A Peaceful Week

Dear all,

   A little over a week ago we Monday we went back to Ifaty, a small seacoast village about 16 miles (an hour's drive) from Toliara. The area around Ifaty has several hotels strung along a beautiful beach. We stayed through Friday afternoon and thoroughly enjoyed the stunning beauty and peacefulness. You may recall that when we visited Ifaty previously we went whale watching, but only saw waves. When we arrived for our second visit, the hotel owner offered to send us whale watching Tuesday morning for free because of our unsuccessful first trip. This time we saw eight whales and followed them for about an hour!  Three whales totally jumped up into the air, which took our breath away! Most of Peg's pictures were of splashes after the whales submerged, but she did get a few good shots.

             Several of the nights we were there the moon was either full or almost full. 

                                                                    From Tuesday morning's whale watching!

                          Their flukes different, ranging from pure white with what looked like a bite out of it, to dark black.

 When the tide was very low, people from the village nearby walked the beach looking for some kind of seafood -- mussels maybe.

                                                               The beach was rocky, with a spiny forest up above.

                                   Each night, the view of the sunset from our room was different over the Indian Ocean.

When Peg taught the photography class, she finally learned to use her own camera's self-timer, so here we are in front of our room. 

Villagers also fished constantly in dug-out canoes, 

and put up sails to get out to the reef when the wind came up.

  

                                                                             Needless to say, we loved it.

   Since we got back Friday, we went with the mission team from Florida to St. Augustine, a small ocean-front town about an hour south of Toliara. This past Sunday we went to church in the bush, where there were 22 baptisms by Bishop Todd with Howard assisting, and 33 confirmed (pictures will be arriving on the website soon). We then drove to Isalo National Park Sunday afternoon, getting back to Tuesday night (September 28th). Isalo features sandstone rocks cut by deep canyons and eroded into weird shapes. The Bara ethnic group has used the caves in the canyon walls as burial sites for hundreds of years. Monday we hiked through rice paddies (the Malagasy eat rice three meals a day), across a dry plain, and into a cool leafy canyon where we saw ring-tail lemurs.

   On Tuesday morning, Howard toured a sapphire mine with the majority of the group, while Peg and a small group again hiked through the rice paddies, plains, and across several streams into another canyon, looking for sifikas at the canyon entrance. Our guide had stated we might not be able to see the lemurs as the local villagers were re-burying the bones of a deceased member of the former tribal king very high up on the canyon wall at the location of the king's tomb. The noise of the villagers did in fact scare away the lemurs and they were nowhere to be found. But Peg and the others were able to see the villagers carrying the bones high on the canyon wall (we will send pictures!). Peg has taken SOOOOO many pictures in the past week and some will be heading to the website this week.

   After we returned to Toliara Tuesday night, the mission team began its journey back to Florida. The team members will soon have pictures from their time in Madagascar on their website, and we will forward the web address.

   This coming Monday evening we fly to the capital and then head to the rain forest east of the capital -- Andasibe-Mantadia National Park. The guidebooks and Malagasy people say if you only visit one national park in Madagascar, it should be this one. While there we will be able to see a wide variety of endemic plants and some of the eleven species of lemurs found there. We will then spend five days at St. Paul's Seminary, which is north of the capital,  prior to our trip home. Howard is looking forward to teaching a course on the theology of C.S. Lewis for seminarians there.

We miss you and love you,

Fr. Howard and Peg

This Too Is Madagascar

    This week's new experiences included a trip 15 miles north of Toliara. Bishop Todd drove their 4-wheel drive truck along the main road northeast. In a second set of pictures from this trip you will see some of the scenes along the road as we returned to Toliara. We stayed at a peaceful resort by the ocean that has incredible views and great fresh seafood. While there, we took a tour in an cart pulled by two zebu into the "spiny forest" to see all sorts of cacti and baobob trees. 

    The forest is very old and has a number of baobobs that are quite old -- the oldest we saw was 800 years old. The one below is unusual as it has four trunks. 

We miss you!

Fr. Howard and Peg

 The "spiny forest" is thick with large cacti called octopus cacti because they look like huge octopuses waving their spiny arms. Some of the arms had very green spikes, new growth. Others looked dead and fragile, but apparently remain on the cacti for a very long time. 

The baobob, according to our guide, is distinguished by its fruit (large balls on tree) that are somewhat like peaches. This one seemed quite stable despite its very distinct leaning. 

The baobab below is the one believed to be 800 years old. We felt very insignificant next to its trunk. The aloe plant to the right had bright red blossoms.

The next morning a butterfly that was as large as a bird stopped to rest and permitted us to take its picture. The hand next to it clarifies how very large it was. 

Later the same day, we went whale watching. However, most of the "watching" involved watching the two guides up above us who constantly scanned the horizon for signs of whales and marveling at how the captain managed to steer the boat only periodically with his foot while remaining above us. Although disappointed not to see the migrating whales, the trip out into the ocean was beautiful and the views as crossed the reef on our return were dazzling. 

The shallow area between the reef and the shore.

On the way back from our trip 15 miles north, a world and more than an hour by 4-wheel drive truck away from Toliara, I rode in the back of the truck so I could have a panoramic view of the countryside. The spaciousness of the desert and rural villages are a stark contrast to the urban Toliara, where space is a luxury and litter, mostly plastic bags, moves from place to place on the breeze. 

We stopped in a village where the road was blocked by an ox cart accident. This mother and her child were walking by

The main highway northeast is traveled by foot, bicycle, motorcycle, oxcart, and trucks. People travel for long distances for water and food.  

The space around the houses in this village and the peacefulness are hard to come by for Malagasy living in crowded Toliara.

Saturdays and Sundays

   Howard and I are continuing to meet warm, welcoming people here in Toliara. The church next door to Bishop Todd and Patsy's apt. has an English-speaking service every Saturday afternoon. Everything in the service is in English. People come not only from nearby but from a distance to participate in the service and visit in English with each other. Many of those who come are adolescents and young adults. Their enthusiasm and joy is contagious as they greet each other and sing together. We are looking forward to the service tomorrow, as the mission team from Florida will have arrived and will introduced. They will be welcomed with the traditional clapping welcome that we will share and demonstrate on our return.

   Each Saturday prior to this service, the church's Mothers' Union (ECW) visits a person or family that has been unable to come to church recently to see how they are doing and let them know they are missed. On a recent Saturday Patsy and I went with them to visit two elderly sisters in the neighborhood by the church. One of them had been quite ill and the other has been caring for her. They live in a one-room thatched house with a tin roof. As the pictures show, they were very pleased to be visited and also loved having their picture taken. They kept saying that the pictures make them look old and laughing, then wanting another picture taken. I got prints yesterday of several pictures to take to them.

Veloma (goodbye) for now,

Fr. Howard and Peg

 

After the visit, the children who had gathered outside their home walked with Patsy and with me back to the main street and the market.

Last Sunday morning, we visited the church in Andronamena, one of the communities in Toliara and the location of the Gathering Center. People there now know us as we have been there several times and greeted us warmly. 

                                                      Howard officiated at the Eucharist and blessing of the children.

At the conclusion of the service, several young women sang a "special song" for us with their church leader Daceys. Although we often recognize the tune of the Malagasy songs and hymns, this one was new to us and lovely!

  
After the service Howard and I visited with Daceys and his brother. They live next door to the church. Daceys participated in the photo workshop and in the youth conference held this week in Toliara. Aubin, the translater who helped me with the photography workshop, facilitated our visit. 


                                      

Fort Dauphin 2

   The visit to Fort Dauphin had many features. Although I forgot my camera, I had an exciting experience in one of the national parks where we went to see lemurs. I saw four kinds; the first white ones took bananas in their hands out of mine. Following that visit we went up into the mountains and had a service with the newer congregation Saturday night under a large tree. In services here, the people have been very welcoming, each one shaking my hand at least once. The peace is sung in a circle holding hands. Many times during both the Saturday evening and Sunday morning services, I deeply wished that all of you could have seen what I was seeing. I left Fort Dauphin with a new brother in Christ and a deepened understanding of how love and respect transcend language. The pictures below were taken during and after the Sunday morning service in the more established of the two churches. 

In Christ,

Fr. Howard

Fort Dauphin

   Last Thursday, September 2, I flew to Fort Dauphin for a 4-day visit. Although it is only an hour flight, it would have taken three full days to drive there by car. Fort Dauphin is a town beautifully situated on the southeast tip of Madagascar. It is surrounded by beautiful mountains and water on every side. The unemployment rate is extremely high and there is no work. 

   I visited there because a new church has started up within the last year and has grown very quickly. I wanted to understand as best I could how so is happening with such limited resources. They have started to build their own church building and have begun a second church in a small, extremely poor village on a mountain nearby. The first church currently meets in a very small classroom in a school where over a 100 people crowd in to worship each Sunday. The church is pastored by Rev. Donne, who before becoming a Christian had lived in small village in the northern part of Madagascar. He has made significant changes in his life. He and the church president Clara met me at the airport, and I stayed for four days at his home with his family. My luggage was lost during the short trip and they bent over backwards to get me everything I needed. He has three sons, ages 3-14, who are incredibly bright. The oldest son was my interpreter for the first two days. His wife works at a women's health clinic in Fort Dauphin. They were remarkably hospitable to this stranger, sharing everything they had, which in material terms is very limited. They have rice and "loca" (vegetables, fish, chicken, or a small amount of beef) for each meal. I slept in a separate room behind their home, which is in a compound of Christians who are Anglican, Lutheran, and Roman Catholic. They live together in a fenced off area with their chickens and their dogs, which provide protection. Fort Dauphin has an increasing crime rate.

   I met Christ with the people in Fort Dauphin and want to share pictures of my trip there with you.  I am sending additional pictures (Part II) from Sunday worship and my visit with the family.

In Christ,

Fr. Howard

Photo Workshop

  

  As many of you know, I have been looking forward to offering a workshop on photography for persons from four established parishes here in southern Madagascar – three participants from churches in Toliara parish, one from Fort Dauphin (a three-day trip each way from Toliara), and one from Sakaraha. In addition, several other participants who are involved in the English-speaking program at Ankilifaly were able to attend. September 1-3, this past Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, I met with 8-10 persons from 9-noon and from 3-5:30, including Aubin, who is an excellent interpreter. I could never have done it without him! The participants included Zefa, Dauphin, Bon Admit, Victor, Mbinitsoa, Rija, Dacise, Josianne, and Johnson. With donations from Ascension parishioners, I brought five cameras for the parishes; the participants learned to use the cameras and also learned basic principles of photography. Most had never used a camera before and none own one. Since we had more participants than cameras, they shared. And we practiced a lot! 

  As you will see in the pictures, all of the participants were very serious about their photography, eager to help each other, very much enjoyed each others’ company, and formed a small community through which they will support each others’ continued progress as photographers for their parishes. They also learned a lot, as their photos demonstrate. They will be taking photos at the youth conference in Toliara next week and of the experiences and work of the mission team that will arrive in a couple of weeks. I shared with them many of the ideas from Jan Phillips' book God is at Eye Level: Photography as a healing art and practical guidelines that have been helpful to me. 

   We took a field trip Thursday afternoon to a sacred site outside of Toliara with huge ancient banyan trees. On Friday we went to the Victory Hotel, where missions teams typically stay, and took photos of the beautiful gardens, gift shop, and each other. Then we went to the Gathering Place, learned about the history of the church (Andranomena) on the site of the Gathering Place  and took photos, including the beautiful sunset. I am sending photos to Fr. Brett in this email and several others. The photos include some I took, but the majority of the pictures I am sending from the class meetings and field trips were taken by the participants. 

 

   It is difficult to describe how much fun I had! Bishop Todd and Patsy are wise in suggesting that one bring one’s passion to Madagascar to share with people, and I lose track of time taking, editing, and enjoying photos. The workshop and field trips were a wonderful way to get to know the participants, thanks to Aubin’s help in translating and Patsy’s willingness to take all of us in their truck on the field trips. Hopefully the pictures will make sense without more details. Enjoy the photos and all the smiles in them (by the way a number of the photos were taken by the participants with the self-timer feature).  Most of them will probably not make it into this blog posting, but you can view them in the Madagascar slideshow on our church's website, www.knoxvilleascension.org

Peg, from Toliara 9-5-10

The Gathering Place

 

   In our several visits to the Gathering Place in the past two weeks, I have been struck by how many people’s paths already cross this beautiful site each day – so many that in any direction one sees dozens of paths worn deep into the grass. The name Gathering Place depicts the place where all in the Diocese of Toliara can come to worship, study, meet and greet each other as well as guests to Madagascar, including mission teams, and have a retreat and be replenished. As Howard and I walked the site Monday with people from the Ankilifaly and Andranomena parishes to pray for the completion of the Gathering Place and for the Diocese, many others also walked one of the paths or rode a bicycle crossed the land – some were on their way home or to get water, going to or coming from the nearby elementary school, a neighborhood soccer game, or an outdoor market nearby; some were herding their cattle or goats; others appeared to be walking leisurely, alone or with others. As I have watched this constant activity -- from the prayer walk around the property on this past Monday, from the second-floor balconies, from a window as we worshipped this morning in Andraomena in a temporary sanctuary built when the new and growing Andronomena parish could no longer meet in a home -- the meaning of the name “The Gathering Place” has expanded for me. It is evident that this place is now and will continue to be a place where people on travel alone and together for many, many reasons. When the construction is completed, they may continue to pass by, or to stop and observe, to stay for a while, or to come again and again.

   The pictures below show the numerous paths worn into the land from the east, west, north, and south of the Gathering Place. When I was there with the participants in the photography class and with Patsy this past Friday, we watched a neighborhood children’s soccer game from the upstairs balcony, looking to the east; at dusk we watched the sunset with Patsy. It was the first time she had seen the sunset in their new home, still “under construction.” We watched a plane land at the nearby airport where Howard, Emily, and I arrived almost two weeks ago; where Patsy’s parents and Bishop Todd will fly in this coming Thursday, and where a team from Florida will land and then stay for almost two weeks. The team members will learn about Madagascar, provide medical care, work on both water and solar cooking projects, teach vacation Bible School, visit the site south of here where the resort and spa and a secondary school will be built. The Gathering Place is already a place of gathering, a place with which people in the neighborhood are familiar. May God bless and speed its completion and the fruition of its many purposes for the Diocese, for Bishop Todd McGregor and the Rev. Patsy McGregor and their family, for the Diocese's leadership and people, and the neighborhood and communities surrounding it.   

Peg, from Toliara 9-5-10