After a very lengthy and fabulous Christmas vacation, I came back to Monapo and got settled back into the regular grind- work Monday-Friday and relaxing/doing chores/eating chicken at Pica Pau on the weekends. Not too much has changed here in Monapo, except for the Mountain Dew that is now sold near the market. I was SO surprised to see the stuff, just too bad I don't drink it. Also, a new Mennonite family has moved in. It's so nice to have other Americans in town!I have not met the father of the family yet, but his wife and children are incredibly friendly. They have 2 dogs, kittens, and 2 monkeys! I was supposed to get one of the kittens (Simba), but he ran away before I got the chance to take him home.
Its been a slow start-up for work, but that is to be expected. Many of my colleagues still have not returned from holiday vacations but those who have returned are hard at work. SCIP recently created a new partnership with the community radios in Nampula province and I am the lead for SCIP Monapo's involvement with our community radio. The relationship requires community debates, reports on SCIP activities and interventions in the communities and radio 'spots' with health themes. Tonight is our first debate and I'm nervous! Along with 3 community leaders, a nurse and 2 HIV testing and counseling officials, my coordinator and I will participate in an HIV debate to be broadcasted over the radio.
Since returning from vacation, I've been battling against a family of rodents who have taken up residence in my house. I moved every food item into glass or plastic storage containers but the creatures just don't want to leave! While they have not caused much physical damage, the psychological damage has left me with insomnia. One night I woke at 3:30am to a mouse on top of me! I don't know how it got inside of my mosquito net (I guess I didn't tuck it in tight enough) and I don't know what it wanted, since I obviously don't have any food in my bed with me. Needless to say, I didn't sleep the rest of the night and only for a few hours each night afterward. Until one morning I woke up to find a dead mouse on the floor of my kitchen-the rodent poison finally took its toll! And 2 days later I was shocked to find a paralyzed rat (slowly dying from the poison) beside my mini-fridge. I was screaming and in no condition to remove the thing myself, so I got my 8 and 12-year old neighbors to help :)
Many people want to know how I spend my weekends here. So I thought I'd explain how I spent my time this past Saturday... I woke up early to meet some colleagues (members of SCIP Monapo's theater group) to have a meeting. I've asked them to help me with a workshop I'm going to be giving to community leaders on stigma and discrimination. So they wanted to show me a short skit they've been working on to perform at the workshop. Unfortunately, when I got to the office to meet them none of them were there! So I went over to Ariel and Leah's house (my new education volunteer sitemates) and chatted with Leah and some of our friends. Then I left to go pick up Simba, the kitten, from the Mennonite family. But of course when I arrived at their home they informed me that he ran away. Feeling pretty defeated, I stopped by the market to buy some fancy new plastic basins for washing clothes. I returned to my house to find 3 members of the theater group waiting for me and we were finally able to have a short meeting to talk about their involvement in the stigma workshop. After they left I washed clothes for 2 hours and ate leftovers (my attempt at pad thai) for lunch. Then, my friend Assane met me to go to the carpenters and ask about the prices of wood as I want to build a table in my kitchen to have space for preparing meals. We went back to my house after the carpenters where I invited Assane to watch an episode of "So You Think You Can Dance" (Season 6) with me. We didn't have time to finish the episode before another friend, Ismael, showed up to have me film his music video. Ismael has been asking me for months to help him with this video and we have just never had the time to do it before. So I spent about an hour filming him and his "dancer" with my camera as they performed to an original song written by Ismael. I'll let you all know when the video gets posted to youtube! You'll be able to see my lovely house and laundry (mostly underwear) hanging up in the background. When the boys finally left it was dark out so I locked up for the night, made banana pancakes for dinner, and fell asleep watching Robin Hood. All in all, a pretty solid Saturday.
Here's what February looks like- more collaboration with the radio, stigma and discrimination workshops in Monapo and Moma, stigma and discrimination refresher course in Nampula, Carnival in Quelimane (the biggest in Southern Africa!), Chocas or Ilha for the holiday weekend (Mozambican Hero's Day), and preparing to leave for vacation in SOUTH AFRICA!
