Monday, July 07, 2008

Moving to Dagu Diaries

We finally got the group blog rolling, so I'm going to be posting to that from now on. The idea is that it will be updated less erratically than this blog, and also provide a wider range of experiences from a very diverse country. See you there!

Friday, April 25, 2008

Lost in the Grass

We've now left our community-based training, and are tying up a few loose ends in the capital before heading out to our respective sites.

I can't say much other than the experience has so far been wonderful. I had a great host family and our training class is full of incredible people. I will have more to say about my site in the near future, and Peace Corps forbids I mention it by name, but it's also very fascinating. Stereotypically remote, it takes 3 days of travel from the capitalm by bush taxi and train - before I get to the 12km hike/bike (interrupted halfway by a short canoe ride) to my village.

The other news is I'll be delivering a speech in Malagasy on behalf of our class at the swearing-in ceremony on Tuesday. The Malagasy culture requires 2/3 of your speech be devoted to appologizing to the audience for speaking in front of them. Luckily, my language instructor helped me litter it with amusing proverbs to keep it interesting. Among them, "Let us not be like the wild boar who, when he visits his father-in-law, is pointed at by his host's lips and then carries his head on his shoulders. Instead, let us be like the little red bird, who whistles at the big brown bird when he visits, and the host sings in turn." The audience in this case, unfortunately, is anyone who happens to be tuned into the Malagasy equivalent of NPR or C-Span. Not a huge deal, but really? Lip pointing? We'll see how it goes over...

But to paraphrase another Malagasy proverb - if the grass is long, the pig is lost and if the blog post is long, the point is lost.

Miss you all!

Friday, January 25, 2008

It's not you. It's me.

Boy, this is awkward.

I have no right to be here, and I know that. I left so suddenly. I didn't even leave a note explaining why I had to leave or where I was going.

But you know I'm no good at apologies, so I'll just skip it if that's alright with you.

Anyways, I'm sorry I left. Just give me another shot. It'll be just like old times.

Well, it might be a little different.