Is this a Research Station or a Hotel?: Life at Centre Valbio

     Things have been incredibly busy over here on the other side of the world. After leaving Tana, we took a [slightly harrowing] car ride all the way to Ranomafana, the location of the world famous Centre Valbio. The ride was about 10 hours, and involved roads where the potholes were so bad that it was better to drive next to the pavement, herds of zebu who just couldn't be bothered to move, and a whole bunch of motion-sickness inducing zig-zags. In spite of that, the view was consistently amazing.

We happened to travel on Pentecost

      I had been told how nice the station was before I arrived, but I have to say that it has far surpassed my already high expectations. Many field stations don't have potable water, much less HOT showers, three course meals, and a laundry service!

A beautiful day at Centre Valbio

The "high speed" internet definitely wouldn't fit that label elsewhere, but I think it's pretty impressive for a remote area in the poorest country in the world. The building itself is stunning, and the staff ever friendly and willing to help. I've even begun to pick up a little bit of Malagasy, although I think that I may need to learn a few words other then "misotra" (thank-you), "salama" (also pronounced, "salamo", "salame", "salami" or just "salam", depending on your preference)(hello) and "veluma" (good-bye) before I can be considered fluent.

The prettiest place I've ever dried laundry

During the week, the Centre is a little quieter, as all of the researchers are generally out camping. For the first week or so, we were busy preparing the lab and equipment for use in our projects. The "Infectious Disease Lab" was an empty room when we arrived, so I'd say there has been a marked improvement.
Field data collection has been my favorite part of our project so far. I don't mind lab work, but I really enjoy going into the villages and interacting with the people and the animals. Our Malagasy guides, Tov (Rhymes with "groove"!) and Jon Claude are fond of teaching me supposedly simple phrases, which turn out to be a huge laugh when I attempt to say them to village children. I still have trouble differentiating between "ulona" and "ulana" (I think that's how you spell them!), one of which means people and one of which means problems. I know there's a joke in there somewhere!

Hamming around with a subject

The project so far really has been extremely interdisciplinary. All of the randomly selected households were given a survey by an in-country statistics group called INSTAT, who have been extremely helpful and efficient. We then go in collect fecal samples from the humans and their livestock, which the Gillespie team will use to look at parasite prevalence and the potential for "zoonosis", or disease transfer between the different species.
 Our days had been starting extremely early, to the point that we were up before the kitchen staff. An average wake-up time was at about 5:40 a.m., with the idea that we be on the road by 6:15. People here often keep their chickens inside, but generally let them out very early in the morning (way earlier than 6:30). I don't know if you've ever been woken up by a rooster at early o'clock in the morning, but I'm surprised so many people kept their chickens in for us.
Most Malagasy households have chickens, so a whole lot of time was spent capturing chickens,

Preparing a sample

placing them in pens, and essentially waiting for them to "produce a sample". Like I said before, the people here think everything we do is hilarious, and collecting chicken poop is no exception. I've been fully trained in the proper way to hold a chicken, but it seems there is no better training in catching chickens than to chase them. To my chagrin, and the the villagers' delight, any chicken that wasn't already in a basket or coop was able to evade me with apparent ease.

There's always an audience around here

My favorite village that we went to, although my teammates may not agree, was Ampitavanana. Ampitavanana is extremely rural, existing at about an hour's hike from the main road, if you're feeling quick. The road was pretty steep and a bit rough, but it was a beautiful place to be at around 6 in the morning. On nice days here, the fog settles in the valleys, and you can look down over it if you climb high enough. The first day we went was a Sunday, so we passed many families in their finest sun hats on their way to either church or market. I gave each passing group an enthusiastic (and horribly mispronounced) version of "Good morning", which inevitably produced more than a few chuckles. As villages around here go, Ampitivanana seemed poorer than most: I didn't see any tin roofs, which are a marker of slightly more well off families. I certainly didn't see any tiled floors or concrete walls, which are marks of the rich. The village had very few zebu or pigs, which are generally owned by wealthier citizens. Some houses didn't even own chickens, which is unusual. The village was fortunate in that it had a school, which

Tov en route to Ampitavanana

was quite nice for one so far from the beaten path. The people of Ampitivanana were more than willing to help us. I felt like either a celebrity or a side show, as at least 25 kids followed us while we were doing our work. The one man in the village who spoke a little English asked my name and told me that he "would never forget me".
     We have had a couple of afternoons to go into the park itself, so everything hasn't been all work and no play! I'll do another post soon about all of the cool non-domesticated animals we have seen.