Yogurt Monkey

We just made a trip to South Africa, a financially intelligent decision as the US dollar is gaining strength in almost every place in the whole world but Mozambique.  Matias and I are not known for our financially intelligent decisions, but this was a good one.  It takes almost $100 USD to fill up our car in Mozambique, but only cost $67 in South Africa. 
The Mozambican government has been fixing our currency, the metical (plural is meticais), for too long, making it artifically strong.  Everything Mozambique costs about 35% more now than it did when we arrived a year ago...  all because of the devaluation of the dollar.  Woe is me, but things here are dang expensive. 
So, instead of wallowing in the few meticais our dollars earn, we drive to South Africa and make a side trip to Kruger Park. 
We stop at Outdoor Warehouse, the South African equivalent of REI, but with special South African touches.  There are small clothes dressers made out of aluminum and mesh that you can set up in your tent.  There are enormous rechargable coolers.  There are portable braais (barbeques) that you can set up in the bush.  To South Africans, owning a braai is tantamount to having a microwave or dishwasher in the U.S.  It is essential.  And at Outdoor Warehouse, there is every kind of water container you can imagine.  No, a Nalgene bottle here would be for lightweights. These are car moutable water containers fit for driving through the Kalahari.  Nalia and Elio were thrilled to be back in a land of consumerism and were taking every free moment to hit Matias and I up to buy water guns, butterfly nets, snorkels... 
Matias and I were so caught up in fending off the rapid fire of requests from both of them that we didn't notice much else going on. 
Then, one of the workers in the store approached Matias... and started speaking Zulu.  When we are in South Africa, everyone approaches Matias in Zulu and in Swaziland, Swati.  When the guy switched to English, we found out that there was someone in the store watching us.  Apparently some malevolent South Africans in and around Nelspruit have figured out a new way to rob Mozambicans.  Mozambicans are easily identified by the license plates on their cars, and are particularly good targets because they come to Nelspruit loaded with cash to buy up.  The store employee informed us that these malandros (or bad guys in Portuguese)  will follow Mozambicans.  Then, when they go out to their cars and are driving away, the bad guys will wave at the driver, pretending like something is wrong with the car.  You, the driver, then slow down, and they rob you of everything you have, including your car. 
Luckily, we were pre-informed by a very benevolent store employee. 
Because there is so much crime in South Africa, this has changed the way people live and interact.  Most shopping is done in shopping malls, patrolled by guards.  Many people live in gated houses or neighborhoods studded with barbed wire, electrified fences, etc.  Of course, these people are the ones who have money.  There are many poor people in South Africa and they do not live like this. 
The next day, we went to Kruger Park to drive through and look at the animals.  For safety reasons, you are not allowed to leave your car while at Kruger.  When you do get to the camps, where there are places to stay for the night and restaurants, these areas are also surrounded by electrified fences to keep big game out. 
Monkeys, however, find a way to get in and target picknicking tourists.  I took out yogurts for Elio's lunch (Elio only eats 4 things, one of which is yogurt), and in a split second, a fiesty and fast vervet monkey jumped on the table and scampered away with the yogurt.  He knew exactly how to open the foil top and began to dig in.  He had perpetrated this crime before.  Elio was a wreck, crying, and all the tourists were laughing and taking pictures of the mokey eating Nutriday yogurt. 
It struck me then that in South Africa, people live behind fences, behind walls, when they are in or out of the wild areas of the national parks. 
But it doesn't stop the yogurt monkeys. 

Shark Dreams

We went to the beach last weekend, in Inhambane province, about seven hours from Maputo.  The beach, called Tofo, is known for its white sands and clear water...  and it is just that.  The water is so clear that you can be up to your neck and look down and see your toes!  Nalia and I went on a whale shark ocean safari on the first day.  Whale sharks are really sharks, but they are totally harmless.  They can be up to 25 ft. long, and there are only 1,000 in the whole world-- 300 of them are found in the waters off the coast of Mozambique. 
We didn't end up seeing any whale sharks, but saw lots of dolphins playing in the water near our boat.  We also got to travel for a quite awhile with a beautiful aqua green sea turtle next to our boat... it was as big as our kitchen table.
Fortunately these animals were alive.  On the second day, we saw fishermen bringing in their catches as usual, though one had something so large it wouldn't fit in the boat.  It was a gigantic manta ray.  When we went to see it, it was still alive, but on its last leg.  It was turned upside down, so we could see its beautiful white underbelly, smooth as silk.  When the fishermen began to butcher it they turned it over revealing a striking leopard print, same color as the sand it swam over.  The kids watched intently as the fishermen went to work.  They said they were going to eat the ray.  They were going to use its tail (stinger) as a whip.
An hour later, they brought in a hammerhead shark.  I couldn't bear to watch them cut it up.  But when I went into the water after the fishermen were gone, the only thing left were the two hammers, blue as the sky.  I didn't know sharks were so colorful.   Elio didn't watch what happened to the shark, but all of this affected him.
He woke up that night with a horrible nightmare, insisting there was a shark on top of his mosquito net... he's such a sensitive guy, and cries when when prune the acacia trees on our street in Maputo.  Nalia convinced him that there was no shark on top of his mosquito net because sharks need water to live.  Seeing the ray and hearing about the shark had just been too much, and really, he's right, it is too much.  It shouldn't be happening, but with the influx of Chinese in Mozambique, the demand for shark fins and meat has gone through the roof.  Also, the fishermen are poor and really do eat rays and sharks. 
There is a foundation, Marine Mega Fauna Foundation, that has been set up to protect sharks and rays in Mozambique.  Please visit their website at http://www.marinemegafauna.org/ and you can adopt your own shark or ray. 
Our camera broke on the first day we were at the beach, so I don't have many photos...



We've been having thunderstorm after thunderstorm... after thunderstorm.  Always at night.  For three nights, Matias and I woke up what sounded like 20 gigantic gongs being clanged at once right next to your ear.  The doors and windows rattled. This was followed by children running in our room crying and then the dog started wailing and barking like a banshee...this went on for about half and hour.  None of us slept much, so when I got up at 5am, I thought I would go on line and do some Christmas shopping... get ahead of the game.  At this time of year, I always get up around 5 or 5:30 because the sun comes up so early here. But when I went to turn on the computer, there was nothing.  I then looked at the modem and there was nothing. Black.  The electricity going out is a pretty common event here, but when I checked around, the rest of the house had electricity.  So I waited until Matias got up.  He would be able to figure it out. 

It turned out that along with all that thunder, there was of course, lightening, and the lightening just happened to completely fry the outlet where our computer was plugged in.  So no more computer, no more internet, for awhile.  This was pretty amazing to me, because I'd heard about this happening, but never known anyone who it happened to...  so the lesson (to self and to others) is to unplug all those important things when there's a big lightening storm. 
For now, we have no computer and no internet at home.  And yesterday we discovered that the cable box is also fried, so no TV either.  In a way, it's almost a relief. 

Below, some photos from my recent trip to Nampula in Northern Mozambique

Mother and baby at health post



Health Post

Nampula, Nalia's first home

Church in Nampula

Church in Nampula

Sunset...

Advising a family whose child had chicken pox