Welcome back?

Well, I have been back in Madagascar for one week, and it has been a dozy.

For those of you who didn’t know, I received a lovely farewell from Madagascar before I headed to the States—my cell phone was stolen a couple hours before I left for the airport. Just a little sendoff to make sure I came back? Something like that.

And my first day back in Morondava, my DVD player was stolen. Like from inside my friend’s apartment (the only apartment being rented, meaning the place is usually deserted) while I took a shower. I mean, it was a good thing, because my friend had TONS of valuable things everywhere—including the laptop my DVD player was sitting on top of. But it was the ONLY valuable thing I had. That and my stolen cell phone. Thank you, Madagascar—I love you too.

(Note: Okay that’s complete bullshit—it has not so much to do with Madagascar as the fact that people steal stuff no matter where you live, so whatever—it could have happened anywhere.)

It wasn’t well thought through, however. They watch French region movies here. The player will ONLY read American movies. (And yes, this also means that I can’t just get a new player here—because they will only read the French coded movies.) And while it can also play CDs (but not the ones with music videos that come along with them, which is what they usually use here), the guy failed to take the charger. Meaning the machine is useless to him, and will be even MORE useless to him once the battery dies (soon)—while it was VERY useful to me. Plus let’s not forget the creepy thought that someone was in the apartment. And while a laptop was donated to my school while I was in the US, it does not play DVDs. Not enough memory, or something like that.

My first week got even better, but I’ll only touch on a couple things.

First, I got eaten ALIVE by some kind of bug that left bite marks as big as bee stings or something. They itch like you wouldn’t believe and cover my back like the measles and they haven’t seemed to go away even though it’s been a week. Awesome.

But to add insult to injury, some restaurant snuck a little mango into a sauce (that wasn’t even good). Mango. In my body. If this does not make you cringe with horror, please go back to a certain entry about a year ago, and you’ll quickly understand. Luckily I didn’t eat much of it (the shrimp were kind of sitting on a swirl of sauce for decoration, as opposed to being soaked in it), so it’s not as bad as it could be. Nevertheless, my face is swollen and itchy. My arms and fingers are itchy. Slightly (okay a lot more than that) miserable and unable to sleep from it at times. And rather than hibernating my way through it, I had to spend two and a half full days without a break with people (it happened in the middle) when all I wanted to do was sleep and wake up when it’s all over. Ha.

All I’m saying, I’m prepared for a cyclone to be a part of the welcome committee. Or maybe I’ll be let off the hook and I now just have to wait for the mango to get out of my system.

To end on a positive (and somewhat ironic) note . . . Throughout all this, I am currently in the process of trying to get assigned to a second tour with the Peace Corps in a different country. Let’s be honest, the US government was probably behind all this—trying to test my commitment before spending more tax dollars on me.

Okay maybe not.

Moral of the story: It’s hot as hell and good to be back. Where else can such a dramatic week be so . . . undramatic?