Immeasurable Impact

These days with Kevin here I feel more relaxed and, in a strange way, even more at home in Chimundo. What I didn’t really realize before is that living alone, although it sometimes has its advantages, can still be stressful. No one to come home to, no one to make dinner with, no one to go shopping with, no one to talk to, no one to travel with, etc, etc. I often envy Erica and Alycia because they live together and they do everything together. As a female living alone, I worry about my safety, I get scared of the dark, I have to fend off sexual harassment everywhere I go, I have to do all the housework, I have to kill my own cockroaches…

So I was amazed to find how quickly Kev and I could settle back into routine. He’s such a flexible person, adapting to Mozambican life was really no problem. (It probably helped him to know that he’d only be here a month. Exasperating children? No running water? Overcrowded chapas? All minor annoyances that would be soon left behind...)

Because of Kev, I often find myself less occupied with household chores and more willing to talk to and play with the neighborhood kids that came by. (Not all of them, mind you, because some are still as annoying as ever.) But since Kev brought with him a bunch of toys and stuff for kids, I put together a box of art supplies to give the children who ask to sit and draw on the veranda. It’s something simple, but they love it because they don’t have their own sets of crayons, colored pencils, scratch paper. (That’s probably also why, even with the older kids, their drawings are crude and their coloring skills generally lacking.)

Slowly, over time, I have come to recognize the faces (less so, the names) of the many children who live in my neighborhood. I can more or less identify the kids who belong in the “bratty and destructive” category, as well as the kids who are in the “generally good and harmless” one.

What’s also happened is that I’ve ended up “adopting” a group of boys. Rosthilio, Vasco, and Alex are 11 years old kids who live nearby and who come by my house every day after school to draw and color. I let them in sit outside my back door and do their thing while I do mine. I affectionately call them my Art Club and they sometimes refer to me as their art teacher. Every day they ask me what I want them to draw that day and I’ll pick a topic such as “animals,” or “fruits,” or “school supplies.” I believe that giving them a general theme helps them think outside the box of their own minds, where they would normally just produce houses and cars and Mozambican flags and guns. They leave their drawings with me, and I already have a plan for them: at the end of my service, I will bind up all their individual drawings and make a little book for each of them.

The other day I handed them a mirror and told them to draw self-portraits. It was obvious that they rarely see their own faces because each kid spent a long time holding the mirror in front of his face and giggling and ducking his face away shyly. They, being typical children, laughed and poked fun at each others’ drawings, but all in good humor.

Usually I’ll spend some time sitting outside with them and talking to them or coloring with them. (I gave them each a Fred Flintstone coloring book and they color one or two pages a day before moving on to free drawing.) The boys ask me questions about America (“Mana Vivienne, I heard that in America, everyone has a swimming pool!”), ask me how to translate things in English (“Mana Vivienne, why do you call Kevin ‘Sweetie?’”), tell me about school (“Mana Vivienne, I have a math test next week. Will you give me practice problems?”). I try to be a good role model for them and teach them things because it’s obvious they need some adult guidance in their lives. Unlike the girls in the neighborhood, who come by less often because of their household chores, boys rarely have many responsibilities at home and play most of the day (a preview of their adult lives, too.)

I teach them how to play well with the dogs, instead of throwing rocks at them like a lot of the kids around here do. I praise their artwork and encourage them to practice drawing the things they’re not good at drawing. I make them jello sometimes, and let them try new things like lemonade. I tell them about life in America and explain that it’s not all golden, that they can’t expect free things in life without working for them.

One day, I asked the boys to help me with my garden. They helped me dig down into the super compacted sand, and then I sent them to buy some cow manure from a nearby corral. (It was supposed to be 5 mts for a bucket, and 10 for a wheelbarrow-full.) I didn’t have two buckets, or a wheelbarrow, so I sent the boys on two trips, to collect with one bucket and one medium-sized plastic basin. The boys came back at the end asking for more money to pay the guy, who was trying to charge 10 mts per basin, although each basin held the same amount as a bucket and certainly NOT the equivalent of a wheelbarrow. I walked back down to the corral, told the guy off, tossed 20 mts at him (5 for each container) as he shrank down in his chair and meekly agreed that I was right, and then went back home. As Vasco and Rosthilio followed after me with the last bucket of manure, laughing gleefully at my victory, I said to them, “Boys. I want to tell you something. In life, don’t let other people take advantage of you. If you know something is wrong, speak up and don’t just accept it.” They nodded with their usual quiet, “Sim, Mana Vivienne.” As children, they won’t speak up against their elders. It’s a cultural thing. But I hope that as they grow older, they’ll remember what I said.

As I’m entering into my 4th month at site, secondary projects are just now starting to appear on my radar. It might be too much to expect that all of them unfold the way I want them to, but I’m going to try my best to get involved in any and all that come my way. From the onset, I’ve been interested in either JOMA or REDES, youth organizations funded by PEPFAR. JOMA groups are for both boys and girls, while REDES groups are all female. JOMA is communications-based, and can focus on theatre, journalism, photo-journalism, etc. REDES is more about the empowerment of women, self-esteem building, etc. Both organizations would enable me to work with older youth, my area of interest.

My friend Castigo also recently approached me asking for help with his new male youth group and their ideas for income-generating projects (raising livestock). Helping him would probably entail a more business-development approach, but I imagine I could also become involved with other group activities. And in time, it could also become a JOMA-related group.

The main problem I’m facing right now is, not having the right connections to integrate into these groups. I don’t work at a secondary school, so I don’t know any of the kids. I don’t have a viable counterpart as of yet, say if I wanted to start my own group. I rarely leave Chimundo, which means my network of connections is minimal. I have heard of most of these possible projects from Erica who, 8 months from leaving Mozambique permanently, is reluctant to take on more heavy responsibilities and would rather pass them on to a newer volunteer.

I’m hoping that things don’t fall through, and I can get involved soon because I am impatient to start on something new. (And I have a secret fear of lagging in “progress,” compared to other MOZ15 volunteers.)

Work at the escolinha is going okay, although a bit tedious because well, working with children means constant repetition. We sing the same songs and do the same activities on a daily basis. I walk around my house singing children’s songs in Portuguese all day, to the point that Kevin can hum the tunes to some of them. (“Please don’t work at a preschool for the rest of your life,” he says.) My work repertoire consists of the following commands: Sit down! Don’t hit her. Be quiet! Come here! Don’t speak Changana! Eat your food. Share the toys!

It’s not difficult, but it certainly is draining. Some days it’s all I can do to not just grab my bag and run, screaming internally, as soon as 12pm rolls around. I work a half day, which is more than enough for me. I’m a volunteer, not a martyr or a full time babysitter. More often than not, I lie down and nap for a few hours right when I get home; the heat of the day makes it unpleasant to do much else.

In the last two weeks of Kevin’s visit we’ve made chocolate pudding, brownies with fudge sauce, beer battered onion rings, curried couscous, garlic bread, passion fruit vanilla cake. I’ll probably be losing weight as soon as I revert back to two and a half meals a day, with no dessert. On the other hand, I’ll be saving a ton of money by not buying so much BEER, or sodas, or well, everything. I forgot that leftovers rarely exist when there’s a healthy man to feed.

Of love and life in Africa

Tuesday, March 1 seemed like it would never come but it finally did, bringing along with it my long lost lover Kevin from America. I left Chibuto at 5 in the morning and arrived in Maputo at 10. Kev was supposed to get into Maputo at 11am but as luck would have it, his flight was delayed by several hours. I hung out at the Peace Corps office, eating brownies in honor of Peace Corps’ 50th anniversary, and out of boredom, left random notes in the mailboxes of other volunteers. At 1430, I took a taxi to the airport.
I am still astounded at how exorbitant the cost of transportation is in Maputo. A four hour chapa ride from Chibuto to Maputo costs about 200 mets (approx. $6 US), but a short 10 minute taxi ride in the city costs me 350 mts. It gets worse. From there, a taxi ride to the chapa stop called the Baixa, another 350.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. I forgot to gush about how it felt to see Kev for the first time in over five months. I was anxious, almost nervous, as I crowded with the others also there to pick up their friends and loved ones. The Maputo airport was recently renovated, and it’s shiny and pretty, but it’s still nothing compared to, for example, O’Hare International Airport. There was only one glass sliding door, and passengers with their luggage were slowly trickling out. A Chinese couple, an Indian man, a South African, a couple of Mozambicans… but no Kev. After what seemed like forever, but what was in reality probably 15 minutes, a familiar figure with a giant backpack emerged. He looked a bit tired, but just as handsome as always. My heart was beating fast and the lyrics to a song came to mind, “Every time I see your face / My heart takes off on a high speed chase...” We kissed and headed out to our taxi where we held hands and looked at each other lovingly the entire time and probably weirded out the taxi driver with our mushiness.
Getting a chapa to Namaacha was almost a bust. We waited 2 hours at the Baixa with all of our luggage (Kevin wouldn’t put any of it down because he was afraid someone was going to steal it). There was a huge crowd of people also waiting to go to Namaacha (this was supposedly the last chapa of the day, by the way), and I was worried we wouldn’t get on; there’s really no way to guarantee a spot because lines don’t really exist and everyone just rushes the car once it arrives. As soon as this happened, I took advantage of my skinniness (Another volunteer recently declared that living in Africa is the best diet; he has lost 30 pounds since being here) and pushed my way to the front. The cobrador, the guy who collects the money for the chapa ride, noticed me (sometimes it helps being the only mulungu around) and took my duffle bag, motioning for me to get on. People piled in after me but Kevin was still putting our stuff in the wagon attached behind the chapa. There seemed no way for him to get to the door so we did the next obvious thing- he jumped in through the window.
Being back in Namaacha was a lot like going back to the place you grew up. My first memories of Mozambique were formed there; the people and the scenery were things I didn’t really appreciate until I was gone. Everything is much greener now than it was a few months ago. The corn that wasn’t even sprouted now towers above our height, the mangoes are long gone but the avocadoes are in full season, giant and proliferous and hanging like pendulums from the trees.
We stayed at Hotel Xisaka for two nights, and raved about how nice it was up until the morning we checked out… Let’s just say we got seriously jipped out of our metacais. I still don’t know exactly what happened, but I think I misheard the price when I called to check a few months back. But it was all nice while it lasted so I don’t regret too much.
During those two days, Kev and I stopped by my old haunts – we went to Paluchas for chamosas, ShopRite for capulanas, Casa dos Dois for sauages and beer, modista Tia Joanna’s to have her make me a capulana dress.
The last night in Namaacha, we went to my host family’s house for dinner. They made us salad, chicken (which Kevin, with the help of my host mom, killed) and rice. It was a great dinner and I’m lucky to have such an awesome host fam. They kept telling Kevin (through me, the translator) that he is now family, that he has to come back and see them again whenever he is in Mozambique.
Leaving Namaacha on Thursday morning turned out to be a huge pain in the ass because it meant going back to Maputo, where every chapa cobrador seemed out to take advantage of us just because we are foreigners. Chapa rides that should have cost 7 mets were suddenly 50 because we had a suitcase, a duffle bag, and a giant backpack. But we didn’t have a choice because very few chapas coming our direction even had space to put our luggage. One chapa we were ushered onto was already full; Kev and I sat behind the driver and passenger seat, facing the back of the chapa, on top on very hot, uncomfortable metal. The cobrador, amazingly, let on two or three more people who hovered over us with their backs against the roof of the car and their armpits in our faces. I later discovered a bruise on my butt from the 15 minute ride. Another chapa ride, the crying lady next to me had two sick babies, one of which was leaning towards me and also crying, with open sores all over its head that flies were feeding on. I couldn’t help but cringe away, leaning into Kevin, so that the baby wouldn’t touch me. A space opened up near the window and we moved seats; the next unfortunate woman to sit next to the sick family must have complained because I heard some bickering in Changana and at the next stop, the woman with the babies got off.
It took us almost 8 hours to get back to Chimundo. By then, Kev and I were exhausted, cranky, hungry, and dehydrated. We were trudging through the sand back to my house from the chapa stop when I spotted some kids that hang out near my house sometimes. I had them help us carry the luggage. Kev and one of the kids took turns carrying the 50 lb suitcase. I would’ve found it cute, had I not wanted to curl up and pass out. We finally made it home and instantly went to the fridge to chug the bottles of water I had luckily filled up before I left for Maputo. We drank all four or five bottles within 10 minutes, and then paid the kids with candy.
The next day, I picked up my four packages that had been dropped off at Erica/ Alycia’s by a Peace Corps staff passing through Chibuto while I was gone. As always, it was exciting to open my mail and know that people at home are thinking of me.
Overall, in the past week, I have received over 80 pounds of goodies that include a Tinkerbell watch (thank you Anna, for your creative interpretation of “cheap watch”), a lifetime supply of Cheezits, a bunch of Goldfish crackers, lots of drink mixes (I think I’m set on Crystal Light for the next two years), and delicious sauce packets. I’m so grateful for all these things, even if they do take several months to arrive. By the way, my birthday is coming up in three months, HINT HINT HINT. :)
Unfortunately, I think I ate something bad while traveling. For the first time since being in Mozambique, I came down with a serious case of diarrhea and stomach cramps. I spent about five days running back and forth from the latrine, before I called the Peace Corps medical office and was instructed to take some meds. Kev, for the most part, avoided the same issues. I suspect it was the raw peanuts that we ate at my host family’s- it was the first time either of us had tried them, and I ate way more than he did. If you’re wondering, raw peanuts taste okay. Nothing special, and definitely not worth the intestinal consequences.
While I was laying in bed curled up, Kev was cleaning my house, washing dishes, and doing laundry. I bemoaned my inability to eat spicy (read: delicious) foods. (Really? I have to eat rice and cooked carrots for dinner?) “Salt and pepper count as bland, right?” I asked as I shook both vigorously over my lame meal. Kevin rained on my parade with a, “I don’t think so, honey…”
“It’s okay,” he then said supportively. “I’ll eat bland foods too if you have to.” The next day, I found him pouring hot sauce all over his potatoes after he thought I’d gone to bed. So much for bland.
Now that I’m feeling much better, I try to do more of the cooking and let him do more of the lazing around; he is on vacation, after all. (As I write this, he is sitting in the hammock with a book and alcoholic beverage in hand.) So far I’ve made potato salad, deviled eggs, bruschetta, pineapple salsa, guacamole and homemade tortillas, curried rice, macaroni and cheese…
Last week, we made our first attempt at baking. Since I don’t have an oven, we fill one big pot with sand and put a smaller pot inside of it and cover it. The sand makes the heat flow evenly. Our lime squares came out amazingly so we graduated to making apple crisp and coffee cake with mocha frosting. Delicious! With the exception of the occasional sand that gives the desserts an extra “crunch.”
It’s been really exceptionally hot the past few days. During the afternoon even taking a nap with the fan on is difficult. The power has gone out consistently around 7pm the past three nights in a row, but only Sunday night did it stay off for a long time- about 13 hours, which means we could not finish making dinner (electric stove) and could not sleep (no fan). We considered setting up a tent outside, but realized that pitching a (broken) tent in the dark would be practically impossible. And sleeping without something to ward of mosquitoes is not a good idea. I’ve also been fighting a cold, which sounds ridiculous considering the intense heat, but apparently it’s not just me; more than 10 of the 20 crianzas at the escolinha have come down sick in the past few weeks.
This past weekend Kev and I took a day trip with Erica and Alycia to XaiXai beach, where we all laid out in the sun all day and swam in the Indian Ocean and got pretty toasted. Afterwards, we ate lunch at the nearby restaurant and a tourist from New York bought us a round of drinks and a handful of freshly split oysters (sold by an old Mozambican man walking around with a bucket of the freshest oysters you’ll ever find), which we slurped down with a squirt of lime juice and hot sauce. It was quite an awesome day.
Next weekend, I think Kev and I are headed for Bilene or Chidenguele, other beach towns. I feel like time is running out! It’s already halfway through the month and as much as I wish, he won’t be here with me forever.

KEVIN’S VERSION OF THE STORY

I left LA Sunday night excited and ready to start my African adventure. I knew that I had quite a trip ahead of me. Over 23 hours of flight time with a total trip time of well over 30 hours. Getting on to the plane I looked enviously at the first class seats thinking to myself how nice it would be to sit there with all that space and legroom. Arriving at my seat I thought about how cramped it was. After just 3 days in Mozambique I crave the luxury of traveling in that “cramped” economy class seat. Greeted at the door to the airport by Vivienne I think I was a little bit in shock. There is no way that I’m really in Africa and that she is here in front of me. We traveled by taxi to a parking lot where we could take a chapa to our next destination. I was a little surprised that there were no seat belts but Viv didn’t even seem to notice. We got to a crowded parking lot where chapas come to pick people up and take them to different cities near by. I was nervous because there were about 30 people waiting to go to Namacha and I didn’t think we’d get a seat. Vivienne told me she was going to slip to the front and get us seats, I was a little skeptical that it would work. After waiting for almost 2 hours a chapa finally arrived. Viv managed to slip to the front and get into the chapa but I was stuck on to the side unable to get near the door due to 30 people trying to push there way into the van. Viv got the drivers attention and pointed to me, I think he took pity on us, me obviously being a foreigner with a look of despair on my face that was hard to mask. He came over and took my bags but that still left me with the problem of actually being physically able to get into the chapa. That’s when Viv managed to open a window on the side of the chapa and in I went to the jeers, cheers, and laughter of the crowd surrounding the chapa. I thought that the chapa was cramped, a van that is supposed to seat around 14 people had 20 crammed into it. As it turns out this is quite normal and Viv and I had one of the best seats only being stuck on a seat that was supposed to seat 3 people with 4. We started off and I got my first taste of highway driving in Mozambique. To all my friends who thought I was a fast and reckless driver growing up I say this. “Don’t get on a highway in Mozambique!” The drivers here are nuts. Viv told me to just focus on looking at the countryside and not on the road. I’ll admit this helped a little bit but it’s a little hard to enjoy the scenery when you feel like your about to be in a head on car crash at 140kph. Arriving at our motel in Namaacha it would almost seem like we were back in the States. It was modern and quite cozy. It amazes me how the buildings along the street have running water and power while houses merely 20 feet away do not. Later that night we went to Vivienne’s host family’s house for diner. Viv told me that they had saved the chicken for me to kill and I must have looked startled because they all started laughing. The meal they prepared wasn’t that different from one I would eat in the States. Cooked chicken rice salad and corn. We left the next morning to head back to Chimundo and I am now 100% positive that I hate traveling in Mozambique. Imagine sitting, crammed in between people some of which are coughing and clearly sick, on uncomfortable seats for hours at a time all the while wondering if you are going to die because the driver is texting on his phone while passing trucks on the highway with cars coming from the other direction not all that far away. I am quite sure that if I ever find myself in Mozambique again I’ll look into renting a car. The scenery here is amazing! Most of the area we have traveled through is incredibly flat and you can see for miles in all directions. It would be nice to explore more of the country, which has some great wildlife reserves I’m told, but traveling here is expensive and stressful. Having now been at Vivienne’s house for a few days I find it quite relaxing. Honestly I think that I’d be happy with anything I did here as long as it involved spending time with her. It’s amazing how being here for a few days can change the way you think. I feel lazy if I wake up after 6am. You can already hear the neighbors starting their daily chores. It’s best to do things in these early hours while it’s still cool. By 11am it’s already so hot that it’s best to grab a book and a cold drink to lie in the hammock for a few hours till things start to cool off again. Vivienne and I have been experimenting with baking. So far we’ve made lime bars, apple crisp, and coffee cake with a coffee mocha frosting. Everything has turned out wonderful which is a little surprising considering our primitive cooking utensils. I’ve now been to the city Chibuto a couple of times and today I got to try my first Mozambique hamburger. It is definitely different then the ones I’m used to but good at the same time. Made of an actual roll instead of a bun, it comes with a thin beef patty and an egg. Viv informed me that all Mozambique hamburgers have eggs on them. To me it felt more like a breakfast sandwich then a hamburger. This weekend we are traveling to the beach city Xaixai. It’ll be fun to see the coastline and spend a day on the beach with Viv. I feel a little spoiled here where at most I have to do a few chores for a couple hours a day but I guess this is my vacation after all. It would be nice to say here longer then the 4 weeks of my trip but I have classes starting in April. I will admit that it will be nice to return to the comforts of my home with it’s internet and running water. I wonder if how long it will be before I once again take all these luxuries for granted. I keep wondering if I could pack Viv up in my suitcase and take her home with me. It’s been a lonely 5 months without her and it seems it’ll be even longer before I see her again once I leave. My only consolation is to think about the life we plan to start together when she moves back to the States. That is an adventure I can’t wait to start.