2pm and we are leaving, only an hour late for our 4-hour journey to Alua, a village in Nampula Province. On the back of the open flatbed truck were 14 mission school students and 8 student pastors.
The 4x4 driving behind us carried a TV crew from GODtv who are doing an in-depth interview with Heidi, and are following her around. Heidi still has a class to teach in Pemba, so she and Shara, her PA, will head out 2 hours later and meet us in Alua, bringing 8 kids, and 4 guest speakers: Asher Interater’s team from Israel and the director of IRIS India, Ravi.
We had just left Pemba, and I was sitting in the front playing with my new camcorder – I was going to film this outreach and make a little documentary thing for people back home – when there was an police checkpoint. The policeman saw my camera and demanded to know where my authorization paper to film was. I don't need one; it’s a small camcorder, for a “home movie”, why do I need authorization? Well they made me get out the truck and wanted to see the footage I had. There was one shot of a pickup truck stuffed with 15 people, and 6 guys hanging off the back. That really upset him. Apparently (according to him) you aren't allowed to film while sitting in a moving vehicle. 2 of our Mozambican leaders were pleading my case, but the cops were really being nasty. “Fine, you all can turn around and go back to Pemba, OR she stays here and goes to the police station with us”. I’m just pretending not to speak/understand ANY Portuguese. They are eyeing my camcorder, so I quickly eject the tape and offer it to the chief guy. (Better that I lose a tape than the camera!) They take it, but are still not happy. Finally after 15mins, I’m not sure what happens, but they accept our apologies, hand back the miniDV tape and let us go. *huge sigh of relief!*
Will (driving the pickup with the film crew in it) was waiting just up ahead out of sight. We fill him in and advise the cameraman sitting in the back not to let the police see the camera.
The next checkpoint is just before the Lurio River, the provincial border between Cabo Delgado and Nampula Provinces. I have driven over this bridge countless time and never had a problem. Today however, they demanded to see all the passports of the foreigners and the ID papers of the nationals. Which hardly anyone has on them. Never in the year I’ve been here have we EVER been asked for documents/passports. They hassled Will about his insurance sticker that was out of date – but legally Will doesn’t need insurance, its optional, and he chose not to renew. It was a long long interrogation. Finally we paid the bribe of $8 and left. We were late enough as it was – and there was lightning in the distance, we don't want to be caught in the rain…
Rain. Lots of it, pouring down and drenching all the people sitting in the back of the open flat bed truck. Soaking the tents, the sleeping bags, the sound system. We stop and buy a big piece of black plastic and everyone huddles under it to stay dry. We hadn’t gone much further when Will flags us down and tells us to stop. Shara’s Landrover had died, the transmission had dropped out – and it’s new, it’s only done 19 000km/11,800miles! The problem however was that she had been driving behind Heidi and Heidi hadn’t noticed that Shara wasn’t behind her anymore… We try to get in touch with her, but Heidi’s phone is weird; it keeps connecting us into her voicemail, so that we actually hear ‘you have 79 new messages’. Heidi’s car is filled with 8 kids, Shara has the guest speakers, some more kids and a student. Finally we get thru to Heidi, she’s only about 5mins past Shara and she heads back. Its late, nearly 7pm and pitch black. The rain has eased up a bit, but could start again at any minute. Finally Heidi calls and says, “OK its too late to get to Alua, just go to the chief of the village you are in now and ask if we can do the outreach there, and camp for the night, We’ll go to Alua first thing in the morning.” Great. We don't want to scare the chief with all the white people at once, so Will and Carlos go see the chief with one of the student pastors from this area. The rest of us stay sitting in the flatbed next to the road. The lightning is spectacular and the cameraman for the film crew sat on the edge of the road trying to capture it when a motorcycle drives past. It’s an off duty policeman and he’d been drinking. And he had a hassle with the camera. Around this time Will comes back with permission for us to stay in the village and just as we head towards the chief’s bamboo mud hut the cop on the motorbike takes our driver’s license and the truck’s papers. We get to the hut and Ibrahimo (the driver) goes to Will and tells him what happened. The cop had taken off to the police station.
Heidi calls again wants us to setup the sound system and just show the last 30mins of the JESUS film. It’s raining so I’m not too keen on that idea. We decide to setup the tents first before the bags and sleeping bags got totally soaked so we had just got all the tents up when Heidi calls again and says that we should rather just go to Alua and stay there, we cannot do the outreach in the rain and at least there is a church building in the other village.
“Pack it up guys!”
The students sighed, “So this was just a practice run?” All the villagers were sitting on their porches watching in fascination as all these white people set up tents and then 10minutes later break them down again. They must have thought we were crazy. So we pack it all up and huddle under the awning of the chief’s hut, trying to stay dry. The motorbike cop had gone to fetch the chief of police, and they confiscated Will’s papers and license too.
Heidi and Shara arrived then, with Shara’s Landrover balanced precariously on the back of a flatbed truck – some random guy had seen they were broken down, stopped to help – when he realized that we help orphans, he said, “Well then I will help you” So he drove his camiao down a ditch so that the back was level with the road, Shara pushed her car onto the back, they used rope to tie the Landrover to the truck, then everyone got back into the Landrover and the guy drove off behind Heidi. They said it was scary; it kept swaying from side to side!
Heidi joined the discussion – the issue of the passports was raised again – then more police arrived carrying AK47s. They wanted to place us under house arrest here in this village because the jail back in Namapa wasn’t big enough to hold all of us. Why exactly they wanted to arrest us was still not clear, but they were having issues with us. Will came to the awning and told us all to pray, not take photos and keep quiet – things were getting tense. The rain was pouring, it was pitch black, and I had been having an interesting conversation with the cameraman for the film crew!
Finally Heidi said, “This is ridiculous, we’re leaving.” And for some reason the cop said, “OK”. Will came running up to us, “Quick. Get in the truck. Get in now before they change their minds. Move it. Double time!”
We (very quickly) load up and go.
Alua isn’t too far away, and we are welcomed by singing and cheering! Its 8:30pm and we are very late, but we made it, and that’s what counts. Everyone helps to unload the camiao and we dump everything inside the church, then we huddle in the building were Heidi has been preaching in the dark for 15mins already. We get the generator out and I try to start it. There was enough gas, but the big question was, “where is the pull cord?” I had let one of the Mozambican staff use it to test some equipment and he had returned it minus the pull-cord, and hadn’t even told me it was missing. It’s a good thing we were out of cell phone range; else I think I would have chewed his ear off over the phone. We use a piece of rope and wind it around the coil; finally we get the generator started and have some light in the church. After the preaching we prayed for people, and Heidi prayed for a guy that was lame, and he got up and walked. Pretty cool!
11pm and we set up our tents, in and around the church building and have a tuna roll for supper. Everyone settles down and by midnight all is quiet.
At 5am the Mozambicans start waking up and making a noise… by 6 it was impossible to sleep - I looked up and saw 7 little black faces pressed against the see-thru mosquito net covering the entrance of my tent. It had been too hot and stuffy to shut the door, but I need to change, so I try to get the door’s zip to cooperate with my sleepy brain, finally shutting out the staring eyes. I change and crawl out my tent, hoping that the water for coffee was already boiling on the wood fire. It was and I make myself a cup of coffee, strong and sweet, and munch on a buttered bread roll for breakfast.
I got the mission students to do sound – its great, so it leaves me free to film. Church starts at 8am and for once I’m not stuck behind the sound desk! There are too many people to fit in the church, so we move the speakers outside instead – its hot in the sun, so most of the crowd find a shady spot and listen from there instead. All the guest speakers preach, and there are a number of healings. A woman comes up to Heidi and says that her daughter is a deaf mute since birth, but she is at home, about 6km/3.72miles away please can someone go fetch her so that she can get prayer??? I offer to take Heidi’s Landrover to pick her up – when I get to the house there was also a cripple guy, so we picked him up too, and also another blind man. Back at the church Heidi prayed for the girl, she is about 12years old, and she said, ‘mama’, her first word. She seemed really bewildered, I guess I’d be too if this was the first time that I ever hear anything! That was awesome!
Heidi had to get into the church, we have to dedicate the building, and she has to officiate 4 weddings (well, actually one wedding for 4 couples). All goes well and the
couples enjoy their kiss at the end… the church building is dedicated, and now its time for lunch.
The film crew want to interview Heidi in the kitchen, so we can’t eat yet, an hour later they are finally done. We’re just about to eat when an Iris pastor comes to Heidi to show her 8 orphans that he has been looking after – he would like to register them with Iris, and he would like us to take them back to Pemba because he cannot afford to support them. They are older children, 13 – 16 years old. Heidi has been going the whole morning now; I think her mind was so tired. I was standing behind her, she turns around and says, “We cant take them to Pemba, what can we do for them?” My suggestion: Buy them goats? This kicks starts her again and she says. “OK, we will buy you 4 goats, some seeds for a garden, and food for the kids. We will register them and support them, but they will stay with you.” The pastor also needs a bicycle, so we head into town to get the bicycle.
Heidi goes shopping - an hour and a half later she returns with all the goodies she’s bought. She likes to shop – we got a bike, 30 capalanas, 50 pairs of flip-flops, a huge bag of rice, a huge bag of beans, buckets, school book, matches, candles… the goats will be bought in the village where they stay.
By the time we get back to the church, lunch is over (we had even fed the community), dishes were done, the camiao was loaded, ready to leave! There is a scramble to get everyone who needs a ride home on the back of the truck, the film crew are loaded, and Heidi’s Landrover is already just dust in the distance. Quickly we go after her – she wants a picture of each kid.
At the pastors house we unload the goodies Heidi had bought, she has a look around the house where they stay, then she dedicates the house as a children’s center, prays for the kids and then we’re off – its 4pm already!
The rain starts almost as soon as we hit the good road, and the students huddle under the black plastic again, some of them wrapped in the rain protectors of the tents. It rained the whole way home, stopping only just outside Pemba. None of the police gave us hassles and it was a fairly smooth journey home. The rain lulled me to sleep, and when I woke up I was so hungry, I realized that all I’d eaten the whole day was a butted bread roll and 2 little mangoes! The film crew was staying at the 5* Pemba Beach Hotel – they have the best buffet there, so I started dreaming of the meats, the veggies… I was ready to drop $20 on some food! But I knew I’d just eat some 2-minute noodles and tuna when I get home.
The sound equipment unloaded, the students dropped off and finally at 8pm I am home.
That was quite an adventure don't you think?
PS The GODtv programme should have been broadcast in 2 parts, on Fridays, Dec 22 and 29 at 10:30am... called 'In Depth with David Aldous', and is an interview with Heidi Baker, focusing on IRIS Pemba - BUT it wasnt - so just keep checking their website www.god.tv.
