“From this trip, I learned the key to connecting with others is to put yourself out there. I got to work with Famiova (the scarf-makers), MAEVA, a woman’s basket weaving group, and in the blacksmith village. I think we helped them get a start on learning a little English, but it also helped me get out of my comfort zone by having to work with people I didn’t know. It also helped me learn that it’s okay to make mistakes, and sometimes I should just say what I’m thinking. For ex-ample, when we worked with the kids at the school in the blacksmith village, [two other people from CultureConnect] and I were working with about 16 girls for four days. Over that span of time, I felt like I stepped up and got more comfortable and confident teaching the group. It was su-per fun. I just got out of my comfort zone by acting out the script we had prepared to perform with them. When we were teaching them for the third day, we were playing a board game that taught colors and numbers. We would show them the Malagasy word and they would have to say it in English. All of a sudden, I pulled out the flash card for orange, and they started laughing. Then they told us that the translation in Malagasy was wrong. We did the fruit instead of the color, and we felt dumb at the time, but eventually, I realized we are all going to make mistakes. And that I just had to learn from them and brush it off. If I had just stayed in my comfort bubble, I wouldn’t have had this opportunity to learn to connect with others.”
— Emma B.

“Before we got to Madagascar, I was guilty of ignorance to some degree. Going to Madagascar, this was immediately apparent. On the trip, there were specific days that were harder than others to process. One particular morning we went to work with a local school in Ambatovaky a blacksmith village, then went to MAEVA, a basket-weaving community. We were teaching English that day, but there were a lot of difficulties. It was inspiring to see people so interested and engaged, wanting to soak up every piece of information. It hurt me deeply, because it occurred to me that maybe the reason they were so eager and determined to learn was because they wouldn’t be able to have this opportunity again anytime soon. Now this may have been completely false and judgmental of me, but it made me think. That night we talked at reflection time about how our work could be more sustainable. Andry, a man working at CVB and Cedric, a friend working in the capital at Zara Aina, had already proposed ideas for learning programs they would like to start.

At Famiova, a weaving shop, English-speaking tourists came into the scarf shop unaware of our activities. They yelled, ‘Oh my god this is amazing!!! Are you guys teaching? Can we look?’ They proceeded to walk around and look over our shoulders, seeing what we were writing on the white boards. They asked, ‘Can I buy one of these?!’ loudly and slowly to one of the women, and ‘Can I get a photo with you on the porch with me and the scarf?’ The tourists were over the top and loud. The tourists acted superior to the women at the shop, almost dehumanizing them. At reflection time, we talked about this and why it felt wrong. This led to another conversation a couple of us had about how people that speak English, but Americans especially, expect everyone to accommodate them. They expect people to speak English to them. This may be familiar to you, as it is a very American thing; if someone doesn’t understand you while you are speaking English, you try to slow it down and speak LOUDER. Something was made very clear that night, we get things in life to share them with others.

I want to use the amazing opportunities I can get in America to learn and grow myself, to ultimately be able to interact and help others, others that may not have the same opportunities as myself. The most difficult part of that day was the realizations I made that night. When I first got to Madagascar, I was in shock. I felt so guilty for taking things for granted at home. I felt so guilty for ‘needing’ so much in my life while the people in Madagascar live with much less. Even education is different: it’s not a reality in Madagascar for everyone. I realized that while this may be true, I also can’t act like the people I met in Madagascar are not equal to me. I can’t act like they are less than me. I can’t act like their lives are less valuable than mine. If I did, it is demeaning and makes me just as bad as the tourists that came to Famiova that day. This experience has made me a more self-aware person, as I consider how my actions are perceived. The thing with individualistic societies like America is that people act like they exist on a pedestal above the rest of the world, but we don’t. We don’t exist above everyone else, we should see each other as equal individuals. The truth is we live in a global society, one where we need to participate in as a part, participate in as an equal part to everyone else.” – Esther

“Every part of our stay in Madagascar was emotionally rich and personally influential. However, the day we left was the hardest day I’ve experienced in a really long time. Having to say goodbye to people who I became close with within such a short amount of time, especially with the knowledge that I’d most likely never see them again, hurt more than anything I was anticipating. In the span of a week, I was able to learn more about the kids from Zara Aina, even though most of them didn’t speak French or English. We sang together, ate together, played games together, and in that short time our bond grew.

On our last day, everyone was so open about how upset they were, and I couldn’t contain the feelings of frustration and sadness I felt because I had to leave. I was really close with one boy named Tino, even though he was the hardest for me to communicate with since [we didn’t share a] common language. That night, I was feeling sick so I played dominos with him, completely screwed up because I didn’t understand the rules, and laughed with him about my misunderstanding. As we were leaving, he came up to me with tears streaming down his face and hugged me, which left me breaking down in his arms. Even though we didn’t know much about one another, and everything that we shared was purely a bond created by shared interactions, the pain I felt leaving him and all of the other amazing people that I met was unexpected. I appreciate the knowledge and the emotional gain that I got from everyone that I met, and I hope that one day I’ll be able to adequately convey everything that I felt throughout this amazing journey.” —Bethany H.