Work and other stuff

My work (why I flew half way around the world)

In mid October I went on a couple home visits with an activista. It was the first time I was able to see the on the ground work that my organization was involved in and what in effect I was there to support. We visited two homes. The first was the home of a woman who was extremely skinny and elderly. The activista had a good relationship with her ad they talked about general family happenings and the activista then moved on to making sure that the woman had been taking her anti retrovirals. We then gave her a kit of health supplies (soap, condoms, bleach for water purification, and a health handbook with lots of different information about preventing disease). This kit was a part of a USAID project to dispense these health info booklets along with some basic supplies. There was a young boy living with the woman, I am still not sure if he was her son or not as she seemed much too old to have give birth to him but she could have been younger than her appearance, so the activista registered him in a program for vulnerable children so he could receive some food since his care taker was obviously burdened with the task of caring for herself. The second home we visited was relatively uneventful and the individual was fairly healthy. I did lean that the neighborhood next to mine was occupied primarily by people from another part of the province and they moved there a few years ago when there was a large flood and some nuns built 60 houses for these people so the neighborhood is now called “sesenta casas.” Apparently the whole area that I live in (the outskirts of the city) has only recently been built within the past 5 years. Before that it was all just coconut and cashew trees. That would explain why my house is in such a rural area but at the same time close to the city.

The next day I went on a trip with the same activista to a school where she gives weekly classes on health and HIV prevention. The school was kinda out in the bush and was very simple. it was maybe 4 large reed huts with palm leaf roofs and all the children sat on the ground as the teachers stood in front of the class with a blackboard. I was much more of a distraction than a help as all the kids wanted to do was just stare at the white guy. SO I played two games with them that are linked with teaching HIV prevention and education and it all went fairly well. Then the teachers invited me to the 10 year anniversary party of the school, I said I would be happy to, they said great and that because I was not a student I would have to pay about $10 USD to attend the party (what?!?!, I could go to a fancy restaurant in the city and have a nice meal with that much money). Sensing some strange scheme to get money out of the American I told them that I would get back to them.

Other stuff

I had some interesting run ins with wild life in October. Of course there is another rat story: One night I woke up to hear my rat trap go off, when I checked it there was no rat but three whiskers attached to it. The rat had just barely avoided death. I think I set the trap too sensitive. SO I reset it but found no rat the next morning. The following night, just as I was settling into bed I saw the rat trying to claw its way into my plastic chest where I keep things like pasta and beans and rice. I realized that the rat had learned not to take the tasty food sitting on the rat trap. I then realized that this rat would never be killed by the rat trap and I had to kill it any way I could or accept it as a new room mate for some time. So, as it was occupied with trying to claw through plastic, I gently got out of my bed and grabbed the broom next to me. I crouched down and snuck up behind the rat very, very quietly. Then I lifted the broomstick and quickly brought it down on the rat’s body. I had thought that the rat would try to run, but I must have broken some bones or something. So I smacked it a couple more time to put it out of its misery. Then as I started to slide it away with the stick and towards the door it woke up and started coughing blood. SO I guess I didn’t kill it I guess I just knocked it out, so I slid it out of my house as quickly as I could as is was convulsing and spitting up blood on my floor. Finally I got it on the veranda where a few more well placed smacks to the head finished it off. Oh how I yern for the days when the most disgusting animal killing experience I had to deal with was sawing off the head of a chicken.

My other wild life I have had to deal with has been scorpions which I have encountered in my bathroom twice now but thankfully (knock on wood) no stings as I was able to scare them away with rocks. Also I had a flea plant a sac of eggs in one of my toe. I had no clue what it was, just a half bubble of dead skin raised from my toe and all the skin around it was numb. The peace corps Dr. I talked to over the phone told me that any Mozambiquan house wife would know how to remove it with a needle. So I went to a Mozambiquan hose wife and she showed up at my house not with a needle but a twig that had been sharpened to a point. I took out a needle and was like “This would be better right, nice, clean, sanitary needle that I washed in bleach?” “No.” she replied, the pointy stick was in her mind obviously the better option, so I washed the pointy stick in bleach and let her go at my toe with it. So she tore off the dead skin and revealed a large sack filled with black puss and then she pulled it out with a dirty, sandy piece of plastic. Then I poured bleach over the crater in my toe. good times.