MozamWeek

Usually at this time of my "leavings" I am becoming more and more irritated by my current country and culture. I remember times of temperamental impatience as someone took too long to find a price for my can of tomatoes... or a car managed to perform a particularly common irrational moving violation in my immediate vicinity... or a beggar asked just one more time...   I've not felt that this time. This last time. I am more filled with understanding and nostalgia. I'm much more gracious than usual. This can only be the grace of God, I think, as I pack another box and say another goodbye. Tears are always close. I well up at the slightest inclination... crossing the Zambezi at sunset... waiting for cows to get out of the road... sweating in the heat as the kids come out of the school... remembering him or her or those other ones. I sigh a lot. I've heard it is good for you. I hate crying, but my grandma warned me it gets worse with age. I'm proving her r...

 First of all, let me say I LOVE the people who work at the Tete Provincial Library. They know me and know how I feel about some of the policies they have to abide by. There are children's books among others. There are shelves of books displayed and organized. There is lovely natural lighting from the big windows, clean bathrooms and even air-conditioning (when the power allows it). The staff are knowledgeable and can be friendly. I don't want to bash the library. There aren't really bookstores around, so a library is a big step towards helping people have access to books! Provincial Library I just want to point out a few things about this context here that might help those of you who don't live here in Mozambique understand what "access to literature" might be like.  Sign at the entrance Necessary requisites for entering the library:    Personal ID:  ID, passport, student card or    driver's license Entrance denied t...

A few weeks ago I had a lovely chat with a friend who loves and supports Little Zebra Books and our community reading programs. Hilda even uses Little Zebra Books in a Sunday School program at her church here in Tete. Our conversation turned, as often happens these days, to our impending exit from Tete. "Are you really going? What will happen to the programs without you? We need you here." "Yes," I replied, "we are going to leave. It is for the best. It has always been planned this way. Others are already running things. There are a few things I can help with from a distance if needed, but I trust my teams." "But it isn't the same. You do everything with love!" I got teary, as often happens this last year in Tete. "Hilda, so do you! You show such love to the kids. So does Veronica! You all do! You can love them even better than me, because you know them better." There is a reason that I'm not in all those pictures. Min...

About a year ago I posted Why read to kids on a pile of rocks in the shade of a thorn tree?   We've come a long way since those days! Not only have we graduated to reed mats, we have also expanded. Yes, Veronica recruited six volunteers in 2016, and we have added several more in 2017 so far!  Each of our newer volunteers is excited to read to kids. They are following the model that Veronica and I worked out as we experimented with our first books.  Talk to adults first.  Gather the kids.  Read stories and talk about what happens.  Meet weekly at a fixed time. The adults often stay for the stories. Some of them can read. Some of them cannot. One thing they are learning is that their children LIKE to read. Books are now a part of their community life! Books are not a foreign thing brought by strangers. These books are THEIR stories in THEIR language.  The bigger storybook version of each title is also really popula...

Yesterday we passed a guy selling pineapples... the kind from Zambezia, not from Manica. I know because I have lived here a long time. I have weekly reminders of the accumulation of years of knowledge of this place. It kind of feels good to recognize how much I've grown even if the areas of growth are somewhat trivial... at least, on the surface! January marks the abundance of mangoes... greens abound, but lettuce is too wet and so are tomatoes (seems to be many with black spots right now.) Last week I bought avocados that seemed pretty local (bigger, kind of beat up and flavorful, instead of perfect and shiny and tasteless!) Avocados are usually most available in February. We just finished the November/December glut of lichies, small plums and peaches from orchards in the north of the province were also easy to find... if you know where to look for them! I do... I've been here since before the dawn of the supermarket chains. The local stuff is generally better and cheape...

Mozambique is generally accepted as being one of the poorest countries on Earth. That said, a lot has improved since we moved here in 1996 for the first time. My first confrontation with street begging was in Portugal in 1995. I was torn: Give to whom? How much? How to say "no" and not feel guilty? After living with my uncomfortable wealth and struggling with odd reactions to my giving and refraining, I asked God what to do. To my surprise, He answered.  In Portugal, I realized there was a 10 escudo coin that would buy a bowl of soup at any corner cafe. It wasn't extravagant, but it was something substantial enough to help someone who was hungry. This wasn't the most common coin in my pocket. It was almost rare. God "said" through a still, small voice in my heart, "Give those to me and trust me with them." I understood that if I had a 10 escudo coin and someone asked me for money, I could willingly give it and trust God to do the choosing. I did...

We have been in Mozambique for a very long time. This is our oldest daughter visiting a village a half hour out of town in 2003. This was most of what she knew about the world at the time. This village was new to her, but not scary or strange. Our home was surrounded by a green, lush garden. Tea time under a guava tree was a daily ritual with Rosa and Maria. I admit, this looks a little "colonial" in some ways. But that is just life in Africa: our kids are white and everyone else is not. When you have a picnic this is what it looks like.  By 2012 my kids were happy in their school. The translation project was well under way. I was out and about visiting friends and finding places to share Nyungwe stories. There weren't many. Not many people were interested yet. We were on the verge of a new big thing, but we didn't know it.  After our "furlough" for a year in 2012-13, we returned to Mozambique. Little Zebra Books started publishi...

I am entering (have entered) a phase of transition - again. Every 3-4 years we have a big shift from Africa to Sweden and America. It marks a year-long flip-flop of joy and frustration. Some people derive great comfort from knowing what is ahead and plan meticulously with great conviction and joy. I don't. It is just over a year to the count-down and I'm dragging my feet in naming my destination. USA? Sweden? You see, this is the last time we do this. We will be leaving our ministry base of 20 years at the end of NEXT year. (Every time I mention this people think we are leaving now. No. Over a year from now. Wanna come help us pack?) I can't decide yet. I just can't. Everything we've worked towards is preparing us for careers in Africa. We really like working in this part of the world where our skill can be stretched and used. We hope to come back to southern Africa, but it we won't be based in Tete, Mozambique, next time around. Reality is that we must leav...

I was reminded again, today, that it is coming. December 2017. We should be officially 'done' with our Nyungwe New Testament. There will follow months of publishing activities and there will be a big dedication... and then... we will go. This "last leaving" flashes into my mind every once in a while. When a friend leaves and reminds me that our time will come. A lump rises in my throat and a tear wells in my eye, and if I let my thoughts dwell there a little longer, I hear myself sigh as the tear falls. "Not just yet," I assure myself. "You have time to get ready, and lots of things will keep you busy along the way." I have left many times and said good-bye to many friends. I have gone and come back to many places. Somehow this place isn't quite "dear enough" on its own to make me dream of visits in the future. Most of what makes this home is very transient: people come and go, houses and homes have changed, church friends have gr...

The kids showed up within 3 minutes of our arrival. Kids on summer vacation left their dusty games in the sand, soccer kicking, and short errands from home. At 9 am, the sun was already high, and after a short 15 minute walk from where we parked the car, I wished I’d brought a bottle of water. Veronica and I greeted the kids and a few adults passing by. Smiles brightened while they talked of Veronica’s Christmas lollipops she gave them before her two-week vacation. There is an easy rapport between her and the kids... and the moms. They led me to the shade tree where they have been meeting a couple times a week for “classes”. It is a tiny spot just off the road. Too small to be anything except a resting place from the sun. Apparently it belongs to someone who plans to build something right there... they mark their ownership by leaving a pile of about 100 bricks under the tree. With thorn bushes growing through the bricks scattered across the area, it looks like they abandoned hope ...

I can list all the upheavals and setbacks and bumps in the road. Honestly, we have our share. I can list them for you to feel somehow that I am deserving of your sympathy or pity or help. I can throw all the ugly truth out there for everyone to see just what we go through around here. But really, that isn't the way I live my life. I am dependent on God's provision through his people... and even through people who don't recognize they are used by Him. I've had to ask for money and it feels pretty crappy. I've had to wait a week or two or more to follow through on plans I've made. They are good plans. They aren't even selfish plans! But it isn't up to me to make them happen in the end.  So, what do I men when I say that God provides? And what do I mean when I say that I must depend? And what do I mean when I say that I don't make lists of all the rotten breaks in this life?  I guess I mean that there is peace. Again and again I am thr...

I have been a frustrated literacy specialist for about 15 years. I'll just admit it. I haven't ever taught anyone to read. I never have claimed to teach, but to train trainers and develop materials and to research how two very different languages can be used in education of some very special people in a very difficult situation. Now that it is out in the open, I can get on with it. I believe that my impact on a community can only make a difference if I can replicate my initiatives. I talk a lot about literacy and materials in Nyungwe and about using Nyungwe to teach reading. I believe that we only learn well when we can relate new information to something we already know. Theories sometimes describe these as hooks or scaffolding to connect new info with our own experiences. On Monday, I stepped into a Mozambican classroom in a Mozambican school with Mozambican students for the first time. I am grateful for a school director and a district administration that trust me with a...

I have a hard time keeping up the pace of "real" work when my kids are home from school. This past week was their half-term break. This coincided with the national elections in Mozambique, so there was plenty of reason to leave paperwork behind and find something else to do together. I have a good friend here in Tete who is blessed with a Mennonite background (like mine) and an air-conditioned kitchen (unlike mine). So when I got a text asking if I wanted to "do donuts" during half-term break, I knew it would be a great chance for some healthy mom-and-kid activity. (In my childhood dialect of northern Indiana, "doing donuts" can refer to "cutting kitties" -- spinning cars around on icy parking lots or the like.) She suggested  this recipe  which she has used in the past. I've not made donuts since I was a little girl in Indiana, as far as I can remember. At least not any that were as memorable as grandma's. Here is my photo documentat...