Thanksgiving

Mozambicans do not celebrate our American holiday “Thanksgiving,” but nonetheless, I brought our tradition here yesterday.

On Wednesday, I walked into town to the market in search of a pumpkin or sweet potatoes. The market in Inharrime is a haphazardly built conglomeration of straw tables and benches positioned behind a series of stores on the main highway that runs through the village. The result is a dark, maze-like structure filled with women selling the currently in season vegetables. I asked high and low for a pumpkin and explained to many of the market-women about the holiday in my county where we always make pumpkin pie. Each one tried to direct me to someone “down at the end of the line” who would have one last pumpkin, but to no avail – pumpkin season ended last week. By the time I came back through the market at the end – everyone was curious if I had found my much desired “abóbora.”

In the end, I made a banana-apple crisp instead of pumpkin pie, and, with the help of my Amercian-volunteer friend Stephanie, a feast of roast chicken, carrots, and mashed potatoes. The sisters and another Mozambican teacher that ate with us were impressed with their small taste of American culture.

And, in this faraway place, we transplanted Americans even took some time to reflect on what we’re thankful for this year. For me: The continued support of my family and friends from home topped the list. Thanks to everyone for your care even when I am far away. I miss you all and hope that your Thanksgivings were happy as well.

End of School ´´Festa``

Today was one of the best days I’ve had in Mozambique. The kids in the above picture spent the past three weeks preparing a small play as part of the “Theatre Group” during the mandatory three weeks of summer activities that go on at my school after the end of classes for the year.

At the end of the three weeks, on the day that final grades are posted, the school hosted a small festival and all the different groups of activities (basket-making, singing, dancing, theatre, sewing) presented their activities for their parents, teachers, and fellow students. My students from the theatre group, as well as the little group of boys who call themselves “Real Heat” and sing rap music about social change, presented. The audience reacted with laughs and cheers for the play, and clapped along to the music. I was very proud of my students, and happy to have seen a fruitful product of some time well spent with these kids.

Life in Mozambique n the past four months has been full: joyful, challenging, fun, interesting, difficult, exciting, and different -- all at the same time.

I live just outside a small town called Inharrime, only about 15 miles inland from the Indian Ocean. Amid the forests of coconut trees and brick-red dirt of “Centro Laura Vicuña,” I've spent the past 4 months working at a variety of jobs. Mainly, I've worked teaching explanation English classes for students at Laura Vicuña Secondary School, and helping teachers and teaching English classes at Domingos Sávio Professional School -- the technical/high school across the street from the sisters run by the Salesian Priests. I've also taught music class at the professional school, helped out with the small summer theatre group at the secondary school, and done lots of playing and working with the little girls on English and music.

Since most of my daily interactions here are conducted in Portuguese, I’ve been forced to pick it up rapidly during these months. Besides my brightest students and the other English teachers, no one speaks more than a sprinkling of English, so I've had to pick up the new language at a rapid pace. While I'm by no means a ''fluent'' speaker, I manage to carry on intelligent conversations and perceive the vast majority of things spoken to me at this point. I now even find myself accidentally sprinkling in Portuguese words when I speak English.

My initial few weeks and even months here were difficult -- not speaking the language, trying to decipher what my job and my ''place'' here should be, feeling quite alone and out of place when stuck into this community of nuns and little girls -- but things have improved. I have a lot of interesting work now. I love teaching and working with the students at my schools, I've gotten used to the some of the differences in cultural norms here, and also come to accept the fact that I will probably continue to feel ''out of the loop'' on some things because I just am a foreigner and there's no way around that. I've even become proficient at eating ''shima'' (a food something like mushed up rice, or wet, doughy bread) and ''fejão'' (beans) with my hands during our weekly ''eat outside with your hands'' meal that we have so the little girls don't forget their Mozambican traditional ways of eating.

As I've become more comfortable here, I've started to work on some interesting projects. I helped some other volunteers in my area organize an AIDS awareness day in which local high school students competed in a theatre contest where they presented short plays about responsibility, fidelity, equality of genders, and other AIDS prevention strategies. 6 groups from my two schools participated. I was also recently approached by a small group of boys who came to me asking for help with their rap music group. While I'm not really a rap fan, they sing all about social issues -- working to change systems of poverty, preventing the spread of AIDS and malaria, stopping early pregnancy and the abandonment of children -- so I'm going to help them out however I can.

It's difficult for me to distill my experience into a short description, but I wanted put up a general update here, and then make an effort to share more of my experiences from here. I hope that an important part of my being here can be to share some of what I learn with my friends and family at home who do not have this opportunity to travel to a new country and learn about a new culture.

For now, I close with a realization that Mozambique has become much more to me now that a faraway land or a foreign new environment: Now beyond the heat and my constantly dirty feet and the unusual foods, Mozambique is a sea of faces and names: Yolanda, Amélia, Julia, Ângela and the other cute little girls constantly following me around shouting ''Mana Maria!'' Lucília, Albertina, Verdiana, and Lúcia -- the sisters. Sérgio, Fanuel, Marta, Santos, Albazine, Mateus, Armando -- my students. Stephanie and Rita, Gildo, Herlagia, João -- other volunteers and teachers. Dona Rita, Tia Saquina, Senhor Camilo, Padre José Maria -- my neighbors. These people are Mozambique to me now.