1/29/13
I know I know I know. I've neglected my
fan base here, my deepest and most sincere apologies world wide web
for leaving you bereft ;)
I don't even remember when the last
time I wrote here was... oof!
In my defense I THOUGHT about writing
blog posts here and there. Maybe I'll write mini posts now in honor
of all the ideas that never flowered into real-life blogs... yes.
That's what shall be done.
Sometime back in November 2012
I'd started a mini running group with a
Mozambican friend and the other foreigner in my town. Granted it
didn't survive past the year but at least for a few exuberant (albeit
short-lived) weeks I was running regularly with running buddies! My
greatest triumph was that I'd finally penetrated the jungle that is
the residential part of town (or in other words, everywhere that
isn't the main road.) There are no road names, no roads really, just
a huge tangled web of dirt paths that weave their way from here to
there and then back again. It's impossible to know how to get from
one place to another unless you're with someone who can lead you
through the maze (or have a compass). I'd always itched to lose
myself in the labyrinth but was a little apprehensive about where I'd
turn up so had never gotten around to exploring.... however with two
people somehow any and all fears
usually just melt away. So me and my running buddy would run and
sprint and leap through the maze in the morning hours until we'd
tumble out into a road we recognized – and then would dive back in
head first :) Although our running group has fallen apart I have
faith that we'll start up again soon (I'm quite persistent about
finding workout buddies, inherited my nagging from my mama :)
During the December holidays
Mozambique loves
the December holidays, so much so that they basically close down all
organizations and jobs and work in any shape or form for the entire
month of December. No joke. In light of our additional free time (as
if we didn't have enough of it to begin with) one of my Peace Corps
friends and I decided to travel around a little bit during the
holiday season. I think I'd mentioned once before how the public
transportation system here is a little lacking, in the sense that it
doesn't exactly exist. There are private enterprises though - never
fear! We'd pile into minivans and buses with double the amount of
people than they should be capable of holding, along with goats
(either tied to the roof or stuffed under luggage in the aisle),
chickens (either loose or in boxes), and bags and boxes and crates
and cases.... I learned some very valuable travel lessons during that
month:
- never ever expect to get to your destination in the time frame you expected. Take the amount of hours it should take to arrive, double it and then cross your fingers and hope you're lucky enough to arrive at all
- always have plan B's – aka the phone numbers of other volunteers en route to where you're trying to go
- There is no shame in calling down another ride that appears to be going faster whilst currently on a ride. I thought for sure the driver would take offense the first time I did that, but he just shrugged and pulled over to let me out while the other vehicle waited for me to transfer.
- Cars and vans and buses and trucks BREAK DOWN. All the time. So bring a book, lots of sun screen and an endless supply of patience.
- The drivers of cars and vans and buses and trucks LIE. Not in malicious way, just an inconvenient one. Beware: when they say they're going to destination C but they may only get as far as destination A and change their mind because they no longer feel like driving any further. Or they get to B and all of a sudden decide they feel like going to Destination 5 instead, no matter that it may be in the complete wrong direction.
Some of my favorite
moments from our travels that month included lying on an empty
highway with no cars in site. There were so many blue butterflies
around us it reminded me of autumn when my father would blow up the
leaves in our yard with his leaf blower thingy. The sky was the
perfect blue, the way a sky should always look. And there were little
puffy cumulus nimbus clouds drifting by that I watched while lying on
the road waiting and waiting and waiting for another car to pass us
by.
Or another time
when we sat on the back of a pick-up truck; the sun had just gone
down and as the first stars began to peek out I called out in
excitement that I saw a shooting star! And then another, and another
and.... oh wait. When the truck had slowed down for a speed bump we
realized that they weren't shooting stars at all, but fire flies. And
my goodness, I have never in my life seen so many fire flies as I did
that evening. It seemed like clouds of them and they never dispersed
after dusk as the fire flies of my childhood had always done. They
stayed for what felt like hours and twinkled in the trees and hills
just like the stars above.
I spent Christmas
proper on a beautiful beach with some good friends (fellow
volunteers), a cold beer and my toes digging in the sand :)
This first month of 2013
Not much has
happened this month. My birthday came and went – I'd spent the day
fighting with corrupt officials and paying unjust fines up the wazoo
for some packages I'd received from beloved friends and family back
in the states (please please please never write the total value of
any package as $50 or above!) Corruption sometimes can't be avoided
in some parts of the world, it was a shame that the first time I
encountered it in the beautiful country happened to fall on my
birthday but what are you going to do :P
We got rain and
rain and a little more rain this month. I had tin cans and tupperware
containers all over my house to catch the stead streams but it didn't
stop half of my worldly possessions from growing a nice lovely fur
cat of mold. All this rain is also bringing out the big scary bugs,
and my adoring kitty has developed a new habit of catching these huge
scary monsters and carrying them inside my house whilst still alive
to play with them inside. He must have not gotten the memo of his job
description.
Speaking of, I
discovered last week that Charlotte is a boy (!!) so little kitty is
going to need a new name. I think he'll just stick with his original
name – Pip. Even though he no longer cries like a pin prick, he
still loves the sound of his own voice (much to my dismay at 3am at
night) so Pip will still suffice. He's also been mastering the art of
climbing. I made the mistake of letting him through the window the
other day and the next evening I followed the sound of muffled meows
to find him stuffed and stuck between the grate and screen of a
window (he didn't realize that this one wouldn't swing open when he
pushed until too late). He hasn't tried any more windows since... Now
instead of crawling under the reed walls of my bathroom to take baths
with me he takes the more dignified route of climbing up the wall and
waiting for me sprawled out on the door frame. The irst few times he
did this he couldn't get down though so I had to climb up in my
towel and carry him down. Kitty is still as little as ever, still
likes to sit on my shoulders when I wash dishes outside, and is
currently dozing on my lap while I write (actually with all this
twitching and jumping he must be dreaming of catching another monster
insect).
Well that's all I
got folks. I hope it will suffice! Tomorrow morning I'm going to try
for the Nth time to have cement put inside my walls (every time I'm
about to do it the carpenter doesn't show up, or the heavens open and
pour buckets of water down from the sky). If I wait any longer though
the cement bags I bought will dry up so hopefully I'll have wet
cement in my house by February! That also means though that I have to
move all of my kitchen items int my bedroom tonight sooooo.... ate o
proximo!
Big hugs and kisses
(and a few extra to those who remembered me during the holidays and
my birthday – it means the world to me & I'll be sending my
thank you letters soon enough :)
xoxo
ps: also found out
that the big banging on my roof is actually from an avocado tree! And
better yet, they're finally ripe!!! Needless to say, I've been eating
a lot of guacamole since this new discovery
pps: have delved
into the Game of Thrones book series this month – am just starting
the 5th and really enjoyed the series so far (the books
are huge but easy to read and even easier to fall into if you're in
need of a diversion.) I warn you though that the last 2 books are yet
to be written/ released so if you're like me and are not a fan of
waiting years for sequels don't tempt yourself.
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