So, after exactly three months in my new home, I find the opportunity to blog. It’s not that I haven’t had the time or that I find blogging boring or that it might not be interesting, but! Well, yes, I’m kind of worried that I won’t find interesting issues or the right voice with which to tell you about it all. Now though, I might just have found an angle from which I’ll introduce you to the secrets of a vazaha and her life as an FK-participant here at Madagascar. I know the preposition preceding Madagascar might be wrong, as an English teacher I should know... But it’s the one I find most suitable, so I’ll stick to it! My experience as a blogger adds up to zero, what I do know though, is that you should have a story to tell, to catch the reader’s interest. I could tell you about my day to day life, my teaching, my research or my feelings and reactions on being back in my childhood paradise, ‘cause that’s really what it is! As you know, many of you at least, I grew up in this country and I was too excited (Arabic way of expressing “very” in English...) about returning as a grown up living and working here. What I ended up with angle-wise, is a kind of a daily life narrative. So, now it all begins... I call this blog “Kristin blogs from her balcony”, it should rather be from her laverangana (veranda in Malagasy), because it really is a huge veranda, from where I have a great view to many a kinds of aspects of life of a Malagasy citizen. I and my colleague live centrally in Toliara, a quite big town southeast of Madagascar. The tropic of Capricorn cuts its way through the town, and believe me, the nocturnal sky is just wonderful from our balcony or from anywhere around this area. We clearly see the “southern cross” every evening, and its angle changes within few hours! At first it stands like a crucifix, then it starts turning clockwise and stops in a horizontal position, and no, it never appears upside down..! Why do I blog from my veranda? First of all, this is where I have an internet connection, kind of a borrowed line ;) Second, I don’t have an office at the university where I officially work, and most of all, this is where I experience most things I want to share with you. Why is it so? My neighborhood is filled with official buildings, the army; the police academy; the immigration office; the appeal court and the highways department, or department of routes nationaux, I guess (I haven’t seen any highways so far...), in addition to the épicerie, the small food stalls, the print and copy center, quite some traffic, palm trees and last but not least, the pousse-pousse drivers. I’ll tell you all about them later. Our house is situated in a T-junction where the street leading from the shore meets with one of the streets leading straight to the center, so all in all it is quite a busy part of town, even though it’s not right in the centre ville. This blog entry will serve as an introduction, and I’ll be back with more in a relatively short while. Please feel free to leave your comments or greetings!