Access Field Trip 2

A few weeks ago, the Access students and I went on another field trip, this time to a little place called Mandraka. I’ve seen Mandraka a few times before. It’s about 3 hours east of the capital city on the road that leads to the coast. Each time I’ve been to Andasibe, just a few hours further down the road, I saw this little river and park, thinking to myself, “Man, this place is so cute. I would love to visit it one day.” Dreams do come true.

We packed up the bus early in the morning and headed out. This time, I was joined by Aida (one of the new English Teaching Assistants), Robert (the English Language Fellow), and Joan (Robert’s partner who specializes in dentistry and public health). Once we got to Mandraka, we broke the students up into four teams, one for each English teacher. We did this because we were going on a short hike through the local park where the guides didn’t speak English. The students were told that they would have to translate for us, which is always fun.

We split our Access students up and had four teams, team Tiger, team Lemur, team Eagle, and team Yet to Decide, which soon became team Change the Name Every Time we Say the Team Name. I will let you guess which team was mine. Anyways, team banana and I went into the jungle with our guide and walked around. We saw a small campsite where people can come camping for however long they wish. Team sweatshirt took a few group photos before team shoelace carried on. We saw a small waterfall, a beautiful pond with several little picnic areas, and, of course, we saw a whole pack of lemurs. I don’t know what a group of lemurs is called. A group of monkeys is called a congress, which I have always found telling that our elected officials form a congress. A group of crows is called a murder. A group of cows is called a herd. A group of birds is called a flock. A group of legionaries is called a cohort. A group of frogs is called a knot. And a group of spiders is called a nightmare, probably for good reasons. But team bottlecap and I never decided on the name for a group of lemurs, something we may do in the future.

Team mango slice took so many pictures of the lemurs and fed them all sorts of bananas. We just passed lemur mating season, so team right-click got to see a few momma lemurs with baby lemurs hanging on their sides for dear life. Finally, team upside-down pineapple cake and the others returned to the part of the park with the river where we ate lunch, joined neighbor family’s Zumba session (not the Kennebunk kind of Zumba), and played some competitive games, of which team shortstop won the majority.

Anyways, what a great trip! I always love getting out of the city when I can and pray that I will be able to do it more often as time goes forward. I have one more short return home before returning to Madagascar in early December. Once January comes around, I’ll be splitting my time between two schools and helping out wherever else I can until July when I come home for good.

When I return in December, it will make an entire year since I moved to Madagascar. Naturally, when anniversaries come about, it is time to reflect. Reflection of this sort is typically beneficial. We should look back on our past to see the good and bad, the beautiful and the ugly, the blessings and the crosses, the graces and the sins. Dwelling long on the past is the goal for its own sake, but it is important to see patterns, reaffirm graces, and recognize faults. Perhaps that will be the next blog post.

Either way, know that you are in my prayers every morning. All I ask is that you do to the same for me.

May God be praised.