South of the Border

This post is loooong overdue. Robert and I took our first vaca out of the country in March to Mozambique. If you’ve never been to Mozambique, which is a likelihood, I would highly recommend it! It was just like Malawi, in terms of Africa and transport, but everything was simply better times a hundred million gagillion. I never wanted to leave! If it ever came up, I would strongly consider moving there (at least to the south coast) as an ex-pat for a good number of years.

So Rob and I crossed the border into a place called Tete, which everyone said was an ugly city with nothing in it, but let me assure you, it was no less than 5 times bigger and better and more interesting than Malawi’s capitol. Then we took a plane from Tete down to the capitol, Maputo. Maputo is like, a real city. Blew my mind! Keep in mind, this is the first time out of Malawi in over a year, standards were low. But there were huge buildings and culture and restaurants and jazz bars and street art fairs. Did I mention that I never wanted to leave? After Maputo we hitched up to Paria de Tofu and Barra for some of the best diving in the world, and I didn’t make that up. It’s a fact. More on that below.

List of the top ten things in need of mentioning about the trip:

1. The food was unbelievable! Everything was delicious! Mozambique was colonized by the Portuguese, which automatically makes their food way more legit. I think I’ve mentioned before that every former British colony was unfortunately forced to inherit the British miserably bland taste in food (except for India). Hence, Malawian food blows. But Mozambiquan food! They know how to use spices, and in fact everything was spicy to the max! Everything had seafood in it! And the bread! Holy gods, the bread! They have this roll, called pao, that they sell everywhere and eat with everything. Essentially, it’s just like a French roll, but c’mon! A French roll! As street food in Africa! It was unbelievable after the BS we get here. Once Robert and I got up to the touristy coastal areas, we made it a point to eat seafood at least once a day. Prawns the size of my hand, lobster, calamari steaks as big as the plate, fish, clams, crawfish, everything! With butter! I’m near tears just thinking about it. Damn, we gotta get back there.

2. So, as previously stated, Moz was colonized by the Portuguese, so everyone spoke Portuguese. The tourist places spoke enough English that we were understood, but it was necessary to supplement it with a little Portuguese tongue twisting of our own. I’d gotten a Teach Yourself Portuguese book on my kindle, and learned the very basics. Everyone said that if you knew Spanish you could get by pretty easily in Moz, but Portuguese felt more like French to me. The only French I know is what Christina Aguliera taught me in the Moulin Rouge song… But it was actually really fun, trying to wade through an entirely different language out of necessity. I actually don’t think I’ve ever really been in that position before, where the principle languages everyone knows don’t include English. Everyone in Europe knows English, Israelis speak better English that I do, India does its business in English. Mozambique was definitely new linguistic territory.

3. The Indian Ocean blew my mind. I’ve never been in the Indian Ocean before. It was beautiful! Pristine beaches, clear aqua water, warm temperature, and a sunrise! And it had seafood in it!

4. Talking about the Indian Ocean, the diving was unbelievable!!! Mozambique is one of the best places in the world for diving, known for its manta rays and whale sharks, neither of which we were lucky enough to spot (another reason I gotta get back there!). We missed the beginning of the whale shark migration by about two weeks. And unfortunately, the day after we got to the beaches a huge storm hit and the water was too rough to go out for about three days. But we did go on two incredible dives, one shallow (about 12-14 meters) and our first deep dive (33 meters). It was also my first real life salt water dive. Salt water marine life is insane!!! Everything was spikey and huge and poisonous. The coral was bright and bizarre. On the shallow dive I think Rob and I racked up 3 sting ray sightings and on the deep dive the fish were as big as my kitchen (yes, I thought about taking one home to fry it up). There was one potato fish as big as a boulder that I had an intense urge to try and hug, to see just how big and cushy it was. We saw a few angel fish on the shallow dive, but the ones we saw on the deep dive were almost three times as big. The schools of sail fish were frightening, each fish as long as a car. We saw those puffy fish that, unpuffed, look spikey and mean, and we also saw those crazy fish featured on Planet Earth that change color and texture to blend into wherever they are.

5. The return of the autorickshaw!!! I thought I’d never see an autorickshaw again, at least not outside of India. I was so pleasantly surprised to see them zipping around the capitol with their green cabs and happy yellow burlap covers. They were my transportation of choice in India, where they are driven as daredevil death machines. They don’t call them autorickshaws in Mozambique though, they call them tuk tuks. But for some reason I couldn’t get that to stick in my head and instead kept calling them things like vroom vrooms and tic tacs.

6. I was blown away with how expensive everything was. I’ve heard that Malawi is one of the most expensive places for a tourist, but things were almost five times as expensive in Moz. 1000 Malawi kwacha, which is a good chunk of money, something like a decent lunch in a Malawian city, translates to 100 Mozambiquan meticais (pronounced met-i-ca-ish, and mets for short), which will buy about half a breakfast, or a tuk tuk ride down the street. Rob and I took to buying their amazing pao and slapping some peanut butter on it for meals not reserved for seafood.

7. Maputo has markets for everything. The markets didn’t look any different than the markets we have here in Malawi, ya know, half wood half cardboard shacks, but each market was specialized and wonderful! They have the vegetable market, the fish market, the bread market, the art market, and, my favorite, the alcohol market, where you can by name brand alcohol at bargain prices. And I love me a bargain!!! And good alcohol! Also at this alcohol market, they have little stands and shops set up like mini outdoor bars, where people can come up, sit on a stool, and order a shot or drink of any type of non-fraternity-like alcohol they wanted served in a Dixie cup, for pennies! Rob and I taste tested pretty much everything, different scotches and tequilas mostly. We had the most pleasant afternoon chatting up men in suits getting off work and marveled at how impossible this would be in Malawi. People in Malawi take shots of crap alcohol, which tastes more like molten lava, which they suck out of plastic baggies. The point of which is to get so disgustingly drunk that they forget they live in Malawi. PC Moz volunteers have it made!

8. The expat and tourist populations have a huge presence in Mozambique, which means we were invisible!! Well, almost invisible. We were still white foreigners carrying huge trekking backpacks. But no “azungu!” or “give me money” following us everywhere. It was a much needed breather.

9. I was gonna write 9 and 10, but this post is getting way too long. But just so you know, 9 was gonna be about our new South African friends we met on a hitch and stayed with for a night and 10 was going to be about the jazz scene and gelato in Maputo. Go to Moz! You won’t regret it!

A Vestigial Tale

I hear myself saying to a classroom full of devout Christians who were force fed Creationism since the womb, “…the tailbone is mostly useless. It is left over from when we were monkeys.” Blank stares. I could practically see thought bubbles coming up from each of their heads, what??

“You know, because millions of years ago we used to be monkeys…”

Nothing. Madam is going to Hell.

Right now in Form 3 Biology we’re learning about coordination. Ya know, like bones and muscles and movement and blah blah. Today, whilst talking about the different types of vertebra I found myself going off on a rare but highly entertaining and educational biology-related rant. We’d finished discussing the cervical and thoracic and lumbar and sacral vertebra and we were to the coccyx, or the vestigial tail, better known as the tailbone. (And I pretty much quote exactly, skip ahead if you don’t care to read my high school Biology English-as-a-second-language rendition of evolution, but if you do choose to read it, imagine me in class acting out every few sentences), “Alright, so millions of years ago we were monkeys, but then over time we evolved into humans. During that time, other monkeys and apes split off from the line and formed their own species, that’s why we have different species of monkeys. But our specific line learned how to walk on our hind legs and grow bigger brains and form thumbs and voice boxes. There’s tons of evidence for this. If you line up all the fossils from all over the world that come from our line of ancient monkey to human, you can see the gradual changes taking place every few thousand years. The proof is unmistakable. Back when we were monkeys we needed tails, but after a while we decided we no longer needed tails so we evolved without them. But the bone where the tail used to attach, for some reason, didn’t go away. It’s a vestigial trait, meaning it’s left over from a more ancient time and no longer has any function. We have many vestigial traits. Have you ever let a baby grab your finger and they have a really strong grip? They can pretty much rip your finger off. That is also left over from when we were monkeys, when the baby had to hold on to the mother while she climbed a tree to escape lions and whatever. Now that we’re humans, a baby has no need to hang onto its mother because what mother would climb a tree with her newborn baby? That’s stupid. Also, some whales have hipbones but no hips! You know whales, those really really big mammal fish? Anyway, they used to have a function for their hipbones when they were a more ancient species. But then they evolved into the whale they are now and were never able to get rid of their hipbones…and that’s why we have a useless tailbone. We were monkeys.”

Responses:
“No no, Madam, no no.”
“Madam, do you read the Bible?”
“But where did the first monkey come from?”
“Madam, you are saying we are nyama, animals. This is not true.”
“No no, Madam, no no.”

My counter response:
“Yes, Victor, I’m familiar with the Bible, no I will not get into my opinions on it in Biology class, or ever. There are plenty of good Christians who agree with me that we came from monkeys, because it’s a fact. Kennedy, what makes you think we are not nyama (which also translates to meat)? If a lion came in here, he would eat us the same as a goat because we are also nyama. Delicious nyama. We can think and communicate complexly, but that doesn’t mean we’re not animals. We still make babies and eat food and breathe air and die. Didn’t we learn in Form 1 that Homo sapiens are a part of the kingdom animalia? And Darlington, I know you’re trying to get me to say that Adam was the first monkey, but that would be silly. The first monkey actually came from an even more primitive mammal, which, many millions of years ago, decided to leave the oceans and evolve into a land animal, which later became birds and reptiles and rodents too. I could explain even further but I would have to explain the Big Bang theory and the gasses present in the universe and the primordial soup, which would take a really long time and get Victor even angrier with me. If you really want to know, come see me after class.”

Their counter counter response:
“No no, Madam, no no.”
“Ahhh, I see!” – That’s the suck up in the class.
“No no, Madam, it is not true.”
“Hahahahaha! Monkey tails!”

So I’m pretty sure I’ve convinced them on evolution…

Stones In Cans

You come across a lot of characters in a bus. This is true anywhere in the world, really. There’s the token drunk guy, slurring his yells, the crazy who smells and wants to get you talking. There’s always the crying baby with the mom on the cell phone, shoving candy down her other kids’ throats then getting angry when they don’t sit still. In Malawi we have comparable characters. Drunk guy, check. Smelly talkative crazy, check. Crying baby, not so much, but a lot of babies attached to fully exposed breasts. We got more Bible thumping Reverends in one bus than I’ve ever met in my whole life combined.

Rarely in the world of public bus transport is there the overly obnoxious, insanely loud and inconsiderate loony sitting right behind you. I mean, it happens, but usually in short intervals and usually the loony is verifiably loony. Those crazies are usually asked to leave or eventually subdued or you can move away from them. But not in Malawi, and not on a night bus. Once on the night bus, there’s no getting off, and there’s no moving around for as long as the bus is en route. Unless you want to lose your seat and stand in the isle for the next four hours. When we happen to be traveling together from Lilongwe to Mzuzu or vice versa and don’t have the patience to hitchhike, Robert and I like to take the night bus. It gives us a full day to spend in whatever city we happen to be in without the stress of daytime travel. Also, the night bus is faster than the regular bus because there are fewer stops and we’re passed out half the time. It’s actually a really pleasant way to go, if you’ve got a seat and managed to avoid sitting too close to Mr. Chatty Stinkypits.

On one such an evening, Robert and I found ourselves sitting in front of what I can only describe as the loudest, dumbest, most insanely obnoxious young women in Africa. I don’t know if they were actually dumb, because I don’t speak Chichewa, but I’m pretty sure they were really dumb. And had I known what dumb stuff they were saying, violence may have ensued. I honestly don’t know what had made them so oblivious that they insisted on talking to each other and on the phone all night, screaming. Just screaming everything they said. It wasn’t even very loud in the bus. Apparently, everything they had to say was of vital importance that even the driver, half a mile away in the driver’s seat, had to know. I really didn’t get it. After a while of shooting death glares at them, telling them to be quiet, and then to PLEASE be quiet in a rude way, Rob and I just ended up staring straight ahead in bewilderment. Exhausted, sleep deprived bewilderment. Eventually, the whole bus turned against them and started yelling back, very un-Malawian. When a bus full of Malawians lose their smiley composure and start yelling in anger, you know it’s bad. The point at which Malawians start yelling in anger is equivalent to when American’s start setting police cars on fire. Or camping out on Wall Street.

Needless to say, the dummies didn’t get the picture. They yelled right back, probably defending their right to free speech at 2am on a bus of a million tired not amused people, but I don’t really know because again, I don’t speak Chichewa. Alright, enough complaining, I’ll get to the point. Rob brought up an interesting saying he’d heard about stones in cans and dumb people that I thought worth repeating in Cyberspace. He said that the more stones a person has in their can, the less the stones rattle around. The fewer stones a person has, the louder and more abhorrent is the rattle. Thank you, Master Robert, for your stones of wisdom. Wish I could translate that into Chichewa. Not that the dummies would get it.

Book of the Week

For this glorious month of June, I have decided to try and stay at site alone for the whole month because, somehow, in the entire year that has past, it has never happened. I’ve always come up with a reason to leave or I’ll have a visitor. I also feel like I ought to put in a little time after abandoning Africa for a European respite last month. Turns out, there’s not so much to do at site after school is over for the day. It’s winter here, so the day is super short anyway. I’ve been reading a lot. Like more than I’ve ever read ever. I’m averaging a book a day. I’m reading some really good stuff, and some real crap. Like I recently finished an absolutely abominable Nora Roberts book I inherited on my mom’s kindle (which she generously swapped for my touch screen kindle, which I hated, because the cat could turn the pages whenever she wanted attention). The horribly grotesque book was something about childhood friends running a wedding venue together and finding husbands themselves and blah blah. I wanted to puke the whole day I read it. Also reread Michael Crichton’s Timeline, which was enjoyable, and John Grisham’s The Confession, which was tolerable, and the final installment of that horribly written Eragon series, which I can’t believe was even published. Who told that kid, Christopher Paolini, that he could write? He shouldn’t even be allowed to compose emails. Almost had to put that one down, which I’ve done almost never. Right now I’m in the middle of Freedom, by Jonathan Franzen, which is a breath of literary fresh air. Depressing, but really well written. But hands down, the best book I’ve read this week, is Sh*t My Dad Says by Justin Halpern. I’m sure it’s not for everybody, but it had me laughing like a crazy person. I’ve never laughed like that for a book. It’s just this guy telling stories about his dad and the crazy stuff he says, plain and simple. Added bonus, the family is from San Diego, which makes multiple appearances throughout the book. Some quotable gems: “On Table Manners: ‘Jesus Christ, can we have one dinner where you don’t spill something?...No, Joni, he does do it on purpose, because if he doesn’t, that means he’s just mentally handicapped, and none of the tests showed that.’” “On Chivalry: ‘Give your mother the front seat…I don’t give a shit if she said you could have it that’s what she’s supposed to do, and you’re supposed to say ‘No, I insist.’ You think I’m gonna drive around with my wife in the backseat and my nine-year-old in the front? You’re a crazy son of a bitch.’” “On Packing My Own Lunch: ‘You have to pack a sandwich. It can’t just be cookies and bullshit…No, I said if you packed it yourself, you could pack it how you want it, not pack it like a moron.’”

Names Everyone Can Pronounce

So, my name is Stacey. That’s a name that starts with a hard S, has a difficult vowel sound in the middle, which then takes a diving leap into yet another S, and ends sliding uncontrollably headfirst into more uncompletable vowels. Mom and Dad had no idea that these two little syllables would have such disastrous results outside of America. To Spanish teachers in high school, I was never Stacey, always Estacey, or Estacia. India, my Tibetan host family called me Taxi. Here in Malawi, my name is so warped in so many different ways it doesn’t even resemble my name any more. The little kids call me Stacia, which is my favorite, and least warped. Others call me Stace, either because the last syllable of most words are cut off in general or they’re garbling the end of the name and hoping I don’t notice. The ones I get most commonly, and I have no idea how, are Stancy and Stracy. Sometimes Strancy. Often Stantzy, with hard emphasis on the second T. Where did you get that?! Why did you put an N in there? It makes no sense even in your own language! Whenever anyone tries to spell my name they will undoubtedly stick in an N or two. Also, I find the word Stancy horribly grating. And it tastes ugly in your mouth. Go ahead, try to say it to yourself without wincing.

Robert’s gotten some funny warps too. Robati, Lobert, Tablet (my personal favorite). Once he got Lablah. Haha! Still makes me laugh. Renee is Rini in her village. Katie Shae is Kity. I don’t even know what they call Clarissa. She has L’s AND R’s in her name. That’s like name death. Ross is Loss, last name Childs. Loss Child, in Malawian. Doug is dog, luckily that works for him, since he’s a dog. Kathi gave up and just goes by Anya Banda, a Malawian name given to her the day she got to site. I wonder if there’s a name out there which everybody can pronounce equally well. It would have to have no L’s, no R’s, no S or J at the beginning (J often becomes Y in some places), few vowels. Kinda limits us to single syllabic generic names. Ben probably works. Maybe Kate or Matt. Any ideas? I’m already thinking my future unborn kids are gonna require more adaptable names, just in case they find themselves outside of the U.S. as often as I do.

Group Presentations

So while I was off flouncing around in Europe with the family, I didn’t want to leave my Form 3 students with nothing to do in Biology. Math was easy to get a substitute for, but nobody teaches Biology as well as I do…considering I’m the only one who understands high school Biology in the school. So I gave the class their first group project, to be completed while I was away. Each group was responsible for presenting on a common disease afflicting Malawi. On top of lecturing the class, they had to present a drama, or skit, about their disease, which Malawians are all about. They LOVE their dramas. LOVE them. They will perform a drama about literally anything. I once saw a drama performed about natural medicine. Nothing specific, just the concept of natural medicine. In it, there was a man playing dead, a rock star, a traditional healer, and a hysterical woman. I didn’t really get it. Anyway, my kids’ dramas were hilarious! I shoulda filmed them. In the Malaria drama, one kid’s only role was to play a mosquito. He buzzed around and poked people. In the Polio drama one kid played a virus, he wiggled around the room and infected people by tickling them. In the AIDS drama, everyone died. The AIDS group actually took the cake with a condom demonstration, complete with a wooden penis model and a discussion about breaking up with bad boyfriends who refuse to use condoms. Way to go, Form 3!

EuroTrip

I accidentally deleted this post from my flash drive before coming to internet. More to come. But know that I had an unbelievable First World adventure with my family in May. And that Denmark is the second best place in the world, after San Diego. And that the Kenya International Airport blows. Hug your parents.