Antsirabe, Madagascar

 Asher Kaufman, age 18, set out on June 28 for a yearlong trip to help spread the Children's Rosary in Europe and Africa. He spent the months of July, August and the first two weeks in September in France. He arrived in Uganda on September 15. From Uganda he traveled by car to Rwanda on September 28. After a week in Rwanda there was once more a return for more travel in Uganda. On October 11 he arrived in Tanzania and on October 26 traveled to Kenya. Most recently he reached Madagascar on November 7. 

"In the last few days, I have wrapped up my mission at St. Therese of the Child Jesus School. Leading the Rosary with the students of St. Therese was very similar to leading the students at Our Lady of La Salette school in prayer. In both places, though there were varying degrees of familiarity with the Rosary itself, most students were familiar with the Our Father and Hail Mary prayers, which made my work much easier. 

At one point during the time I was commuting to St. Therese’s, I became sick with something like the flu. The symptoms were quite debilitating, such that I was unable to kneel for the whole Rosary, so I began taking a spot at the back of the group of children so that they would not immediately notice that partway through the prayers I had taken a seat. We like to encourage the children to kneel, but it is hard to do so when one oneself decides to sit down. 

On Saturday, after having finished the missions at both the School of Our Lady of La Salette and St. Therese, Fr. Bertrand took me to see a local lake where we might walk around and enjoy the views and the breeze. 

Near the water were some vendors of souvenir items, and I decided to go take a look at what they had to offer. I told myself when walking in that I needed to be disciplined and only buy one souvenir (thinking of my already badly overweight bags). I then proceeded to behave like a classic sucker and buy about five souvenirs in total. The vendors did have decent goods, like creches, nice images to hang on the wall, etc. 

The vendors themselves were very nice but seemed rather desperate for me to come to their stalls. One vendor told me that she had had very little business since the political strife. Another told me that I was her first customer the whole day and that hardly no one comes to her stand. This I found quite hard to believe as, if no one really came, I was pretty sure she would just move to wherever the customers actually were. I figured that next to the lake was as good a place as any and probably a good deal better than most. I must say that the experience of buying goods from the vendors was a very important one for me. Previously, when on trips with my family, I often would have little or no patience for the time when we would stop by the vendors and look at souvenirs to buy. I never really saw the value of such things. However, I think it is part of the process of maturing where one begins to see the value in such cultural goods; whereas before a kindle or a set of headphones might have caught the attention, at this age, I find that a well painted cloth to hang on the wall or a particularly nice-looking bowl does the trick. 

After the vendors, Fr. Bertrand and I went to a different kind of market but one where there was little chance of me getting swept up in the purchases. It was a livestock market. We walked past quite a large number of cows, bulls, pigs, and goats. 

That afternoon, we went in the direction of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd of the Sacred Heart. You might recall that I visited them the week before, and they invited me to come pray the rosary with some children that frequent the formation house on Saturday afternoons, but we already had a program for that day. Thus, I came back after the morning leisure time. 

After some trial and error and turning down a few wrong paths, the deacon and I found the formation house. 

Before I tell how the visit at the formation house was, I just want to take a moment to describe a bit one of the most common and inescapable forms of transport in Antsirabe. Some of you may remember my description of the Antananarivo taxi a few weeks ago.

The most common form of transport in Antsirabe is even more rudimentary; it is called a cyclo-pousse (pronounced (see-cloh-poohs). This is essentially a bicycle where someone rides on the seat and pedals, and where the back wheel would normally be, there are two wheels side by side, and on top of these is a seat for a passenger. Thus, the proprietor rides just in front of the passenger and pedals the bike. The first time I rode one of these to commute to the School of St. Therese, I was a bit uncomfortable watching the man in front of me pedaling hard the whole way. I preferred to rest easy in the knowledge that the work was being done by a mechanical motor. However, this was not as disturbing as what was locally called the pousse-pousse and what is more commonly called a rickshaw. The puspus is just like the cyclopus except there is no front wheel; the whole contraption is pulled by a man who is walking, not bicycling. I never rode a pousse-pousse because they went slower and the men who pulled them were evidently working much harder than the cyclists; they were generally older gentlemen who did not feel comfortable driving the cycles, and they all looked like they were in the throes of an extreme effort when I would pass them on the street; I could not bring myself to hire a pousse-pousse. 

The sisters were happy to see us and apologized because there were only about twenty children who showed up. 

I told them it was no worry, and to be honest, I was very happy to have the chance to pray with such a small group of children. Sometimes when people want me to come to their parishes or schools, they think they must have a whole stadium full of children to make it worth my time, but this is not the case. Oftentimes, with small groups of children, the connection as a group is tighter, and everyone feels themselves a more essential part of the “team,” so to speak. Our group at home in Connecticut often has only a handful of children, and we know them all by name, have seen many of them grow up, and personally know the effects that participation has had on each of them. 

The children come from the surrounding area to play games and have fun with the sisters on Saturday afternoons. We went into a small building nearby to pray. The group prayed in Malagasy as the children were more comfortable that way than in French. Afterward, we played a game where we looked for leaves from as many different kinds of plants as possible to see who would get the greatest diversity. I was far from the winner. One of the sisters, who seemed to have a remarkable knowledge of the native plants, gathered an almost unbelievable variety in the few minutes we had of foraging. 

That evening, I prepared my affairs for the next day when I left to go to the parish of St. Peter’s in Ambano. There is a La Salette parish in there that Fr. Bertrand had arranged I could visit. I was warmly welcomed by Fr. Theo. Ambano is a short distance outside Antsirabe, and it is “en brousse,” as they say here. That is just a very Malagasy way of saying it is a bit rural. Indeed, as we picked our way gingerly over the profound divets and rock-studded mounds that characterized the road to Ambano, I felt almost like the car was moving as much vertically as horizontally. It was bumpy almost beyond belief, with the road so disfigured due to the seasonal rains. 

At Ambano, we visited a parish outstation where Fr. Theo celebrated Mass and baptized several infants. Then we went to the main parish of St. Peter’s where I gave a short talk on the Rosary and we prayed all together. 

I spent the rest of the evening visiting with Sister Lanto, who runs the school next door to the parish. We walked through some ricefields and bean plantings to a farm not far away where some brothers work.

They showed me the prodigious amount of pigs there (they have about 130) and cows. There were also two dogs that barked angrily at us from a long distance away when we walked by the first time and then would not even bother to get up and look at us when we walked up to the house; some very interesting guard dog tactics. 

The next day, Sister Lanto divided up the students into four groups to come to the church and pray a Rosary with me. 

It turned out to be a rather pleasant morning; I learned a bit the art of evolving the short talk I gave for each iteration of students so that I was not giving the same talk to the high schoolers that I gave to the kindergarteners. 

After lunch there at the parish, Fr. Theo drove me back into town. We stopped again at the lake where I had seen the vendors, but this time we just walked along the water and then sat down next to the shore. It was a nice, quiet way to conclude the visit. 

The next day, Tuesday, I took the bus again to head back to Antananarivo; my work in Antsirabe had come to an end. 

Before I conclude the story of my stay in Antsirabe, I just want to say that it was such an enjoyable time there with the community of La Salette that I really was quite sorry to see it come to an end. Fr. Bertrand and Deacon Fidelis (whom I had seen in La Salette in July) along with all the priests and brothers who were there were so welcoming at the Provincial House, and Fr. Gerard and the brothers were equally so at the Shrine of Our Lady of La Salette. Everyone made me feel at home, did what they could to facilitate my work, and continued to thank me for what I was doing. I feel so blessed to have been given the opportunity to visit this wonderful community in Antsirabe."

To see all of Asher's dispatches from his journey click HERE