Year 1 – Week 2: The Great Escape

For all of his ramblings about “diversity” being a wooden ship and bears being attracted to women’s periods, Ron Burgundy does some offer some wise words. At many times during the first week, I found myself saying “I immediately regret this decision.” But for Sunday, no words rang more true than “It’s so damn hot…milk was a bad choice.”

On Saturday night, Richie and I finished off the spaghetti and white sauce that we made on Friday. We had some doubts about it: as we don’t have a refrigerator and the white sauce has a milk base, we thought there could be a problem. I gave a sniff and it didn’t smell bad, but I still had the thought of “I immediately regret this decision” as we began to reheat and eat it.

The regret set it in even further early – very early – Sunday morning. By 3:30, I was awake, my stomach writhing in pain. I really didn’t want to have to go to the bathroom while it was still dark outside, so I fell asleep for a little while. Then the problems began.

Over the course of the day, Richie and I were constantly racing to the bathroom. Luckily, neither of us had to go at the same time – timing is everything, right? Regardless, we were housebound, in pain, and without food, so we didn’t eat in the morning.

By the afternoon, we were feeling well enough to walk into the villa to get groceries. Even though our stomachs were feeling better, we started feeling guilt-ridden as we walked to the market. There were a good couple-hundred people waiting in line, staring at us as we passed, at the World Food Programme tent. The stares were worse as we walked back, food in hand. How could we not feel guilty walking past them with all of that food?

Our lunch helped settle our stomachs completely and we wasted away the rest of the afternoon waiting for the energy to come on. We had our standard spaghetti dinner – without the white sauce – and went to sleep feeling decent.

Monday picked up with where Sunday left off – killing time, waiting for energy to come on. We had a Volunteer coming to visit us before we progressed on our Christmas vacation. We went to the market to stock up on food for the day and once again, people were in line at the World Food Programme tent. The guilt returned, but there was nothing we could do.

I spent the afternoon doing Sudoku – 15 of them on difficult level. There was not a lot else to do. Most of the teachers who were at the school have made their way out to Beira or Chimoio or Maputo for their own Christmas break. Our buddy arrived in the late afternoon. Richie gave him a tour of the place – if you could call it a tour – as I prepped for dinner. The energy came on a half-hour late, as has been the trend recently. We ate, watched another disc of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia,” and called it a night.

It was a crystal clear night, and in the darkness of Machanga, every star came out. The bug quotient was relatively low, but with no clouds, rain, or breeze, it might have been the hottest night we had experienced in Machanga. It’s really difficult to sleep as you sweat. I want so badly to keep wiping the sweat off, but I have to keep in mind that as bothersome as it is, it is keeping me cool.

None of us slept particularly well. And we had a long day ahead of us. By 7:00, the three of us left Machanga by foot to get to the river. We made our first river crossing via canoe; there were no hippos in the river – bummer. From the neighboring town, we took a chapa to the main road. It is much easier to travel on the opposite side of the river because the road is paved, and it’s a shorter road. There are no chapas from the main road, so after failing three times,we managed to get a ride with a couple of Zimbabweans heading toward Maputo. We had hoped to ride for free, but as we stopped for gas, they asked for an exorbitant amount of money. We bargained, and ended up paying 500 Meticais for three of us – not to bad, but still probably too much. From the crossroads, we got in another chapa to Vilanculos.

We tried to reach the Volunteer in the area, but cell service had been spotty for the last few days. Finally, one of us got in touch with her, and we were good to go. Vilanculos was absolutely swarmed with other white people – mostly South Africans – here for the holiday, so we were kind of treated as tourists. I think that we fended for ourselves pretty well just by speaking Portuguese.

The house in Vilanculos is glorious. It was one of the stops that we made on the way up to Machanga, so we knew what we were getting into. This house is the anti-Machanga: constant electricity, hot running water, internet in the house, close to the beach – basically paradise.

By late afternoon, we were ready to experience some of this paradise. We headed down to the beach a little before sunset. The weather was perfect and the ocean was like a bath. We sat on the beach and enjoyed some beers that we brought with us.

Before heading out to dinner with some other Moz Volunteers, we finished off the crate of beer that we bought. We were in for a treat for dinner – pizza and milkshakes. At this point, price meant nothing: I was just ready for something other than eggs or spaghetti. This food was a slice of paradise. Lactose intolerance be damned!

We came home and it was scalding hot, maybe hotter than the night before in Machanga. With no fan and no breeze to speak of, we didn’t sleep particularly well.
With such a poor night of sleep behind us, most of Wednesday was lazy. I can’t really say that we woke up because none of us really slept. After eating breakfast, when we were conscious, we made our way into town to buy some food for the upcoming days. As much as I loved eating pizza and drinking milkshakes, it’s just not financial possible to eat a restaurant every night. Richie and I stopped in a hardware store to see if we could get some screws and hooks for our house, but they did not have any. On our way back into the house, we stopped in a supermarket where we were lucky to find an electric double-burner and some clothes hangers. Even though we didn’t get what we were looking for, we were pleased to find something we had not expected to find.

We returned to the house while two others continued shopping. The three of us didn’t have a lot to do, but there were three beers left in the fridge. How convenient. It didn’t really matter that it was 11:40 AM. Upon the others’ return, we ate our lunch and made our way down to the beach.

It was a hot day and the ocean was hot to match. The water was calm and cleansing. As we sat on the beach, four of us played Euchre. Richie and I decided that when we get back to site, we have to teach a couple people how to play. Sufficiently burnt and rather tired, we returned home. Richie and another Volunteer prepped dinner while I played Scrabble with another Volunteer. And once again, the drinking commenced. As dinner was prepared, we watched “Elf” – it was, after all, Christmas Eve.

Dinner was quite delicious – breaded chicken. It was really nice to get some protein in my system from a source other than eggs. We continued our Christmas celebration with a couple of drinking games.

It was a beautiful night out. The stars where glowing off a pitch black sky. The five of us made our way over to the bar. On the way, were joined by a couple of other MOZ 13 Volunteers. We spent the night talking with some Volunteers from Malawi and South Africa. This city is beautiful, accessible, and relatively cheap, so a lot of Volunteers from other neighboring countries come to Mozambique for their holidays. It was great to get different perspectives and stories, hear about similar and differing struggles, and see some new faces.

Christmas Day pretty much got out of hand. I woke up early to get to an internet café in an effort to upload pictures, but the internet was down. Disappointed, I made my way over to some other Volunteers’ house to commence the celebration. Drinking brandy and cokes at 11 in the morning probably wasn’t a great idea, but we had nowhere to go and nothing to do.

By the afternoon, we were ready to get moving again. We made our way to a bar that was hosting a barbeque. The put together a lot of good food for way to much money, but it was well worth it. We stuck around for the better part of the afternoon and evening, swapping stories with Volunteers from South Africa and Malawi.

The evening is where things got interesting. We went to a different bar with the sole intention of drinking and dancing in a completely straight all-male dance circle (no joke). I ended up learning a game that was similar to Mancala. I lost the first game, and then won the next three against the guy who taught me. The, some random dude angrily said “Welcome to the big leagues” and proceeded to lose three consecutive times to me. After walking around town for a while, in the rain, we managed to get to sleep around 5 AM.

For Friday, we plan on sticking around town and stocking up on money for the next couple of months. There is no bank close to us, so this is out last chance for a while to get money. The long trek back to Machanga will commence Saturday.

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukkah, and wishing everyone a Happy New Year.