This Part of My Life is Called Madagascar

This blog has been hibernating since I returned from studying abroad in Cape Town, South Africa in 2011, but now that I’ve decided to fly south for the summer it is slowly but surely waking from it’s slumber.

I’m too lazy to change the name of the blog even though it’s no longer entirely applicable (although I did have the foresight to add and beyond to the description). That part of my life was called Emily in the Cape…

This part of my life is called Madagascar.

It took 38 hours, four airports, three planes, two cars, and a lot of patience, but I made it to the island of singing lemurs without losing anything but sleep. I’m now going on day 17 in this country and I already feel like my first impressions have been tainted by my second, but I’ll do my best to give an honest account of the blur that was my first week. I apologize in advance for my long-windedness.

Day 0: A Malagasy man named Joseph picked me up from the airport. He spoke great English, but only seemed to use it to ask me about the prices of various products in the U.S. …What about the bag of chips? The mobile phone? What about the pants?  And so it went for an hour and a half into the city.

We went straight to the embassy, where I met the Public Affairs Officer, Brett, who began discussing all things Public Affairs that I would soon be a part of. He must have noticed that I was having trouble stringing sentences together because he finally offered to take me home. Not two hours after dropping me off, however, he was back to pick me up for dinner at the Chargé’s house. If you’re confused by that term, join the club; it took me half the night to figure out what a Chargé was, what he did and whether or not I should care.

Turns out I should- and I do. The Charge d’Affairs is in charge of the U.S. mission to Madagascar in the absence of an ambassador, and since the U.S. does not recognize the government of Madagascar (I’ll get to that later), we do not have an ambassador. So, I shared an amazing meal with the Chargé and ten or twelve of the highest-ranking diplomats in the embassy and it was all I could do to keep my eyes open. Needless to say I didn’t make much of an impression.

Day 1:  I spent the day settling in and getting to know my housemate and fellow intern, Kayla. We went on a short driving tour of the city with one of our neighbors, went to dinner with one of the marines (there are five or six of them at embassy), and went out to a bar with an eclectic mix of other foreign interns, some NGO workers, and some local Malagasy. It was a good day, and it was particularly reassuring to know that I would in fact have a social life outside of dinners at the Chargé’s over the next three months.

Day 2: The hash. To be continued at a later date.

Day 3-4: My first two days of work at the embassy were mostly filled with various security briefings, introductions and meetings that I may or may not have been invited to. The whole Public Affairs section and much of the embassy was busy preparing for the Fourth of July festivities later that week, so I helped out when I could and took advantage of the free Internet when I couldn’t.

Day 5-6: The Fourth of July was formally celebrated at the embassy on the third of July. Roughly 500 members of the diplomatic community, the embassy and Malagasy civil society came together to celebrate with food, drinks, and music. It was quite the social event and was the first chance I really had to mingle with a wide variety of embassy employees.

The actual Fourth of July was more properly celebrated with the day off of work and a barbeque at the Chargé’s. It was about as all-American as it gets in Madagascar- full of hot dogs, country music and American expats, including peace corps volunteers, Mormon missionaries and Exxon oil business reps (the usual crowd). Despite the enjoyable day, I felt the first pangs of homesickness as I thought of my family barbequing together or my friends romping around the streets of IV. I think I’ll try to make it home before the next Fourth of July.

Day 7: Fridays are half-days at work (best decision ever) and I spent mine in a very long and very French meeting. I’m slowly recovering some of my beginning French language skills from school, but for the time being it’s a pretty legitimate excuse to zone out. Friday night Kayla and the marines and I went out to a ritzy bar by Malagasy standards where I had a $3 mojito and a $1.50 beer (gotta love that conversion rate) and then went out dancing. It was a blast. I’m very lucky to have inherited the group of people that Kayla pulled together throughout the month before I arrived- good people, good times.

There you have it- week one. There is so much more to be said than I would ever make anyone read, but I think I hit all the major points. And to those of you who made it through this whole post, I miss you, and I’m excited to continue sharing this adventure with you!