Maggie—1 Mozambique—0

This weekend after a crazy week of school and lesson planning and confusion I decided to travel to Nampula to visit my friend and get my packages. I was really nervous to be traveling by myself and wasn’t quite sure how it would go…but surprisingly it didn’t go half bad!

The part of the trip I was most nervous about was the 15Km stretch from my site to the highway where I would catch a chapa to Nampula. Normally we don’t see many chapas driving on that stretch of road, only motorcycles. On Friday, I was able to drive with the students and professors heading back to Nacala and they dropped me off at the highway. On the ride to the highway we saw a mother with her baby fall off a moving motorcycle-we kept driving so I’m not sure if they were all right but it didn’t look good. Then 5 minutes later we saw that a student had fallen off a motorcycle as well and hurt his foot so we picked him up. Between the 15km of a washed out road and people driving way too fast on their motorcycles it can get dangerous.

Another student and I caught a chapa from this nice family to Nampula. It was dark by the time we got there and they didn’t want to drop either of us off at a random spot so they drove us both right where we needed to go! They were really nice people but I will admit I was hesitant during parts of the drive. One of the ladies I was sitting next to, Amelia, was trying to teach me some words in Makua during our drive. Of course the question of whether or not I was married/had kids came up as usual. When I said I didn’t have any kids and wasn’t married the guy driving asked if I wanted to have a baby with him….I politely told him no thanks. Later on during the drive they asked me if I liked the music and when I said yes they told me that I should sleep in the car with the driver for the night. I really don’t understand that train of thought but thankfully I think they were just joking!

During the 3 hour drive to Nampula we stopped to “passear” (hang out) on the side of the road a few times. At one of these stops the women in the family bought beer-by some miracle only they started drinking and not the driver. I was really thankful I got there without any problems and in one piece :)

Being in Nampula was so different than Nacuxa! They had actually stores that sold bread (I even bought some sliced bread)! And places where you could get chicken take-out and grocery stores with so much food it was overwhelming. And of course I was able to hang out with one of my really good PCV friends, Hannah, while I was there so it was a very good weekend!

I also got 2 care packages from my mom and one of my best friends from back home! Now I have some good American cereal and Sunday Comics I can enjoy while I lesson plan today! They were absolutely perfect and are helping to keep my sanity for a few more weeks :) Thank you Schu and Mom for those wonderful care packages!!!

The trip back to Nacuxa was a little crazy. On the way to the bus stop I needed to buy another phone charger but we couldn’t seem to find a store that sold them. Finally I asked a nice older Mozambican woman where a store was that sold phone chargers. She was so sweet and actually walked us all the way to the store and helped me pick one out then took us to where I could catch a ride to the bus stop.

I don’t practically like taking chapas out of Nampula because you have to wait a long time for them to fill up before you can actually leave. But, since I was traveling by myself I didn’t really want to try and boleia (hitchhike) alone and had no idea where to find a boleia inside the city of Nampula.

As I was sitting on the chapa waiting for it to fill up I was texting some friends when out of nowhere some guy reaches in my window and makes a grab for my phone. Thankfully, (I’m sure it was a small miracle), I held on tight and he gave up and didn’t succeed in stealing my phone! I was a little nervous after that but I shut the window (even though it was sweltering inside the bus) and waited for an hour before we actually left Nampula.

The trip went pretty fast and when I was dropped off at the highway I was trying to mentally prepare myself to have to walk 9 miles back to site if no cars drove past me. After only a few minutes walking on the road a truck passed me and then stopped. It was a car full of some nuns and a new student heading directly to my school! Seriously, I don’t think I could have had better luck with my travels yesterday! You can bet that I prayed extremely hard and am thanking God for all those miracles that helped me travel to and from Nampula safely (still with a phone and without walking 9 miles)!

At least now I have another traveling experience under my belt and hopefully won’t be as nervous next time. Now to crack down and lesson plan for the week….maybe I’ll treat myself to a Nutty Bar from one of my packages! :) Happy March!