New photos from Corie

We talked to Corie last night. She has a few more days in Tana, then will fly to Diego and from there make the 5 hour trip back to her village. She said the training sessions with the new PC volunteers went well. She was in great spirits and seemed very happy as she was also able to post 10 new photos, which you can view by clicking here:

http://corieinmadagascar.shutterfly.com/33?eid=112

Enjoy the Weird!

(email from Corie on 4/16/10)

So…one day I guess I decided to try and write a book. Here’s a preview…(just the beginning…I had to make it blog-y!)

During college, I worked part time at an old family-run coffee shop in Laguna Beach California. It was a good job; I learned to master the art of steaming milk and maintaining an exceptionally perky outlook for any human being at 5am, and consequently, always had tip money for the bus ride home. Between handing a colorful regular named Sean one of his twice daily 16-oz dark roasts and serving the next customer, he would usually leave me with brief, witty pearls of wisdom. These ranged from “You guys should change the music in here, sappy love songs don’t sit well with people before breakfast” to, “Don’t you even think about working for a cruise line, Corie, You’d be much better off on an Alaskan fishing boat!” We became fast friends. We found common ground somewhere (though don’t ask me an exact location) He, the 50-something Scottish ex-pat locksmith and I, the 20 year old art student/barista. Sean took me a couple of times to a sweatlodge ceremony in the dusty hills of Orange County. People from all walks of O.C. life would come to claim their own piece of “inner tranquility”. I liked that everyone was welcomed, the aging hippies, the trial lawyers, the soccer moms, the Jews, the Christian conservatives, the gays…all sweating together in a tiny buckskin tent in the middle of a dark nowhere. “Safe, happy, healthy to everyone I care about”, I thought…and often left up a few points in “tranquility” myself (and down quite a few more in water content). On the way home one of those evenings, rattling around in the co-pilot’s seat of Sean’s big lock-picking-gadget-filled van, he said to me, “Corie, always remember it is a good thing to be changing up your experiences in life.”

I remembered.

In a rare moment of concise, relevant advice-giving, Sean unknowingly taught me the lesson of a lifetime. His words inspired me to keep living for those diverse, serendipitously “out-of the norm” moments in life. They would find me there, in a tent full of strangers under the stars, to where I was last week, celebrating Easter 2010 by eating fish I caught with my Malagasy family under a cashew tree, and today, wandering the Diego markets in search of some lady who would sell me “magic” shells and nuts to bring back to my friend to string around her kids’ necks to protect them from evil.

Just in case anyone needs to hear it at this moment, life is full of interesting moments waiting to be lived, and you can find them wherever you already are, if you look. Take a different route or talk to someone new on your way to school, work, or the corner shop for a diet coke and go get your own slice of weird!

My own weird as of late:

* I saved a hedgehog (Tenrec, to be exact) from drowning in my well. I almost didn’t even try because I thought it was a rat, and hate them. They eat everything and make too much noise at night with their fighting and tending to their babies in my walls…I digress. I fished him out with a rake. I didn’t tell my friends though, because people eat them here!

* I almost got attacked by a rabid dog. It’s dead now, no worries. Plus, I have my shots.

* I led a young French whippersnapper around the village (intern of the hotel owner down the road) He wanted me to translate his way overkill idea of good flirting to my friends. I didn’t.

* March 8^th, International Women’s Day, was a bust. My village is too small to host a big party, so we were supposed to go to the one down the road. In the end I was not allowed to go because “too many people do sorcery in that town.” Such is life.

* I’ve been really into fishing lately! It’s one of the few most awesome pastimes here. Stopped being fun when someone told me after the fact that there are crocodiles in the water and they are hungriest at this exact time of year. Oops.

* I was hanging with my counterpart the other day while he was thatching a roof and he was telling me, with a straight face, about the “2 foot high little people that live in the woods” (Malagasy leprechauns?) and the 6-times-woken-from-the-dead woman that supposedly walks the town. Can’t wait to meet her!

Until next time, wishing you all safe, happy healthy….and weird…times!

Facebook posts from Corie on 4/15/10

Corie posted these from Diego, her banking town, where she'll catch a flight to Tana, the capital to begin training the new PC Environmental volunteers.

At 5am this morning when I woke up, it was only 75 degrees...the start to a great week. Thought preparing myself for cold, cold Tana. I'm flying there tomorrow to train the newbies again! Also, someone told me yesterday with a straight face, there is a 6-times-back-from-the-dead zombie woman living in my village. I can't wait to meet her!

"Live everyday like you might be evacuated tomorrow"
-- the wise words of Beth Tofte.
Have a good day everyone!

Letter from Corie dated 3/17/10

Hi Mom & Dad, How are you guys? I've been checking into a new cell phone plan where you can talk all you want with anyone in Madagascar for a cheap fixed price. My PC friend has it and she says its great to be able to keep updated with other volunteers about things and laugh about things only people here think are funny or whatever. This PC friend and I are planning some projects that we could possibly do together...maybe taking kids to the forest and I helped her design an AIDS mural for the school in her village. I can't wait for the rainy season to be over so I can start making clay stoves and hopefully have some tourism customers at our village campsite. Plus, after they fix the washed out roads, I'll be able to actually go places and meet more people.
Yesterday I went to Ambilobe with the hotel's car (bigger town 4 kilometers away) to pick up some more gas for my cooking stove. I have been cooking over fires the last two days. It was fun to get out and I got some good food at the market (avocados!!) I also made friends with the hotel's driver. He lives nearby and we talked a long time about life and stuff here and it felt good to have a great conversation.
Only 8 more months here. How is it going so fast? Crazy! I miss you guys a lot and jaime too. It will be nice to have her closer in San Francisco. I can't wait to visit her there. She sounds great too. We'll talk again soon. Love, Corie

Short phone call from Corie 4/10/10

A short phone call with Corie tonight...short because her phone battery was running out. She has a cough and a cold, but otherwise seems ok. She's anxious as her eco-tourism project is lagging a bit and tourist are due to start later this month. The hotel told her they are booked full thru June. She's also been given another award....honorary soccer team captain! It seems that there are many boys on the poor side of town (where Corie also lives) that don't go school for a variety of reasons: not enough money, flunked the 3rd grade, need to watch the cattle or otherwise help out the household during the day. So the last time she was in the PC office in Tana, the capital, she noticed a box full of soccer jerseys and a ball, so she arranged to bring those back to her village. Needless to say the boys were thrilled and immediately started making a field and want her to come to every game! That's it for now.