A school in Madagascar

Tuesday, February 21, 2017
Ivato, MG.05, Madagascar
You approach the school from the capital via a rough rutted red earthen road that winds through the hills and is sometimes washed out in places after a rain. The trip takes longer than you think it will, even after you knew it would take longer than you thought it would. This is a region of low hills of brick-coloured laterite, which is something between soil and rock. The school sits half-way up one of these hills, with a beautiful view over a starfish-shaped group of five flat valleys. The soil in the valleys is richer, and rice grows well, in subtle shades of bright green, when there is enough rain. One or two snow-white egrets are visible now; at dawn and dusk a dozen of them may get together for a fly-by. At any given moment you are likely to observe several people filing across the fields on the narrow ridge of soil created to dam the small plots for flooding; at least one of them is carrying something on her head. Beyond the rice, a kilometre away, four or five villages are perched on similar hillsides, vivid in the clear air.
On a calm morning the creaking of cart-wheels on the next ridge sounds as clear as though you were riding on the wagon. These carts, drawn by a pair of zebu, sometimes pass in front of the school on their way to one of the three villages that border the road before it peters out a few hundred metres on. Occasionally a bicycle goes by, more rarely a motorbike. If a car or van approaches, it is almost certainly coming to the school itself, and a week may pass between these visits.
Yet a five-minute walk up the hill behind the school provides a view of the country's principal airport, just two hours' walk away (as close as downtown Brampton is to Pearson), and the capital city itself is visible. If you had a good reason, you could walk to the city and back in a day -- although I personally would recommend walking in any other direction.
The school has 720 students from pre-school to high school completion, as well as teachers, several full-time kitchen staff, numerous gardeners, and five guards. It's not just a school, however -- it's a development project centred on a school. The school owns rice fields and is buying more. There is a large garden, a work in progress, designed to provide school lunches as well as to raise funds. Recently the parents worked collectively to improve the garden by building "swales" to retain water and reduce erosion on the steep hillside.
Susan spends about half the year here, most of her time dealing with administrative issues, medical emergencies, and various other requests for funds. Here is a partial sample from a single week:
The wife of one of the teachers is about to give birth to twins, probably requiring a caesarian.  Susan keeps in contact with the hospital and makes sure the funds are available through an associate in town (because there is no free medical care in Madagascar, apparently. In the end the babies were delivered normally).  
A boy in the village has a hernia and needs funds to go to town for treatment.  
The son of one of the kitchen staff is in hospital, possibly with malaria, in a town on the coast. A family member has to go there to look after him, because in Madagascar you are neither fed nor treated in hospital without a personal advocate. Nursing care is minimal during the day, and absent at night. All night the relative will sit in the ward on a stool beside the bed (but is not allowed to climb in to share the narrow cot) or else naps on the floor somewhere. But near the floor the mosquitoes are more numerous. During the day, the relatives of the patients are gathered under trees near the hospital, cooking on charcoal fires.
Someone borrows an onion.
At 2 pm Susan says, "Mme Davou (school administrator who lives in the capital and has a car) has been standing outside the mayor's office since 9 am." Why? In order to complete the paperwork to buy half an acre of land. (She succeeds an hour later).
A woman arrives on behalf of her son whose femur has been broken by an aggressive zebu. Although the boy is not a student, Susan gives her money for the trip to town. The next day the father comes to ask for money for the operation. The doctor is asking for 1.5 million ariary or over CAD $600, but Susan contacts her doctor friend who says it should cost 850 000. (We have been told that doctors are paid by the state, not the patient, yet it is the doctor, not an administrator, who communicates the fee. I ask, Will they negotiate? Susan is not sure. It seems quite possible that the doctor is getting a cut).  Susan gives the father 850 000, saying, "That will get the operation started, anyway." She contacts friends in town who will be able to top up if necessary. The family will probably be unable to pay off this "loan." The higher figure is as much as a teacher's annual salary, and the man is a farmer with no regular income.
I ask Susan: If you weren't here, what would happen to people like this boy? She says she doesn't know, but she can think of two people who would have died in the past six months without her emergency help.
The optometrist is here. He manages to examine most of the students in two days, but the glasses he recommends will cost a lot more than the school can afford. (Malagasy optometrists seem to be unanimous that children should not use any one pair of glasses for more than a year. Canadian optometrists are puzzled by this. Malagasy optometrists say it's because of the diet.  Canadian optometrists remain puzzled.)  Anyway, Susan suggests maybe we can triage and only do the needier cases. The optometrist responds: In that case we will give glasses to the kids who are writing their exams this year. (This is the first time we have mentioned exams, but it will not be the last).
(Three extra photos below)

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