Nico the dog!

Ok! Let’s talk about my pets! As you can imagine here is not so common to have the pets… Ok, if you consider that pets are the animals that you have at home, in that case is another story, chickens, lams, leasers, scorpions, cockroach, rats, etc… I can’t consider the chickens and the lams as a pet, because I like to eat them, in the end it would to said to kill them, so I don’t have them at home… I will not explain wish ones I have at home place, otherwise someone could get shocked, I’m just gin to talk about “Nico”.
Nico is the volunteers’ dog! Lately I needed to start teaching him… he killed 2 chickens at the village, even having a nicer meals then lot of people around that bastard doesn’t learn… we hope that he will learner (it’s still young) otherwise we need to send him back :s Nico is one of the main reason to get dirty every were… some days is quite impossible to leave home without getting finger prints of Nico on the cloths…
But is our best guard! At night he stays lying in front of our door and at minimum movement the alarm is on!!
I’m going to share with you a secret of Nico, his favorite spot to go drink water is our 20l shower bucket!! It’s the only spot were there is kind of cold water during the day…

Market Februry the 7th

On Saturday there was a lot of movement at my street… I did see passing 5 “chapas” ( pick-ups, the local public transports) completely packed, which is not normal for regular day! Eurico told me that was the 7^th of april market…. Starnge! Here everything is delayed… we are just in March… the he told me that 7^th of April is one village close by where there is market every Sunday. But because is the event of the villages surroundings the people starts going the day before to get the best spot! On Sunday Eurico was spouse to guard my house during the day but instead we decide to go shopping at that famous market! Nico, our dog would be the guard for a bit! On Sunday at 7 o’clock Eurico was already calling me at the window form my room, I don’t have glass or such thing, only a net for the mosquito… “Mr Luis, awake? Lets go market?” we went by motorbike to make it easier… was already faking hot and the road full of people! Lots of them were bring things to seal over there, was nice to see all those diferente products but also the way that they carry and pack the things….But I really need to keep one eye on the road that more like a trial track!! Soon I got ther everybody was looking to me … I was the only “Mucunha” (the white . in macua) everybody was talking about the mucunha, really bad feeling… Eurico used is contacts to make sure that no one would still the motorbike or gasoline from it! The market… like in other markets of the world , there are several products for sale… this one was not different… fruit, dry fish, salt, flour, brad, cooking oil (in coca-cola bottles), cloths, wood, furniture, spear parts for bikes, snacks and “refrescos” (cold drinks). There were also services, sharpening tools like machetes, fixing bikes, fixing clothes… But something was intriguing… there were no vegetables… most of times I don’t see them here in normal markets for sail… according with Eurico vegetables don’t make your stomach full, and if your family don’t have so much to eat… Ups I forgot, I did see meat for sail! There was gout meet, the head was there to prove it! All the meat in the floor on top of a fabric… there also flies, lot of them, they were included in the price! There were also some chickens, the chickens for sale are always alive, but we never know… sometimes I do understand de vegetarians… There was also a cinema there… but I will leave it for another time, needed To Go home to make some lunch…

Business without money

As you can imagine here there is not so much Money, but there are no things to buy as well…
So I had some tenting proposals of business… One of the dudes that works at the Caju plantation offer me 1 chicken to get my shorts! Sounded a nice business but need them, I’m planning to stay here some more time so I will need them. The same opened with another guy and another piece of clothing, this time was my sandals, but now the business was even more tenting 2 sickens and 5 few bananas… I think that my back pack will go back home completely empty!

Proposal of engagement

Silvano is an worker from the caju plantation, e spend his days cutting grass with machete… another day during the lunch break e told me that he needed to talk me in private, which is quite normal every day someone comes to talk about their problem or ask for something… So let’s see which the problem was: “I have a sister and I want you to get married with her”. And then he starts with more details… “I want to be your brother in law”, “She is 12 years old but no worry she knows how to cook”, “She already has bubs and can have babies!”… In this situation you would think that was joke, but here the values are a bit different... After this brief explanation of his sister I told him that was not interested, and explained him the reasons… He was a bit confused! The day after he approached me and said: “Do you know that here you can have more than one wife? (yepp here most of the men have more than one wife at same time) so do you accept to have my sister as wife? And if you want you can have another one older if that is the problem!”…HELP!!!!!!!

The visit of the governor

Mozambique is organized in 10 regions, each of them with a governor. I had the privilege to see a live the visit of the governor to the village of Nicane! For days that no one was talking about anything else, everything needed to be perfect! The roads clean… no grass, sheet from the goats or stones… the place for the stage needed to be perfect! The colors from FRELIMO and the picture of the president couldn’t miss… The “chefe do posto” (kind of president of the municipality) was supervising everything, what personage! The day before there was a comity of people to verify if everything was according with the plans, lot of last minute changes (there was dude painting until the moment that the big boss arrived). When I wake up there was a peregrination at the street, people coming from other villages, some of them walking for several hours. Almost time for the arriving, 11:30 was the plan… not too bad he arrive 1h later… but last minute the assistant of the “chefe the posto” passed with black shoes in a plastic bag, the chefe de posto was still with flip-flops… the black shoes need to be safe just for the important moment! Everyone else was ready, all of them with the best cloths that have, is not every day that the governor comes to your village… Was interesting to see the ones that have money for shoes to see how do they behave, their shoes are huge, like when you are kid and you want always a bigger shoe juts o show that you are growing! Here with big shoes you show respect! Soundly several 4x4 vehicles arrived with the governor comity… there was a contrast… a group of fat people that just passed by, eat everything, even took the leftovers and the gifts while the skinny people was smiling, waiving and looking…