Oh hey! I am finally in a place where I can upload pictures, ie the unlimited internet of the home of my gracious fellow MCCers Sara and Brooke, so I'd like to share a few photos with you so you can imagine where I am.

Wanna come visit me? This is what the countryside in my province looks like on a nice sunny day . . .

Sweet sweet tree that is found everywhere in the countryside here. I can't wait to see it with leaves.

Note the lovely green mosque (mesquita) - I hear the prayers several times each day, which is a lovely reminder to myself to thank God for all God's blessings.

Hopefully more to come sometime soon!

I have now completed one month here in Mozambique! It feels like forever, but also like a very short time. I am now done with official language study but I will continue to study on my own, because I certainly can’t speak or understand completely yet. My language lessons helped a lot though – I can really tell that I’m understanding more than at the beginning.

Over the past couple of years, I spent a lot of time thinking about how to live an environmentally responsible life, especially in reference to an appreciation for God’s marvelous creation. Mozambique is giving me new perspectives on the environment. There are some ways in which people here are unintentionally helping the environment, which is wonderful to see. For instance, most people use compact fluorescent lightbulbs for almost all lighting, because they are far less expensive in terms of initial cost and energy consumption. On the other hand, if a family has a television, it is quite common for the television to be on whenever someone is in the same room.

Many urban families do not have running water in their homes so they must carry it in from a pump shared by multiple families. When you have to carry in all of your water, you are much more conscious of how much you use because of the energy you have to expend to get it. Rural families are even more conscious of water use because they must often carry water for kilometers during the dry season. My host family has running water, but even so, we take a lot of baths out of a bucket rather than taking showers. Bathing out of a bucket was strange at first, but now it seems quite easy and it is a far more efficient way to use water than a shower. I challenge my readers to try a bucket bath sometime – all you need is a bucket, 2-3 gallons of water, and some sort of cup or pitcher to pour water on yourself.

Other environmental issues are more visible here than in the US. In the US, we throw away tons and tons of trash without thought because we have large landfills to store all that trash in. For most of us, we don’t have to see all that trash on a daily basis. Here in Moz though, there really aren’t landfills, at least in the engineered sense. I wouldn’t say that people here are in general more careful about not producing trash, but we certainly have to think more consciously about how to deal with it. The majority of trash, even plastic bags and wrappers, is burned on a household basis. Outside Tete there is a large landfill of sorts where the trash of many people is burned and left to lay amongst the trees and bushes. Seeing all of this trash on a daily basis really makes me think about what I throw away.

Air pollution is also an interesting phenomenon here. There are very few motor vehicles, but yet the air quality is often poor. Why? Many people in rural areas clear their fields by burning them. In addition to polluting the air, these fires often burn out of control, destroying homes and claiming lives. It is hard to witness this practice.

Well, those are my thoughts for the week on the environment. I don’t really have too many answers yet to all the questions bouncing around in my head, but I think Americans and Mozambicans could each teach each other something about creation care. Peace and love to you all!

It is so strange to not be able to communicate easily. Most of the time it just makes me laugh, but sometimes it is very frustrating. Here is a list of words that I have found extremely useful so far:

1. Obrigada (obrigado if you’re a man) – Thank you: This is one of the first words I learned in Portuguese and one of the most important, especially when you need a lot of help. Sometimes I feel like an infant.
2. Poeira – Dust: Tete is very dry and dusty, especially now since it is the dry season. Our feet are constantly dirty and our sinuses are all a bit clogged here. I have to be especially careful with my contact lenses so that I don’t get infected eyes.
3. Consada – Tired: I use this word a lot because adjusting to a new culture/language/climate takes a lot of energy. I usually slept 6-7 hours a night in college but here I sleep 8-9 hours at night and at least 30 mins after lunch. Although I feel like a lazy bum, it is important to be well rested so that I can concentrate and not get sick.
4. Quero – I want: In place of more polite words, my family can usually figure out what I need or want when I say I want something. Again, I feel like an infant, but it works for now.

Things are still going pretty well here in Tete. This past weekend was a three-day weekend because of celebration of “the Day of Victory”, something to do with Mozambique’s independence from Portugal. It feels a bit like Labor Day weekend to me since I’m used to that at the beginning of September, but I think the sentiment is a bit more like Veteran’s day. It was nice to get some extra rest, because I have been sick over the past week.

Sunday I went to visit the Igreja Metodista Unida (United Methodist Church). My boss, Sr. Tiago attends this church and they were having a special celebration so he asked me to come. What fun! It was a yearly celebration of Thanksgiving to God, not unlike our own Thanksgiving sorts of church services in the US. They had a huge pile of produce decorating the front of the church. The Methodist church is much larger than the Mennonite congregation I usually attend so it had a totally different feeling. There was a big choir that sang lots of nice songs and the congregation kept spontaneously singing at other times (they probably had reasons, but I couldn’t quite tell what was going on). The time of offering took a good half hour because they were having some sort of competition between different neighborhoods to see which one would give the most. Happily, the church met their goal. I was very proud of myself because I think I understood the sermon pretty well. They were translating it into Nyungwe, the local language, so I had pauses to absorb what was said. The man sitting next to me was translating it to English for me, but I think I was getting it even without his help. Afterward there were tasty refreshments of Coke/Fanta rolls, cake, and some sort of fried pastry thing.

Well, that’s all for now! Thanks for your prayers!

I started writing a post recently after arriving in Moz, but I have not had good access to internet because the internet in the office where I work is out. I apologize for the lack of communication, and I hope to be writing more frequently soon.

8/25/08
Bem vindo ao Mozambique! (Welcome to Mozambique!) I arrived safely last Monday, with my checked baggage following 1 day later. I am very thankful that everything made it. Last week I had in country orientation with fellow MCCers Jenny and Joel Bishop Kempf. We spent a day in Beira where I arrived before traveling to Gondola where they live. We spent two days there and in nearby Chimoio learning about MCC’s work in Moz and getting to know 2 of the other workers, Brooke and Tony. On Friday, we drove to Tete, the city where I will live for the next year. We spent Saturday visiting the two communities where I will be working with sand dams. On Sunday I visited the Mennonite Church here in Tete and had a bit more of a tour of Tete.

Since arriving in Tete, I have been staying with my host fam. My host parents are Julio and Carla Calengo. Julio is a human rights lawyer and also a well known singer. Carla works for the Christian Council of Mozambique (where I work) and attends school in the evenings. They have two lovely children, Hariet (6) and Calvin (2) who entertain me whenever I’m at home. Their neice Neiva (14) also lives with them. I think this host family will be wonderful and I can’t wait to get to know them better.

Because I like lists, here is a list of my observations in my first week here in Moz:
1. Driving – Driving is on the left side here. It still feels weird every time, and I have to be especially careful when crossing streets because the cars come from unexpected places.
2. Bikes – You have to have a bike license to ride a bike here. Maybe I will get one, but my family doesn’t have a bike so maybe not. People put anything and everything on bikes. It is almost unusual to see a bike with only one person, and typically there is some sort of huge heavy load like 2 sacks of charcoal or a stack of firewood on the back.
3. Bread – I didn’t expect to find bread here, but it is plentiful. A typical breakfast consists of bread with butter and jelly and tea to drink. There are bakeries everywhere like in France.
4. Weather – It has been pretty cool so far. Up here in Tete it is definitely hotter, but I’ve worn jeans a lot and even my sweatshirt several times. We are nearing the end of winter, so it’s only going to get hotter from here on out. The difference I’ve noticed is that the sun feels really intense, even if the air temperature is not very hot.
5. Landscape – The land here is really beautiful, albeit a bit dry and dusty during this season. It reminds me a bit of the southwest US, although there are a lot of trees everywhere. The soil is a little bit red.

Well, I will have language study for the next three weeks with a tutor and conversation partner, so I’m getting ready for brain overload. Wish me luck!