Aaand we are back in Norway! We have now enjoyed a fun week at HALD with only Norwegians and one week of Easter vacation. We are now ready to go back to HALD and meet the rest of the students :D This video is from our last week in Madagascar. It included packing, lots of goodbyes and goodbye-food-dates, a familytrip to a «TOBY» and a place where they produce tea and lots of fun with our friends the last days. We ended our Madagascar-life in Tana with lots of good GBU-friends. We are forever thankful for all the people we have met and the experiences we have had - VELOMA MADAGASIKARA, AM MANARAKA INDRAY!!
0 Comments
A little late update from here because we have had problems with the Internet. So this update is 2 weeks late ish, and it summarizes our last whole month in Fianar. February and march included: sleepover, GBU New Years Celebration, taco, Ph.D ceremony, visit from FK Norway, two birthdays in the family, visiting people in church (a Hald student from 2004 who still knows Norwegian), P got visit from Norway, the schools were closed because of the cyclone and evangelization with both GBU (soup and cine-evangelization) and GBS (drama-evangelization). We have had more conferences for both GBU and GBA, culture shock and leadership, we joined a cellegroup at a catholic school, the cyclone gave us time to have movie nights at Gerizima (with GBU) and K has started her pingpong career. There was also a preparation weekend for Easter Camp for GBU, and we are impressed by how they prepare, study and learn to get ready to be leaders for GBS. GBA (people who work) helps prepare GBU (University students) to be leaders for GBS (High School students). Amazing organization! A lot of the students are back from vacation now, so we got to meet a lot of new people and get new friends. We went on a big trip with the whole GBU to Anja, beautiful place not far from Fianar. We did not know where we were going…so slippers was not our best choice…as we climbed… We are not ready to leave, and are enjoying our last days here! We also walk around singing Malagasy songs, so here is a Malagasy hit for you! We have now been back in Fianar for almost a month, and times goes by way too fast! But we are having a blast and enjoying the last months as good as we can. We still keep ourselves busy with english teaching and GBU-work, and there is a lot more happening now since vacation is over for the students. P has joined the very serious weekly pingpong-trainings, while K is more focused on becoming the UNO-champion. + We both got new jobs - K is now also teaching kids in the countryside, while P volunteers at the hospital (pediatric department). We also arranged "Norwegian Culture Night", a very fun and successfull night. It involved "boller og saft", dialectshow, "trønderrock", Lisa Børud songs, birthday games and "skumringsstund/korsstog". We have kept ourselves busy with Malagasy "julebord" with the teachers, New Years celebration with the big family, had a prayer party with GBU, climbed grapetrees and we have discovered that Malagasy dresses are the most comfortable outfit we know of. We also decided to buy a fan when we realized that it will not get any colder...as there is lack of rain during rain season. OBS! We just want to add how proud we are of our family who makes homemade "grøt" for us. Here is a little (late) update from us in Tana. We are now finished with one week of vacation in beautiful Nosy Be and one week with «Infield» in Mahajanga. Tomorrow we go back to work, friends and family in Fianarantsoa. December was a great month full of Christmas preparations, Christmas traditions, visitors and new experiences. No snow and no «pinnekjøtt» did not stop these girls from getting «julestemning». It was a month filled with gingerbreads, «lussekatter», hot chocolate nights, «Månetoppen», Christmas tea, Christmas calendar, Christmas movies and Christmas decorations. We even arranged «Norwegian Christmas Night» for our fellow UGBM-ers and showed up in our Christmas sweaters. We taught 50+ people how to make gingerbreads, say «God jul», eat «grøt» and how to do secret santa. A fantastic fun night which ended in a sleepover! This month …:
A memorable December month, and now we are finally ready for Fianar!! Our first month in Fianar is coming to an end, and we are starting to know the drill :) WE...
PS! We will sleep here every second week… We have learned to love the times when the light is out. The happiness when it comes back, the «koselig» moments with candles while we wait for it to come back and understanding the concept of using what you have. BTW: If you think Norwegian roads are curvy, think again. 8 hour bustrip and no tunnels…that is an experience in it self. GOOD LUCK NOT GETTING CARSICK. Since our last days in Tana we have moved 9 hours, by car, South of Tana to Fianarantsoa. This is where we will stay for the next 5 months. We live with an amazing family of originally 3 however in the Malagasy culture you take care of your whole family so there is at least 5 extras here, and family comes and goes. In the family only the dad and daughter talk a little english - but with lots of guessing, fantasy, hand movements, Kristine´s french and kelykely Malagasy (a little Malagasy) we usually understand each other. We have been so lucky with our work too. We will teach english and work with UGBM. The people of UGBM here in Fianar are amazing! They welcomed us with dancing, singing, speeches and we even got to show them some Norwegian dancing…yeah that is right, we do not have any, but The Bird Dance worked perfectly. The last Sundays we have attended the biggest church in Fianar, the Lutheran Church. For those who do not know Norwegians have been doing mission work on Madagascar for 150 years - on Sunday we noticed. As we both are reverent-daughters, well used to the protestant church in Norway, we laughed when we knew the songs and liturgy by heart - except from the fact that they were in Malagasy. And to our great joy we figured out that those 3 hour long services are perfect for reading the Bible when you are 3 weeks behind on the reading-plan. And we cannot forget Kristine´s birthday party. K finally reached a grown up age - 20. We celebrated this on tuesday. She got a lot of presents and we quickly learned that the typical Malagasy gift is «a hat and a Malagasy purse». This she now has enough of. And we had a big birthdayparty in the evening. Everyone we knew in the neighborhood came (amazing Malagasy culture) and it was a party. We ate, we sang, we danced, and we ate, we sang, we danced…the party never ended. BUT WHAT A PARTY! We are both so excited that we were able to experience a real Malagasy birthday party. Our life here in Madagascar is becoming more and more Malagasy, and we have realized we leave with a Malagasy family.
We already got a lot of friends, and the UGBM house and lots of GBU-ers (students) live next door. AND THERE IS A PINGPONG TABLE IN THE UGBM HOUSE! We could not be happier with the city, the family or the UGBM-people! Two, or three, awesome weeks have past and we are getting ready to go to Firanantosa on Friday, hopefully on Friday…we are not always sure. On monday we went from a team of 4 to a team of 2, so far so good - we are enjoying the peace (kidding, we do miss you Kanto and Mitia). Short summary of the last weeks:
We have also used our time to see Tana. So we brought UGBU-ers and they showed us the castle where we got a beautiful view over Tana, we saw the beautiful nature of Madagascar on four-wheelers and we went to a zoo where we finally got to see lemurs. OBS! For those who believe that african countries are all about heat and sun we are now telling you - YOU ARE WRONG! The last weeks we have experienced REAL RAIN. We did not believe our african friends at HALD when they told us norwegian rain is not real rain - now we do. Real rain includes lightning and thunder like crazy, and so much water that the roads do not look the same the next day. One week has passed and we already feel well-experienced. 1. We have learned that toilet paper and water are not things that come by themselves. So with troubled stomaches - this has been a challenging week. 2. We have learned that in Madagascar they dont use norwegian «ferdigmat». Cooking takes time, and we have realized that we are lazy cookers and do not really know what they eat here in Madagascar. Which resulted in being vegetarians for 5 days and having eggs and pasta everyday. And here they eat 3 times a day which for us norwegians means - we are always hungry. 3. We have experienced the Malagasy bus-system. We have been standing in a 5-meter line, pushed ourselves into the bus, filled gas, squeezed, hitchhiked and jump on while the bus was still moving. 4. We have experienced Malagasy time and learned the expression «moramora» (slowly). However for us it is no problem - it means no alarm in the morning and eating breakfast with the teacher (Hery). 5. Last but not least we have learned that Malagasy people are beautiful! Very good-looking :) And they are amazingly kind, funny and caring people - what could be better? All in all it has been a great week! We got to meet the amazing staff of UGBM. We got our visas and visited the NMS-center - and met the Connect team again. We joined a UGBU-camp in the countryside, where we got to meet a lot of the students in UGBU, kill chickens, sing, play sports and play table tennis (One very happy Pernille). And we even got a chance to go swimming with Hery and some former UGBU-students. On monday we started with Malagasy lesson, and we will have that every week for the next 4 weeks. So now we are walking around and saying the few sentences we know to everyone. Salama! The best part is that we have been so lucky to have the best contact person (ZukTina) and the best guide (Hery, former HALD-student). We laugh all the time with Hery, and ZukTina takes such good care of us and teach us everything we need to know. We also had our first meeting with cockroaches this week. It is a good thing we have Kristine who can kill it while the three others are standing on chairs screaming. Once upon a time there were two girls going to Madagascar. One lost her shoe, and the other one almost missed the plane and had 15 kg too much. However they both learned that its always time for taxfree and the statement «the ones who live closest shows up last» was confirmed. We are now safe and secure at the UGBM-base in Tana (Antananarivo). We got all our bags and they have now filled up our ENTIRE room. We (Ingrid, Lotte + us) were picked up by our contact person and a Hald-student from last year at the airport. And after 60 minutes in malagasy-traffic (we added 5 people to the already full bus along the way) we were welcomed by lots of students who live here at the UGBM-base. The night included a cold shower, no water for the toilet, suddenly no light and an amazing supper with our contact person - we could not be happier to be here! And to make the day even better Kristine found two extra chocolates in her bag. We have now left Hald after 6 weeks of preparation, school, late nights, dancing, new friendships, malagasy-food, christmas, team-dates, vaccination and fun - and we are now ready to leave for Madagascar on wednesday. Ready, not prepared. The last two days we have been packing, cleaning and enjoyed an amazing farewell-party. Here you will get a taste of it! READY OR NOT, MADAGASCAR HERE WE COME! |
ABOUTWe are two girls from Norway, Kristine and Pernille, traveling to Madagascar for 6 months. Archives |