Arobina Chacha ny Toamboavoa (congratulations for catching the new year). Okay, that spelling is not exactly correct, but I don't know how to spell anything!

Let me start off by wishing you all a very Happy New Year! This week was just a whirlwind. First, I have to start with New Years. The whole country was partying! It was very exciting, although not very fun, because for the most part people were just raving drunk. Actually, a note on that, if I had to summarize the overall vibe of the day it would be Christmas is a day to party (ergo get drunk), and New Years is just a day to get ridiculously drunk. People were freaking out, I think some people got pre drunk the night before just so that they could build on that for the big day. And then they drank themselves back to sobriety. 

Holidays are challenging because lots of people are visiting family and so we didn't have a whole lot of time to teach lessons. For the most part we tracted. That was hard because we set the goal this week as a companionship to work for 28 hours (that means in lessons or tracting). We were working ALL day every day. It was good, but it was hard, especially because half the people we ran into tried to yell at us about New Years in a hybrid French/ English/ Malagasy.

We also had a birth this week. One of our investigators gave birth to a healthy baby boy - 3 kilos. It was a little scary because there were a few complications that required a cesarean section. The hospitals here are really below American standards, but thankfully mother and child are doing very well. We went and ministered to the new mother and her husband at the hospital. It was a very weird experience. I did not see a single doctor the whole time I was there. It was just nurses and family caring for the sick. People don't go to the hospital unless they have to. At the hospital the only thing provided is medical care. Food, bedding, anything else needed must be provided  by the family. If no one feeds the patient then the patient doesn't eat. Thankfully our investigator has a really great family that was there supporting her. It was also weird because there were US Aid, UN, and other relief institution posters everywhere. They told how to administer life saving procedures. Also there was no clean running water in the hospital. Most of the hospital was outside. The operating room and housing arrangements were indoors but not separate from the outside. Very few of the rooms had power or lighting and none of them had climate control of any kind. 

Other than that we did achieve our goal of 28 active hours of missionary work. Things are starting to turn back to normal after all the business of the holiday season. It's weird that I will be leaving Tomatov soon. I am looking forward to not sweating all the time. I still have a little time here. I'm really going to miss a lot of the people I've met here. We have possibly my final baptism here coming up on the 24th of January. This upcoming week we have interviews with President Adams. Other than that things are about the same as always. I hope you're all doing well. 

Elder Ahlstrom