What a long, strange trip its been

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Never thought I would get the chance to be writing this entry but here I am in Maputo, writing from a library where the internet moves about as slowly as one might imagine. I don´t think I have a lot of time before we are going to have to leave so I will do my best to give a quick rundown of what I have been doing for the last 2 weeks.
Training began in in downtown Philadelphia where our entire Peace Corps Mozambique group of 69 people got to know each other through ice breakers and imformational sessions about safety in Mozambique. The short stay in Philly was highlighted by a package of cookies that was left for me at the front desk one morning from a very generous Aunt and Uncle who I will refer to as anynomous. I owe them a big thank you and will be sure to repay them two years and three months from now. Yeah, it´s starting to sink in.
Anyway, on Tuesday morning we took a bus to JFK airport in New York where we would board the plane that we would spend what seemed like the next week of our life on. We flew about 8 hours to Dakar in Senegal where we landed for fuel. We took off again about an hour later and headed for Johanassburg, which took nearly another 8 bours. Contrary to the way most maps depict Africa vs. the United States, Africa is actually quite a large place, slightly bigger it turns out, then the US. Once landed, we were shuttled to our hotel where we stayed the night. For those of us who where expecting to stay in a short of mud hut village now that we were in Africa, we were extremely disappointed. The hotel we stayed in was probably one of the top 5 nicest hotels I have ever stayed with, and it certainly had the best continental breakest that I have ever had.
Thursday morning we went back to the airport and flew to Maputo where we were again immediately shuttled to a hotel. The next three days included some language training, more informational sessions on safety, a few sessions that gave us a glimpse of what kind of work we would all be doing, and most importantly, how to poop and pee in a hole and how to take a bucket bath, which would be necessary information a few days later once we arrived with our host families. Although the days were a bit of a struggle, the nights at the hotel were amazing, none more so than the first night. The hotel has a facility that can be used for wedding receptions, large parties, and other get togethers. On the first night, the former president of Mozambique attended a party that was held in his honor. Even if you hadn´t seen the President, you might have known that someone important was in the area because when I walked out of the common area, I was greeted by about 7 people who were dressed like they were in the military and who carried AK-47s, one of the items that is on the Mozambican flag (the only flag in the world that has an AK-47 on it thank you very much). The reception tent was wide open so you could sit outside and see everything that was going on. Many different dance groups and musicians performed, and I got some of it on my audio recorder. We saw the president use dance moves that even I had not seen before and all of us watching thought that watching this free show would be the high point of the night. Near the end of the party, as music was playing and a group of 4 women were performing a dance, the president danced his way out (literally) to a round of applause. Everyone else in the party was to remain until the dancing and music stopped. All the while that I was standing outside of the party, I was dancing myself, and I guess the dancers inside must have noticed because during this finaly number, they walked out and pulled me into the middle of the dance floor, pushed me to the ground in front of these hundreds of guests, and began dancing on top of me. I am pretty sure what we were doing could be considered an orgy in most places, but people there seemed to enjoy it. After the party, the U.S. ambassador to Batswana came out and congratulated me on my performance. Wonderful. After all the guests left and the hotel staff were cleaning up, more dancers and musicians who had stuck around began playing and invited the group of 20 of us who had been watching to come in and dance with them. It was one of those nights when everything seems good, and you are just genuinely happy, no strings attached.

On sunday afternoon, I left Maputo with the other health volunteers and headed for our new home. There was quite a bit of anxiety and anticipation as you might imagine. Most of that was caused by the fact that none of us could (can) speak Portuguese. There were 20 health volunteers and we were split in half, 10 in one village and 10 in another one that is about 20 minutes away. I was part of the second group, and in our village we were all greeted by our new moms. They sang a few songs for us in Portuguese,a dn then took us by the hands and led us to our new homes. My new family includes a mom and dad, the brother of the mom who is 20, and two younger children, a 6 year old girl and a 2 year old boy. Without the benefit of having more time, you will just have to take my word for it that my family is about as good a family as I could have hoped for. And plus we even have electricity! And acutally a TV and DVD player, although we are still living in very small quarters. I have successfully pooed in our bathroom a couple times, which literally is a hole in the ground, and I am becoming very found of my bucket baths. I am getting along very well with the 20 year old in my house. There is a soccer field about 10 feet away from our house, and I have played in games on three separate nights thus far. This morning I went running with the 20 year old, and we lifted weights yesterday, which is a pole with large tin cans filled with dried cement on the ends. The Portugese is sloww going but I am increasing my studying time outside of class so that I can communicate with my family a little more effectively.

I am sorry that I was forced to brush over quite a few details and mispell a lot of words and maybe not everything makes sense right now, but next time I know that I will have access to the internet I will have something prepared ahead of time so that I am not writing frantically. I am doing well and I am not prepared to drop out of the program yet (although 2 people have) and I want to thank everyone who sent me e-mails and other messages of goodwill. I hope everyone is doing well, and I promise that the next entry will be better.

Jimmy

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