Halfway through PST with only minor injuries

It's funny how quickly living here has become routine. Life has a comfortable rhythm, both in my home and in our classes. It leaves me feeling like I have been here much longer than I have and it is bizarre to think that only about a month had passed back at home. We will be halfway through training as of tomorrow, as week 10 will be our swearing-in and traveling to site.

Tomorrow, we will also find out what sites we will visit this coming weekend. We will be staying with currently-serving volunteers for about 6 days and seeing what it is like living at site. I am very excited to travel to another part of the country and to meet more volunteers. One of the most helpful parts of training so far, besides our homestays, has been talking with volunteers who have already been teaching in country. Each week, two volunteers travel to Namaacha and run some of our technical training sessions. Hearing their experiences and how much they vary person to person has been invaluable.

In other news, this past weekend I got my first black eye. I am absolutely fine and will post pictures of my super-sexy shiner when I get my SD card. During a 2-day session on Permagardening, I ended up with another trainee's hoe in my face. The hoe, or enchada in Portuguese, is omnipresent around here. With 81% of the country's population involved in agriculture (mostly subsistence farming) you can't walk down the street without passing someone with an enchada propped on their shoulder on just about every block. It is even on the Mozambican flag, crossed with a blessedly-less-present enormous gun. So I feel like it was a baptism of sorts and I am glad it was the non-lethal emblem that got me.

Our training class has had a shocking number of strange afflictions. So far, not too many have had the ailments you might expect - digestive issues, exotic flus and the like. No, we had someone get their head stitched up after splitting it on a basketball net. (The exotic aspect of his injury was that the doctor stitched the gauze pad into his scalp. On purpose.) Another trainee cut his hand while repairing the zipper on his backpack and also needed multiple stitches. Someone scratched his cornea with the key he keeps on a lanyard around his neck. And another was quarantined because he came down with chicken pox. All the maladies did lead to an excellent costume at this past weekend's Halloween party. Once again, pictures to come.

Currently, I am typing by the light of my head lamp as power went out a few hours ago. We had a beautiful sunny day that gave way to an epic thunderstorm in the evening. (The weather here is even more schizophrenic than in New England.) The windows were rattling and we heard at least one tree fall outside. Some of my friends here are living in houses with tin roofs and I hope it lets up before bedtime. It is making me feel a little closer to my friends and family back home riding out hurricane Sandy. My thoughts are with you all and I hope you are safe and dry!

The "Problema de Água"

Something that became immediately evident when we arrived in Namaacha was the difference in our relationship with water here versus the US. I have lived all my life with clean, potable water just a turn of the faucet away. I remember having conversations in elementary school about the importance of conserving water and being a little confused as to why we had to worry about our water supply. It wasn't like leaving the tap on meant it would suddenly stop running. Looking at a globe that was mostly blue, it seemed like lack of water was about the least important problem we might face. And saving the rainforest was way sexier back then anyway.

As I got older, I came to understand the problems that many parts of the world face for want to clean water and irrigation. On an intellectual level, at least. I was still never more than a flick of the wrist away from a seemingly endless supply of clean water, however.

Here, the situation is a little different. Here, when there isn't rain, tanks and wells run dry. The omnipresent machambas, or small subsistence farms, whither. Right now it is raining. Pouring, actually. There has been thunder and lightning all night and the power cuts off and back on every half hour or so. Tomorrow, the roads will be full of mud and the walk to class will be an adventure unto itself. But since my host mom spent my first two weeks here dealing with the "problema da agua," I am thrilled that the rain has come.

Even when the tanks are full, water here is a constant concern. Water has to be hauled in giant buckets into the house and stored in a huge barrel. Every morning, I heat a kettle of water on the stove for my bath, then carry the bucket of steaming water to the bathroom where I mix it with cool water until the temperature is perfect. Instead of standing under a steady stream of hot water until I am awake enough to begin washing, I carefully use each cupful, making sure I have enough left at the end of my bath to wash my smaller pieces of clothing.

Water for drinking is an even more precious commodity. Peace Corps provided us each with a large, fantastic filter. All drinking water must first be boiled, then cooled completely before it is filtered. I never leave the house without my 1 liter Nalgene filled. Even when brushing my teeth, I use the boiled and filtered water.

When we wash dishes, we fill two bowls, one with soapy water and the other for rinsing. When the dishes are done, we dump the wash water and refill that bowl with the rinse water. Rarely is a drop wasted.

I have only been here a month and I already cringe at the thought of my lifelong habits of leaving a faucet running or turning on the shower and walking away for a few minutes while the water heats up. A lifetime of after-school specials couldn't communicate the message conveyed by the women hauling buckets every day here.

Life in Namaacha

Some unrelated facts about life here:

- I run most mornings here. Two of my friends come some mornings, which is great both for the company and because one is 6'2" and fast. It's whipping me into shape pretty quickly. A lot of times, Mozambican kids will run along with us. I had a kid follow me in his church clothes one morning and a 15 year old girl in flip-flops later that same run. Getting burned by an 8 year old in too-big flip-flops is actually not uncommon, but still hurts a little every time.

- When Mozambique was a Portuguese colony, many Portuguese had vacation homes here in Namaacha. When Mozambique gained its independence, the colonists up and left very quickly. This has had many terrible consequences for the country development-wise, but also means that towns like Namaacha are littered with beautiful homes, hastily abandoned by the Portuguese and now inhabited by Mozambicans. Many have the infrastructures for utilities, without the utilities themselves. Most have electricity, but what is known as a "bucket flush" toilet is common. In my house here, there is a regular toilet, but to flush it, you have to fill the tank with water from a big plastic bucket sitting on the floor.

- Even though I live a five-minute walk from a paved road that runs from Maputo to Swaziland, there are chickens, roosters, ducks, cats and dogs running all over the place. There are also goats tied up everywhere. Everywhere. Sometimes not even near a home there will just be a goat tied to a fence without a person in sight.

- My host mom is a super impressive woman. Very smart, very hard working even after retirement. She volunteers a lot with the church and at the convent up the street. Yesterday she spent through whole day out in through "machamba" or small farm outside through house, seeding corn and peanuts since it finally rained. She knows some English and a little bit of French. Her three children all have careers: the eldest daughter works at the Irish embassy in Maputo, her middle son runs a trucking business and the youngest son is a professor at the teachers college in Maputo. One granddaughter is a prosecutor and a grandson is studying urban planning at the university. I am new to this community, but I get the feeling that those accomplishments are no easy feat here.

Namaacha: Quick Update #2

Hello, all! I am back on the grid, but only via smartphone for now, so this will be quick, probably full of typos and - most unfortunately - without pictures. First off, everything is great here. I am living in a lovely house in the vila of Namaacha, a border town of about 30,000 people. My host mother couldn't be nicer. She has already hosted 7 Peace Corps trainees, so she knows the whole process and is used to American quirks. She has 3 children and 10 grandkids who all live in the capital, so she likes having someone else in the house. The food has been great. She has a huge garden at the house, full of fruit trees, manioc, peanuts, avocados and garlic. Unfortunately, things have been very dry and much of the garden is withering. But every meal is still full of fresh veggies along with potatoes, rice, bread or xima - a local corn meal staple - and chicken or beef. One particularly delicious dish is couve, or collard greens, prepared in a peanut and coconut sauce. Very popular with all the trainees. Days have been very busy with language and technical classes almost every day from 730 to 500. These classes are with other people who will be teaching the same subject. For Portuguese classes, we are split into subgroups of 5 or 6 and then all 11 math teachers come together for tech classes on teaching methods and math-specific language. Small groups meet in students houses on a rotating basis while tech sessions occur in our hub - a pretty house surrounded by winding paths through fruit trees and a pig pen full of piles. Adorable but smelly. There are a lot of fantastic people in the training group. I happen to think the math folks are particularly awesome. We have had a few cultural exchange activities, including the Dia da Paz celebration of 20 years of peace in Mozambique, dancing, singing and art presentations. We have a day of cooking with our host moms coming up this week, as well as a trip to see the site were Mozambique's first president's plane crashed in South Africa on Friday. So far, the people in this town have been fantastic. They have welcomed us all into them homes, communities and families. They have been teaching us all how to run a home without many of the conveniences we are all used to. They are unbelievably patient with our broken Portuguese. I have learned so much in 2 weeks that it feels like i have been here so much longer. I have so much more to write, but now it is time for Sunday chores and then a hike. Now that i have a connection, I will go back through my journal and try to fill you all in on some more of what has been going on here. I miss you all and cannot wait to hear what has been going on with you.