My first stop was a town just a few hundred km from Vil, so I allowed myself more than 10 hours to get there, assuming that was more than enough. Well, I got to Mapenhane around 830am to wait for a ride into Mabote, which is 120km off the EN1 (and Mapenhane) down a dirt road. I waited until 1130 before a car even drove by. I asked to catch a ride, and they thankfully said yes, placing me on the back of a loaded up truck. I was with about 8 other Mozambicans. We stopped several times on the trip to unload things from the truck. And every time we stopped, practically the whole town would come to meet the truck. The people I was traveling with were coming from South Africa where they had bought things (table and chairs, bikes, buckets, clothes, food, etc) for people in the town. Not only did they bring things, they brought a Molungo!!! All the kids in the town would stare at me, talk about me, and try to touch me, like I might be a ghost. The old drunk men in town would also try to talk to me. Of course by now I'm used to people staring at me, and this journey I was so excited to see these little tiny towns that I didn't actually mind the staring and touching. It was so cool to see the faces of the traveler's families and the kids light up as they saw things being loaded off the truck.
Well, I finally got to Mabote at about 5pm. However this was not my last stop. Julie (the PCV in the town) and Angela (visiting PCV) came to meet me and walk me to the best place to catch a ride. Once we realized there was NO way I was catching a ride before nightfall, we started walking through town looking for someone I could pay to take me the 14km to Makwakwa, Mandy's site. We finally found a car that was (in a round about way) going to Makwakwa and so I jumped in. Driving out, it looked so stereotypical Africa to me, it was spectacular, with the red and orange sky setting over giant trees as we drove through the forest on a sandy path.
Mandy lives on the school grounds, so as we waiting for the power to come on (the school gets roughly three hours in the mornings and three hours at night), I met several of her students and asked about her projects. A bit later I went with her to her sewing club. I was so tickled when the first two students walked in, grabbed their things, and started sewing. They were both boys. More students came throughout the next hour, and I met about 20 kids and talked to them about sewing and their basketball team (separate groups that Mandy leads). One girl noticed the REDES shirt I was wearing, commented that she LOVES REDES and really wants to participate again (she did when she lived in Maxixe 3 years ago) and how can she get involved. I was SO happy to hear that she has such a good experience and wants to continue.
I finally crawled into bed at about 1030 and, I'm embarrassed to say, fell asleep mid sentence while talking to Mandy. Of course she forgave me, but what an exhausting first day of my trip!! I'm hoping this gets easier.
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