Mozambique Alive

Inhambane

For the past five days we have been in Inhambane an 18th century port town nearly 4 hours north of Maputo.

We started our journey on Wednesday afternoon. Nearly 9 hours after our departure from Maputo we arrived in Tofu a small town outside of Inhambane. During our first full day in Tofu we visited a local market place where the craftsman were selling there goods.

During our visit we met a young man who was selling lemons to the local cafes. Mark overheard him speaking English and starting talking with him about the community. The gentlemen was headed to Inhambane and we agreed we would give him a ride. During our 15 mile ride to the center of town we learned that our new friend travels to Tofu 3 times a week to sell lemons to the locals. He sells 2 bags of lemons for 4 dollars. The bus costs him 1 dollar to go back and forth, so he is left with 3 dollars profit, living life on 12 dollars a week or 48 dollars a month. Our friend agreed to show us around Inhambane and give us insight into the quaint portugese fishing village.

We visited the Cathedral, and met with the priest in charge. He was a father from Mexico who just arrived in Mozambique a few months earlier. He was thrilled that we were sharing this picturesque town to students in the United States and gave us some statistics to present in our conference. After our visit to the Cathedral we went and visited a local mosque. There were Muslim in this town and in much of Mozambique way before the Catholics and Christianity arrived.

Following our visits to the religious centers of Inhambane we went to the local market, the heart of the town.
The local market sold all types of goods from freshly caught fish to baskets and local produce. Inhambane is known for producing some of the hottest chili’s in Mozambique and after tasting them, perhaps the world. The locals make a hot sauce out of the chili’s called Peri-Peri is often created in families homes and fermented by the African sun and then sold street side to locals and tourists alike.
If you have the chance to taste this sauce from Mozambique know that you have been warned that your lips will be burning for many minutes following.

Our visit to Inhambane concluded with a tour of the beautiful Portuguese Architecture that dots the town and a local community were we met “mama”. Mama was gracious enough to allow us to look through her house in order to realize how the locals live. Mama lives in a simple hut made with branches from her trees and does most of her cooking and community interacting outside her hut and around some large palm trees. Her home is one that I feel that I have seen before in some type of travel or adventure magazine. Inhambane for sure is one of the most quant and unique ports I have visited in Africa and definitely worth a visit.

More To Come...

Well here I am in Mozambique, our program has started and we are completely absorbed with creating each broadcast as interesting, unique and exciting as possible. I have been here since February 2nd and have already had a wealth of experiences. We plan to create a GNG subsidiary in Africa, most likely based in Mozambique. As opposed to coming to a country for 1 or 2 months for a program, I arrived here with many thoughts and questions that I normally ask myself when I am coming to a country to stay for some years.

Even though it has only been just under two months I think Mozambique will be a country that I will fall in love with. Having lived in Africa (Ghana and Botswana) as a child, many memories, very vivid, both during the day and in my dreams, are coming back to me.

Ok, more about my personal feelings later, let’s get back to Global Nomads Group and our Mozambique Alive program. As Chris mentioned our first two broadcasts were great, students on both sides really began to open up to each other – exactly what GNG is all about. The students here, both from Josina Machel and the International School are incredibly gracious and willing to share their lives and country with us and all the participants in the program. For English being not their first but rather their third or fourth language they are incredibly articulate.

These last few days took us to an amazing Island, Inhaca, about three hours off the coast of Maputo, where we learned about a community that is rather impoverished, yet so full of life. A NGO, Right To Play, has implemented a number of programs on the island that revolve around gender issues, empowering girls, giving them more freedom to learn, through sports. Having received the blessing of the elders, young girls, rather than just staying at home and working, have become more involved with community programs. There are a number of girl coaches that are volunteers (high school girls) that help organize sports activities that include soccer for girls. We got to watch both a boys and girls game that kept both the players and crowd on their toes!

The Inhaca visit was in preparation for our April 5th and 6th broadcasts on gender issues. An issue that I feel is important for youth to discuss to understand both the way girls and boys life differ here in Mozambique as well as in the US.

Peter Reid has taken some awesome professional pictures, I have included a few above, more to come. You can also visit ourcommon.com (without the www) where he has his own blog with more cool pictures.

Today, which I think Chris and I will both write about, has been a long one, we were finalizing our preparation for what I believe will be one of our most interesting broadcasts. FUTESCOLA (Soccer and School) is a program that was started by a Mozambican business man, Armando. FUTESCOLA takes young children, who have grown up in horrendous conditions, mainly living off of and in Maputo’s notorious garbage dump, and providing them with food, and soccer training, providing they go to school. Come back to learn more about FUTESCOLA in the coming days. I’m off to bed, forgive the grammar and lack of creativity – promise to be more exciting in my next update.

PS - Check the photoalbum for some Mark amature pics...

Mark

Let's Get Mozambique Alive Started!!!!

For the past 6 weeks I have been on the road. I have been to S. Africa, Rwanda, Uganda and now have reached Mozambique where I will stay for the next month helping to produce Mozambique Alive.

I was in S. Africa for my roommate in college’s wedding, which was great.

I was in Rwanda to revisit Fawe Girls School and the students of La Columbiere. The main purpose of my visit was to share with Ingrid and her classmates Rwanda Alive, our documentary about Ingrids survival of the 1994 genocide http://www.gng.org/product/videos/rwanda_twl.html As always, Ingrid and her classmates made me feel at home and impressed me as the watched and validated the film.

In Uganda I met up with my old friend Peter Reid who agreed to join me to the north of the country to observe the 20-year-old conflict that has been using children as soldiers. You can learn more about the conflict and our adventure at www.ourcommon.com.

The real reason I am here and the reason I am writing is to share with you Mozambique. Having taken an 8-hour bus ride from Johannesburg, South Africa, Peter and I arrived in Maputo were Mark picked us up and gave us a brief tour of the town.

Mozambique was colonized by the Portuguese and has a very different feeling then other African countries I have been to. It is very tropical, with palm trees and short buildings many beautiful old colonial buildings. Maputo reminds me of a mix between Macau Island off of Hong Kong and Waikiki Beach in Hawaii.

Because Mark has been preparing for this program for the last several weeks I had little to do with the preproduction. Two days after we arrived we started our programs. We are working with youth from the International School and Josina Michelle here in Maputo. The International School is a private school and Josina Michelle is a public school representing Mozambique’s finest students.

The students from both schools are wonderful and have been working well together. The first two conferences, one from the rooftop of Josina Michelle school and the other hosted by the World Bank, were the “breaking the ice” conferences where the students got to know each other. The students in Mozambique did a traditional dance for the students in the US, it seemed like a combination of traditional Latin and African dances – very beautiful. The students in the US showed videos of their towns and described American way of life including their visits to Mc. Donalds and KFC.

We did an exercise with the students from Mozambique on how the rest of the world perceived them. Most students felt that most the world didn’t even know that Mozambique existed and if they did they thought of the flood several years ago or of the civil war that ravaged the country. I feel that the students definitely have an agenda over the course of this program of bringing light to Mozambique and especially the culture elements that make them unique and beautiful….I look forward to watch them do this….

-Chris

Welcome

Welcome to Mozambique Alive! Check back soon for team diary entries.