I was born August 23rd, 2014 at
the arrivals gate of the Antananarivo airport.
Well, not exactly. My real birthday is in
March and I’ve been alive much longer than three weeks. But in some ways I
really do feel like a newborn baby. Instead of nine months in a womb I spent
three days in various international airports anxiously awaiting life in
Madagascar. Admittedly, I’ve never spent much time around babies, but from my
distant observations, we are pretty similar…
Infants don’t talk much. How could they?
There is still so much to observe and absorb and experience. Everything they
see and hear and taste and smell and touch is new! It’s a long process to start
to form those thoughts and feelings into words. Speaking of words, babies don’t
have many to use, at least not at first. After two weeks of language study, I
can follow general conversation topics but I do not yet have the words to
contribute to the conversation myself. But with each day comes progress!
Babies sleep a lot. It seems crazy but it’s
exhausting being a newborn! Between the language and culture differences, time
change, change in diet, and always meeting new people, there are times I can’t
keep my eyes open at the dinner table!
Babies seem to cry a lot. And I’m starting
to realize that that’s a pretty natural reaction to being born. I can’t always
communicate what I want or need or feel, or I’m overwhelmed by all of this new
stimuli, and sometimes I just miss everything that used to surround me that was
safe and familiar.
But being a baby isn’t all challenges and
tears, in some ways it’s really liberating!
People are generally very patient and
understanding with babies. People have been incredibly patient with me too!
Like when I walk to a nearby storefront to buy crackers and speak in such a
mixture of French, English, and Malagasy that I must be nearly impossible to
understand. Or when I accidentally take over another teacher’s English class at
church and they sit through the whole class pretending to be a student. Oops.
Babies are given names. And in those first
few months of life, that’s really all they have. They haven’t yet gained the
labels and titles and other “names” we humans tend to collect over the years
through status, education, memberships, and careers. So in coming to
Madagascar, I’ve had the opportunity to revert to just being Maddie, child of
God. And that’s a really beautiful thing. Because my host family doesn’t care
whether or not I graduated summa cum laude. And the kids I teach don’t know
much about my journey to get here.
All that matters is I am here.
I am learning and growing. And sleeping and
crying and laughing. And living and breathing. And taking those first few baby
steps. And thanking God for the miracle of life.
1 comment:
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