fidel castro.

July 11, 2012

I just got back from a short trip to the northern province of Gaza… I visited a current volunteer in a barrio called Fidel Castro, which is about a 30 minute drive from the capital of Xai-Xai. The trip was definitely a learning experience… a lot of questions ran through my head during the last few days, and although I did not fall in love with the barrio of Fidel Castro, I am glad I got to see first hand what the PCV experience is like.

I think that in general, the Peace Corps experience is characterized by highs and lows. Sometimes you are happy to be here and other times you can’t seem to stop asking yourself what the hell you signed up for… These last few days have certainly followed this pattern….

My alarm went off at 2:40-ish on Saturday morning. I got dressed, gathered my things and set off to meet the rest of the volunteers by 3am. I walked over to our meeting spot with Carla and her host mom in absolute darkness. There was a power outage right as I was leaving my house, so all the streetlights along the rua principal (main road) where out. It was about 4am by the time everyone was on board the mini bus and we were leaving Namaacha. We arrived in Maputo about an hour later and proceeded to look for chapas that would take us to our destinations. All 28 volunteers went on site visits- some of us went in pairs to one site and others went by themselves. We went to sites all over the country… most of us took ground transportation, while a few hand full of trainees got to fly to their destinations.

Jimi and I rode to Xai-Xai with two other volunteers that were visiting a near by site. We got into our chapa around 6ish and waited for it to fill up…

So, here is the thing about chapas… they are miserable, miserable things. Let me paint a picture of the discomfort that we endured-

Ok, a chapa is a basically any truck or mini van that drives people around for a small fee (well, depending on the destination). During one of my previous entries I wrote about riding in the back of an open chapa (an open pick up truck)… well, this chapa was closed. It’s a mini van/bus. Think of a VW hippie van from the 60s. That shape. Ok, so this mini van has 4 rows, a driver’s seat, and a passengers seat. Ideally, it’s only made to transport 14 people comfortably. However, comfort is not a luxury that Mozambicans get to enjoy. The drivers pack (and when I say PACK- I MEAN PACK!) these small mini vans with 20+ people! So, in a row where only 3 people should be sitting- there are four. Doesn’t sound like a big deal… but keep in mind that this is a requirement for ALL. They don’t care if you actually fit or not. So, here you have 4 people of different sizes CRAMING into this row, and on top of that- there’s bags/backpacks that we’re carrying. So there’s no room to move and personal space is but a fleeting memory. After the four rows are crammed with 16 people, two more people are squeezed into the passenger seat, and behind this seat, the cobrador sits … facing one of the passengers in the 1^st row. So, technically, there’s about 5 people in the 1^st row space…  

Alright, now that you can visualize this tightly crammed mini van… imagine sitting in this uncomfortable death trap for an extended period of time- oh, and on top of that… there’s limited ventilation and all you can hope is that your fellow passengers remembered to take their bath/put on deodorant… which most likely did not happen.

SO- this was my transportation experience during these last few days. Uncomfortable chapa rides driven by questionable men… the road to Xai-Xai is only a 2-lane highway… so, people pass each other using the opposite lane all the time… and well… that makes for more suspenseful trips. I think we had 2 very close calls to a head-on collision… scary. Like I said, these things are death traps. I remember thinking, “If I survive there 2 yrs in Mozambique, I will consider myself LUCKY,” …yea, like that.

I remember my last few weeks in LA and during one of those days I had to take the bus to get to UCLA or somewhere and it’s funny how much I use to dread public transportation back in the states… public transportation is non-existent here in Mozambique. Well, public transportation that is regulated by the government, at least. Sure, LA doesn’t have the best public transportation in the country, but honestly, it’s much better than the situation on this side of the world. After this trip, I am looking at the LA Metro system in a whole new way.

Alright, so …after an awful 3-hour chapa ride to Xai-Xai, we were met by the volunteers who were hosting us. ..We walked around the city for a little bit and gathered some groceries/refreshments for a party that we would be attending later.

During the next few days, we attended a pig roast, a lobolo (is that how you spell it? A traditional wedding ceremony/ presentation), we walked around our volunteer’s community ANNND even got our first spurt of diarrhea, merrrrp. Did I mention that I also used a pit latrine and peed on my foot during one of those occasions? Ahahah. What has my life come to? LOL.

It was really interesting to see how well our volunteer has integrated into her community. To our surprise, she spoke the local language (Changana) VERY well. She kept insisting that she was only at a conversational level… but that’s a lie. This girl is FLUENT. Or so it sounded. I was really impressed by her skills… she has full on conversations with her neighbors in Changana… Jimi and I just stood there….

Not going to lie, … being in a location where the local language is the dominant form of communication was a bit rough. I think Jimi and I both felt that we had put in all this effort into learning Portuguese… and here we were… in a real life scenario… and while some people spoke Portuguese… THEY CHOSE NOT TO… and so…. We just sat there… idly by…feeling useless… while people had their conversations in changana…

It was tough. But I know that I will probably find myself in a similar scenario…

During this trip, a million questions went through my head… what if I hate my site? What if I get a crappy organization? What if I’m not happy? Two years is not THAT long… but honestly, TWO years is a long time to be unhappy.

Throughout the trip we spoke to our volunteer and a few other current PCVs about their experiences and the challenges that they have faced- corruption within your organization, lack of structure, lack of work, and irrational expectations were all pretty common themes…

I’ll be honest (as I have strived to be throughout this blog), and I’ll admit that this all made me really nervous. On one hand, I think, “well, what the fuck? If there’s no work- then why am I here? How does Peace Corps expect us to fix all of these problems?” ….And in reality, they don’t.

A lot of problems here in Mozambique are inter connected- poverty, lack of access to education, shortage in human resources/medical staff, lack of infrastructure, etc etc etc. The list goes on. And it’s a daunting task to think of all of this at once. I can’t fix all of this, obviously. And I won’t. I KNOW THAT… BUT there IS A LOT that I can learn from being here.

Which brings me to my personal conclusion- so much of this experience seems to be what you make of it. And I have decided to take away as much as I can from this… learn from this experience what it has to teach me… even if its just a broader understanding of the world. Even if its just a shift in my perception/perspective… even if its just teaching me how much I took for granted before coming here…. I know that I can’t change the world, much less Mozambique in 24 months… but the experience of living and working in Africa is worth the challenges that will surely come my way.

So, after dinner I was talking to minha mãe and …WOW… I had a really good conversation with her. She told me about her experience growing up in colonial Mozambique… she confessed that although the system of colonialism was not right, everything was in order (in contrast to the state of Moz today). She said that there was public transportation, there were schools with proper materials, the streets were clean, etc. She kept repeating, “não faltava nada!” These confessions were part of her critique of the current state of affairs in Moz today. She is a conscious lady and I really appreciate that… she was saying that she believes that a revolution is imminent. According to her, Mozambicans are dissatisfied with the conditions that exist, and perhaps, the younger generation will be the ones that spark a change in the near (very near) future. Mozambique is definitely going to be an interesting country to follow politically in the following years….

During the conversation, I realized… I have never met anyone that lived under colonial rule, until this experience. Crazzzzzy.