Blogs from Mozambique, Africa - page 3

Geo: -25.9664, 32.5713We sailed into Port Victoria in the Seychelles about 7am on January 27th. This is more like the tropical islands we know. The green hills rose in the centre while around the shores we glimpsed white sand. Port Victoria is the capital and is on the island of Mahe. Rain was forecast and it was very humid. We disembarked the ship about 8-45am and walked into the town. This took about 20 minutes. We stopped along the way to take a picture of a large model of a tortoise outside the Library. Giant tortoises are native to these islands. We also stopped at a square where three white crescents represent the three main peoples of the islands, African, Asian and European. We planned to hire a car so found a Hertz shop in the ... read more

I want to take a moment to reflect on a few things that have happened over the last few weeks, particularly since a few people have commented on the grumpy and somewhat negative tone of a few of my last couple of posts. Unrelated to travel, Africa, and my personality quirks, but very much related to life in general and social media, is the idea of the personal, private, and uncurated thoughts and emotions that a person goes through on a daily basis versus the public, often perpetually positive, highly-curated projection that is expected of us. This is nothing new – when immigrants to the US went for pictures to send back home to Europe they put on their finest clothes and projected levels of affluence and wealth that many did not possess in the slightest. ... read more

Recapping quickly, I’ve been in a crappy mood for the last good chunk of time and haven’t wanted to do anything. Despite being more than a bit sketched out by the idea of sleeping in the wilds of Africa in a stick hut without a door or solid walls (not even Baraka construction), I felt it was necessary to get out to Mukambe feha and spend some time with them. It was necessary because otherwise this whole idea of me teaching the process of making the materials and thinking about the situation in a greater context was useless because all I would be doing is the same thing that every other NGO and government department does, come in, provide a temporary good or service, and leave. Now, I’m not totally crazy or naïve and realize that ... read more

28 Jun – 4 Jul Sunday, slow day. I spent the day on the computer working and was “forced” to go into town in the afternoon since I had eaten everything consumable in the kitchen as a result of not leaving CoH for a few days. Café food and grocery store accomplished, I headed back to CoH. When we were waiting for the chapa to leave I sat there listening as the cobrador for the chapa next to us as he changed the destination of his chapa and started telling people his was going the same place ours was (Nhamaxaxa, which is further than Chicuque, but on the same route). A few women got into the other chapa, and then as it became evident that the chapa I was in was going where they wanted to ... read more

Another week down, ack! Time goes too quickly when you’ve got stuff to do, I swear. Sunday wasn’t very productive. I got a text from Vishal to go to Inhambane with him and his wife, but when we got in the car he said it was a couples’ church thing and that I could wait with his brother Zito. Meh. We drove around for a bit and then went to a café – Bistro Pescador – next to the ferry landing. It was actually really nice and has wifi, so there is a silver lining to this story. We waited for 2 hours, but it was going to be another 2, so I took the boat back to Maxixe to go to Taurus (grocery store) and Pasterlaria Universal for foods. Monday was only mildly more productive ... read more