T.I.A. – This Is Africa. It’s a saying that they use here that I’ve gotten to know well. Sometimes strange things happen which can’t be explained except to say This Is Africa. Like when you rent a shoppa (bus) to take you to the city and on the way back home your bus gets pulled over by police and the driver then proceeds to get out of the bus and take off running like a bat out of hell down the street. That would have been strange enough by itself but it gets even better (or worse depending on how you look at it). The driver’s accomplice then took the wheel and led us on a car chase through the back (unpaved) roads of Mozambique. After about 10 minutes the cops (6 of them with AK-47s) caught up to us and we find out that our driver (or should I say current driver) had no license. But like I’ve said previously, God is good, and we ended up getting back home safe and sound.
On a more positive note, over the past few weeks we have been staying with Angie Wheeler who runs an organization called Beacon of Hope located here in Maputo, Mozambique. The program teaches young men the skills they will need to make it on their own. Everything from gardening to computer skills is taught here. We spent the majority of our time teaching them English. We also had the amazing opportunity to travel with Angie to a small village in the bush for a weekend and help paint a clinic. As fate would have it a baby was born the night before we arrived and when we showed up to paint the clinic that morning we were able to see him and his mother as they left. He wasn’t even a day old.
Yesterday my friend Tyler and I went into town for some food and learned a good lesson about the metric system. You see we were hungry and craving some meat. We didn’t care what kind just that it was meat. We stopped at a little restaurant that happened to be selling pork. They sell it by the kilo and not knowing how much a kilo is I ordered 2 kilos of pork. Later I learned a kilo is over 2 pounds. Needless to say we ate like kings with a lot left over (which we shared). It was nice to have a full stomach for once. Later that night we went on a mini safari around the property where we’re staying and discovered an amazing creature. We still have no idea what it is we saw but we call it the monkey-cat. It looked like it had the body of a monkey and a big bushy lemur type tail and a cat face. There were a dozen or so of them running around up in the trees. We managed to get some pictures of one of them and I will be sure to post them as soon as I get a chance. Hopefully you can help us solve the mystery of what it is.
Other than that, our time here has been fairly relaxed. Angie has treated us exceptionally well and has cooked us some amazing meals. I will truly miss this place when we leave tomorrow morning. Our next stop on the World Race is Swaziland. It’s going to be a MAN-istry month where all the guys in the squad will live and work together and all the ladies will also live and work together. I don’t exactly know what it is we’ll be doing but I’ll be sure to keep you informed. Well I’m getting tired and we have a long day of travel ahead of us tomorrow so I will talk to you guys later. Stay safe and God bless! Peace out!!!
