MozamWeek

In my American past... Widows were old ladies from church. When we lost Dad in 1987 mom became one of the rare young widows. I honestly didn't know others her age who had lost a husband. Orphans were also fairly rare. These were few children who'd lost both parents through some freaky accident or horrible diseases. Rarely would a child be abandoned to an orphanage, but would be cared for by relatives. Orphanages were from fairy tales where kids were treated badly and they managed to creatively escape their dismal circumstance through fantastic feats of brave defiance. In my current world... Widows are my team-mates and neighbors. They are between the ages of 25 and 50. They live with their kids if they have them... or the children are relocated with the husbands' family who is responsible for them. Women officially have the right to keep their children, but tradition often overrules law. Many opt to keep the peace by not bucking the system too often and resign themselve...

Leaving for vacation... Tete Commutes Missionaries like us generally live in out-of-the-way places with little on offer in the area of leisure activities. While a Swede is happy to live for a month without running water and electricity at the lake in the summertime, most of us don't find this "mysig" (cozy and quaint) after years with power-cuts and dry spells. Considering that the hills surrounding our residence in Mozambique were littered with land mines during the war, we have been wary of hiking off the beaten track. It is safe now, but our routines were formed during the not-so-safe years after the ceasefire. We don't wander much. Where to go? This is often determined by the next scheduled mission meeting or mandatory travel to and from schools or courses. When we were expected to visit northern Mozambique once a year, we planned on a few extra days to visit our favorite beach spot. When the kids needed to be taken to boarding school, we schedule...

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...

Long ago, our mission directors decided that a short American girl should share a desk with a tall Swede in Maputo, Mozambique. They were in the same department and the office was very small. That's the beginning of our story. We've told it often and in many circumstances: when we visited churches everyone wanted the "love story"; when we met people in Mozambique and they wanted to know how we ended up together; when I've given a lift to a lady on the side of the road and she asked how I ended up in Mozambique and questions led to the story. God has used the story to show many how he can lead with a smile, and a whisper of hope. We married at the age of 30. It seemed very old at the time! February 22, 1997 Mikael and I have made a life together, and we have mostly allowed God to guide us. He's guided us through good and bad decisions and moved us a little closer to His vision of who we are in Him, I hope. We are never quite there... but we are moving the...

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...