Invinha baby!

I have a new number, and this one should be permanent!  258-866209064

Finally, I arrived.  Invinha!  It is beautiful.  Every day it has rained which means that everything is covered in a nice layer of mud, but I can’t really complain because when the storm clouds are rolling in, it is breathtaking.  I am surrounded by mountains on all side, and I couldn’t really be much happier about site placement.*  Being from a small town back home I am used to travelling for hours on end to get anywhere, so Invinha is nothing new; only the mudslides and bumpy roads are.  I live 15 minutes way from the district capital, Gurue, in the Zambezia Province.   Gurue has basically anything we would really need, pots and pans, a big market, a place to buy energy, hardware stores, bikes, banks and supermarkets.  Invinha itself has small pickings in the food department (tomatoes, onions, mangoes, pasta, and that’s about it), but it’s enough to get by if need be. 

I live in a neighborhood of teacher’s houses about a two-minute walk from the school.  Our house is identical to everyone else’s—white with brown trim and a tin roof—except for a few ‘minor’ differences…bars across all our windows, a walkway up to our front porch, a tiled porch.  It’s all a lot of people talk about, the extra security measures.  It’s really hard because while this is a really safe community in comparison to many others across Mozambique, I am still well off.  I have a laptop, an ipod, a rain jacket, a kindle, and a camera.  These are a few things that 97% of people don’t have here and it’s tempting for them to want them.  While these extra measures on our house are here to protect me, it also hinders me from getting to know my community when they think I don’t trust them. 

As for my school, wow.  There are three sisters that run my mission school, one of them being my director.  Irma Isaura (sister Isaura) is my director, and she’s hilarious.  She’s quick witted and has no problem telling people what is on her mind.  And not in a strict way like she’s scolding people, but more in the get the hell out of my way, your’e driving too slowly type way.  It’s great.  The first night we arrived (me and my roommate Hannah) the sisters made dinner for us, well what we thought was dinner.  This was at 4:45.  After we were done eating, they told us to come back at 7 for dinner.  Apparently we had just finished lunched.  Hannah’s Portuguese is infinitely better than mine, and she thought they said they would pick us up, so we were waiting around the house for them.  At 8 Irma Isaura comes over with 2 pots of hot food….oops!

The next day, Sunday, we were invited to the school for food again…for a late breakfast and dinner.  Holy smokes, this is GREAT!  This time it was a church meal with probably 80 people sitting at two rows of tables.  There were the fathers and priests sitting at the head table, and then the other 70 something.  Hannah and I were asked to sit directly to the right of the men of honor…oh boy!  We were two of four women sitting down at the tables.  The other women were packed around the outside of the room eating rice and beans while the people at the table had chicken, French fries, and then the rice and beans.  Even young boys were allowed to sit at the table over their mothers.  This will be something to get used to.

            Moving in was/is a slight challenge because the last three years only one volunteer has lived here…I can see why.  My bed takes up 2/3 of my floor space, and that’s without bringing in my two fully sized suitcases, a hiking backpack, and a regular backpack.  The only thing my room had when I walked in was a bed, a 2-foot long shelf, a basket with coat hangers (where am I supposed to hang these?), and a beautiful view.  I refuse to unpack my bags until I can put things somewhere, so this is what my room looks like after two days.  (I know…don’t judge.)  Once I go into Gurue, I’m buying wood slats to make shelves, a thick bamboo rod to hang from the ceiling, which will then be where I hang all my clothes, and I’m going to hang my bulky suitcase from the ceiling.  Right now there is literally no place for my to put anything, so like the last two months, I’m living out of suitcases. 

Okay, I lied, you can judge me a little, but this is my room for the next two years. 

View (through the screen) from my room!

            Also, around the house I’ve been pretty handy.  I helped Hannah create a temporary closet, I fixed one of the hanging shelves, I fixed the table in the living room, I made photo holders (three sheets of cardboard surrounded by a capulana that I can pin pictures to in my room), and I organized our entire common room.  I really like living in a place that needs a little work to it.  It gives me exciting new challenges to figure out and fix each day. 

We have a fully stocked library (well at least for Peace Corps standards!)

            Tomorrow we’re heading into Gurue to meet the health volunteer that lives there.  She’s having some other volunteers come over and she invited us down to meet everyone! 

*Pictures of Invinha will come.  I don’t want to be flashing around any expensive electronics in the first few days, before I get to know my neighbors at least.