Goodbye Moramanga

I lived in Moramanga for six months.   Moramanga is a sprawling, muddy, crowded little Malagasy city that I came to love over the course of six months.  It is also home to some of my favorite people inside and outside of Peace Corps.   I met a lot of people from the giant mining complex which operates around Moramanga--Canadians, Europeans, Arabs, Australians.......Indeed, a fellow volunteer joked that I knew more Arabic than Malagasy.  Not true!  Sho fe?  Ma fishy.  That's all I got.

I was able to say goodbye to the community and to my surprise about ten people wanted a photo with me--in the middle of the fishery.   I remain a novelty.   Then people started asking for gifts.   I politely refused.  I did, however, give my neighber a very nice head lamp because he has been admiring it for months and I will have electricity now.   And a fridge apparently.  I think I may have just moved into Fancy Corps.

I was also able to enjoy one last night at my favorite Karaoke place where I sang my two standards:  Depeche Mode, Somebody and Eagles, Desperado.   I know they sound like pathetic songs to sing as a single woman roaming around Madagascar--but really they are just in my range.  And I got to say goodbye to the karaoke gang.  Karaoke in Madagascar is not like karaoke in the United States.  People are serious.  They clap for each other.  It's like five minutes of fame getting up there.  It's fun.  Plus, I figure even if they don't like my voice everyone likes to hear how to pronounce songs in English.  True story.

I left town on a posy posy (rickshaw) with all my bags and myself.  It was a heavy load for the cyclist.  I paid him two dollars.  The usual fare is one dollar.  It was misty, rainy and muddy.   I was not sad to leave but I was not sad to have been there either.  It was just time for somethin' else.  It was sad to leave the people I have met knowing most of them I will never see again (excepting Peace Corps Volunteers).

I didn't get to say goodbye to the girl I have written about.   She's so outgoing, perhaps she will make friends with the next volunteer.