. It romantisized the city in which the anime takes place. The effect this had on the main character, the husband, is that the city was personified, trying to please people. It might seem sad, but even though this was a drama, the action was awesome. The anime wasn't too realistic: there were triplets with purple hair and different eye colors. But one of them, and the class president, were good fighters for some reason. Anyway, the main struggle for the protagonist is having the confidence to be happy about his relationship with the main girl. You know, he keeps thinking she would have had a better life if they didn't meet. In the end, even of the sad storyline, he thinks the joy of his love for her was worth the pain.

One thing about Madagascar is that men and women do not always use separate toilets in public places. Actually, it is not easy to find toilets. They are around, but they are not so well advertised as they are in the US. But when you find one, often, you are looking at something that doesn't exactly flush. Some toilets have buckets of water outside the stalls. Lastly, some places, like the sport center and some of the public toilets where peeing costs 2.5 cents, have tubes on the walls. The tubes spray water down the wall, and there is a tile barrier between the wall and the floor. Guys can just pee on the wall. I think that is pretty efficient since even most urinals require finding a sweet spot where you can pee without spraying yourself.

Let's see, what is is going on. Well, I am almost done applying for my visa. I have a permit to stay while the Ministry of Public Function prepares the last document I need to submit to the Ministry of the Interior. In this process, I had to write to three ministers and one prefect. They weren't personal letters, everyone who so applies has to write them, but the style is crazy! I have the honneur of soliciting your great benevolence... It wasn't not fun at first. But after, it sort of became a game. I met lots of nice ladies working in different offices. I also met a great guy who works for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I mentioned him before. It is an important realisation for me that these sort of administrative tasks, which meant nothing to me, are actually fun and educational. They really gave me a chance to think about what I want to do here. I learned that it is best never to hide my desires and that it is important to prepare people to give thought to my situation in order for them to understand my desires.

I am paying for my internet as I use it. So far, I think it will be about as expensive as accomodation. If I settle down, I will get a long term plan that is more reasonable, because the fee is lower and it is unlimited. Today, I opened a bunch of pages I wanted to read, then shut off the internet because I don't really understand how the count works: is it all done by the quantity of data transfered to the computer or is there also a price per unit of time?

There is no water at my place right now. It has been at least 12 hours. I am going to move in with someone like a friend of a friend of a friend. He is 27 and lives near the school. The lack of water isn't really the cause as I made the decision beforehand. I finally built a computer. It is a desktop. I wanted it that way. Right now, I live on the third story of a sixteen classroom complex. The nearest family lives on the first floor. I talk with them everyday, but I don't live with them. In the new place, I hope to learn Malagasy from the flatmate while in the comfort of my own desktop environment.

This is Koba. It comes in logs wrapped in banana leaf, which you can see. It is really expensive but very delicious. It is made of peanuts, flower, and honey. 

Mofogasy

I am in love with these sweet rice cakes. They costs somewhere between a nickel and a dime.

Mofo Akondro 

This is a fried banana; a good idea that is widely available here. This particular specimen is has exemplary thickness of the fried shell. If it is also sweet dough, you are in for a real treat.

Books

The Return to Treasure Island and the Search for Captain Kid by Barry Clifford with Paul Perry tells two stories at once. It was annoyng for the majority of the book since the story of Captain Kidd was not very interesting. I think too much of it was told in the beginning. The stories were somewhat entertwined in the penultilmate section of each. The modern portion was interesting for me because of its proximity to my present situation in Madagascar and because of the magnitude of the mission.

Robinson Crusue, by Daniel Defoe, is an adventure story. An English boy ignores the requests of his parents for him to stay in English. He scrapes by with his life until he lands on an island whose only use is for periodic cannibalism. He has many provisions from his ship. He becomes serious about his religion while he is on the island. His life becomes comfortable. The book left me very impressed with his manual ingenuity due to the comforts he crafted. I also envy taking months to devote to tasks like making a plank.

The Life of Milarepa, Rechugpa, is a book about a a boy whose immediate family was mistreated by relatives after the death of the father. In retaliation, the young man learn black magic, he uses it against the wicked relatives. Later, he feels guilty and seeks to become a buddha. After finding a the right teacher. He asks repeatedly for instruction. The teacher tells him to perform various feats to earn the instruction. He builds towers. Each time, he misses part of the building instruction and he is asked to recommence. Through the help of the wife of the teacher, he succeeds and receives instruction. Then he meditates in solitude. He leaves the teacher to discover the fate of his mother. After, he continues to meditate in solitude.

BIG BALLoon

Ya, that yellow thing in the middle is my room. The circular window on the right is for the classroom next door.

 

The kitchen is primitive, but cooking is still a blast.

The cats that live in Le Karthala Kitchen.

The kitchen is primitive. Having a whiteboard is great. 

The room is massive.

 

The pink paper is to mark a nail head that protrudes slightly.

On my way in between a cyber cafe, where I watched the first seven episodes of Naruto, and Le karthala to pick up the last of my affects and take tem to my new residence, a man walked in the opposite direction on the same side of the side. He wore a pale jacket. As he passed me, he began to shout, in English, "You are a devil!" He spat and pointed. I turned around and approached him, saying, "Why?" He backed away and yelled, "You have a devil. I am an angel of the true god, Jesus Christ." Some boys outside of the adventist church shook their heads as if to say, "Sorry, he is crazy."

Maybe he is. Anyway, last night I ate in the restaurant Chez Jo with Johnathan. We stayed for a while. He tod me about some escapades, recent and long ago. We talked about ombiasa. They are possessed people. He believes they are living devils. I asked him what he thinks about speaking in tongues. He told me that in the countryside, if someone spoke in English to him, he would believe in them. Apparently not only are the ombiasa psychic in that they know about your past, but they can strike you with lightening or make you forget loaning someone your fortune.

Zoely was in the same restaurant. She seemed timid in front of Johnathan, but I was glad they met. She cancelled our trip to the countryside to find some honey. So, maybe I can find some other gift to find for Arianne

The night of the fourth of August was my first in room nine at CNELA. Everything went alright. My shopping list is pretty long though: I need a lot of stuff for cooking.In the morning, Liziane took a look at the room and said she was going to call a plumber to fix the shower and an electrician to install WiFi.SO, I cooked pasta in my rom last night. I used an electric stove that I got for 25 bucks in themarket because I am afraid to tamper with the gas stove. This wasn't just pasta though, I used peanut butter and MSG, so it was heart stoppingly special.

I decided on the z77 D3H by Gigabyte. I found an authorized dealer who were out of stock. I waited three weeks for the shipment to come. Now that it is in, they want seventeen dollars more than a third party retailer, who will order it from France. I am still a bit lost as to what to do about a power supply.

Well, I had a really productive day: In the morning I made biscuits. I tried to make pancakes, but without butter, and used sweetened condensed milk, and having no syrup or honey, I added a lot of salt. The biscuits were delicious. Then, I made more biscuits, this time sweet. Before I finished eating, I started some math homework and I did some Tai Chi. But actually the latter was a bad idea because my shoes were very squeeky and when I looked outside my room, people were taking a placement test next door. Then, I finished the first homework assignment for an online teaching certification. I made copies of my passport, updated the government about my new residence, and got a lot of documents legalised for the long term visa application.

Now the day wasn't all good. First off, a mo-ped driver hit my right arm as I cross between two busses. He was passing the buses. I don't think he was at fault, since if he moved over anymore, he would have been in danger of a head on collision with oncoming traffic. I will be more careful to realy peek around standstill traffic before putting myself in harms way. It didn't hurt but I probably muttered wtf.

The second part of the day that suxored was that I paid 17usd for my residence certification in Faravohitra, 15usd to remove that certificate, and another 20usd to get a new residence certificate for Antahabe. Now, I get inscription fees, but why have a retraction fee? It got really shady when a man asked me whether I want a visa.

So I went to the electronics Mecca in Madagascar: Supreme Centre. Most of the PSU's I found were fake. The majority of what was left were way to powerful and way too expensive for me, since I am not going to use a graphics card. I found a bunch of ten year old Antec products (Channel Well), some ASUS PSU's that I cannot find on the internet, a random HP PSU, and a 475W Cooler Master for 75usd, which is on Newegg for 50usd. I don't really know what to do. The lowest of the high end? The OCZ 600 MXSP seems like a good product, but at 175usd, it is steep.

Ok, after fiddlying around in the stores trying to get the products I want, I am starting to think that there is reason to buy cheap components to figure out just what the hell I am doing. Buying a computer was a fun activity, but now it is too stressful. So, I am going to take 200 usd to Supreme center and leave with whatever computer I can get. Once I have some know how, I can decide about whether to invest more into a machine.

chum^change

When you read this, mine will be a life of nearly 25 years. I have gone through both easy and hard periods, and the way I judge whether an event is easy or hard has changed. I have spent the last month trying to get a visa for Madagascar. I postponed many activities to accomplish this goal. I even compromised some of my principles to get the visa: when I left Phoenix, I wanted to live in a rural community in Madagascar to augment my knowledge of life with technology; now, I am without a visa in a polluted capital city.

I know that it is important to balance the principle that when tasks offer a lot of resistence, take another route with the principle that without pain, there is no gain. Another duo is that while it is important to avoid pain, one must stick to one's principles. Trying to get into the countryside has caused me some pain: I even felt more like going to China more than staying here. The reason I stayed is not to get to the countryside, though I did get a contract with an English school that will allow me to do so. The reason for me to stay is that I am not man enough for China.

I have never really been fully immersed in another culture, and maybe I never will. But I believe immersion in an unfamiliar culture is maturing. I don't feel ready to deal with the perspective on home that I expect from living in China. I get rattled when get stick out there hands, "Monsieur, donne argent". Here, American music an fashion are popular. Also, fake products are very prevelant and they are associated with China. Viewing this dynamic without understanding it is a dangerous piece of knowledge.

I could not keep good records of my attempt to get the visa. I am looking forward to the future, but I spend so much time doing that!

ooooh weee

The hotel keep ten cats in the kitchen. A black and gray striped one likes me. I like an orange and white one with long hair. The rest are afraid of me because I make like I am going to kick them when they get into my food. There are three kittens that look positively deformed. One of the boys, Sisi, treats them like stray soccer balls, and he does Tae Kwon Do, so they are pretty tough cats, despite being confined to a ten by fifteen foot rooM.

There are dogs out back, by the staff house. One is chained. He is big, but skinny. The other two are little, white and black, and dirty. They cry and cry and cry. One hits the door next to mine. The chained one jumps sometimes. I never go back there because I miss Bela and because it is not really for guests.

The saxophone playing neighbor has really improved in the last two months.

I make a lot of pancakes. Whipping the milk a little helps get them fluffly. Another important thing about cooking is that I have a lot of trouble making a rice accompaniment taste good without some type of stock. Most of the cubes here have MSG, but I found one that doesn't. It does have maltodextrin, which I am afraid to google. I feel kind of like a noob because I need packaged flavor to enjoy the food I cook.

I have a one year contract with the National Center for the English Language; it includes time for me to spend in the bush. There is a problem though, I have a dirty criminal record. In 2008, I was arrest in Sky Harbor for having a fake ID. I wasn't charged; in fact, when I showed up for court, they told me to go home. But, it is on the books, so whether the Malagasy Ministries will approve me for a long term visa is uncertain. Regardless of what happens, it I hope it will happen during the next business week, as my current visa expires on July 29.

rock bottom

I judged an English competition last week. CNELA is a school donated by the British in 1974. The facility is vast. They have sixteen classrooms and over thirty teachers. The students in the competition were in high school. Different students competed in reading, spelling, and speaking. Between segments of the competition, students made music and danced. After the competition I talked with the director about a job. I told her that I want to go to the bush to learn Malagasy before I start teaching. She said that I need certification to teach. I said I will take an online class while leading conversational classes. She said that will work. At the end of a tour of their facility, I participated in an English club meeting. Later, I submitted my terms in writing. After two work days, she did not get back to me.

I went to the American version, ETP, on the other side of Independence Avenue on the 9th. I submitted my resume for consideration.

On the fifth, I went to Lala's place for an end of class party. At the begining, the only students that were there were Lala, Bodo, and Emilie. I mentioned Emilie before, but I probably spelled her name incorrectly. I felt a  like I did in the summer of 2010, actions seemed to be for my particular benefit. I listened to Kirk Franklin. The house has a nice layout: at the entrance is a big rool split between living and dining. Almost in the middle is a hallway with the kitchen, bathroom, and a bedroom on one side, and two bedrooms on the other. Lala runs a store. Lala wants to become an English teacher and Emilie is now a tutor. Bodo has a daughter that lives in China and speaks both English and Chinese. When everyone arrived the women worked on food, while Buddy, Marius, and I talked about school and the US government. There was a lot of meat, so I was not a vegetarian that day. We took a lot of pictures. I finally spoke in French with Miora. Lala has a nice family.

The next day we elected Lala president of the SEC English club. It was Johnathan's idea to select a president so that he can relax on the week. Aside from running the election, we talked about food. We talked about food preferences. Tahina, a guy from the southeast, told us about some of the things he ate while living in the bush. He has eaten crocodile!

Sadly, there is little hope for me to use my Nexus 7 tablet. I broke the old screen when I switched them and the new one is defective. I had that verified by a technician at the Supreme Centre in Chinatown. In other technology news, I am learning about Ubuntu.

Before I left the US, I was watching the anime, Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood. I liked it, but I didn't bring it with me. Ben Fisher, my Huckleberry Hill Lane neighbor, brought me my external HD, so I could continue. I was hesitant because I had heard the original show, Full Metal Alchemist, was better than the new one. So when I found a movie store that transfers an episode for a dime, I got the original. I watched the first three episodes. They were a LOT alike, so I decided to skip. I was on ~45/60. The new show has 50 episodes. I decided to skip to 33. At first, I new exactly what was happening, but after, I wasn't sure I was watching the episodes in order. By the end, it was OK. The conspiracy in the plot is more plausible in the original so far as I can tell.

I saw Claude on the Fourth of July. We each had delicious tomato salad at a restaurant between Isoraka and Analakely. He told me about how NGO Azafady was doing when he quit. He has some important affairs in England and he wasn't really satisfied with his position. We talked about Kung Fu and Capoeira. He is getting creative with the latter. He told me that in the countryside, it is easier to find martial Kung Fu instead of the kind that prepares one for demonstrations. It was cool to see Claude because he understands a lot of my goal here and he respects what I am trying to do.

But I have to say that now, I am much more interested in computers than farming.

Kevin came by on the eighth. We had lunch in the bookstand restaurant Mary runs. We talked about Anime. He recommends I watch GTO. After, we walked through a market in Antanimena. He came by for dinner. We talked about how to improve the lives of Malagasy. I said this place needs to search for a country specific solution, not a development that worked for another country. He and I really disagree about China. That came up because he said that people here have to avoid the route the Chinese took. I think Malagasy can become world leaders in both environmental policy and technology that benefits the environment. People here should avoid reliance on manufacturing.

Red Tape

I had a nice conversation with Victor, the man who works with visas for the Minister of the Affairs of Foreigners. The main bit of information is that my tourist visa can be extended for either employment or investment. Actually, I want to go to school and to farm in the countryside. But I really don't want to leave Madagascar. I can get a student visa if I leave for a short time.

That depends on getting a police report from the FBI. The process takes around six weeks. I expect a response in August. My current visa expires on the 30th of July. I arrived here on the second of May with a ticket for an early August flight. Somehow I got a two month visa. I extended that visa last week. After the last day of class, July 2nd, I am going to look for a way to farm without leaving the country. My plan is to apply for a teaching job. I want to get a school me to send me to the bush as part of my training. The purpose will be to learn Malagasy. I will be able to deliver lessons more effectively with that skill. Right now,  we often use French for clarification.This sometimes creates another problem. I believe that using two languages is more efficient than using three. So, I am also interested in requesting a police report through an FBI approved channeler. If the turnaround time is within my current visa, and if I get a job, I might be able to stay.

The aim is to stay for a year as a teacher, then become a student. Right now, I am more interested in computers than teaching. I also have not found a place to do Kung Fu, so I am not tied to Antananarivo. I want to help my students. SEC is not a registered academic institution. A contract with a registered company is essential for a work visa. I am somewhat attached to my students. I am going to try to get them some English movies to watch. 

I met a teacher from a different school, CNEZA, on the bus last week. She asked if I want to teach for them. There is one British boy working for their school, so she is sure they can get me the required documents.  Going that route enables me to build a computer, learn martial arts, and remain slightly affiliated with SEC. Those are all nice activities. I came here to live in the bush. If I can have all of the above, then that option is more attractive than leaving the country at the end of July to get my student visa. 

Sample

Today is Sunday then 16th of June. I went to Andohanfotsy to practice wushu. The kun is in a forest on a hill. To get to the area I took a bus south for about 20 minutes. After a short walk through a street, we crossed a rice paddy before climbing the hill.We practiced outdoors. I was warming up right away. I practiced with a pretty strong guy around my age. He shozed me a form. The we started punching and blocking. This was really fun; I hope to continue, but of course, all depends on the visa.


Yesterday, I went to an Assembly of God church to help with the foundation for an addition. A student named Freddy in my two pm class invited me. Many people who use the church help to renovate the church. I like this custom. I felt welcome and I was very comfortable but for one mishap. The wife of the pastore wants me to come teach English at their church. I dont really have the time since I teach English all week. I want to work with computers, study, and practice martial arts too, so I cannot teach English on Sundays. Also, I was very near Andohanfotsy yesterday.


I tutored Nadia yesterday afternoon. She is a young woman that works for a coalition of civil societies that support the governance of natural resources in Madagascar. One problem she faces is that foreign compines who wish to exploit the resources here have only to make a deal with the government. Since the contents of these deals are never made public, there is no way of ensuring that the government distribute compensation for the locals of an area affected by the exploitation. She is trying to set up a system that requires foreign companies to meet the standards of her alliance before making a deal with the government.
 

I like tutoring Nadia. She tells me about her personal life and she is not prejudiced. She offered to get me help with my visa, building a computer, and a math problem I am struggling to resolve by consulting some of her acquaintances. When she gets tired, she starts to speak in French. This is a problem because she is practicing for a discussion in Germany that will be conducted in English, therrefore there is no garauntee that French will be any use to her there. This will be her first time abroad so I am excited to help her make the journey successful.


Renee is in Tulear setting up a second school. I liked Toliar so teaching there is pretty appealing to me. I am in contact with a policeman about getting the visa. Also, I am preparing the documents that the ministry of interior indicates are necessary. I like teaching alongside Johnathan because he really cares about English. Sometimes he asks me to talk to his classes. I found that even newcomers to SEC are good at English. People here receive education in English from eleven to eighteen years of age.

Ankle deep

I am teaching classes alone now. I use a lesson plan Rene gave me. It is really fun. I get less than eight hours of sleep. I am very energetic. I miss talking to native speakers. My Malagasy is improving slowly.

The visa application demands a certificate of residence and the certificate of residence demands a visa. I am staying in La Karthala guest house at the moment, but I may have to leave due to money issues. I like it here. The staff is very friendly. I have access to the Internet, a computer, and the kitchen. My clothes and my room are cleaned once a day. One problem is due to the luxury of this hotel. I am rarely in a situation where I need to communicate with someone who speaks only Malagasy because there are many rooms and many multilingual people here. 

Spoken English Course was not an authorized employer when I arrived. This authorization is required for issuance of a work visa to me. Renee said he is doing everything he can. He wants to open a school in Tulear. I don't want to be in the pollution of Tana for too long so this suit me. But something needs to change in the way we teach English in order for me to sign a contract, which is another condition of the visa. 

The school advertises that someone can learn to speak English like an American in two months. We do not currently issue Tesol certification. I think we should offer Tesol certification. Then we can justify offering courses beyond the two month course. A big problem with two months of lessons is that revenue depends on new students. If we offer certification, revenue will be divide between the fees of new and those of old students. That is the project of the Advanced class that I am teaching. Supplementing my service with American Tesol certification will attract the the thousands of students who have completed the two months course back to SEC.

My parents are sending me a new screen for my Nexus so that my tendonitis doesn't flare from flipping this hunk of circuitry every time I need to press a button on the opposite side of the screen. In the package will also be both a camera and an external hard drive. I let a cat get to my camera while it was perched precariously close to the edge of the table. I didn't bring my external hard drive because I wanted to be in the bush, where there are no devices that have power to use such a memory bank. Now I know how hard it is to get a visa for any purpose. I don't know how to get one for learning how to farm rice. So I will stay in the city to teach English, because it is enormously fun. I want a computer so I can watch movies and TV shows. To that end, I asked to get my external hard drive here so I don't have to buy another.

Rewind

I manage to get everyone talking in the noon class of Johnathan.The debate was about life in Tana. It was their first debate. I had everyone choose whether they though it good or bad. Then I asked people of the same opinon to sit on the same side. Two girls, Tsinta and Mbola, did not decide. I asked them to explain why they could not decide. Mbola does not like it here but she wants her children to have the education that the rest of the coutnry lacks. Each student said one point to persude Tsinta and Mbola to come to their side.



The Saturday before last, Rene and I argued about the Illuminati in English Club. Afterwards, a beautiful girl asked me to help her with some vocabulary. I had to run to meet Yvonne for dinner, so I told her I would help her in the morning on Tuesday, which was the next day of class. I was unable to get out of bed that morning; In fact, I did not make the six oklock class once that week.


Last Saturday, both Johnathan and I told riddles in English Club. I asked Emily about her vocabulary. I helped her a bit on the terrace. She likes to watch the news in English. She has a little notebook with vocabulary written in blue and words she does not understan in red.We did not come close to adressing all the undefined words. We separated. I felt horrible because I wanted to see her again but she does not have class this week.


Yesterday, I was reformatting old blog posts instead of hanging out with Yvonne, who was in my neighborhood for his last afternoon here. On my way back from the cyber cafe, I was calling someone whil I was walking to the big staircase dozn from Isoraka. I heard, "Hello, Joseph", from someone walking the opposite way. I turned to walk with Emily. I offered my help this week since there are not many classes; She took my number. Today is the Tuesday, the twenty eighth of May. It is two days after the Malagasy Mother's Day and it is two days before my dad's birthday.


The week passed without word from her. I must have been too eager.


It rained two days ago. There are lots of mosquitoes. The kitchen where I cook is home to at least seven cats. 


The currency here is an Ariary. With a new, big bill, one US dollar is worth about 2200  Ariary. But people here quote prices in FMG, the Franc of Madagascar. One US dollar buys 11000 FMG. So, every transaction involves dividing the quoted price by five.


Another peculiarity of this country is linguistic: I have yet to meet a native who does not speak Malagasy, a Malayo Polenesian language. Yet; despite gaining independence from France over fifty years ago, university classes are conducted in French.


There is a lot of pollution here in Antananarivo. There are no highway loops for this multi million person capital city. The best way to get around is to take a mini bus for less than a quarter per trip. I pray for the electric mini bus to save me from cancer. Also on the topic of transportation, I think intercity trains will boost the economy in this country by increasing the rate of trade.


There was a graduation ceremony at SEC. I shook hands. Boy was I underdressed! After, I went to dinner with both Jonathan and the family of Renee. We talked about how to approach interviews. Rene and I discussed how to sell the story of Madagascar. Rene is a good marketer with big dreams.


I am trying to get a long term visa. The current project is to get a police record from the FBI. It needs to be done through the mail!!! Also, I am visiting a lot of martial arts schools in order to choose a new art to practice. Tomorrow, on the third of June, an advanced English class starts at SEC. I feel comfortable engaging the students, but I do not feel comfortable doing so with the teaching style of another teacher.

Settling in Tana

I heard someone on the street whistling Pachbell Cannon. It is hot during the day here. Attempting to learn Malagasy, I started to teach English.

Taken from the Spoken English Course establishment.

This is the view from the top of the staircase next to my hotel. Can you make out the opposite staircase in the distance?

There are people singing next door when I go to sleep Moonlight Hotel at half past ten on the evening of the fourteenth of May. When I awake at half past three, they are still singing. 

The night before I switch hotels after 10 days in Moonlight, an overturned charcoal tub for streetside cooking sets a nearby secondhand book stand on fire at the bottom of the hill on which my new hotel, La Karthala rests.

Some of the rubble is still there when I got my camera out a few days after the fire.

 

On the walk from one hotel to the other.

There seems to be a big difference between the bush and the city in Madagascar. I can't really compare it to the United States because I have experienced neither a downtown area nor the countryside in America. Also, I haven't spent enough time in the city or the bush Madagascar to extrapolate. 

I was confronted with this situation: I gave someone a gift. The person to whom I gifted something offered a return that I did not want. Was I right to reject the offer? I think not for the following reason, it is best to exchange. If the person to whom I gave freely seeks another gift from someone else, then discomfort will follow when someone asks for something in return. If so, I should give to those from those who will return a gift and receive gifts only when I will offer on in return. 

I have trouble getting people I knew at different times to know each other.

The students tell me English is an international business language. When people of two countries do business, even if neither country is an English speaking country, and instead of learning the language of the other, each group will learn English in order to communicate. Some said this because of the size of the US economy. Is that right?

Would you like some English?

I get a whistle; a honk, or a "monsieur, taxi?" pretty often. I was frustrated, but now I can use the extra qttention to attract business for SEC.

 Where Anna will work, if she comes here!

Ugh. I cracked the screen on my Nexus 7. I was not using any external protective case when I was walking around with it, amongst other things, in my hands. I dropped it. In trying to catch the falling tablet, I pushed it against a window with force. I broke the fall with my foot. Half of the screen still works...

I am cooking dinner for myself in the new hotel. I got lessons from some boys. Beans need to be soaked for 24 hours BEFORE being cooked! It is great that I now have the option to avoid going to a restaurant.

These picture are taken from the terrace at La Karthala.

I worked a stand for the Spoken English Course at a fair for the last four days. People were not encouraged to learn English when they found out that I do not speak Malagasy. Lalaina, who practices Jeet Kune Do, taught some polite greetings. A Comorran man, Nanasy, helped me develop a sales pitch that I could repeat.  Rene, the SEC director has a good pitch. Le Gastronomie Pizzaria has the best pizza I have eaten in Madagascar.

Right now I am focused on a more economical living situation, a long term visa and how to teach the advanced course next month. Enjoy life;°)