Well, our first week in Mozambique has been crazy to say the least. We’ve been in the car for over half of it–we left on Tuesday the 19th at the crack of dawn. We made it to the border quickly and were able to cross without any hassle. We traveled about ten hours each day, roughly from 6am to 4pm and then set up camp and would fall asleep by 8pm. We made it to Dondo in 3 days, just as we had hoped, to meet up with our contact Peter. We ended up staying there 2 nights to get all the needed supplies. It was also a bonus to have a bed for 2 nights, even though we had to share the place with a couple rats.
The drive up to Mutarara was our longest day. We had a rented vehicle to help us carry some supplies, but its top speed was eighty km so that slowed us down a lot. We left at 8am and arrived in Sena- a city next door to Mutarara- at 530pm. Thats when we found out that the ferry crossing and the car bridge are both shut down. So that left us with one option– walk across the bridge and carry our supplies and belongings across on the back of bicycles.
The bridge plus the walk to the place we are staying was about 6 to 7km long. We walked it that night, finally arriving at the orphanage at well past dark, setting up our tents and crashed for the night. The next morning, bright and early, we did the same walk again to go back to the car and retrieve the rest of the supplies and bring it back across the bridge. 14km early morning exercise is quite normal here.
I wouldn’t exactly say that we have hit the ground running. Our first week has been mostly logistics and not a lot of action. We are doing all that we can to work everything out so that we can begin the work as soon as possible. This is where your prayers come in! We need prayers for action!
If you are wondering where we are exactly, we are about 60km south of Malawi, in central Mozambique–in the hottest province in the country. We are staying in our tents at the temporary residence of the orphans. For now we are using our cook stove, and when that runs out, open fire. (Pray God keeps the stove working haha). Most mornings I’m awake between 445am to 5am and I’m asleep at night by 8pm.
There are about 45 orphans here. They speak Sena, so communication is hard, but we manage. They love to play futbol, love to watch us Americans and laugh at our belly buttons (they all have huge outies). The kids carry babies on their backs and most meals they eat corn. They sleep outside on mats because they don’t have a home.
It’s a tough place to live, but a good place to be. I’ll update you again whenever I get access to internet–which is 5 hours away and we only go to when we need to get to an ATM. Probably sometime around the 17th because we have to renew our visas soon.
We don’t know how long we will be here yet, but I’m thinking it might be until mid April– we are committed to seeing this project completed. Continue to pray for us, specifically for progress in our work here.
Until next time…
