A Few Words on Vazah

Vazah is the Malagasy word for foreigner (think Gringo), and for many Peace Corps volunteers, it is a loaded term. At times it is used completely innocently, even in a friendly way, while at others, sneering contempt drips from the voice of the speaker, and it becomes a sort of racial slur. My wife Julia and I have been wrestling recently with how we feel about the word. On one level, it seems silly to let it get under your skin too much, since it’s not something you can realistically eliminate. (At site maybe, but you’ll still get it all the time when travelling.) And there is some value I think in learning what it feels like to be in the minority, which for our almost entirely lily-white stage is a completely new experience. Still, we drew the line when our neighbour had a guest the other day who determinedly held our neighbor’s baby up to our fence and pointed at us, teaching him over and over again “vazah, vazah, vazah.” He wasn’t particularly mean about it, but the concerted effort bothered us enough to tell him to stop, and to ask him to teach our names instead. I was almost surprised when he quickly complied, and it showed me that his actions were less malicious than I had first suspected. I know this is an issue with some varied viewpoints, so I’m curious about how other people see it. What’s the vazah perspective? What? We can call each other vazah right? Isn’t that how these things work?