This may be a rash generalization but I think
there are some people in the US and the world that suffer from post 9-11
Islamaphobia. Before I scare everyone off, bare with me for a second. Whatever your
opinion may be, I think some might agree that when a Muslim male or
female walks into a room wearing traditional, religious garb this person
attracts a fair amount of attention. I apologize if this is offensive to
anyone, but what I really want everyone to do for a quick second is to take a
minute and put yourself in that person’s shoes. What does it feel like to be
that Muslim man or woman attracting the eyes of everyone in the room? To stick
out because of stereotype?
I’ve been wanting to write a blog post like
this for some time now – a reflection on what it has meant to be an American or
really any vazaha (the Malagasy word for foreigner) in Madagascar. After two
and a half years here, I’ve come to the rather depressing conclusion that it
seems impossible for an American Peace Corps Volunteer to completely integrate
themselves into Malagasy culture and society.
Let me quickly start with this term “vazaha,”
which I may have already written a blog post about. I can't remember. Imagine you are walking
down a street in your slice of suburban America or wherever when let’s say a
person of Asian descent comes walking toward you on the same sidewalk…
You don’t know anything about this person:
where they were born, how they got to where they are, or what they do for a
living. Common sense tells most of us that extending this stranger a quick greeting
would be the kind thing to do. Unfortunately, western society seems to think
that extending a kind greeting to a complete stranger is a bit strange in itself and
possibly borderline creepy. In fact, western culture usually tells us that you're more likely to have some sort of ulterior motive or that you’re selling something
than simply displaying a random act of kindness. But for the purpose of this
blog post, let’s say you give a quick “hello” and then the two of you go on
your way and maybe never see each other again. No harm done, right?
Here in Madagascar, such an innocent
exchange appears impossible. It seems that at some point between
Madagascar winning its independence from France in 1960 until now a certain
degree of narrow-mindedness has slowly grown out of control. Let’s go back to
our sidewalk example to see if I can explain myself a bit better.
Imagine this same Asian American walking
toward you on the same street in your slice of suburbia. As this person comes
within eyesight you stop dead in your tracks and stare at him or her. I’m
talking like a deep, hypnotic gaze. You've probably seen him or her around before but you just can't help it. As this person gets closer you pull on the
corners of your eyes while mocking them with your intentionally sloppy version
of Chinese or Japanese or other language from an Asian culture. Finally, to
top it all off, you decide to greet this person with “hello foreigner.” Granted, I am no expert in foreign relations but I have to believe that it is highly
possible you should start running for your life at that exact moment. In most
places in the world this is one of the more offensive things you could do in
this situation. However, for a PCV in Madagascar, this could
be a Tuesday…or Friday…or possibly any
part of any day of the week. Then,
multiply that by 2 (or maybe more) years. Trust me when I tell you that it gets
really, really old (and I’m not even Asian American).
Most white volunteers are greeted with
“Bonjour vazaha” depending on where he or she lives. PCVs in smaller towns usually
don’t get it as much because there are less people in the town and he or she
usually knows everyone. In larger towns you get lost in the shuffle and you’re probably
not the only white person anymore (ie. Manakara - pretty sure I got at least two or three on my two minute bike ride to post this blog). When I lived in Ampasimanjeva, I rarely
heard “bonjour vazaha,” but anytime I left my small town for another other town
or city all bets were off.
You might ask why can’t they just say hello
and be done with it? Well folks, therein lies the million-dollar question. But
let’s play devils advocate here for a second. For starters, the French
colonized this place forever (and still have a pretty big influence) so that
explains the “bonjour” part. And of course, all white people are French so--…oh.
Wait. They’re not?! Weird.
But seriously, the bonjour thing really isn’t a
big deal since most white people who do visit here are French. I also haven’t
forgotten that this is one of the poorest countries in the world where the
importance of education is used as more of a punch line than a path to a
brighter future. Another reason is that almost all Malagasy people are black or
darker skinned and probably have never left this country so it's not incredibly
surprising to see why they’re so blown away when they see white people.
I’ve been told (and I’ve noticed) that
Malagasy people love to state the obvious. So much so that it’s almost a
cultural habit. So, for example, if I’m sitting on my porch with a bucket of
soapy water while scrubbing clothes some Malagasy person may walk by and ask,
“are you washing clothes?” Most PCVs will respond with a smile and say yes, but
inside we’re thinking, ‘no I’m driving a car. Of course, I’m washing clothes.
What does it look like?’ I guess I would equate it to two Americans talking
about the weather. Both conversations are just filling time and both are
equally uninteresting for all parties involved.
According to a few Malagasy people, the
same logic applies to the word vazaha. If you see a tall white male walking
down in a street in Madagascar you don’t need a sign to know that he’s not from
around here, but Malagasy people still can’t keep themselves from pointing out
the obvious, thus leading to the bonjour vazaha.
I used to play basketball in Ampasimanjeva
with a kid who lived right next to me. He was always really respectful and knew
my name, but when we played basketball and he was calling for the ball or
something he would address me as “vazaha” or “lava be” (meaning really tall). It's like everything went right out the window when he had some d'ing him up.
There are actually times when I can
appreciate the usage of the vazaha comment to differentiate between people. To
stick with the basketball references if I’m playing on a team with four other
Malagasy guys and the opposing team is deciding who is going to guard me then
they’re most likely going to say ‘you take the vazaha’ cause its an easy
identifier and they may not know my name.
But even if they know names, Malagasy people still teach their children to say vazaha from a really young age. There is a six-year old who lives in a house near me here in
Manakara and no matter how many times I’ve told him my name is Rory, that I’m
American and I don’t speak French I always get the same loud, high pitched
greeting every morning, “SALUT VAZAHA!” Don’t worry, I’m not getting all worked
up because of a six-year old, but what I’m trying to say is that we as
volunteers stick out like a sore thumb. Despite our attempts to learn this
language, wear the right clothes, and participate in cultural traditions we
quickly lose whatever connection we feel with our communities when we hear the all too familiar greeting bonjour vazaha. Teenagers and kids do the most damage when it comes to
the vazaha comment because it is in their sarcastic, demeaning tone that you
know not only are they using the V-word just to use it but using it to poke fun
as well.
Most of us tell our close friends and
neighbors that we don’t really appreciate the word vazaha and they usually
respect that. Recently I was biking with Briana in Analavory when we passed one
of her closest friends’ house. We were biking slowly and she was sitting out
front with her 8-month old baby and she yelled in somewhat of a baby voice (as
if it were her child talking), “SALUT VAZAHA E!” I was a bit surprised, but we kept going to Bri’s house. When we got there she said her friend knows that she doesn’t like when people say vazaha but she
was probably just doing it to tease or to annoy us. You may be reading this and
think wow Rory, Briana and all PCVs are apparently really melodramatic, but
first think about the fact that we are in a foreign place, surrounded by people
we haven’t known for that long, speaking a language we all struggle with at
times, thousands of miles away from family and friends and all the while just
trying to help out. We go through days where we feel like we are on top
of the world and we really are just another Malagasy person with white skin.
Other days we hear vazaha and the like and we remember that this is not our
home. We are like 10-year-olds in school in that all we really want is to fit
in and not be labeled or criticized for being different, but it seems like that
isn’t really possible here. If we do the basic day-to-day chores of any
Malagasy person such as getting water, carrying things of any weight, wearing
some traditional dress (especially for women), carrying an axe, working in the
rice fields or getting muddy then we are almost guaranteed to get laughed at,
pointed at or talked about by people who think we’re too stupid to understand what
they’re saying about us. It's a deflating feeling.
For argument sake let’s suppose you think
I’m being a bit dramatic. Here’s another thing that PCVs run into all the time: people thinking they can get more out of us and are justified in doing so
because we are white. If we are white then we are not from here and if we’re
not from here then we must have mountains of money waiting for us in our real
home. A relevant example actually just happened as I was writing this to a volunteer
passing through Manakara on her way to a moringa (type of edible plant)
training that she is organizing with another volunteer. She arrived in Manakara with something like 70
or more of these plants in 5 crates (all of which are a bit heavy). She has to move three of these crates on to another brousse to take the plants
another 20 kilometers south to the town where the training is going to be held
the next day. She goes up to one brousse driver and asks how much it will cost
to send these 3 crates to the town. He says 3,000 ariary. The PCV laughs to
herself a bit and says no thanks knowing full well that the cost for a person to go
to this town is half that. The guy clearly thinks she is a unsuspecting vazaha who will give any amount of money. She walks to another brousse driver and asks him. He
agrees to do it for free and says its no problem (the answer any PCV would have hoped for but probably never expected) until a few seconds later the
first driver comes over and tells him that he should charge 3,000 too. Solidarity
wins out and the volunteer is forced to move on to a third and final driver (there are only so many drivers for certain routes).
The same thing happens leaving 3 greedy Malagasy male brousse drivers versus a
white, female PCV whose only crime is trying to bring 70 plants to a small town
80 kilometers away from her "home" to show people how they can farm and eat an extremely
healthy, inexpensive plant. In the end, there is no other way for the plants to
be sent so the brousse drivers win. The worst part is that they know they are
screwing her over because they are smiling and laughing the whole time as her frustration
mounts. (For your information, 3,000 ariary is a little more than a dollar so,
yes, it isn’t a question of whether she can pay it but the principle).
These kinds of things happen all the time
in all sorts of places in Madagascar and often times the Malagasy person will
tell you straight up that they know you can afford it because you are vazaha.
You can talk about what it means to be a volunteer, to not make money, and that you have lived and worked in this place for years. You can do this until you’re blue in the face, but that price is never going to
change.
You don’t even have to be buying something
for this to happen. There was a middle school-aged kid who used to live next to
me in Ampasimanjeva and on the same day that I opened the library in June, he came in
and asked me if I could give him a soccer ball. I was a bit confused because
the request came completely out of left field so I asked him what he meant and
he reiterated that the next time I left to go to a big town or city that I
should bring him back a soccer ball. I told a white lie to keep from getting
too annoyed and said that I didn’t have enough money to get him a soccer ball. Keep
in mind this is a kid that I really didn’t have too much interaction with, but
he always seemed nice enough. He then brought up the fact that
I’m a white vazaha so I must be lying about the fact that I don’t have enough
money. I admittedly got a little angry at that point and said something
like “is this not enough?” while gesturing to the library we were standing in. You may still being thinking, "Jeez, Rory, ya Scrooge. Just go get the kid a ball. I'll send you the money." But the bottom line is that the requests and begging never stops because it's never enough. There is always something else that we should be giving.
Moments like these really make you think twice
about the concept of international aid. If Malagasy people keep seeing
American or European NGOs and volunteers offer financial or material aid even
when it might not be asked for, how will they ever learn to live independently?
Peace Corps prides itself on sustainable projects, but in the end there needs
to be motivated Malagasy people behind these projects and sometimes they can be incredibly
hard to find.
In continuing with the idea of monetary
humanitarian aid, the Malagasy government appears to have one of the most
corrupt infrastructures I have ever seen (just a reminder that these are my thoughts and not those of the Peace Corps). When another country offers monetary
aid it's not hard to imagine that the money won’t go farther than the corrupt
pockets of various government officials. So in the midst of feeling like you
can never be accepted into Malagasy society you also sometimes get this
horrible feeling that maybe the work you’re doing here is only further
debilitating these people, the country and it's future.
There are so many other examples of every
day occurrences where a volunteer might feel detached from his or her community
or have doubts about the work he or she is doing. It sucks to stick out and it
sucks to have no way to hide it, but it seems as though our Malagasy
counterparts can’t seem to get past it. And so we continue on with our work as
strangers, as foreigners, as vazaha.
Just so we end this on a positive, happier
note I thought I would include some pictures from the last few weeks, including
lemurs! Hope everyone had a great Christmas and new years celebration!
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| My best friend from Ampasimanjeva gets married! No, I don't own a belt. |
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| The official opening of the library in Ampasimanjeva. To the left of the picture is the girl who replaced me in Ampasimanjeva. |
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| Christmas in Analavory. We wrapped up a bunch of things Briana doesn't use anymore and gave presents to a family she is really close to. They loved it! |
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| A taxi-brousse accident on our bike ride to Manakara. The accident was about five days old by this point. It was an overnight brousse from Tana, a ride we all have to do. Apparently several people died including probably everyone in the front row. I'm not sure if the broken bottles near the car is some sort of ceremony that was held. That's a complete guess. |
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| We went to a hotel just north of Manakara and there were lemurs. |
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| We made friends quickly. When it doubt, bring food. |
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| The gang |
