Central Cohesão

This past Friday marked exactly three months since we arrived at site. This is an exciting time, firstly because we've survived what's widely known to be the hardest time of Peace Corps service, and secondly because it means our three-month travel ban is up! No longer confined to our provinces, we're now allowed to travel freely throughout Mozambique.

So, naturally, at our first opportunity that's exactly what we did. This weekend, all of us living in the Central provinces of Tete, Manica, and Sofala got together in Messica, just north of Chimoio,  and spent two days at a secluded lodge called Casa Msika. We enjoyed the company of other volunteers, relished the quiet luxury  of the lodge (i.e. took an excessive number of showers), and got caught up on the latest fofoca (gossip).

This is apparently an annual event, called Central Cohesão, and is intended to bring volunteers in the Central provinces closer together to form an unbreakable bond of friendship and cameraderie. There may have also been some kind of strange initiation ceremony, but I'm not at liberty to say.

Needless to say, we had a blast, and got to do the three things that volunteers do best:

1. Descansar (Rest)

LEFT: Sarah's tuckered out from an all-day hike. RIGHT: Wendy enjoys a nice nap on the grass.

2. Relaxar (Relax)

LEFT: Shane and Dylan share a special bond. RIGHT: Chilling out by the pool.

3. Festejar (Celebrate!)

I am joyously reunited with Lisa, completing our trio, the self-dubbed "Blondtorage"

We had a great time, and the weekend passed much too quickly for my liking. As much as I like the quiet life in Mavudzi-Ponte, I'm always counting down the days until the next time I get to see the other volunteers.

Nevertheless, I was very happy to be home again at the end of the long and tiring trek back to Tete -- I walked into my complex to an ever-so-happy to see me Poppy, made some dinner and promptly slept for twelve hours.

Dealing with O Senhor Carpinteiro

I've heard a lot about our local carpinteiro (carpenter) since I've moved here. He's lazy, they say. He lies. He's slow.

Not wanting to succumb to local gossip right off the bat, I thought I'd give him a chance. My house is somewhat devoid of furniture, so two weeks ago, I asked the carpenter to make me a bookshelf. I showed him how big it should be, and drew a picture of what I wanted it to look like.

"No problem, no problem," he said, "I'll bring it on Thursday."

We agreed on a price, and I paid him part of it up front so he could go buy materials. He told me he would come find me in a week, on Thursday, to inspect the finished product.

Thursday (Expected Shelf Delivery Day): 

The day comes and goes with no word from the carpenter.

Friday (1 day late). 

Having forgotten exactly where the carpenter's house is, I ask my neighbor's daughter to show me. All her friends get really excited and want to come to, so I show up there with about a dozen children to ask where my shelf is.

"The man who was supposed to bring me my wood only came yesterday, so I haven't had time to make the shelf yet," the carpenter says.

"You haven't even started?" I ask.

"Unfortunately not. But I will be done by Monday. Tuesday at the latest."

"At the latest? You're sure?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, yes. No later than Tuesday! Promise!"
 

Tuesday (5 days late)

This time, only one child accompanies me to the carpenter's house. He smiles when I walk up, but looks visibly annoyed that I keep bugging him.

"Is my shelf ready yet? You said you'd bring it today, and it's already almost sundown."

He squirms. "Well, I needed glue to put the wood pieces together, and I only went the city to get the glue yesterday, you see, so I'll need one more day. I'll come find you tomorrow when I am finished so you can look at it."

I seriously consider telling him I'm no longer going to pay full price, but I think he might just take longer if I do that, so I hold my tongue. I tell him I'll wait for him at home tomorrow morning, and hope against hope that he'll come.

Wednesday (6 days late) 

I wait at home all morning. Nothing happens.

 

Thursday (7 days late) 

In the afternoon, as I'm heading back home after one of my classes, I spy the carpenter walking away from my house. I wave at him to get his attention.

"There you are," he says somewhat accusingly, "Where were you?"

"At school, teaching, like I am every afternoon." I say.

"Oh. Well I've finished your shelf."

Finally! I walk with him to his house and inspect the item in question.

Well...

My new shelf.

It's a shelf. You can put things on it. It's made of rough wood, sloppily nailed together, and it wobbles, but it looks more or less sturdy. There's a backboard behind it that doesn't quite reach all the way down to the bottom, leaving a gap. The corners don't quite fit together.

It doesn't look much like my drawing.

Still, looking around at the other projects in the carpenter's yard, I gather that this is about the level of expertise I can hope to enjoy from him, so I tell him it's fine, though secretly I'm thinking that I've made theatrical props in half an hour that look better than this piece of... shelf.

"Who is going to carry it?" he asks.

"You said you would," I tell him.

"Well, I can, but it's heavy. I'll want an extra 50 mets for delivery."

At this point I'm fed up. "Fine, add an extra 50 mets for delivery, but I'm taking 50 mets off since you're a week late," I snap at him.

Realizing that I'm not going to pay him to carry the shelf, he mandars a kid from nearby to come carry it. The scrawny twelve-year-old picks up the shelf, muscles straining, and starts hobbling towards my house with it.

In the mean time, I pay the carpenter, and start walking to my house to meet the boy.

On the way, I realize that the carpenter definitely isn't planning on paying that boy for carrying my shelf, and I feel bad -- it's really heavy! I should have just carried it myself.

Darn.

I make it home at the same time as the boy, and he puts the shelf on my porch. I give him some money and thank him profusely. He's dripping with sweat. He takes the money, panting, and wanders home.

At the end of this tale, I find myself having gained two things: first, a shoddily built shelf. Second, the knowledge that if I need any other furniture made, I am going to ask anybody but our carpenter.

Going with the Flow

It's been an interesting few days here in Mavudzi-Ponte. Yesterday, I woke up energized and ready to teach my tenth graders about present continuous, only to find out from my friend Vanda that school had been canceled for the day. Why, you might ask? No idea. I hate missing Mondays, because it's the only day I see my tenth graders, but what can you do? Not much. Foi mandado. It was mandated.

Today, I checked beforehand to make sure we were actually going to have class. Yes, yes, Vanda assured me, there's class today.

And yet, lo and behold, when I went to school at 12:30 as usual, none of my 8th graders were in their classroom. They were all in the salão, the big room, for a mandatory anti-drug seminar. Now I'm all for the anti-drug message, but does it have to be during my teaching time?

Apparently so.

I paced the hallway waiting for them to finish -- and once they did, I quickly ushered my kids to their classroom and did my best to cram my 45-minute lesson into 15 minutes.

Next up, I was slated to teach two ninth grade turmas -- the same lesson twice, back to back. As I went to get my materials for the first class, I had (what I thought was) the following conversation with one of my brightest students, Cristiano:

Cristiano: Teacher, can I please sit in on the 9A class today?
Teacher Helena: Don't you have another class to be in?
Cristiano: No, teacher. The Portuguese professor's not here today.
Teacher Helena: Well...I suppose you can sit in on the class.
Cristiano: Can my friend come too?
Teacher Helena: Sure.

Cristiano's a very bright student and shows a real aptitude and willingness to learn, so if he wants to sit in on an extra class, great! After all, 9A is one of my smallest classes, and who would notice just one (well, two) extra students?

Cristiano, smiling, turned and ran to go get his notebook. I went to the sala dos professores, the teacher's lounge, to get my lesson plans. Then, I walked into the 9A classroom to see this:

A sea of students!

"Holy guacamole! Where did all these students come from!?" I thought, "These kids can't possibly all be in 9A! In fact, I know that one there is in 9B... and that one... and that one... wait a minute, half these kids are from 9B! What's going on!?"

At this point, I would like to add, as a disclaimer, that generally my Portuguese is pretty good. I have no problem communicating and  there are very few times these days when I have trouble articulating my thoughts or have to ask for clarification. And yet, sometimes I, too, misunderstand.

This was one of those occasions.

Turns out, the conversation I had with Cristiano actually went like this:

Cristiano: Teacher, can our class please sit in with the other class for English today?
Teacher Helena: Don't you have another class to be in?
Cristiano: No, teacher. The Portuguese professor's not here today, and if we do English all together we can go home early.
Teacher Helena: Well...I suppose you can sit in on the class.
Cristiano: The rest of my classmates can come too?
Teacher Helena: Sure.

You see, Cristiano is the chefe da turma, the class president, and so the task fell to him to ask me if we could juntar (join) the two groups into one. I just didn't realize what he was asking me.

Usually, I say no to these types of requests, figuring that these classes are already big enough -- but at this point, I had about 85 expectant faces staring up at me, having already moved all their chairs and desks into the room, waiting to learn about present continuous.

I decided to just go with it.

And you know what? It was a great lesson. Maybe it was because there were so many of them, and they were feeding off of each others energy. Maybe they were excited to go home early. Maybe it was because my 9th graders are just awesome. (I know I'm not supposed to have favorites, but let's get real here. Who doesn't have favorites?)

In any case, I they all understood the material, they were all participating, laughing when I cracked jokes, working when I assigned them problems, and (for the most part) they were quiet when I was talking. It was a fantastic!

I can only hope my lessons tomorrow will go just as well. I have my two most challenging turmas, and to make things more stressful, I'm being visited by one of the Peace Corps staff. Don't get me wrong, Ramiro is really great, but he's also the one who taught all of our "How to Teach English" classes, so the idea of having him sit in on my classes while I teach is nerve-wracking.

Wish me luck!