Home Away From Home

So I just have not been sleeping well. Between mosquitoes, nightmares, a cold that is stubborn in staying and lack of water in the morning, there seems to be a conspiracy to make my head a mess when I go to work. To the point that I don’t feel like going and it takes me at least an hour to get in the rhythm of the thing. And it is not that it is that fast paced… Oh well. Yesterday, me and Bernardo decided to stay home and enjoy the rest of the Crab Curry (peanut, not coconut) that Marisa prepared for us and realized it was probably even better than the day before. As I struggled to go through my to do list I realized (one more time) I did not know when to start and decided my work day was stopping at dinner time. At least it gave me a deadline and a higher willingness to get things done. But it did not help me that much. If you wonder how much can you have to do in so little time… well, pictures to send to the tv program we are participating on and for a sort of fundraising event next ...

I tend to be quick to post an update from the weekend, especially when I visit one of the missions, but this week started sort of bumpy. I go through pictures, movies, files, lists, emails and projects and try to make sure I forget nothing of what my head likes to think when I do not have a notepad handy. But mostly I am still in the process of absorbing the weekend. For two reasons: one because I was curious to know what Bernardo thought of all this, two because the weekend was indeed tough. On one, I guess I can now breathe deeply because I know now that he understands. He always helped me out with the NGO, but he helped because it was me. Now, he has seen it, he has lived it, he helps me because he wants to, not necessarily cause I am on it. Which is a good thing, which is the great benefit of people coming to visit. You realize that little things do make a difference and you can’t help but trying, even if you think it is a long shot. He know sponsors Paulo and got a friend to spons...

A weird feeling invades me as I get Bernardo back after two months that seemed to have no end. But he is here now and it seems just as surreal as him being away from me. But just immensely better! Things started smoothly with me skipping work for the afternoon. I greeted him with a semi fresh crab in Sagres and a first taste of the quality of the service in Mozambique. To make up for it, we had dinner in Taverna with Tricia and Claire and the waiter was more helpful than I had ever seen in Maputo. Maybe he figured it was Tricia’s last dinner. Or else, he just wanted a good tip, which he got, clearly! It is sad for Tricia to leave as it makes me start to feel away already, it makes me feel like my time is coming soon as well. I read Rosa and João’s blog about how people come and they go and I can’t help sharing the feeling that I have been living for 4 years. Meet new people, make new friends, know a new city, have a new house and then pack your bags, have a farewell dinner, send ...

It is D-Day today :-) I took out the braids, and the clock is ticking. Bernardo will be in Maputo in two hours. We have plans for the weekend and so much to catch up on. I doubt I will be blogging soon, hehe

So I finally got outside and I could not believe my eyes. The children are singing in changana (the local dialect), asking for “Mana Sara” until I show up. And then they sing “Here she is, now we are happy!”. Suddenly I realized the children in front of me were not from the Escolinha but from the Orphanage. They did the trip just to celebrate my birthday. But the children of the Escolinha were there too, some 100, many had not seen me in a couple of years given I often come during their holiday period. Grown up, little men and women came to greet me happy to see that this volunteer came back and kept her promise. They sang and danced for me for more than an hour, songs of love, of joy, of happy wishes and most of all, songs of gratitude. I can not help but feel unworthy of all they sing for me but in that special moment they are really happy that I chose to spend my birthday with them. And I felt sad of all I wished I was home the day before. They invited me to dance with them, lift m...

It is 10:15 am and the children started arriving a while ago. I can see a lot of movement outside but I am not allowed to be there. And I also can’t talk to anyone because everyone is busy running around. This morning, the sister asked my car to go and buy wood. Clearly, she went to buy the Cokes and Fantas for the kids that I said I wanted to buy… I just found the boxes being unloaded from my car by mistake! Not only am I not allowed to walk around freely but also everyone shuts up wherever I arrive. I gave up now and sat in a room by the laptop, trying to write a business plan while someone braids my hair. It took an hour and a half until they would let me out and still I had to run away. I could hear the children singing and calling for me… and finally the time came!

This year, I am having a different birthday. I keep on telling myself not to be sad from being away from my friends and family. The truth is… I am. I wish I had the usual family problems of lunch and dinner with who to manage, the stress of booking a dinner for 20 people, the novelty of spending a first birthday with Bernardo. But then again, I am not sad to be here, I am just sad not to be in two places. I just had dinner with 7 friends and even had a candle at midnight. Tomorrow, I have a chocolate cake in the office, I am driving up to Xai-Xai and on Saturday I have a big birthday party with the children. And I am sure once I am there (if not before) they will remind me of the important things in life. Truth is, I may never spend another birthday here so I decided to cherish this one as much as possible. As part of my “mission” here, I also took a decision for my birthday. This year, I am asking my friends for a little gesture , rather than a birthday present. In fact, it w...

I know, it is a weird topic, but I did not get it out of my mind since Sunday so I guess I will just have to write about it. As part of our visit to the Orphanage, we distributed some gifts and a mere 3.5 Euros blackboard was a great moment of celebration. As each of the 1st graders showed the others they could write their name, the blackboard filled its mission: to teach. From that moment, we learnt Paulinha has dyslexia and writes her name perfectly backwards. From that moment we learnt that the walls around us needed more colour, the chairs asked for some paint and we definitely needed to get money for a solar panel and finally ensure continuous light in our “playroom”. As each child wrote his/ her name in the blackboard, I learnt something else. I learnt that the combination was beautiful, I learnt that having different names on the board that all fitted together was what made it special. And I learnt a way to fit more names into the blackboard of this NGO that tries to chan...

Today I made up for yesterday’s sadness with the world. Me, Rosa, Teresa and João went to the Nursery of Chaquelane to visit the children one more time (for me) and the first time (for them). Not even the rain would stop us and, to the sound of Adéle, we were off before the sun was too strong (which never happened today) and had a smooth ride to Chaquelane. Now I know that there are 30km after the left turn in Macia, and next time I won’t be hitting the breaks and looking for a sign from km 15. Between singing, dancing, tea and early morning salad, I was happy to see they had a good time. The truth is I always wonder and I always fear people may just find me ridiculous for loving this so much… But they did not. Moreover, we left with our hearts full of plans. In the way to Xai-Xai they already got themselves “invited” to come along when Bernardo (finally) comes and sees this little thing that rocks my world. But they are not coming empty handed! They promised to bring along b...

Did I mention how much it disturbs me to speak in public? Well, it does. I can’t say I don’t like it, or that I am not good at it, I can only say that it disturbs me beyond reasonable levels. Tonight, I had a dinner, in “Academia do Bacalhau”, funny enough it means “Academy of the Cod” a kind of Portuguese association abroad that exists in over 5 countries. They invited me over since they sponsor 5 children in the Mission of Chongoene and this afternoon I found out I was supposed to speak. I manage to keep away from the hand shaking and stomach pain just until before my name was called. And I even followed all the rules today, prepare the speech, know the place in advance, all the good stuff that they taught us in some Harvard seminar about the “Fear of Public Speaking”. The only thing I did not do was eating bananas before. And it still clearly did not work. The piece of paper that I had lovingly prepared with the stories of Nomussa and Piedade that I told you last week seemed to be a...

Yesterday me and Teresa (the new volunteer, and the first ever for Um Pequeno Gesto) went to game, a developed world supermarket (or sort of) with a mission: buy gifts for the kids. Some because a nice sponsor sent a donation to buy something specific for a birthday, others just because I realized in the Orphanage they had nothing to play with. It was fun actually, us kind of lost in the middle of all those possibilities, trying to count of many 70 cents footballs we could afford not to go off budget. Clearly we did not realize the footballs were 70 cents until I got home and did the conversion :-) Oh well, it was still fun, we got a blackboard and coloured chalk for the little ones, we got legos and puzzles, footballs for the boys, hula hoop circles for the girls. We even got High Street Musical sets of crayons and pens. The only thing we could not get was a Barbie or a doll for a girl’s birthday next week, not only were they expensive (even in real terms) but also they were all ...

Imagine you are a six, maybe seven year old girl. It is Saturday, you are probably out playing in the garden or in bad weather home entertained with a playstation or, at best, a Barbie. Not in Mangunze. Electricity does not even come here, even less playstations. A simple board game could be surprising over here. Even so, that is not the point, you would not be out in the garden or playing with anything anyway. You would be on your way to get water for your family, sometimes as far as 30km away. You may even do it twice a day, once in the morning, before the hour walk to school and another one in the afternoon. This is the story of many girls in Mangunze and throughout Mozambique. The water well built two years ago has reduced the distance to many of them, but it is still a heavy burden. As we watched the little girls so swift with the pump that we had difficulty operating on our own we are not half as surprised as when they grab one of the buckets we could certainly not lift and put t...

It is amazing that I got to spend four full weeks in Mozambique without going to Xai-Xai, I could not believe it myself when I counted the days! But Friday, Scott and Chelsea, newcomers in Mozambique (coming from where? BOSTON!) joined me in the afternoon and we had a smooth ride there. It was fun to find out after all there is another guesthouse in Xai-Xai called Taverna (I wonder why Sister Isabel said they drink too much there…). Despite the lack of mosquito nets, towels and toilet paper, the place was actually pretty ok, or maybe my standards are all messed up by now! Saturday was a great day. I got to the end of it tired but re-invigorated, if the both are possible in the same sentence! Tired of how much we saw and did and rejuvenated to see that it is all worth it. Me, Scott and Chelsea had an early start in the beach of Xai-Xai while we waited for more visitors to arrive but at 12.00 (not sharp) we left towards Chongoene, to pick up Sister Aparecida who was joining our ride. Who...

Being an expat is always fun. You always connect with the most random people and anyone you just meet can become an immediate friend if you happen to have a common background (or maybe without it). So here I was, planning a quiet weekend in Xai-Xai, probably the last quiet weekend in the Summer. And then DP asked if he could join (I would ask to, after loving so much the orphanage!) and off course I was happy to have his company for the ride. And then Frank and Heather want to join, because Heather was a development worker before and is delighted to get to know Mozambique better. And you know me, I am always delighted to show a bit more of what I love to people! But them coming meant I was back to driving alone up there! Oh well, last minute this morning, two students arrived, guess where, from Boston College! So my expat feeling just invited them to come along for the weekend, especially since there is a 4th of July celebration going on at the beach! I am back to driving in good...

So I am incurable. Really. All that blog post about re-educating myself… pffff not quite there yet… So I was feeling useless. You know how it is, these bloody Harvard people always looking for some appreciation… Hence: I spoke to my boss to make sure I was not being useless. Result: I will get my needed appreciation even more shall I prepare what I thought of preparing in 2 weeks over the next 2 days. Nice. Banker is back. Talk later!

So I don’t really have much to say today but this blogging thing can get addictive, especially when people say that they actually read it. (I was astonished by that, by the way). I had a bad migraine two days ago, but it had a great effect! Once it was gone, my brain was in full speed (which truth be said has not been happening a lot the last couple of days). And so I decided that if you can’t sleep with the excitement of a project in your head for 3 hours, that can’t just be the drugs you took for the pain, it has to be more than that. So I am finally following Joana’s advice and putting the ideas to paper. She said she might even help me with it! So now I am in recruiting mode in Harvard for partners for the Business Plan competition. I promise a lot of fun and no clue on results!

Today, I am sharing with you a story that Masthini (who works here at Opportunity) sent to me “There was a young woman who had been diagnosed with a terminal illness and had been given three months to live. So as she was getting her things 'in order,' she contacted her Pastor and had him come to her house to discuss certain aspects of her final wishes. She told him which songs she wanted sung at the service, what scriptures she would like read, and what outfit she wanted to be buried in. Everything was in order and the Pastor was preparing to leave when the young woman suddenly remembered something very important to her. 'There's one more thing,' she said excitedly. 'What's that?' came the Pastor's reply. 'This is very important,' the young woman continued. 'I want to be buried with a fork in my right hand. 'The Pastor stood looking at the young woman, not knowing quite what to say. ‘That surprises you, doesn't it?' the young ...

Yesterday was a good day. I had time to work, to develop NGO, to cook and to chat to Tricia (my flatmate), to post pictures and even have time to learn how to work out movie maker. Moreover, I even had time to reply to emails. Because yesterday was a full day on the email side. I guess somehow I am thankful today for the internet being so unreliable here and that no emails can come in or out because I will not have that temptation of checking what the corner of the screen is popping out. There was one common pattern in the emails yesterday, which was a reaction to yesterday’s post (I guess people don’t like to post in blogs!). Many of you friends were impressed with the work I was doing in the NGO, how the kids looked so sweet, how the post was so full of emotion. I think in the most touching email Teeba said I was her inspiration. Now, hence my title, it is not me. We all have this inside us and some people are fortunate enough to have been able to meet the right people and have...