Baby Orphanage

Where do I start?  How do I even begin to express all that I am feeling after being here in Mozambique for just a few days?  It would be easy to tell you how my team and I went to the baby orphanage yesterday.  It has an official Mozambican name but we call it the baby orphanage.  Why?  Because there are 75 children there under the age of 5.  Room after room of cribs and one big room full of high chairs and little dinning tables.  When we arrived the children squealed with delight and ran to us with arms outstretched.  I picked up one little girl and sang with her although I didn't understand her Portuguese song.  It was something about dancing as the other children were dancing up a storm.  I went to set her down to see if she would like to dance and she grabbed my hair, my glasses, my clothes and clung on and did not want to leave the comfort of my grasp.  As I watched the children dance I recognized a couple of the twins I had cared for in 2009 toddling around with their misshaped heads.  That's what laying in a crib the first year and a half of your life will do to the shape of your head.  They are the cutest little guys and I wanted to pick them up and snuggle with them but my little Rebecca would not budge from my arms.  Once the time had come for us to leave none of the volunteers wanted to go.  I had to remind them we would be back each morning to care for and love these little ones.  So the telling of experiences is easy.  The sharing of feelings is the hard part.  Hard to put into words all the emotions, the love and  the sadness.  One of my volunteers from 2009 wrote down her feelings.  Maybe this can give you some idea of how all this makes us feel.
 Orphan
You run toward me extending your arms to wrap around my body twice, with a smile that reaches me instantly.  You run toward me as though the harder we collide, the less likely we are to part.  You run toward me although someone has run from you.  You run toward me, and I fold my body over you as though I could press all the love that you've missed back into your life with one genuine embrace.  I fold my body around you like a mother who carefully wraps a wounded child.  I fold my body over you and for a moment I am all the shelter you need.  I fold my body over you, and you fold your body into mine.  ~Kellee English

A NEW CHAPTER BEGINS

I am resting comfortably back in the lap of luxury.  I still continue to think of my friends in Mozambique every day.  It is hard to forget.  Jonathan Fischer put together a nice piece of video work that I'll admit I was a little embarrassed by.  I tried to get him to dance and let me take video but he declined.  After watching the spiritual transformation that takes place in these individuals as they sang and danced, I couldn't help but feel jealous and sorry at the same time, for in many cases this is all they had, and the release from the day to day struggle was real.  I crawled out of my 2,000 pound shell and tried to dance.  The people really seemed to get a kick out of seeing a white boy try to dance.  I was surprised to find out from Joao that after I left he visited a village I had danced in a few weeks later and a woman approached him and asked if he would teach her the dance that the Doctor did.  I at least have one follower in Africa.  See what you think!
http://youtu.be/TLE4TNioofY

Margie and her group will be in Beira on Tuesday and off and running on Wednesday.  Stay tuned as she will continue this blog with the great work she and her volunteers will be doing.  If you are interested in sharing some of your talents with the people of Mozambique please contact the good people at
http://careforlife.org/

NEVES UPDATE

I met Neves at his home tonight.  He is now 8 years old according to his mother.  He is very thin and his skin was very dry and rough.  His scalp was covered with thick dried crusts from his scalp weeping and oozing.  Flies continued to bother him in the scalp due to the odor.  I was dissappointed at his appearance as it was worse than my visit 2 years ago.  On the positive side he was still much better than the first time I saw him.  I reviewed treatment and the importance that this is a chronic life long problem and treatment needs to be continued.  I left some medication and will leave instructions to pick up further medication for infection and inflammation reduction with Care for Life who will visit him again in a week or 2 to deliver the rest of his treatment.   

Neves and his parents .  Neve means snow in Portugueese with Neves being plural or a lot of snow.  I am not sure if Neves is his Surname or first name but his father does call him Neves.  Tomorrow will by my last training session in the morning and I will be off to catch a flight back to the US.  I will miss my friends in Mozambique.

Beautiful Mozambique

Today at around noon we decided to go to the beach.  One of our favorite places is Rio Savane.  A peninsula jutting into the Indian Ocean with the Savane River on the south and the Ocean on the north.  It didnt take much convincing for Joao to take us.  He loves the beach!  When we arrived the tide was out.  The normal transport accross the river was stuck on the other side where the deep river channel lies.  We had to walk accross the river bottom to meet the boat that would carry us the last 100 yards. It was muddy to the ankles so walking barefoot turned out to be easiset.

We met people crossing the river in the other direction taking their products into town.  (a twenty plus mile hike)

The Indian Ocean was beautiful.  There was a small fishing village to the north and villagers walking down to the river crossing point.  We decided to walk up to the village.  There were quite a few boats out on the water fishing.  The boats were dug out canoes with sails.

While walking to the village, we were having a meal prepared at a resturaunt located on the peninsula.  The meal was wonderful.  We spoke with the proprietor and owner of Rio Savane.  The property has been in his family for 3 generations.  The large trees we enjoyed today were planted in 1951 including groves of coconut trees.  We then walked back to the beach and headed south. To the mouth of the river.  We had to hurry back to the boat so we would not miss the last run to the car at 5 pm. 

It was amazing to see the river now the tide had come in.  The river we almost could walk accross was full. It was going to be another beautiful Africa sunset.


With afternoons like today it makes it hard to leave Africa.  When we crossed the river by dugout and arrived at the car I was brought back to reality.  I hate mosquitos!

Mud Pies

I am going to miss my friend Philipe.  While waiting for villagers to arrive for a training session I played  a little soccer with him.  His ball made out of tattered shopping bags held up relatively well.  I felt bad when his father sternly scolded him for not attending school that day.  Evidently  our game became so intense he forgot to go to school.  His father told him if he wasnt able to go to school he would not be able to play and made him come sit on the porch of the family home.

The act of mimicking the preparation of food appears to be universal.  This young girl was busy making the best mud pies in Nhamatanda.  Her mother was busy frying some type of dough balls that looked like hush puppies so she could sell them. Mozambique is making progress.  Individuals are starting small businesses from making and selling food, selling fruits and vegetables, making consumer items like furniture, bricks, sifters and many other items.

These are the items that the mother of the girl making mudpies was frying.

This man has taken bamboo and cut it into thin pieces and will weave it into the bowl held below.  This instrument is used to separate the chaff from rice and corn.  The finished product will sell for just over $1.00 in US funds.

The above 2 pictures are of a brick making process.  This entrepenuer has hired a few boys to apply the outside mud coating before firing the bricks.  The bricks were made on site from the clay soil.  Wood is placed beneath the bricks and will "fire" the bricks. They are stacked in such a way for the heat to move through collumns in the stack.  There are 12,000 bricks which will sell for 1 metical each.  This is approximately 11 cents per brick.  When these are all sold it will give the owner enough money to buy a motorcycle which will be a huge sign of success in the community.  It is going to be hard to leave Africa. Our training is over.  I will train the staff one more time Monday morning before my flight leaves for home.  I do miss my family and look forward to returning to Arizona.  There is still much work to be done and we will be doing another revision to the Health Booklet.  We learned so much by teaching the people.  I learned more than I taught.  I also gained a greater love for these wonderful people in Mozambique.  If you have any desire to help dont hesitate to contact Care for Life on their website careforlife.org

Asubida

We went to 2 more villages today.  We went to a village near Dondo.  We taught the health promoters in the community.  They were very young, but bright and attentive and had a great knowledge of the things we were teaching and reinforcing. We taught in the village of Asubida in the afternoon.  Over 30 people from the community attended the training in addition to the health promoters.  They continue to amaze me with their willingness to learn and their enthusiasm for the things care for life is teaching them.  Almost all are usisng latrines, drinking purified water and using mosquito nets.  I am very impressed with they way they entertain thruough song and dance.  As soon as they begin to sing it almost seems to put them in a trance and take them to a happy place.  Their smiles and enthusiasm are contageous.  We walked down to an area below the village. Miles of endless rice fieldsl could be viewed and its beauty was enhanced by the setting sun.  I thought Arizona had beautiful sunsets, and they do, but the sunsets in Mozambique are indescribable.