Outreach in Pemba

Last night we went on outreach to a place 6 minutes away from my house - I've never been there before - its a village just off the main road, in a fairly muslim area. For some random reason we left the base at 3:30pm... arriving at 3:36pm, and considering that the sun only sets at 5:30pm we had some time to kill! I sat in my car and studied for my upcoming exams while waiting for the sun to set.

Finally its time, and the guys get everything set up real quick, too quick actually cos we had to play the swahili dancing music for about 25mins before it was dark enough to start the film.

Its Ramadaan at the moment, and one of our student pastors came to me and excitedly informed me that he had stationed 6 other pastors around the generator, because there were banditos in the city and they could easliy take off with the generator. I thank him, and then he adds, "...and usually, here in Pemba city, after the movie, the people like to throw rocks at us. But its OK, because God is good!" *gulp* OK.

I had set up the sound desk and media player in the back of my car - it makes it easier to look after it, and also gives me a comfy place to chillout while the movie is going. I usually sit there and study, or if I have a good book I sit and read.

The movie ends and I look around at the crowd to see their reaction - ready to throw the equipment into the back if they got violent, but thankfully nothing happened. It was a very 'hard' area, the people were not very receptive - although I did see one guy wearing a skull cap put up his had for salvation. Awesome!

Rule #1

So I was eating a bowl of matapa tonight (random green leaves - sorta like spinach, but not quite) and as I was eating I wondered why I just swallowed mouthfuls without chewing.

So I stopped and chewed..*crunch crunch*
Then it dawned on me: Rule #1: SAND will be present in all food!

...And that, is why I never chew the center food! Makes sense when you think about it :-)

Lotsa Typing!

I'm at a bit of a loose end at the moment - my sound systems are either totally broken and need to go to South Africa, or they are 100% fine! So, unless I spend time in my sound room aimlessly shifting heavy equipment around, I have a bit of time to kill. So I'm helping out in some of the other departments - This past week I've been helping in the accounting office - there was a large backlog of receipts from the petty cash that had to be captured so I spent every morning in an office typing typing typing. It's kinda fun, decipering the portuguese receipts!

Then our bible school has started and the girl who usually runs it has gone on a well deserved break, so one of my other friends has taken over... kinda overwhelming! So for this week I'm helping out there - some of the name badges were wrong (name and photo dont match...) so we had to redo a lot of them. But there are lots of little admin things that need to be done, so I guess I'll be kept busy with that - then its back to the accounting office to start capturing the backlog of receipts from cheques that were issued!

So nothing fun and exciting this week, just work! :-)

A Day at the Beach with the Boys

Photos by: Raphael Vaney

Saturday was a fully packed day with lots happening - I am glad that I had Sunday off too, to recover from all the 'relaxing' I did!

As usual the day started with pancakes (which were delicious!), then I went to pick up 12 of the Iris boys (aged 10-12) who live in Raphael's dorm. I had offered to drive them to Murrebue - and they were very excited to finally go. The morning had started off rainy, but by 11am the sun was out and the sky a perfect blue.


There were 12 boys, Rapha, Brandon, Eric, 2 dogs (Bala and Jahu) and myself going - so we took 2 cars!

At the beach Rapha played soccer with the boys while Brandon, Eric and I took the dogs for a long walk down the beach, stopping for a chat at a soon-to-open restaurant run by a lovely Italian family.

By the time we got back to the Murrebue restaurant the food had been served and the kids tucked into their chicken meals. I had ordered the battered and fried prawns - mmm mmmm mmmmmm! so good!

After lunch the tide had finally come in, so we could go swim!




- everyone headed into the ocean and we played a totally unorganized game of "volley balll/'piggy-in-the-middle'/throw the ball to anyone you want to" with the boys. It was very energetic to say the least! Raphael and Eric where throwing the boys into the air so that they could do backflips into the water,


The boys also started a small seaweed fight and some of them would sneak up on me and grab my ankles! They loved it - and it was great to see some male missionaries around who could just play with the boys.

So loads of fun, but I was exhausted by the end of the day - when we dropped the kids back at the center they each came to give me a hug and say thank you!

The day didnt end there - I made dinner with my neighbours, and then we watched a movie - so I got to bed quite late, but it was a fun day!

Tsunami...

We were in the middle of a 'goodbye' Travis party, all just chilling, listening to him play guitar, soaking - when suddenly Musy burst into the room, her face white. I thought that something had happened to her week old baby, Bella. But instead the most unexpected words came out of her mouth: "A tsunami is going to hit Pemba in 2 hours, we have to evacuate NOW!!"

There was a silence, and then suddenly everyone is up, outside. I text my parents to get more info. All 120 of the bible school students had to be told, all our staff. People were already in bed. Very quickly everyone is home, packing the essentials - wondering if its really going to happen, and at the same time not quite grasping the concept of a wave splashing down on our houses.

My housie is in South Africa at the moment, so I text her and asked what I should get out of her room. Finally I have everything in the car, dog included.

By that time the 'HUGE' tsunami had hit the Seychelles, and it had been a whole 15cm higher tide than usual. So we started relaxing at bit, but we still had to evacuate. Some of the Mozambican staff didnt want to leave their houses. The men said "We'll just go to the beach, and when we see the wave coming we'll get our families and go to higher ground" *... yes, great idea...*

All the kids were sent up to the school at the top of the hill, and they even took the drum kit! It was quite noisy to say the least, but finally around 22:50pm when it was clear that nothing of significance was going to happen we finally decided to let everyone go back home.

I wanted to go see what this 15cm wave would look like, and 2 of my friends were keen too. So we headed for the beach, and at 23:39pm (the given time of arrival) we stood looking out to sea. We were sorely disapointed... the tide was out very far (which is usual) and we could not even see where the waves were! So at midnight we decided to head back home.

So some excitement, some scares, but after a good night's sleep we are back at work today!

Round 2...

Well I think i've just had malaria, I'm getting better by taking the malaria meds, so even tho my test was negative the doc is certain that it was a false negative and that I had malaria...

BUT we caught it pretty early so I'll be 100% in no time! Right now I'm in the 'argh-my-body-hurts-and-even-making-a-cup-of-coffee-exhausts-me' phase, which indicates that it was malaria, but it also means that I'm getting better! :-)

This little Piggy...

A month or 2 ago we discovered what to me might be the bestest thing about Pemba. A butchery! Tucked away around a corner on the road leading into one of the local village markets stands a small building, a plain store front with only a cardboard sign advertising mineral water - there is no storename, and nothing to indicate that it is a butchery.

Inside the owner, a sweet little portuguese lady, deals with the crowds - she opens at 8:45am and usually by 10 all the good cuts of meat had been sold out.

Yesterday we decide to go buy some meat - she has a selection of beef, goat and chicken. We wanted some good 'primera' beef, or if that was sold out 'segunda' beef would be fine too.

Its cheap too, for 1kg of 'primera' its only $6, for a kilo of 'segunda' its $4.50. (well cheap considering that at the local restaurants a single steak would cost your $12...)

Well we arrived and found the store fairly quiet - we know we are kinda late, but we hope that the good stuff was still available.

"Tem Primera?" (Do you have Primera?)
"Sim"

Oh yeah!! She still has nearly 3kg of primera and we buy it all. We also buy 2kg of ground beef (some for us, some for our neighbor)

Just as we are about to leave, a truck pulls up infront of the store, and the driver comes into the store. In a whisper he asks us, "Do you want some PORK?"

Are you kidding??? Pork was next to impossible to find here in this largely muslim town and recently I had been dreaming about a good pork chop. Of course we wanted some pork! The guys quickly scans the area to see if anyone is watching. The coast is clear, and he holds up half a pig. "Front or Back?" - I pick the front "Chops?" - Oh yeah! "How much do you want?" - Everything!! :-)

People come into the store and quickly the pig carcass is hidden. They leave and the workers start cutting me my chops. The guys uses his body to block the view to the ferocious looking meat saw - If the locals found out that they were cutting pork on the same saw as the beef there would be some serious trouble!

Finally we get our chops (just under 4 kgs) for $3.50 and we head home VERY happy!