This past week, I lived in a fishbowl. I swam around in circles while snot-nosed children pressed their fingers to the glass, intrigued by the way my scales gleamed in the sun. I have never felt so naked.
After bouncing over dirt roads in the bed of a truck for several hours, I was greeted by the sound of bare feet pounding over hard red clay. My ride deposited me in the midst of a gaggle of children. For the next five days, their dark eyes did not leave me. They followed me as I walked to the cockroach-infested outhouse, played with the scraggly pair of kittens in the kitchen and brushed my teeth on the balcony. They giggled as I danced to their clapping hands, pounded rice and plucked feathers from a duck. I was instantly the most entertaining object in this rural village of 500 people. Friendly faces surrounded me, yet I was alone in the spotlight.
My host parents bestowed three kisses on my cheeks when I arrived and took me to my room to deposit my bags. I settled into a plastic chair and smiled awkwardly as my new family gathered around. "Nice to meet you," I tried to say, but stumbled after the first few syllables. Three weeks of Malagasy lessons and I couldn't even manage basic greetings. I thought my previous experiences in villages in Senegal and Mali had prepared me for my visit, but I was lost. My passable French would not help me in this collection of mud-brick huts whose occupants had not made it through primary school.
After I ran out of stock phrases in Malagasy, my host family brought me a box of Christmas gifts they had received from an American charity. "What's this?" they asked, as they held up cat-shaped Halloween face paint. They showed me a letter from the generous donors, which I did my best to translate. I had to look up every other word in my woefully inadequate Malagasy notebook, but I was pretty proud of my work. Every concept I managed to get across was a triumph.
As I attempted to explain the contents of the box, I imagined the American family preparing it in their little suburban home in Tennessee. How kind they were to bring a little Christmas joy to a poor African child. It was strange to find myself on the other side of the world, just as perplexed as the recipients as to why someone thought that these people needed glow sticks which didn't work, Christmas colored soap confetti, an eye mask whose gel had long since drained and a pack of gummy bears that had expired months ago.
It was a three-hour car ride to the nearest town with electricity or running water, not that anyone in this village had a car. My hosts were subsistence farmers. They needed candles and rice and clothes, pens, so their children could attend school. They did not need, nor have any way of knowing what their presents were.
On the last day of my village stay, my host aunt asked me to come to her house. Inside, she opened a large burlap sack. I stood confused by her obvious excitement as the contents were revealed: bananas.
"Bananas!" I said, with attempted enthusiasm. She wanted me to take a picture. As she handed me a bunch of bananas, she thanked me. I realized this was her parting gift, a great gesture from someone who had very little. She was thrilled to share everything she had: her culture, her work, her bananas, with a white stranger who took an interest in her way of life.
You can reach this columnist at thescene@theeagleonline.com.
